“I see.” For an instant hope came into her eyes, but it went away. “It’s just our luck for him to pull a stunt like this when something good was coming up. I don’t know where he is,” she ended listlessly.
“But you must have some idea,” Shayne persisted. “When he left home this morning—”
“He wasn’t home this morning,” she interrupted. “Not since last night. He phoned this morning and said he’d be away a couple of days on business. He never tells me anything,” she went on, her lips tight and her voice weary. “Ask that big blonde he keeps down at the studio. He tells her things, I guess.”
“I see,” said Shayne gently. “Thank you very much, Mrs. Ludlow.”
He went back to his car and drove slowly to North Miami Avenue and turned southward toward the address of Ludlow’s studio.
He found the number above an entrance crowded between a shoe-shine parlor and a delicatessen. Faded lettering on the door read: Ludlow Photographic Studio. Beside the door was a plate-glass window with heavy drapes drawn.
Shayne hesitated for a moment with his hand on the doorknob. The “big blonde” angle sounded promising, but thinking back to his telephone conversation, he didn’t know what approach to try on her. He shrugged, opened the door, and heard a bell tinkle inside.
He entered a small square studio furnished with two easy chairs, a couch, several large movable light fixtures on adjustable standards with huge silver reflectors, and a portrait camera mounted on a tripod in one corner.
Against one wall was a luridly painted backdrop depicting a beach with palm trees reaching out to the ocean. A covering of dust on everything gave the room the appearance of disuse.
A narrow corridor led back along the right-hand wall, and as Shayne closed the street door he heard the clack of high heels on the bare floor.