Marked for Murder by Brett Halliday

edition. The first one to hit the street about two-thirty. And only in that one edition,” Gentry added with a slow grin. “The managing editor caught the story and killed it in all the later editions.”
    “Had Rourke been writing much stuff like this?”
    “He’s been pounding on that line for several days,” Gentry admitted. “Needling Painter and hinting that those three murders were tied up with the new and growing gambling racket on the Beach. Nothing like this last story,” he added hastily. “This was the first time he took his gloves off and named names, or gave any of those facts he’d dug up.”
    “The damned fool,” Shayne muttered hoarsely. “He should have had sense enough to know they’d go gunning for him if he started giving names and descriptions to the paper before the murders were solved. What’s got into him, Will? Was he imagining things, or is it getting that bad?”
    “It’s getting bad, Mike,” Gentry told him soberly. “We’ve had our hands full the last few months. It’s been getting bad,” he repeated. “We’ve held things down pretty well on this side of the Bay, but you know the Beach has always been inclined to wink both eyes at stuff like that. You can’t blame Painter too much. He’s got a job to hang onto.”
    Shayne lit another Picayune, disregarding Gentry’s shudder of revulsion. “So Rourke had been riding this line for days, and then suddenly comes up with this broadside. No wonder they killed the story after one edition.”
    “The way I get it,” said Gentry, “that story was a sort of slap in the face for Walter Bronson, the managing editor. He and Rourke have tangled several times in the past when he tried to hold Tim down, and it seems he read the riot act to Tim Tuesday morning. So Tim faked a tame story for his okay and sneaked this one in instead. He knew it’d be the last he’d write for the Courier, so he made it good and hot.”
    “Walter Bronson,” said Shayne meditatively. “I thought Wilcox was the Courier editor.”
    “They fired Wilcox about a year ago and imported Bronson from New York. He’s a big shot, I guess. I never met him myself, but I’ve heard Tim’s gripes. He bought a big place on the Beach, makes speeches at the Chamber of Commerce—” Gentry waved a beefy hand to indicate more of the same.
    “No wonder he tried to gag Rourke.”
    “Jimmy Dolan says Bronson was sore as hell about that story. Rushed out to fire Rourke and found a note in Tim’s typewriter telling him where to stick his job.”
    Shayne chuckled. “Tim never did give a damn. I’ve had to hog-tie him a couple of times to keep him from going off half-cocked with a front-page story before the time was ripe. Always sticking his neck out.”
    “Seems to me,” said Gentry, “I remember your neck being on the block a couple of times—and the ax raised.”
    Shayne arched a bushy red brow at Gentry and went on gravely, “You say this thing hit the streets at two-thirty? Sometime between noon and four o’clock Tim took a hell of a beating. And by ten-thirty that night he had a couple of slugs inside him.”
    “That’s right,” Gentry said quietly. “From a thirty-two fired from close enough to leave powder burns. The slugs don’t check with any one of the bullets taken from the other three murder victims.”
    “Someone must have a big supply of thirty-twos,” Shayne grunted. “A new gun for every job. This blonde—could she be the gal who came to visit Rourke while he was out getting himself beat up?”
    “Could be. Maybe she arranged it, thinking she wouldn’t get caught in his apartment. The manager said she was blond and beautiful.”
    Shayne’s blunt finger tips drummed impatiently on the chair arm. “Even Painter couldn’t ignore a story like this. It must have pushed him into doing something.”
    Gentry shrugged heavily. “None of those three clubs were open for business Tuesday night. Painter made a lot of noise about personally