Shayne bent over the body and smelled the blood. Then he looked around. The television picture was coming in without sound. There were various small signs that a fight had taken place. A loaded ashtray had been knocked over. When Shayne returned to the body he saw something on the floor beside the right hand. At first he thought it was fur. Using the point of a pencil, he turned it over. It was a patch of human hair, blonde and curling. Each individual hair had been sewn to a piece of silk.
Shayne left it there. The buzzer sounded.
“Open it from outside,” he called. “I don’t want to smear the knob.”
The security man used his keys. Tim Rourke entered with him.
“Jolly,” Rourke commented, looking down. “Single occupancy. Not really supposed to have guests.”
“Tim, you have to handle this for me. He’s been dead a couple of hours, so I doubt if Painter will try to lay it on me. Tell him I’ll call in.”
“Mike, you found him,” Kaufman pointed out. “I’m afraid I’ll have to insist that you stay around till Painter gets here. It won’t be long.”
“You’re well within your rights,” Shayne assured him. “Insist. Tim, did you leave the keys in the Ford?”
“Yeah. But Mike, Kaufman has a point. Painter’s going to want to know what you wanted with him, and that’s for openers. What do I tell him?”
Shayne allowed himself a tight grin. “Tell him you can’t say anything before you talk to a lawyer. Mention the Supreme Court.”
“That’ll send him up the wall! Be reasonable, Mike. I’ll be glad to go down another catch basin, or anything easy. But I’m getting older. I’m losing my sense of humor. Petey doesn’t amuse me any more!”
Shayne went out. In the doorway, Rourke called after him, “Don’t leave me out on a limb too long, Mike, or you’ll lose a friend.”
Alone in the elevator, Shayne doubled his fist and slammed it against the wall. It relieved his feelings slightly. With Moseley’s help, the next step would have been easy. Now it might turn out to be very touchy indeed-he wasn’t sure he could pull it off.
He crossed the lobby, ignoring the stares of the guests who were still up. In Rourke’s Ford, he found he had to baby the carburetor to keep it operating while he shifted into the upper gears. He felt the front wheels shiver, but he reached the Sunrise Shores with everything still intact.
The guard at the gate didn’t think he looked trustworthy, and came with him to be sure he was welcome aboard the Nefertiti. Nearing the end of the dock, the guard exclaimed, “They’re gone! Nobody told me they were going!”
Shayne’s pace quickened. He heard a girl’s cry. Sally Lyon hurried down from her father’s boat and ran into his arms.
“Mike, I didn’t know what to do! Your car phone didn’t answer-” She pulled back and looked at his face. “You’re hurt!”
“It looks worse than it is. When did they pull out?”
“Do you know this man, Miss Lyon?” the guard said.
“Isn’t that obvious? Go on back.”
The guard turned reluctantly and Sally went on, “About half an hour ago. I thought we ought to call the police, but Dad talked me out of it. You should have seen them! They were in no condition to-”
She was bouncing in his arms. He took her by the shoulders and made her hold still. She was still wearing the same short nightgown.
“Sally, tell me how it happened.”
“They were drunk and they just took it into their heads to go for a sail. Mrs. De Rham, mostly. Paul was trying to stop her. He looked so desperate! They woke everybody up. They were disgustingly plastered-staggering around drinking out of the bottle! They went out without lights, they forgot to cast off one of the lines and pulled the cleat out of the dock-”
“Which way did they go?”
She waved. “North. And ever since they left I’ve been listening for sirens. He couldn’t get her away from the wheel, and she’s a menace! If they stayed in the Waterway they’re sure to smash into somebody, and good grief, if they went out through the Cut-”
“Did your father wake up?”
“Heavens, yes. He came up and yelled at them to come back. A lot of good that did.”
“Let’s wake him up again,” Shayne said grimly. “I want to borrow your boat.”
She hung onto him as he started to step aboard. “Mike, you’re not too well liked around here, you may remember. It took me an hour to get him calmed down, and I don’t think he believed what you told him about you and me-I mean about not-”
Shayne stepped into the passageway. “Which door?”
She pointed at one of the doors and he hammered on it. “Mr. Lyon! Wake up!”
“Oh, dear,” Sally said. “He probably just got back to sleep for the third time. Let me go in and prepare the way.”
Shayne let her get by. He went up to the wheelhouse. They had a good Hallicrafter radio-telephone, he was glad to see. It was still warming up when Sally’s father came boiling up from below.
“What’s this about taking my boat?” he demanded. “Like hell! You’ll get out of here before I-”
Shayne said mildly, “There’ve been two murders, and there’ll be a third unless we can find the Nefertiti in a hell of a hurry. We need the Coast Guard. You call them while I get underway. I know this water better than you do.” He called out the window, “Cast off, Sally.”
“I already did!”
Lyon was looking at Shayne suspiciously. “Who’s been murdered?” The motors caught. Shayne reversed and began to back into open water.
“Sit down, Mr. Lyon. What business are you in?”
“I’m a retailer. What’s that got to do with anything?” He was sputtering. His hands opened and closed, but Shayne loomed over him, a bloody, menacing figure, and he did nothing more than breathe fiercely through his nose. “You’re hijacking this boat. By God, the first thing the Coast Guard is going to hear-”
“Sally says you’re from Baltimore. This is going to be a pretty big story. You’ll make the Baltimore papers.”
Sally ran in. “Dad, are you being pleasant or unpleasant?”
“He’s about to call the Coast Guard for me,” Shayne told her, swinging around the first buoy that marked the channel under the Broad Causeway to the Bay Harbor Islands and Bal Harbour.
“Sally, go below and get some clothes on,” Mr. Lyon said sharply. “You can see right through that nightgown.”
Sally groaned. “Dad, you’re so far behind the times you’re prehistoric! Well, it’s probably better to have him snapping at me than at you, Mike. I’m more used to it.”
When she left them Lyon hesitated, then picked up the transmitter. “What am I going to get in the Baltimore papers for? Not for being a hero, I hope.”
“They have a gun aboard, but if they use it they’ll be shooting at me,” Shayne said.
“They could miss.” He signaled the marine operator. “I’m thinking about the women as well as myself. Of course,” he added, “they’re probably too potted to find the gun, let alone shoot it. I’ve been known to take a drink myself, but those two on the Nefertiti-they give alcohol a bad name.”
“That’s an impression they’ve been trying to give,” Shayne said. “As a matter of fact, they’ve been sober most of the time.”
“Sober? Mrs. De Rham? She hasn’t drawn a sober breath since she got to Miami.”
“It was part of the con. Tell the operator you want the Coast Guard air station at Opa Locka Airport.”
The operator was slow to answer. Lyon signaled again. When he had a connection he asked urgently for the Coast Guard. “Shayne, they’ve been moored about six feet from me for the last two weeks. I saw the empty bottles.”
Shayne let him listen to how that sounded. Lyon said slowly, “I guess she could have emptied them down the drain, but Beefeater gin-do you know what it costs?”
Sally came in, dressed in brief shorts and a respectable top. “Mother’s sleeping like a baby. What about Beefeater? That’s Mrs. De Rham’s brand.”
The Coast Guard operator’s voice came from the amplifier. Shayne picked up the small mike.
“May Day, May Day.”
The channel was open, and they heard an abrupt clanging of bells.
“Right,” the operator said tersely. “Where are you?”
“North Biscayne Bay. This is Michael Shayne. I’m on a boat named-”
“Panther,” Lyon supplied.
“Panther. A boat’s been stolen. The Nefertiti, fifty, fifty-five foot, a black cruiser.”
“Motor yacht,” Lyon corrected him, leaning forward to speak into the mike. “A deck and a half, open deck aft. Pacemaker.”
“Check. Can you give me a location?”
“We think they went out through Haulover,” Shayne said. “They have half an hour’s start. Two people aboard, a man and a woman. Tell the pilot they’re armed.”
“Roger.”
Sally’s eyes shone with excitement. “Stolen, Mike? Were you making that up?”
“Do you know what he claims?” her father said before Shayne could answer. “He says they’ve only been pretending to be drunk. I’ll be the first to admit I never cottoned to Mrs. De Rham. Very hoity-toity and unsociable. But a non-drinker? I don’t go along with you there, Shayne. I observed her carefully.”
“Maybe Mike knows more about it than you do, Dad,” Sally said.
“Do you think so?” Lyon said stiffly. “I’m inclined to doubt it.”
The sky was lighter in the east. Shayne looked at his watch and cut the lights. In a few more minutes they were approaching the Cut. They went under the highway bridge without slackening speed. Sally called out, pointing to the big Sikorsky helicopter coming up last behind them, white with a bright orange stripe.
“That didn’t take long.”
Shayne called Opa Locka. “He’s overhead now. Can I talk to him?”
“No, you have to relay through me. He’ll search to the south first. You’d better head due east. He’s computed a half-hour cruising radius for a fast boat. After he checks the north-south line he’ll come back along the arc and intersect you. Visibility’s good. We’re sending another helicopter on a line over North Miami Beach. Do you want the cutters alerted?”
“No, they couldn’t get here in time. Tell him not to bother about the Keys. These people are heading for deep water.”
Shayne hung the mike on its hook and took out his pint of cognac. “I don’t know about anybody else. I’m going to have a drink.”
“I’ll have a small one, thanks,” Sally said promptly.
“You will not,” her father said. “Not before breakfast.” He accepted the bottle when Shayne held it out to him. Shayne drank and put it away.
“How much did you see of Mrs. De Rham?”
“Just glimpses,” Lyon admitted, “but I do know a drunk when I see one. That was no act.”
But he already sounded less certain. He rubbed his mouth doubtfully. “I suppose if they had some reason-”
“Do you think they’re imposters, Mike?” Sally said. “That they’re only pretending to be Mrs. De Rham and Brady?”
“Somebody’s pretending,” he said briefly. “How are we for gas?”
“Right up snug.”
Shayne asked for binoculars, and when Sally supplied a pair he began combing the horizon. The air was still, with a light haze over the water. The sun was almost up.
“Mike thinks we might get our pictures in the papers,” Lyon said.
She looked at Shayne and laughed. “That explains the transformation. How did you know he was a publicity hound?”
“Publicity hound? I have to protest that,” Lyon said. “I’m thinking about the store. That kind of publicity translates into dollars and cents.”
The helicopter, gaining altitude, passed out of sight to the south. Suddenly the sun burst over the horizon, huge and orange, the static cut out abruptly and the Coast Guardsman called, “He’s spotted them, Shayne.”
Shayne pulled the wheel down and the boat swung.
The voice continued, “A mile off Government Cut. A bit over a mile. They’re circling-They’re on fire! They’re on fire!”
Shayne’s eyes narrowed.
“They’re heading north. Wheelhouse seems to be empty.”
Holding the wheel steady with his chest, Shayne raked the binoculars back and forth in a long arc. He picked up something that might be a smudge of smoke. He corrected his course slightly.
“I see the chopper,” Lyon said excitedly. “I’ll take the wheel, Shayne. Head for the smoke, right?”
The Coast Guardsman, after his brief loss of composure, was speaking again in his unemotional professional voice. “Nefertiti still proceeding north under full power. The fire’s out of control. No one at the wheel. I say again: No one at the wheel.”
His next words were lost in an electronic babble. Shayne brought the dial up a hair and picked up a raucous taxi dispatcher, probably somewhere in Miami Beach. The Coast Guardsman for the moment was lost.
Sally, her youthful face alive with excitement, prowled behind him, her eyes going from the smoke to the helicopter and back to Shayne.
“Why don’t they jump?”
The Panther roared through the water, at maximum speed. A black dot took shape at the base of the column of smoke, and grew rapidly larger. The helicopter was slightly ahead of the Nefertiti, a hundred feet above the water. Its hatch was open.
The gap between the two boats closed rapidly. Shayne was holding the binoculars on the burning boat. Details showed up clearly. The entire after section was hidden. The smoke shifted as the boat swung, and he saw the flames.
“But what the hell are you going to do?” Lyon said. “You don’t think you can board her, do you?”
Suddenly the Nefertiti veered sharply. Through the binoculars Shayne saw two figures, a man and a woman, struggling on the forward sun deck. The man staggered and struck the low rail. The woman fell away into the water. He looked around in confusion, waved toward the helicopter and dived after her.
Shayne handed the binoculars to Sally. “There are two people in the water,” he said quietly. “Never mind the man, I want the woman. Don’t run her down, but get as close to her as you can.”
“Right, Mike,” Lyon said.
Shayne ran out on deck, shedding clothes. The helicopter was hanging above the rapidly moving boat, which had begun to swing in a long arc to the east. The sun was directly in Shayne’s eyes. He signaled with both hands and saw an answering wave from the open hatch.
The helicopter began to turn to come back. Shading his eyes, Shayne picked up two black dots in the water. They were together, and floundering. They disappeared briefly. Then he saw a splash, a frantically waving arm.
He motioned to Lyon in the wheelhouse, and waited tensely. As the wheel came down Shayne dived, slicing into the water cleanly. He drove powerfully toward where he had seen the heads. When he rose to the surface Brady appeared to be alone and in trouble. Fifteen yards separated them. Shayne ate up the distance in a smooth crawl. Ignoring Brady, he filled his lungs, snapped his body forward and dived.
He had only one chance. He was down ten feet when he saw her, slanting rapidly downward. He stroked hard, feeling the beat behind his eyes. With flippers and an air tank he could have reached her, but she was falling too fast.
Her body turned in the water. Shayne took two more strokes, his lungs bursting, and his fingers closed on her hair.
It came loose in his hand, a wig. The little contact changed the angle of her descent. Stabbing out desperately, Shayne managed to clutch her short cotton jacket. Her face had been terribly burned; it was only a charred mask.
She spun away, her arms rising against the pull. He yanked hard, kicking upward. She slid away, leaving the jacket in his hand.
He shot to the surface, gulping in air the instant he broke water.
The helicopter hovered above him, its rotors beating the water around him into froth. A life preserver attached by a line to the hatch lay on the water between Shayne and Brady.
Brady was thrashing convulsively, making no effort to reach the life preserver. Shayne swam to him. His face was blackened, almost unrecognizable. Shayne yelled, and Brady twisted and swam toward the sound. Shayne guided him to the life preserver. He groped for it helplessly. His eyelids were torn and raw. Shayne realized then that he was unable to see.
He signaled. The helicopter put down a two-man lift. Shayne worked the straps under Brady’s arms and about his legs. Then he fastened himself in, waved to the Coast Guardsman and they were hoisted aboard.