genuine.
'Try telling the facts,' Dundy suggested.
'The facts?' Cairo's eyes fidgeted, though their gaze did not actually leave the Lieutenant's. 'What assurance have I that the facts will he believed?'
'Quit stalling. All you've got to do is swear to a complaint that they took a poke at you and the warrant- clerk will believe you enough to issue a warrant that'll let us throw them in the can.'
Spade spoke in an amused tone: 'Go ahead, Cairo. Make him happy. Tell him you'll do it, and then we'll swear to one against you, and he'll have the lot of us.'
Cairo cleared his throat and looked nervously around the room, not into the eyes of anyone there.
Dundy blew breath through his nose in a puff that was not quite a snort and said: 'Get your hats.'
Cairo's eyes, holding worry and a question, met Spade's mocking gaze. Spade winked at him and sat on the arni of the padded rocker. 'Well, boys amid girls,' he said, grinning at the Levantine and at time girl with nothing but delight in his voice and grin, 'we put it over nicely.'
Dundy's hard square face darkened the least of shades. He repeated peremptorily: 'Get your hats.'
Spade turned his grin on the Lieutenant, squirmed into a more comfortable position on the chair-arm and asked lazily: 'Don't you know when you're lacing kidded?'
Tom Polhaus's face became red and shiny.
Dundy's face, still darkening, was immobile except for hips moving stiffly to say: 'No, but we'll let that wait till we get down to the Hall.'
Spade rose and put his hands in his trousers-pockets. He stood erect so he might hook that much farther down at the Lieutenant. His grin was a taunt and self-certainty spoke in every line of his posture.
'I dare you to take us in, Dundy,' he said. 'We'll laugh at you in every newspaper in San Francisco. You don't think any of us is going to swear to any complaints against tIme others, do you? Wake up. You've been kidded. When the bell rang I said to Miss O'Shaughnessy and Cairo: 'It's those damned bulls again. They're getting to be nuisances. Let's play a joke on them. When you hear them going one of you scream, and then we'll see how far we can string them along before they tumble.' And—'
Brigid O'Shaughnessy bent forward in her chair and began to laugh hysterically.
Cairo started and smiled. There was no vitality in his smile, but he held it fixed on his face.
Tom, glowering, grumbled: 'Cut it out, Sam.'
Spade chuckled and said: 'But that's the way it was. 'We—'
'And the cut on his head and mouth?' Dundy asked scornfully. 'Where'd they come from?'
'Ask him,' Spade suggested. 'Maybe he cut himself shaving.'
Cairo spoke quickly, before he could be questioned, and the muscles of his face quivered under the strain of holding his smile in place while he spoke. 'I fell. We intended to be struggling for the pistol when you came in, but I fell. I tripped on the end of the rug and fell while we were pretending to struggle.'
Dundy said: 'Horse feathers.'
Spade said: 'That's all right, Dundy, believe it or not. The point is that that's our story and we'll stick to it. The newspapers will print it whether they believe it or not, and it'll be just as funny one way as the other, or more so. What are you going to do about it? It's no crime to kid a copper, is it? You haven't got anything on anybody here. Everything we told you was part of the joke. What are you going to do about it?'
Dundy put his back to Spade and gripped Cairo by the shoulders. 'You can't get away with that,' he snarled, shaking the Levantine. 'You belched for help and you've got to take it.'
'No, sir,' Cairo sputtered. 'It was a joke. He said you were friends of his and w'ould understand.'
Spade laughed.
Dundy pulled Cairo roughly around, holding him now by one wrist and the nape of his neck. 'I'll take you along for packing the gun, anyway,' he said. 'And I'll take the rest of you along to see who laughs at the joke.'
Cairo's alarmed eyes jerked sidewise to focus on Spade's face.
Spade said: 'Don't be a sap, Dundy. The gun was part of the plant. It's one of mine.' He laughed. 'Too bad it's only a thirty-two, or maybe you could find it was the one Thursby and Miles were shot with.'
Dundy released Cairo, spun on his heel, and his right fist clicked on Spade's chin.
Brigid O'Shaughnessy uttered a short cry.
Spade's smile flickered out at the instant of the impact, but returned immediately with a dreamy quality added. He steadied himself with a short backward step and his thick sloping shoulders writhed under his coat. Before his fist could come up Tom Polhaus had pushed himself between the two men, facing Spade, encumbering Spade's arms with the closeness of his barrel-like belly and his own arms.
'No, no, for Christ's sake!' Tom begged.
After a long moment of motionlessness Spade's muscles relaxed. 'Then get him out of here quick,' he said. His smile had gone away again, leaving his face sullen and somewhat pale.
Tom, staying close to Spade, keeping his arms on Spade's arms, turned his head to hook over his shoulder at Lieutenant Dundy. Tom's small eyes were reproachful.
Dundy's fists w'ere clenched in front of his body and his feet were planted firm and a little apart on the floor, but the truculence in his face was modified by thin rims of white showing between green irises and upper eyelids.
'Get their names and addresses,' he ordered.
Tom looked at Cairo, who said quickly: 'Joel Cairo, Hotel Belvedere.'
Spade spoke before Tom could question the girl. 'You can always get in touch with Miss O'Shaughnessy through me.'
Tom looked at Dundy. Dundy growled: 'Get her address.'
Spade said: 'Her address is in care of my office.'
Dundy took a step forward, halting in front of the girl. 'Where do you hive?' he asked.
Spade addressed Tom: 'Get him out of here. I've had enough of this.'
Tom hooked at Spade's eyes—hard and glittering—and mumbled: 'Take it easy, Sam.' He buttoned his coat and turned to Dundy, asking, in a voice that aped casualness, 'Well, is that all?' and taking a step towards the door.
Dundy's scowl failed to conceal indecision.
Cairo moved suddenly towards the door, saying: 'I'm going too, if Mr. Spade will be kind enough to give me my hat and coat.'
Spade asked: 'What's the hurry?'
Dundy said angrily: 'It was all in fun, but just the same you're afraid to be left here with them.'
'Not at all,' the Levantine replied, fidgeting, hooking at neither of them, 'but it's quite hate and—and I'm going. I'll go out with you if you don't mind.'
Dundy put his lips together firmly and said nothing. A light was glinting in his green eyes.
Spade went to the closet in the passageway and fetched Cairo's hat and coat. Spade's face was blank. His voice held the same blankness when he stepped back from helping the Levantine into his coat and said to Tom: 'Tell him to leave the gun.'
Dundy took Cairo's pistol from his overcoat-pocket and put it on the table. He went out first, with Cairo at his heels. Tom halted in front of Spade, muttering, 'I hope to God you know what you're doing,' got no response, sighed, and followed the others out. Spade went after them as far as the bend in the passageway, where he stood until Tom had closed the corridor-door.
IX.Brigid
Spade returned to the living-room and sat on an end of the sofa, ehbows on knees, cheeks in hands, hooking at the floor and not at Brigid O'Shaughnessy smiling weakly at him from the arnichair. His eyes were sultry. The creases between brows over his nose were deep. His nostrils moved in and out with his breathing.
Brigid O'Shaughnessv, when it became apparent that he was not going to look up at her, stopped smiling
