ends on the desk. He watched without interest. “If I had stolen her virtue,” I said, “I wouldn’t be carrying it around in my pocket.”
He got to his feet. “Don’t leave town. I only need a puff of wind to throw you in the tank[32] as a material witness, so watch yourself.”
He walked out of my office, through the outer room and into the passage. He left both doors wide open.
I collected my possessions and returned them to my pockets, then I pushed the door shut and sat on my desk and lit a cigarette. Right now they hadn’t a water-tight case against me, but they did have something. A lot depended on what they turned up within the next few hours. Although Retnick was a bird-brain, I had a feeling the killer was framing me for the murder and would drop another clue in front of Retnick that could be a clincher. The disappearance of my gun could only mean the killer had shot her with it and it might turn up where Retnick would find it.
I slid off the desk. This wasn’t the time to sit around shaking my head at myself [33]. I had work to do.
I locked up the office and headed for the elevator. Against Jay Wayde’s glass-panelled door, I saw Retnick’s shadow. He was talking to Wayde, collecting evidence against me. With a sense of urgency, I rode down to the ground floor, walked by the two cops at the door, then crossed the street to where I had left my car. I got in and slammed the door.
I was now as jittery as a junkie. I had a sudden urge for a slug of whisky. Drinking before six o’clock wasn’t my usual routine, but this was something special. I slid across the bench seat and opened the glove compartment. As I reached for the bottle, my heart gave a big kick against my ribs and my mouth turned as dry as a sun-bleached bone.
In the glove compartment lay my .38 police special and a lizard-skin handbag.
I sat staring, feeling a chill crawl up my spine. As sure as I was breathing, this handbag belonged to the dead Chinese woman.
3
At the back of police headquarters there is a large yard surrounded by an eight-foot high wall. Here, the police park their patrol cars, the riot squad trucks and the fast cars that rush experts to any emergency.
On one of the walls is a big notice that says in large red letters against a white background this park is for police vehicles only.
I swung my car through the open gateway and parked carefully beside a patrol car. As I cut the engine, a cop appeared from nowhere, his red Irish face showing violent fury.
“Hey! What’s the matter with you? Can’t you read?” he bawled in a voice that could be heard two blocks away.
“Nothing’s the matter with me,” I said as I removed the key from the ignition, “and I can read – even the long words.”
I thought he was going to explode. For a long moment he opened and shut his mouth while he struggled to frame words violent enough for the occasion.
Before he could give utterance, I said, smiling at him through the open window of my car, “Detective Lieutenant Retnick, the Mayor’s brother-in-law, told me to park here. Take it up with him[34] if you feel badly about it, but don’t blame me if you get yourself kicked humpbacked.”
He looked as if he had suddenly swallowed a bee. For two long seconds he glared at me, his mouth working, then he stalked away.
I sat staring into space for perhaps twenty minutes, then a car came into the yard and parked within ten feet of me. Retnick got out and started towards a door that led into the grey stone building that was police headquarters.
“Lieutenant…”
I didn’t raise my voice but he heard me. He looked over his shoulder at me. He stiffened as if someone had goosed him with a branding iron, then he came over fast.
“What do you imagine you are doing here?” he demanded.
“Waiting for you,” I said.
He considered this, staring intently at me. “Well, I’m here – now what?”
I got out of the car.
“You searched me, Lieutenant, but you forgot to search my car.”
He became very still, breathing heavily through his pinched nostrils, his hard watchful eyes alert.
“Why should I search your car, shamus?”
“You wanted to know what the yellow skin, as you call her, had in her handbag that had tempted me to shoot her in my office with my gun. You didn’t find it in my office nor in my pockets. I should have thought a really keen cop would have checked my car to make sure I hadn’t hidden the motive for murder there. So I’ve brought the car along just in case you wanted to be a really keen cop.”
His face tightened with fury.
“Listen, you son-of-a-bitch,” he mouthed. “I don’t take smart talk from a cheap peeper. I’ll get Pulski to handle you! He’ll take the shine off your wit! You’re too goddam smart to stay in one piece!”
“Better look in the car first before you feed me to your meat-grinder, Lieutenant. Look in the glove compartment. It’ll save time.”
I stepped away from the car, letting the car door swing open.
His eyes smouldering, Retnick leaned into the car and yanked open the glove compartment. I watched his reactions. His fury died. He didn’t touch either the gun or the handbag. He looked for a long moment, then turned to me.”Is that your gun?”
“Yes.”
“Her handbag?”
“It adds up, doesn’t it?”
He studied me, puzzled.
“What the hell’s this? You ready to make a statement admitting you killed her?”
“I’m laying the cards face up as they’re dealt to me,” I said. “I can’t do more than that. It’s up to you what you make of it.”
He bawled to the cop guarding the gate. When the cop came over, Retnick told him to get Pulski fast.
While we waited, Retnick again looked at the gun and the handbag without touching them. “I wouldn’t give two bits[35] for your chance of survival now, shamus,” he said. “Not two bits.”
“I wouldn’t give two bits myself if I hadn’t come here to show you what I found,” I said, “but since I’ve come, I’ll gamble two bits but no more.”
“Do you always lock your car?” he asked, staring at me as his brain creaked into action.
“Yes, but I have a duplicate key in the drawer where I keep my gun. I didn’t look but I bet it isn’t there now.”
Retnick scratched the side of his face with a rasping sound. “That’s right. When I looked for the gun, I didn’t see any key.”
Pulski came pounding across the yard.
“Give
to throw you in the tank – (
to sit around shaking my head at myself – (
Take it up with him – Можете это с ним обсудить
wouldn’t give two bits – (
