my gun in his left hand as he pocketed his own, then switched my gun to his right hand. The sight of my own rod made me snap out of it.
No matter what happened I had to get my gun back. Wren said, “As for any report, I must doubt that. You are young and cocksure, out to make a name. Very commendable too. After you left, the one thing that remained in my mind was your saying you were working on your own time. I figure you for a glory hunter, a lone hand. Otherwise you would have visited me with your partner. As you see, unfortunately I have some small knowledge of police work.”
His voice was still weary and in the deadness of the empty store very clear. “Although I hold a gun on you, Wintino, this is not necessarily an unfriendly conversation. We shall—”
“Sure, you're doing me a big favor. I get knocked off in a store instead of in an alley like Owens got his!” My voice was back to normal.
He smiled, a very tired smile. “Your bravado has returned —fine. Only don't let it go to your head, you'll have need for some clear thinking. As for Owens—I didn't kill him. I wouldn't be here now except I suspected you realized the blunder I made in my office.”
“Yeah?” I said, trying to stall for time, to think.
He belched slightly,- there was a light odor of whisky. “Whether you are pretending innocence or not doesn't matter now. When you asked about the check, I'd thought all along that Wales had forged it, that's why I had to shoot him. A sad error, perhaps my undoing. I completely misjudged Wales. He was an honest and intelligent man.”
I felt as if I'd got a shot in the arm, even the heavy meal in my belly seemed to have digested. One word kept banging in my brain, clearing the cobwebs—forged. Wren had sued a bank for a forged check at the time when Wales' wife had run up a big hospital bill. I said, “You mean you thought it was Wales forging a second check?”
He blinked, or something happened behind those foggy glasses. “You are far smarter than I thought. So you know about that. Although Wales didn't forge the check—exactly. I'm going to tell you certain things not because I want to but because I sincerely don't wish to kill you.”
“You touch me—Bird!”
Another belch, the hairs of his mustache flying in the breeze. “Don't be stupid-brave, Wintino. That's all I ask of you. Listen to me and think, think like a man not like a kid. In the office I said something about live and let live. Perhaps you didn't pay any attention to it. Concentrate on it now, Wintino: live and let live. Keep running it over in your mind. It's a remarkable philosophy, the basic rule of our world. Self-preservation is said to be the first law of life, but we really protect ourselves by following the live- and-let-live rule. I'm not preaching to you, or talking about something abstract. I've found from bitter experience that all that stops our world from being more of a jungle than it is...”
I wasn't listening. Wales had been so right: keep digging. I had never bothered to check Wren's signature on the Parker check. Well, to hell with that now. The bathroom was small and he was in the doorway, less than three feet away. He'd be watching my right hand: by leaning forward I might be able to hook his fat belly with my left. The light was dim, if I fell forward to my right I might belt him fast enough to fall out of the line of fire.
“... So, if I can explain, you'll be able to understand what this is all about. I'm sorry you're so young, an older man would see the logic. Wales did. And Solly Kahn. I'm not a thug or—”
“Some logic! Wales is dead!”
“A rash mistake on my part, as I said. Perhaps that's why I'm talking to you—I don't want to make another mistake. You see, I don't know where one draws the line between criminal and noncriminal, or if there is such a line; when pressed everyone will turn to 'crime.' I'm going far afield, Wintino. The point is I graduated from college at the start of the depression. You work and sweat for an education and it all turns out to be a large zero, a—”
“Get down to facts. Why did you kill Wales?”
He shook his head gently. “Since I have the gun I will do the talking. I'm not trying to bully you, but cut the tough little brat line.”
“The big executive mans with a gun calls me a brat,” I said leaning toward him.
“Sit back, make yourself comfortable Wintino. And I know how to use a gun. Now, you never went through a depression. My engineering degree wasn't worth a damn. I was forced to work as a waiter, pearl diver, anything for a meal. While I was living in a cheap boarding house I met Solly Kahn. To you Solly is probably only a man with a record, to me he is a saint. He was a bootlegger and the trouble with bootlegging was the expense and risk of running the stuff in. A still in the city was hard to hide and—”
“And you made an electric one,” I cut in, watching the lights on his glasses.
“I did, and an excellent piece of engineering it was, a silent still. Solly and I started making money, big money for those hard times—nearly six thousand dollars.” Wren waved my gun in a small arc, as if making a big point. “I was a bootlegger, breaking the law, if you wish, but I'd found laws are a fraud. I lived by a law that said if you work hard you get ahead and if it wasn't for Solly I'd have been selling apples on a corner. I suppose you think you know the rest?”
“Sure I do. Kahn gunned Boots Brenner when he tried to muscle in,” I said. I had a sudden uneasy feeling, neither fear nor anger, but kind of as if I was watching something, as if I was seeing myself on a stage.
“The obvious details. Solly shot this thug in self-defense. We were sure he wouldn't get the chair. But the gun was mine, I had a permit for it. When he was caught Solly carefully hid the weapon behind a loose brick in the wall. I was—”
“That's what Wales was searching for all those years,” I cut in.
Again that tired smile. “You are more thorough than I imagined. Yes, the gun was hidden and Solly never talked, not even when facing the chair. You see I wasn't around the plant much, I was still seeking that token of respectability and security, a job at my profession. And Solly, who never had been inside a college, demonstrated the highest intelligence, he didn't see any sense in incriminating me. What good would it do? Can you understand that?” He paused, his stomach rumbling. “Tell me, Detective, what good would it have done? Would justice have been served any better? Would anything be gained by ruining me? Tell me, Wintino, what would you have done if you had found the gun?”
“Arrested you as an accessory to the crime. You would have had your day in court.”
“My day in court? When there weren't any jobs for engineers what chance would I have had, what future, smeared and with a criminal record? That's the real fact of the matter and Solly realized that. Live and let live. He let me live. It was his money, his and mine, that enabled me to start my factory. Sal Kahn, a true human being. I've never forgotten him.”
“I know, that monthly registered letter to his mother.”
Wren stared at me, his glasses like two dull headlights. “You're too smart, I certainly didn't make any mistake seeing you, Wintino.”
“You still made a mistake,” I said, closing my eyes for a second. The light en those thick lenses seemed to hypnotize me. “Pointing a gun at a cop is a big mistake.”
“I'm not talking to a cop but to a human being. I trust the gun will never enter our conversation. But let me remind you this is a vacant store and the gun will be your gun. Naturally I have set up an alibi, not to mention the fact that I am a successful manufacturer —we are rarely accused of such things as murder. Now, I don't know how long we may have... uh... privacy here, so let me finish. We both will have an important decision to reach then.”
“You have the gun, talk.” I relaxed against the tank of the toilet. I still felt I had a chance of belting him but I wanted to hear him talk. I kept toy eyes on my gun—away from his glasses.
“Kahn did the human thing, let me live when there was no point in hurting me. The missing gun was a big item at the trial, although it wouldn't have made any difference in the verdict. Al Wales was one of those lucky people who never work—they enjoy their job and hence it ceases to be work. He never gave up searching for the gun in the old building. Naturally I avoided the place although I wondered about the gun too. I had nightmares over it for many years— the serial number would point at me. Well, Wales did find the gun and he was an intelligent man too. He realized I had nothing to do with the actual killing, that I had used the money to build my factory; I had gone straight—to use a trite phrase that has no meaning. So even though he at last had the evidence he had hunted for over many years, he did nothing about it. Live and let live.”
“Wales isn't living.”
“I've told you I made a stupid error,” Wren said, his voice coming alive with anger. “Wales didn't use his evidence because he was a sensible man like Solly who—”
“And they're both dead.”
“Wintino, stop talking like a phonograph record. Yes, they are dead and you and I are alive and want to stay that way. In 1949, years after he found the gun, Wales did another intelligent thing. He needed money for an operation on his wife and came to me. Understand, it wasn't blackmail, but live and let live. He needed help in his living. We talked things over, much as we are—”
“You hold a gun on him too?”
“Wales was a mature man, guns weren't necessary. As it happened, I didn't have any cash handy. I'd been expanding rapidly. However, I felt my obligation to Wales so we both hit upon the idea of letting a bank give Wales the money. It was rather a neat idea, one that my business situation made ideal.”
There was another tired grin. I looked at his eyes. Then at the street light on the gun barrel. I counted the buttons on his coat, a left beside the last button would kayo him. Even if he shot me, I'd have a chance to grab my gun.
The silence in the coffin-like room was heavy and I glanced at his eyes. The glasses seemed to bore into my eyes. I had this feeling again that I was watching a movie.
Wren said, “I was waiting to see if you had caught on to our scheme—you'd be a genius if you had. I will tell you about it
