Shayne moved around the desk, rubbed his chin. thoughtfully, sat down in the swivel chair, and leaned forward with his arms folded on the desk. He said, “Sit down, Will, and let me get this straight. You say this lawyer in Wilmington claims his office was robbed last night of the file on me?”
“That’s right. Broken into early this morning. Nothing else taken that he can see. Just your letters to him and his carbons to you.” He pulled a chair nearer and sat down opposite Shayne, turned to Detective Sturgis and said curtly, “You and Benton may as well beat it. You’re not going to find anything here.”
Sturgis left the room to the accompaniment of Shayne’s blunt fingers drumming on the desk. He said absently, “So Bates’s alleged documentary evidence has disappeared.”
“Conveniently for your denial. Did you go to all the trouble of flying up to Wilmington to steal that file?” the chief asked heavily.
“I swear to God, Will, I can’t get it through my head you’re serious. From the very beginning when that woman came to my room, it stunk of a frame-up between her and this Wilmington shyster. Don’t ask me what kind of a frame,” he went on angrily. “I don’t pretend to even guess what they thought they were gaining by that story.”
“Trouble is, Bates doesn’t appear to be a shyster at all. I’ve checked on him, and the Wilmington police give him a clean bill. One of the most respected attorneys in town. On top of that, there’s every evidence that his office was broken into early this morning, around six-thirty or seven o’clock. So, you can clarify things a lot by proving you couldn’t have flown up there and pulled the job. Just tell me where you were between four and nine.”
“You’re not going to like it,” Shayne warned him.
“Probably not. Don’t tell me you were with a dame whose name you can’t divulge on account of her husband’s the jealous type.” Gentry pursed his lips over the cigar and struck a match to it.
“No.” Shayne turned his head to grin at Lucy Hamilton who was tidying the files and listening earnestly. “I wish it were,” the redhead said candidly. “You’d like it better than this. I was parked out on Biscayne Bay, north of Seventy-Ninth Street, all that time, Will. All by myself.”
“That’s just fine,” Gentry grunted. “That fixes everything up just dandy.”