resemblance, though.
I said, 'You killed Spinner Jablon.'
'You're out of your mind.'
'No.'
'You already found out who killed Jablon. You told me that the day before yesterday.'
'I was wrong.'
'I don't know what you're driving at, Scudder—'
'A man tried to kill me Wednesday night,' I said. 'You know about that. I assumed he was the same man who killed Spinner, and I managed to tie him to one of Spinner's other suckers, so I thought that cleared you. But it turns out that he couldn't have killed Spinner, because he was on the other side of the country at the time. His alibi for Spinner's death was as solid as they come. He was in jail at the time.'
I looked at him. He was patient now, hearing me out with the same intent stare he had fixed on me Thursday afternoon when I told him he was in the clear.
I said, 'I should have known he wasn't the only one involved, that more than one of Spinner's victims had decided to fight back. The man who tried to kill me was a loner. He liked to use a knife. But I'd been attacked earlier by one or more men in a car, a stolen car. And a few minutes after that attack I had a phone call from an older man with a New York accent. I'd had a call from that man before. It didn't make sense that the knife artist would have had anybody else in on it. So somebody else was behind the dodge with the car, and somebody else was responsible for knocking Spinner on the head and dumping him in the river.'
'That doesn't mean I had anything to do with it.'
'I think it does. As soon as the man with the knife is taken out of the picture, it's obvious that everything was pointing to you all along. He was an amateur, but in other respects the operation was all quite professional. A car stolen from another neighborhood with a very good man at the wheel. Some men who were good enough to find Spinner when he didn't want to be found. You had the money to hire that kind of talent. And you had the connections.'
'That's nonsense.'
'No,' I said. 'I've been thinking about it. One thing that threw me was your reaction when I first came to your office. You didn't know Spinner was dead until I showed you the item in the paper. I almost ruled you out, because I couldn't believe you could fake a reaction that well. But of course it wasn't a fake.
You really didn't know he was dead, did you?'
'Of course not.' He drew his shoulders back. 'And I think that's fairly good evidence that I had nothing to do with his death.'
I shook my head. 'It just means you didn't know about it yet. And you were stunned by the realization both that Spinner was dead and that the whole game didn't end with his death. I not only had the evidence on you, I also knew you were tied to Spinner and a possible suspect in his death. Naturally that shook you up a little.'
'You can't prove anything. You can say that I hired someone to kill Spinner.
I didn't, and I can swear to you that I didn't, but it's hardly something I can prove either. But the point is that it's not incumbent upon me to prove it, is it?'
'No.'
'And you can accuse me of whatever you want, but you don't have a shred of proof either, do you?'
'No, I don't.'
'Then perhaps you'll tell me why you decided to come here this afternoon, Mr. Scudder.'
'I don't have proof. That's true. But I have something else, Mr. Huysendahl.'
'Oh?'
'I have those photographs.'
He gaped. 'You distinctly told me—'
'That I had burned them.'
'Yes.'
'I'd intended to. It was simpler to tell you it had already been done. I've been busy since then, and didn't get around to it. And then this morning I found out that the man with the knife was not the man who killed Spinner, and I sifted through some of the things that I already knew, and I saw that it had to be you. So it was just as well that I didn't burn those pictures, wasn't it?'
He got slowly to his feet. 'I think I'll have that drink after all,' he said.
'Go right ahead.'
'Will you join me?'
'No.'
He put ice cubes in a tall glass, poured Scotch, added soda from a siphon. He took his time building the
drink, then walked over to the fireplace and rested with his elbow on the burnished oak mantel. He took a few small sips of his drink before he turned to look at me again.
'Then we're back to the beginning,' he said. 'And you've decided to blackmail me.'
'No.'
