Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine, Vol. 8, No. 6, May 1961

Mosby’s frown deepened. “The guy phoned Mrs. Cole that he was coming over to kill her. You said so yourself. He carried out his threat, then came back here and hanged himself. Why do you want to complicate a simple picture? It all fits.”

Shayne irritably tugged at his left earlobe. “Somebody phoned her and said he was Trimble. According to Marie, his voice was so thick she could hardly understand him. Thick with drink, she said. But it could merely have been a disguised voice.”

“She used to be married to the guy,” Mosby said impatiently. “She’d recognize his voice. She’d be certain to.”

“She hadn’t heard it for five years. And for all we know, she’d never before heard it over the phone when he was drunk. Would you recognize your wife’s voice over the phone if she called you, said she was someone else and talked so thickly you could barely make out the words?”

After staring at the redhead for a moment, the lieutenant made a dismissing gesture. “Why would anybody rig a thing like this, Shayne? What would be the motive?”

“I don’t know,” Shayne admitted. “I just don’t like the smell of it.”

“Why?”

“I talked to Trimble right here in this room less than fourteen hours ago. He said he was permanently on the wagon. He sounded like he meant it. If a couple of months had passed, or even a couple of weeks, I might swallow it. But it’s hard to believe he didn’t even have enough will power to hold off one night.”

“He’d been in stir five years. In that time you can build an awful thirst.”

“If he was that thirsty, he’d have gotten drunk as soon as he got out. Why would he wait over twenty-four hours?”

Mosby shrugged. “It’ll be easy enough to settle. I’ll ask the autopsy surgeon to check his alcohol content. That’ll show whether he was drunk or sober.”

He turned to George Gannon. “Phone Al Buck at the Cole residence and see if that lab man is still there, Gannon. If he is, have him sent over here. Then phone headquarters and tell them to drag Doc away from his poker game again. I want this guy looked at before he’s cut down.”

Shayne waited around until the lab man and the medic arrived. The latter got there a moment before the lab man, so the lab technician quietly waited to one side until the doctor was finished. The medic seemed in an even more irascible mood at being called from his game a second time than he had at the Cole home.

After examining the body, he said peevishly, “Strangulation. At least an hour ago, maybe two or three. Say between ten thirty and one thirty.”

Shayne asked, “Can’t you cut it any finer?”

“On the autopsy table tomorrow, maybe. If you can tell me what and when he last ate. By figuring the rate of digestion, we can pinpoint it within maybe fifteen or twenty minutes. But if you can’t get me the dope on what he ate, don’t expect a much better answer than I just gave you.”

Lieutenant Mosby said, “We know he was alive at eleven thirty, because he was murdering his wife then. Even if he drove like a bat out of hell, he couldn’t have gotten back here before about ten of twelve, or a quarter to at the earliest. The stakeout arrived about a quarter after and didn’t hear any sound in the room. So he must have done it about midnight.”

The medic’s face slowly turned red. “You mean you called me out for a second time in one night when you already knew the answer!” he blared.

Mosby said pacifically, “Shayne here thinks it might have been rigged. I want to know if he was really drunk.”

The doctor continued to glare at the lieutenant. “I can’t tell that on the scene, genius. You expect me to dissect him right here? Get him down to the morgue and I’ll tell you everything you want to know in the morning.”

He stalked out of the room.

Mosby looked at Shayne. “Touchy, isn’t he?”

“Maybe he was winning,” Shayne said. “You need me any more, Lieutenant?”

“Not tonight,” Mosby said. “You’ll have to come down tomorrow and dictate a statement to sign. But I guess we’re set for tonight.”

Shayne went home and went to bed.

VI

At eleven the next morning Shayne arrived at police headquarters. After dictating his statement of the night’s previous events to a stenographer and signing it, he dropped by the police chief’s office.

Chief Will Gentry looked up from some papers he was reading and gave the detective a cordial nod. “Morning, Mike. I was just looking over Sam Mosby’s report about last night. He notes that you disagreed with his conclusions.”

Shayne dropped his lanky frame into a chair. “I just can’t see Trimble falling off the wagon so soon after he told me he was permanently through with the stuff, Will.”

Gentry shuffled the papers in front of him until a different one was on top. “Here’s the post mortem report. He had enough alcohol in his bloodstream to knock the average man out. It’s a wonder he was able to stand on that chair.”

Shayne frowned. “Were they able to fix the time of death any closer?”