“Nobody’s looking for me,” he snarled, but it lacked conviction.
“Then you won’t mind if I do just that. Can’t hurt anybody.”
I began to get up. The girl started, and put a hand to her mouth.
“Mac——” she said urgently.
McCann stood in front of me bouncing his right fist inside the open left palm. My jaw began to twitch in anticipation. Then he snorted with exasperation and turned away. My jaw was grateful.
“What’s the use?” he said disgustedly. “So I belt him around, so what does it get me? I know I’m not going to knock him off. And so does he. Right, Preston?”
“I think so Legs. I never heard of you taking up that kind of work.”
“Nah.”
He held up his fists, gnarled and knotted, and turned them round for everybody to inspect.
“This is me. I don’t go for the rods and all that jewelry. I lean on somebody, all right. If he’s quick enough on his feet, maybe he gets a coupla pokes at me, too. That’s fair.”
Shiralee’s face was a study in bewilderment.
“I don’t get it, Mac. What is it you’re trying to say?”
I grinned at her.
“What he’s saying lady is, there’s no profit in taking a swing at me. If I’m going to talk, I’m going to talk, and no punch on the jaw is going to stop me. The only way to be sure of me, is to kill me. And that is not McCann’s style.”
“Oh.”
She nodded in such a way as to indicate she still had no idea what we were raving about. But there was something about the way she looked at him, not at all the way I’d expect a midnight fan dancer to look at any man. It was my turn to be puzzled.
“So what are you waiting for?” barked McCann. “Run away and peddle your dirt.”
I hesitated.
“I don’t know. Maybe not. How about it, Legs? You trade me a little information, and I’ll forget I ever saw you.”
“No deal,” he said automatically.
“Aw Mac, honey,” she appealed.
She walked across and put her arms round him.
“What harm can it do?” she wheedled. “You’re all right here, have been so far. Maybe this guy can do some good, help get things sorted out. Then you’d be off the hook, wouldn’t you? You can’t stick in the apartment for ever.”
“I ain’t gonna turn into no fink,” he said stubbornly.
“Nobody asked you to,” I butted in. “All I need is whatever information you have.”
He thought for a moment then shrugged her arms away from him.
“What kind information?”
She nodded eagerly, as though the question made everything come out right in the end. I lit an Old Favorite from the stub of the last one. I have to do something about all this smoking.
“Did you hear the radio this morning?”
“No.”
“Then open up that newspaper.”
The paper was folded so as to show the Flower murder with its repulp of the Brookman killing. Wonderingly, McCann took it from Pook’s outstretched hand and unfolded it. Underneath the fold was the story about the shooting of Jake Martello. He took in breath quickly when he saw the picture, looking at me at the same time.
“Read it,” I suggested.
His eyes scanned quickly down the page. By the time he reached the bottom, he was again chewing vigorously at his lower lip.
“It says you were there,” he accused.
“Right. I’m probably lucky that isn’t my picture you’re looking at. Another foot to the right, and I would have collected that slug.”
Shiralee took the paper from his unresisting ringers.
“So somebody shot Jake Martello. Where does that get us?”
But the words had no bite. The story meant something to him.
“All right, let’s take a flyer,” I said. “I’ll tell you what I think. I think Jake was the one who told you to scare hell out of Brookman. I think it was his three grand. I think Brookman was about due to pay back and you probably knew it. Brookman was bumped off, the money disappeared. As soon as you heard about it, you got to thinking Jake might figure you killed him for the money, Jake’s money. And you would know, we all know, what Jake would do if he thought anybody crossed him up that way. So you went missing.”
“And that’s the way you work it out?”
“Makes a kind of sense. Makes as much sense as any other part of this crazy deal.”
He went and rested his hands on a table, leaning forward as though there was a great weight on his back.
“Where were you last night, Legs?”
He shot round quickly.
“Now, wait a minute.”
“Why? You killed Brookman, stole the money. The guy after you was Jake Martello. Problem, what to do? Answer, knock off Jake, then everything is the way it was before. Except, now you have a stake.” He shook his head violently, as though repetition added weight to the denial.
“Crazy, you’re crazy. Why, I was here the whole time last night. I haven’t been outa this place in nearly two days. Why would I want to kill Jake? The guy’s a friend of mine.”
“Next to a woman, nothing comes between friends like money,” I told him pompously.
“No listen, will ya? You’re talking crazy. What’re you trying to do to me?”
“Nothing. You could be doing it yourself, hiding away like this.”
He gave a resigned laugh.
“The way you stack it up, I don’t have any cards.”
“Not if you did it, you don’t,” I agreed. “And I won’t do anything to help you. But if it wasn’t you, you ought to have sense enough to tell me anything that might help me get you off the hook.”
He looked at me, then at the girl.
“Honey, step outside and make some more coffee huh?”
When she’d gone he came over and sat down, speaking in a low tone.
“You got part of the story, Preston. I was working for Jake when I put
