“I suppose none of it’s important,” she ended with a sigh. “We don’t even know for sure that there was any note from Joe Meade to Nora. Celia might have just been making that up.”
Shayne shook his head. “Christine evidently didn’t think she was making it up. And I don’t believe so either. Remember her hesitancy backstage tonight? I thought she was holding something out on us.” He continued his long-legged pacing with shoulders hunched forward, hands clasped behind his back.
After a few moments, Phyllis cried, “For heaven’s sake, stop impersonating Krazy Kat and tell me whether I did all right or messed everything up. You give me the jitters.”
Shayne said, “I’ve already got ’em.” He stopped at the window and stared broodingly out into the mist of dawn.
There was the sound of starting motors and blasting horns, signaling the end of a full night of revelry. In the cold, merciless light of morning, the little town with its ancient dwellings looked bleak and drab, robbed of all the glamour and intoxicating warmth that had come back with the glory of departed days for one night.
Shayne sighed and turned away from the window. He filled a wineglass from a cognac bottle and sank into an easy chair. He felt drab and bleak and robbed of something.
He reassured Phyllis. “You did all right, angel. Swell, with the material you had to work with. I suppose there wouldn’t be any chance of dragging the contents of the note from the Moore woman?”
Phyllis shook her head and laughed shortly. “Not unless you want to stick pins in her to wake her up.”
“And when she sobers up, she’ll tighten up,” Shayne prophesied gloomily. “She’ll probably deny having seen a note. Oh, hell.” He took a long gulp of cognac, set the glass down dejectedly.
“Maybe I could have kept at her — forced her to tell me.”