Blood on the Stars by Brett Halliday Read Free Book Online

fighting back.
    He stumbled forward as the three men jumped in and slammed the doors shut. The limousine jerked forward just as he reached it and caught the rear door handle. It turned in his hand and the latch released, but the door didn’t open and the car was picking up speed.
    The man in the rear seat rolled down the glass and leaned out. He cursed and smashed his pistol barrel down on the hand clutching the door handle. Mark Dustin stumbled back and the limousine roared away toward downtown Miami Beach.
    Celia ran to him, sobbing, as he swayed drunkenly in the headlights of the roadster. When she saw the blood streaming down his face and the crushed hand he was holding out stiffly, she cried out, “Oh, Mark, what have they done to you,” in an agonized voice.
    He put her aside with his other hand. His face was stony and his voice harsh as he grated, “We’ve got to notify the police. Get under the wheel and see if you can back out.”
    “But your face! And your hand! You’ve got to get to a hospital!”
    “Get in and drive to a phone.” He shoved her toward the roadster and walked around to get in the other side.
    Celia didn’t waste time arguing. She had the car in gear, and as he slumped beside her she gunned the motor and let the clutch out with a jerk. The rear wheels spun momentarily, then took hold, and the roadster lurched backward onto the pavement. She put it in low and spun the steering-wheel. The left fender was crushed against the wheel and rubber screeched protestingly against steel as she swung in a short circle and headed toward the hotel.
    Dustin started to protest that they could reach help faster by driving on to Fifth Street, but a look at the set of her jaw stopped him in mid-sentence.
    The steering mechanism had evidently been injured, for the roadster wobbled drunkenly as she gained speed, but Celia kept the accelerator down and herded it down the pavement with grim concentration.
    Mark Dustin held a handkerchief to his cut face. His injured hand lay on his knee. When they drove up to the hotel entrance the doorman opened the door and Dustin snapped, “Get the police. We’ve been robbed of a couple of hundred thousand dollars.”
    “Send the doctor up to our suite. Please hurry.” She was out of the car and going around to open the door on Mark’s side. She put her arm around him and led him in through the lobby and on to an elevator.
    The resident doctor had Dustin’s cheek bandaged and was putting a temporary splint on his injured hand when the first contingent of the law arrived, two city detectives and the chief of the Miami Beach detective bureau.
    Peter Painter aggressively took the lead in snapping questions at the victims, getting a brief outline of the occurrence and sending his two subordinates scooting away with routine instructions to establish a road-block across the bay and put out a radio alarm for the limousine.
    By that time the doctor had Dustin’s broken hand swathed in bandages which he assured the suffering man would take care of it until he could get it X-rayed and properly set. Three fingers were broken, and two smaller bones in the hand itself, he explained, and as soon as the first shock wore off he should go to a hospital for a thorough examination.
    He picked up his bag and went out. Celia went to the telephone and ordered three Scotch and sodas sent up. Then she reseated herself beside her husband while Peter Painter stood in the center of the room and regarded the couple disapprovingly.
    He had reason for this attitude. In his opinion, any tourist who ventured out in Miami wearing a fortune in jewelry was a congenital fool and deserved whatever happened to him. Moreover, they were a great nuisance to him and his department and were always kicking up a stink in the newspapers if their stolen property was not recovered within a few hours, which it seldom was. Such robberies made bad publicity, and were frowned upon by the city fathers to whom Painter owed