“I said that I would pass on your message, sir.”
“Gimme that drink,” said Tex Brandt, and grabbed and tossed down much Bourbon and little water. “If I weren’t standing here and listening, I wouldn’t believe this could be taking place,” he said.
“Oh, it happens every day,” declared Rollison lightly. “That the lot. Jolly?”
“Mr. Grice telephoned.”
“Ah.”
“He will be coming round this evening, sir, about half past eight, and asks that you leave a message for him if you will not be in.”
“Oh.”
“I just can’t bear this suspense,” said Tex, and held his glass in front of him as if he were likely to finish the drink at the next gulp. “Who is Mr. Grice?”
“Superintendent William Grice of New Scotland Yard,” Jolly informed him, and then paused slightly to indicate a change of subject, and added to Rollison: “Will you be in to dinner, sir?”
“Yes. All three of us.”
“Three?” ejaculated Tex. “Who’s the third?” he broke off, glanced at Jolly, finished his drink and dropped on to the arm of a chair. “I just don’t get it,” he said. “You look too feudal to sit down at the same table together. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not being rude, I’m just being American.”
“We quite understand,” said Jolly, and for the first time gave a slight emphasis to the one word. He bowed. “If there is nothing else, sir, I will prepare dinner.”
“Remember that all I had for lunch was a miniature pork pie and a pint,” said Rollison. He turned to Tex as Jolly went out, softly. “No,” he added firmly. “No what?” asked Tex, faintly.
“Jolly is not available for New York, Chicago, Miami Beach, Las Vegas or Hollywood.”
“I wouldn’t want Jolly,” asserted Tex. “I would want you.” He lit his cigarette and drew deeply on it, drained his glass as if forgetting that he had already emptied it, glanced at the bottle, and went on : “Would you mind telling me something?”
Rollison refilled his glass.
“Probably. What is it?”
“What made you think I might have killed the man Lodwin?”
“Because you also had the chance to kill the man Charlie,” answered Rollison, and handed him the glass.
Tex Brandt took it, but sat very still, and didn’t drink or speak for what seemed a long time. Rollison judged him to be rather older than he had seemed : in the middle-thirties. He was rather more handsome, too, and the colour of his hair was quite beautiful.
“So I could have gone back and killed him.”
“Or killed him before we left.”
“I didn’t.”
“You’ll have the police to satisfy, not me.”
“How easy will that be ?”
“It won’t be easy at all, once they know you’re around,” said Rollison. “So far I don’t think they’ve any idea, but I wouldn’t be too sure. We’ve a weak link in the chain.”
Tex drank Bourbon as if it were lemonade.
“Name of Morne,” he remarked.
“You know him ?”
“Sure, I know of him,” Tex said, and put his glass down, drew again on his cigarette and stubbed it out half- finished, then stood up and walked to the Trophy Wall; but he paid no attention to the weapons there, no attention even when he brushed past the hangman’s rope and set it swinging. “Mr. Rollison,” he said, and his voice seemed to be more noticeably from the Wild West, “I guess it’s time I told you more about myself and what I’m doing here. I told you that I came from New York to buy Selby Farm, and I’m working on behalf of a wealthy American. Maybe I forgot to say wealthy, but you’d guess that. He wouldn’t have used me unless he expected trouble, and he told me that someone else would try to buy the farm, and use Lodwin and maybe other guys. I was to stop them.” Slowly, Tex shook his head, and his eyes looked dazed. “Two guys have certainly been stopped,” he said. “No wonder you think I killed them.”
“I just think you might have.”
“Thanks. My client told me to be very careful of Lodwin, he was a psycho. From the way Lodwin talked to Miss Selby and tried to buy that farm, I guess my client was right. It was the corniest interview I’ve ever heard. Lodwin just told her she had to sell, and that was that. My client told me that the other guy who wanted to buy the farm would try to get it legally first, but would get it somehow, if he couldn’t buy it. He couldn’t buy, so he kidnapped Selby and then put pressure on Gillian through Lodwin.”
“You think Lodwin and Charlie both worked for the same man—your client’s rival?”
“Yes,” answered Tex.
“Who is this rival?”
“That I don’t know.”
“An American?”
