Framed in Blood by Brett Halliday Page A

Michael.”
    Shayne put one arm around her and quietly turned the doorknob with his free hand. She pressed against him, and he pushed the bolt, freeing the night latch. Then he patted her shoulder and promised, “I’ll be in touch with you, Marie. Get some sleep now, if you can.”
    He put her away from him gently, went out and closed the door, strode down the hall a dozen steps, then turned and tiptoed back. He paused outside with his hand gripping the doorknob and listened intently. He was rewarded by the clicking of the telephone as Marie dialed a number.
    He turned the knob silently, eased the door open a crack, then wider when he heard the low murmur of her voice. Her back was toward the door, and she held the mouthpiece close to her lips.
    Shayne could not distinguish any words as he moved stealthily inside and approached her. She stopped talking to listen, and as though some inner intuition warned her that someone was listening, she glanced around. A strangled cry escaped her throat.
    “’By—Ned,” she exclaimed, dropped the instrument on its prongs and whirled to face Shayne with dilated eyes. “How did you—what do you mean?”
    “Ned Brooks,” said Shayne flatly.
    “Well, what of it?” she flared.
    “Why did you call him?”
    “Because Ned is Bert’s best friend—and he’s got a stake in that story they’ve been working on.”
    “How well do you know Ned?”
    She turned away from his cold, demanding gaze and said indifferently, “He has been here a few times with Bert. That’s all.”
    Shayne wondered if that was all, but he knew he would get no more from her now, so he went out and continued down the hall to the back stairway.

 
Chapter Eight
    MIKE PULLS A FAST ONE
     
    THE SKY WAS GROWING LIGHT when Shayne stepped from the rear exit of the apartment building into the enclosed tenants’ parking-lot and made his way to an opening in the high board fence that led to a side street.
    He yawned widely, then twisted his wide mouth in a grim grin. There had been a time, he reminded himself disgustedly, when an hour or so of sleep was enough. Especially when he was working on a case. But he was getting older. Besides, this wasn’t his case. Not officially. Thus far there wasn’t a fee involved, but from what Marie Leonard had told him about Bert Jackson’s phone call from her apartment he felt pretty certain he’d receive an offer before long. Whoever had gone so far as to murder an elevator operator and ransack his office and apartment must be convinced that the data for Jackson’s graft story was in his possession.
    It wasn’t difficult, now, to surmise approximately what must have happened after Jackson left the Las Felice at ten o’clock. He probably stopped some place to call Mr. Big back and foolishly made a date to meet him that night, trusting that his story about a detective named Shayne having possession of the material would hold as life insurance for him.
    And it hadn’t worked out that way.
    The only trouble with that theory, he corrected himself sourly, was that it failed to account for the smear of blood on the back of Rourke’s car seat. If that smear had any connection at all with Jackson’s death.
    He wished now that he had forced Rourke to explain the blood as soon as he discovered it. There could be a dozen plausible explanations. But at that time, he excused himself, things had been so mixed up in his own mind that he had been unwilling to press his friend for an explanation for fear—he acknowledged—of what Rourke might have told him. It was one thing to go to bat for an old friend if you suspected, but did not know, he had committed a crime. On the other hand, if he took advantage of friendship and confessed, it became an entirely different matter.
    So you went along and kept your mouth shut and hoped for the best.
    Shayne shrugged off the unpleasant thoughts as he rounded the corner cautiously and glanced down the street to make certain his car was the only one