“Uh-huh, for killing Tim.”
“You know who killed Tim?”
“Huh? Sure, he did.”
“You did.”
“Huh? What’s the matter? You simple?”
“There’s a gun in my left hand,” I warned him.
“But look here–didn’t he tell the broad that Whisper done it? What’s the matter with you?”
“He didn’t say Whisper. I’ve heard women call Thaler Max, but I’ve never heard a man here call him anything but Whisper. Tim didn’t say Max. He said MacS–the first part of MacSwain–and died before he could finish it. Don’t forget about the gun.”
“What would I have killed him for? He was after Whisper’s–”
“I haven’t got around to that yet,” I admitted, “but let’s see: You and your wife had busted up. Tim was a ladies’ man, wasn’t he? Maybe there’s something there. I’ll have to look it up. What started me thinking about you was that you never tried to get any more money out of the girl.”
“Cut it out,” he begged. “You know there ain’t any sense to it. What would I have hung around afterwards for? I’d have been out getting an alibi, like Whisper.”
“Why? You were a dick then. Close by was the spot for you–to see that everything went right–handle it yourself.”
“You know damned well it don’t hang together, don’t make sense. Cut it out, for God’s sake.”
“I don’t mind how goofy it is,” I said. “It’s something to put to Noonan when we get back. He’s likely all broken up over Whisper’s crush-out. This will take his mind off it.”
MacSwain got down on his knees in the muddy alley and cried:
“Oh, Christ, no! He’d croak me with his hands.”
“Get up and stop yelling,” I growled. “Now will you give it to me straight?”
He whined: “He’d croak me with his hands.”
“Suit yourself. If you won’t talk, I will, to Noonan. If you’ll come through to me, I’ll do what I can for you.”
“What can you do?” he asked hopelessly, and started sniveling again. “How do I know you’ll try to do anything?”
I risked a little truth on him:
“You said you had a hunch what I’m up to here in Poisonville. Then you ought to know that it’s my play to keep Noonan and Whisper split. Letting Noonan think Whisper killed Tim will keep them split. But if you don’t want to play with me, come on, we’ll play with Noonan.”
“You mean you won’t tell him?” he asked eagerly. “You promise?”
“I promise, you nothing,” I said. “Why should I? I’ve got you with your pants down. Talk to me or Noonan. And make up your mind quick. I’m not going to stand here all night.”
He made up his mind to talk to me.
“I don’t know how much you know, but it was like you said, my wife fell for Tim. That’s what put me on the tramp. You can ask anybody if I wasn’t a good guy before that. I was this way: what she wanted I wanted her to have. Mostly what she wanted was tough on me. But I couldn’t be any other way. We’d have been a damned sight better off if I could. So I let her move out and put in divorce papers, so she could marry him, thinking he meant to.
“Pretty soon I begin to hear he’s chasing this Myrtle Jennison. I couldn’t go that. I’d given him his chance with Helen, fair and square. Now he was giving her the air for this Myrtle. I wasn’t going to stand for that. Helen wasn’t no hanky-panky. It was accidental, though, running into him at the Lake that night. When I saw him go down to them summer houses I went after him. That looked like a good quiet place to have it out.
“I guess we’d both had a little something to drink. Anyway, we had it hot and heavy. When it got too hot for him, he pulled the gun. He was yellow. I grabbed it, and in the tussle it went off. I swear to God I didn’t shoot him except like that. It went off while the both of us had our hands on it. I beat it back in some bushes. But when I got in the bushes I could hear him moaning and talking. There was people coming–a girl running down from the hotel, that Myrtle Jennison.