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not. I have no idea why you’re here and I have nothing to say to you.”
    “I’m Michael Shayne, the private investigator who was recommended to you as being ah—discreet,” Shayne told him. “I introduced myself at the Hawley house.”
    Mr. Hastings grew more confused. He fussed with some papers on his desk, said, “I’m sure I didn’t catch the name.”
    “You need a private detective, don’t you?” Shayne stretched his long legs. “You’re on the spot with that will of Mrs. Hawley’s brother-in-law leaving everything to Albert Hawley, but not to his heirs and assigns if the young man predeceased his uncle. In that case, as I understand it, his entire estate goes to Mrs. Hawley and her daughter.”
    “I don’t care to discuss it with you, sir. I don’t know what you’re after or where you got hold of this information. I shall arrange for another investigator at once.” He turned back to the legal forms on his desk.
    Shayne said, “You’ve got to get hold of the two men who were in the lifeboat with Albert when he died and find out the exact date. The newspaper reports were vague on that point. The men reported that Hawley was alive either four or five days. I’ve checked back on the dates and find that Uncle Ezra died on the fifth day after young Hawley’s ship was torpedoed. If Albert died on the fourth night, Ezra Hawley’s estate goes to his sister-in-law, Mrs. Sarah Hawley, and her daughter. But if he didn’t die until the fifth night after his ship was torpedoed, he was alive at the time of his uncle’s death, and his subsequent demise will turn the entire fortune over to his divorced wife, according to the terms of the will. Am I correct thus far?”
    Mr. Hastings was disturbed. He hadn’t looked at Shayne during his lengthy and rapid discourse. The lawyer jerked around in his creaking swivel chair, took off his glasses with an unsteady hand, and glared at the detective. “I’m sure I don’t know how you’ve gathered this information,” he said testily, “or why you’ve wasted your time gathering it.”
    Shayne looked at him in surprise. “I always try to familiarize myself with every aspect of a case when I’m called in on it.”
    “But you haven’t been called in on this case,” Hastings said angrily.
    “You were too anxious to get rid of me at the Hawleys’ even to learn my name. You called me in on the case not more than half an hour ago.”
    “And now I’m dismissing you,” said Hastings. Purplish color showed in his thin face.
    “I’m in and I’m staying in,” Shayne said hotly. “Mrs. Hawley is your client—Albert Hawley’s divorced wife, I take it, is not. It’ll mean a couple of millions to your client and a nice fat fee for you to persuade Groat and Cunningham to testify that Albert Hawley died on the fourth night in the lifeboat. You’ve got to reach them before Albert’s ex-wife does, because she might even go so far as to bribe them to say it was the fifth night. If there’s any bribing done—well, you want to have the first crack at it. That’s why you need me.”
    Hastings was nervously tapping his glasses against the palm of his hand. The purplish color heightened in his face. “Young man,” he said austerely, “the mere mention of bribery is repugnant to me.”
    Shayne said, “Fair enough. That’s why you need someone else to do the dirty work and spare you the details.” Shayne lit a cigarette and settled back in his chair.
    Hastings played a little game with his long, thin fingers, his pale eyes studying Shayne’s gaunt face and relaxed figure. He said, “Humph,” finally.
    Shayne asked casually, “Do you know the police are looking for Jasper Groat?”
    The lawyer stiffened. “Eh? What’s that?”
    “Groat has been missing since about eight o’clock last night, the time Beatrice Meany invited him out to the Hawley house.”
    Hastings sat very still and didn’t say anything.
    “Beatrice Meany,” Shayne went on, “is a queer