Bodies Are Where You Find Them by Brett Halliday Page B

along the bar toward a rear door that said Gentlemen. It opened onto a corridor leading to the back of the building. The first door on the right was also chastely lettered Gentlemen. He went into a lavatory and washed his face and hands with soap, dried them meticulously, and combed his unruly red hair with his fingers. There was an ugly bruise on his left cheek, and both lips were badly swollen, but the cut on his upper lip had stopped bleeding.
    A waiter passed him as he stepped into the hallway. He carried a tray with two highballs on it. Shayne watched him stop at a door near the end of the hall. The man knocked, then entered, leaving the door slightly ajar.
    Shayne followed him, treading noiselessly on the rich hall runner. The door was marked Private. He heard Arch Bugler’s peculiarly sinister and purring voice, a soft sibilance acquired by the mobster to conceal the naturally harsh and guttural quality of his tone.
    “Forget it, Marlow. I should be sore at you for barging in like this, but I don’t blame you for being upset. You can’t trust a skirt nowadays. Too bad you had to make a trip down here to find out how you stand. Put it down the hatch. It’s out of my private stock.”
    A thin, shaky voice answered him. “I’m not going to believe it until Helen tells me so herself. There’s something screwy going on.”
    Shayne stepped forward quickly as the door started to open inward. He strode nonchalantly down the hall without looking back, turned to the right at the end. An intersecting corridor led to a wide archway opening into a big square room which was deserted except for a couple of workmen busily polishing roulette tables and crap layouts. White cloth covers still were in place over other tables in the rear.
    Stopping in the doorway, Shayne scratched a match noisily and put flame to a cigarette. One of the workmen glanced up without interest. Shayne grinned at him and asked, “Getting ready for the grand opening, eh?”
    “Yep. That’s about it,” the man replied, and his companion added, winking broadly, “If the election turns out right.”
    Shayne nodded and turned away. A deep crease furrowed his brow as he went back to the door marked Private. He turned the knob and went in without knocking.
    Arch Bugler stared at him across a wide, flat-topped desk of shining mahogany. He was a squat man with tremendous shoulders and torso. His eyes were almost colorless and appeared opaque, slightly protuberant and unblinking, like the lidless eyes of a reptile. He had swart, heavy features and coarse black hair, and was about thirty years of age. He said, “Well, if it isn’t Mr. Shayne.”
    Bugler appeared to be alone in the office, but as Shayne stepped forward he saw a pair of brown Oxfords protruding past the corner of the desk. He moved aside and looked down at the limp body of a young man who lay beside a straight, armless chair. Long fingers were clasped about an empty highball glass.
    Bugler watched the detective from lidless eyes without speaking.
    Shayne nodded toward the recumbent figure and slid one hip onto the desk. “You must have told the bartender to mix the next one stronger after the girl walked out of here under her own power this afternoon.”
    Bugler purred, “You’re going to get your nose dirty, Shamus.”
    Shayne nodded, his eyes bleak. “It’s one of my failings. Helen Stallings told me just enough before she passed out this afternoon to get me interested.”
    Not a flicker of expression changed the stony coldness of Bugler’s swarthy features. He pressed a button on his desk with a blunt forefinger. “You’ve stayed out of my way a long time, Shayne. Better if you kept on being smart.”
    Shayne’s gray eyes glowed hotly. “I’ve never stayed out of any man’s way. I’ve been waiting for you to stick your neck out.”
    “And you think I have?”
    “I know you have.” Shayne touched the bruise on his cheek and his cut lip. “It was a mistake for you to sick your