"I-don't believe that."
"You will, before I get done. Now listen Huff. I'm still shy something. I'm shy one link. They put you on the spot for something you could testify to when this suit comes up, I can see that. But what?"
"What do you mean, what?"
"What is it you know about them they would knock you off for? Their being in your office, that's not enough. There must be something else. Now what is it?"
"I-don't know. I can't think of anything."
"There's something. Maybe it's something you've forgotten about, something that doesn't mean anything to you but is important to them. Now what is it?"
"There's nothing. There can't be."
"There's something. There must be."
He was walking around now. I could feel the bed shake from his weight. "Keep it on your mind, Huff. We've got a few days. Try to think what it is."
He lit a cigarette, and pounded around some more. "That's the beauty of this, we've got a few days. You can't appear at a hearing until next week at the earliest, and that gives us what we need. A little help from the cops, a few treatments with the rubber hose, something like that, and sooner or later this pair is going to spill it. Especially that girl. She'll crack before long…Believe me this is what we've been waiting for. It's tough on you, but now we've got them where we can really throw the works into them. Oh yeah, this is a real break. We'll clean this case up now. Before night, with luck."
I closed my eyes. I couldn't think of anything but Lola, a lot of cops around her, maybe beating her up, trying to make her spill something that she knew no more about than the man in the moon. Her face jumped in front of me and all of a sudden something hit it in the mouth, and it started to bleed.
"Keyes."
"Yeah?"
"There was something. Now you speak of it."
"I'm listening boy."
"I killed Nirdlinger."
Chapter 13
He sat there staring at me. I had told him everything he needed to know, even about Lola. It seemed funny it had only taken about ten minutes. Then he got up. I grabbed him.
"Keyes."
"I've got to go, Huff."
"See that they don't beat her."
"I've got to go now. I'll be back after a while."
"Keyes, if you let them beat her, I'll-kill you. You've got it all now. I've told you, and I've told you for one reason and one reason only. It's so they won't beat her. You've got to promise me that. You owe me that much. Keyes-"
He shook my hand off and left.
While I was telling him I hoped for some kind of peace when I got done. It had been bottled up in me a long time. I had been sleeping with it, dreaming about it, breathing with it. I didn't get any peace. The only thing I could think of was Lola, and how she was going to find out about it at last, and knew me for what I was.
About three o'clock the orderly came in with the afternoon papers. They didn't have any of what I had told Keyes. But they had been digging into their files, after the morning story, and they had it about the first Mrs. Nirdlinger's death, and Nirdlinger's death, and now me being shot. A woman feature writer had got in out there and talked with Phyllis. It was she that called it the House of Death, and put in about those blood-red drapes. Once I saw that stuff I knew it wouldn't be long. That meant even a dumb cluck of a woman reporter could see there was something funny out there.
It was half past eight that night before Keyes came back. He shooed out the nurse as soon as he came in the room, and then went out a minute. When he came back he had Norton with him, and a man named Keswick that was a corporation lawyer they called in on big cases, and Shapiro, the regular head of the legal department. They all stood around, and it was Norton that started to speak. "Huff."
"Yes sir."
"Have you told anybody about this?"
"Nobody but Keyes."
"Nobody else?"
"Not a soul…God, no."
"There have been no policemen here?"
"They've been here. I saw them out in the hall. I guess it was me they were whispering about. The nurse wouldn't let them in."
They all looked at each other. "Then I guess we can begin. Keyes, perhaps you had better explain it to him."
Keyes opened his mouth to say something, but Keswick shut him up, and got Norton into a corner. Then they called Keyes over. Then they called Shapiro. I could catch a word, now and then. It was some kind of a proposition they were going to make me, and it was a question of whether they were all going to be witnesses. Keswick was for the proposition, but he didn't want anybody to be able to say he had been in on it. They finally settled it that Keyes would make it on his own personal responsibility, and the rest of them wouldn't be there. Then they all tip-toed out. They didn't even say good-bye. It was funny. They didn't act like I had played them or the company any particularly dirty trick. They acted like I was some kind of an animal that had an awful sore on his face, and they didn't even want to look at it.
After they left Keyes sat down. "This is an awful thing you've done, Huff."
"I know it."
"I guess there's no need my saying more about that part."
"No, no need."
"I'm sorry. I've-kind of liked you, Huff."
"I know. Same here."
"I don't often like somebody. At my trade, you can't afford to. The whole human race looks-a little bit crooked."
"I know. You trusted me, and I let you down."
"Well-we won't talk about it."
"There's nothing to say…Did you see her?"
"Yes. I saw them all. Him, her, and the wife."
"What did she say?"
"Nothing…I didn't tell her, you see. I let her do the talking. She thinks Sachetti shot you."
"For what?"
"Jealousy."
"Oh."
"She's upset about you. But when she found out you weren't badly hurt, she-. Well, she-"
"-Was glad of it."
"In a way. She tried not to be. But she felt that it proved Sachetti loved her. She couldn't help it."
"I see."
"She was worried about you, though. She likes you."
"Yeah, I know. She…likes me."
"She was following you. She thought you were him. That was all there was to that."
"I figured that out."
"I talked to him."
"Oh yeah, you told me. What was he doing there?"
He did some more of his pounding around then. The night light over my head was the only light in the room. I could only half see him, but I could feel the bed shake when he marched.
"Huff, there's a story."
"Yeah? How do you mean?"
"You just got yourself tangled up with an Irrawaddy cobra, that's all. That woman-it makes my blood run cold just to think of her. She's a pathological case, that's all. The worst I ever heard of."
"A what?"
"They've got a name for it. You ought to read more of this modern psychology, Huff. I do. I wouldn't tell Norton. He'd think I was going high-brow or something. I find it helpful though. There's plenty of stuff in my field where it's the only thing that explains what they do. It's depressing, but it clears up things."
"I still don't get it."
"You will…Sachetti wasn't in love with her."
"No?"
"He's known her. Five or six years. His father was a doctor. He had a sanatorium up in the Verdugo Hills about a quarter mile from this place where she was head nurse."
"Oh yeah. I remember about that."