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

He left the bottle in front of me and turned away. I drank it I gurgled in more bourbon and drank that. I heard the door open behind me and looked at the mirror behind the bar and saw her.

She was young. Maybe fifteen. Maybe sixteen. She wore a transparent yellow rain cape with a hood that she pushed back off her head. Her hair was pale gold, smooth and straight. Her face was white, and the rose-red lipstick made a gaping wound across her blank face. Her eyes were green as emeralds, slanted and shining as she looked at me.

I said, “Hi, kid,” to her reflection in the mirror.

She said, “Hi,” back to my reflection. Her eyelids drooped and listed slowly like the flick of a cat’s tail. She moved up close behind me. She said, “Will you do something for me?”

I reached for the bottle. “Name it, kid.”

She took in a deep breath, sibilant with a little hiss. I could see her teeth between swollen, scarlet lips, small white and sharply pointed. Her voice close behind my ear was a whisper. “Will you kill a man for me?”

I slid my gat back into my pocket. I turned on the stool and took a long look into those green eyes. They were young and they were hot and they promised me everything. I said, “For you... sure, babe.”

She said, “Come on,” and turned toward the door. I dropped a bill on the bar and followed her out.

Neon lights threw screaming colors across the rain-blackened streets. She left her hood down and walked through the lights and shadows and the rain, stony and detached.

I walked through the rain beside her and asked, “Your boyfriend?”

Her voice was small and clear and dry as she answered, “No.”

I said, “Who, then?”

She said, “That doesn’t concern you.”

We went on through the night and the rain. We reached the corner of Broadway at 42nd. There weren’t any pedestrians. There was a black-coated cop directing traffic at the intersection. His back was to us.

The wind tore at our bodies and the rain lashed at our faces. There was only an old man selling pencils on the corner. A very old man. His hair was white and his beard was white and his slack mouth trembled as the cold rain beat at it.

She lifted her hand and pointed a finger at the old man and said, “That’s him.”

I looked into her green eyes and she looked back and it was like there was a flame between us that the raindrops couldn’t put out.

I said, “Okay, babe,” and pulled my gun and shot him between the eyes.

He fell flat on his face. His bony fingers scrabbled a moment among the scattered pencils. The cop thought it was a back-fire and kept his back turned. I nudged the old man over with my toe to make sure he was dead. I knelt beside him. His rheumy old eyes were glazing. His lips parted. He muttered, “That bitch,” and then he died.

I got up and turned around. She was gone. I was alone with the night and the wind and the rain... and with a dead man.

Sleep No More by Mann Rubin

He was afraid to sleep... for death stalked his dreams.

* * *

When Richard Mott opened his eyes the morning after, he found the drab, cheerless face of Emma hovering over him, pin-curls and all. Every year, he thought, his wife looked more and more like the M-G-M lion.

“Good morning,” he mumbled, turning his head away.

“Who is Linda Rhodes?” she roared.

The words hit him like a bucket of ice-water. He sat bolt upright, tingling.

“Who?”

“You heard me, you cheat. Only save your lies. I already know. She’s the new secretary that started in your office two months ago, isn’t she?”

“What about her?” asked Richard, his mouth dry, a sinking, nauseous feeling rumbling across his stomach.

“I’ve got news for you. Her name’s mud in this town. Before I’m finished she’ll wish she never laid eyes on you.”

Richard cringed inwardly at the threat. He thought of Linda — sweet, luscious Linda with hair like spun gold and the softest, warmest lips. The ache in his stomach tightened into a fist.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He reached for his robe, telling himself he’d have to keep calm and play it casual. But it wasn’t going to be easy.

“Don’t you?” cried Emma sarcastically. “And I suppose you never heard of Cabin Number Twenty-two at the Seaview Motel in Santa Monica, where you made love to her for three hours last night while I thought you were at a Kiwanis meeting?”

“How did...?”

“Fortunately, dear husband, you still have one habit I find most revealing and rewarding, even after fourteen years of marriage.”

“I talked in my sleep again.”

“Raved is more like it. Thanks to you and your dreams I had a blow-by-blow description of your charming little rendezvous. You supplied everything from the name of her French perfume to the number of times she called you her Tutti-Frutti Lover-Man’. Want any more?”

“That won’t be necessary,” said Richard weakly. “If you’ll excuse me I’ll go shave.”