Back in the living-room he took several sheets of the forged letterheads and stuffed them in his pocket, looked at his wrist watch, and was angrily aware of the dull, throbbing pain in his wounded head.
He returned to the bedroom on the second to find Nash wearing a blood-spotted shirt and trousers, and groping on the floor for his socks.
“You’re all right the way you are,” he growled, taking him firmly by the elbow and jerking him erect. He swung the arm up in a half nelson behind his back and shoved him out to the stairway and down to his car at the curb.
Nash huddled in the corner of the front seat, sniffling and choking, while Shayne drove to headquarters.
Parking in the police lot, he yanked Nash out and half carried him in the side entrance and back to Gentry’s office.
Timothy Rourke was with the chief when Shayne kicked the door open and tossed him inside. “There he is, Will. I hope I left him enough teeth to talk with.”
Gentry rolled his rumpled lids up and stared at the bloody, barefoot man. “Who the hell is it?” he thundered.
“ What the hell is it would be more appropriate,” Timothy Rourke said mockingly, and his nostrils flared like a bloodhound on the scent.
“The name is Bill Nash,” Shayne grated. “I had him in my office pinch-hitting for Lucy a couple of months ago. He got smart and tried to grab up all the new cases that came in while I wasn’t around. Bates’s letter was one of them.
“I got everything from him,” he went on grimly, “except the straight about mixing up my room with Carrol’s. Maybe your boys’ technique will be better than mine for that.”