Blood on Biscayne Bay by Brett Halliday Read Free Book Online Page B

saw him at the Play-Mor. He was with a girl who answered Mr. Hudson’s description of the maid.”
    “What time was that?”
    “I saw them at the roulette table slightly before ten. I dropped forty bucks and went out for a few drinks and looked in again about ten-thirty. She was still there, but I didn’t see him.”
    “That’s what I told you,” Floyd put in wearily. “I skipped out on her and went on and made a night of it by myself.”
    “Where?” Painter asked incisively.
    Floyd shook his head. “God only knows. I hit the Den first and tilted a few. And I think I was at the Yacht Club, and maybe the Tropical Tavern.” He managed a puffy-lipped smile. “Didn’t get in till about four-thirty.”
    “You didn’t come back here in the meantime?”
    “Hell, no. Home didn’t appeal to me right then.”
    “How long were you at the Play-Mor?” Painter demanded of Shayne.
    “I reached my apartment at eleven o’clock. I didn’t go back into the gambling room after I looked in at ten-thirty.”
    “And the girl was there at that time?”
    “She was at the roulette table when I went out and got a cab,” Shayne said steadily.
    Mrs. Morgan entered the room unobtrusively. She touched Leslie Hudson’s arm and said, “I think you’d best go up to Mrs. Hudson, sir. She’s resting quietly, but she’d like to see you.”
    “Of course” Hudson arose hastily. “You’ll excuse me.
    “And I,” said Floyd, “have told you all I know about anything. Is there hot coffee, Mrs. Morgan?”
    “On the stove. I’ll fix some—”
    “You’ll stay right here,” Painter said sternly, “until you’ve answered a few questions.”
    As she turned back looking flustered and unhappy, Floyd brushed past her, saying, “I’ll fix some myself. And don’t tell him any more than you have to.”
    Mrs. Morgan sat down and folded her hands in her lap. She answered Painter’s questions steadily and clearly. She had helped rear Christine, and when Christine married she had been happy to come to Miami and take the position as housekeeper in the Hudson home. She hadn’t known Natalie Briggs until she came to work as a maid, and the girl had done her work competently. There had been no complaints. She knew nothing at all about the dead girl’s background or friends. She had had no callers during the few weeks she’d been employed at the Hudson house, and had received no letters to Mrs. Morgan’s knowledge.
    She and the girl occupied adjoining rooms in the rear wing of the house, upstairs, and when she retired at midnight, Natalie was not in her room. She hadn’t tried to call her early this morning, supposing she was asleep, but had gone up after preparing breakfast and learned then that she had not returned during the night. She had heard no unusual sounds during the night, but she was a sound sleeper and would not have heard any noises had they occurred.
    Peter Painter snapped his notebook shut with a snort of irritation after concluding his interrogation of Mrs. Morgan. He smoothed his thin black mustache with his thumbnail, shrugged, and strutted out the front door.
    Shayne went out after saying good-by to Mrs. Morgan. He silently followed Painter around the side of the house to the rear, taking the same path he had watched Natalie take the preceding night.
    A flagstone path led through the spacious lawn to stone steps going down into a boathouse built out from the breakwater into Biscayne Bay, large enough to house a thirty-foot motor launch. The roof of the boathouse was flat, and level with the top of the breakwater. A man was lying on his belly at the far end of the roof, looking down at the water.
    He rolled over and sat up as Painter, with Shayne a few steps behind him, walked out on the roof toward him. “We got it just about figured out for you, Chief. Whatley is down there in a rowboat scraping off samples from the plank doors of the boathouse. Blood is what it is. Diluted with water and washed up there against