XI.
The Fat Man
The telephone-bell was ringing when Spade returned to his office after sending Brigid O’Shaughnessy off to Effie Perine’s house. He went to the telephone.
“Hello Yes, this is Spade. . . . Yes, I got it. I’ve been waiting to hear from you. . . . Who? . . . Mr. Gutman? Oh, yes, sure! . . . Now–the sooner the better. . . . Twelve C. . . . Right. Say fifteen minutes. Right.”
Spade sat on the corner of his desk beside the telephone and rolled a cigarette. His mouth was a hard complacent v. His eyes, watching his fingers make the cigarette, smoldered over lower lids drawn up straight.
The door opened and Iva Archer came in.
Spade said, “Hello, honey,” in a voice as lightly amiable as his face had suddenly become.
“Oh, Sam, forgive me! forgive me!” she cried in a choked voice. She stood just inside the door, wadding a black-bordered handkerchief in her small gloved hands, peering into his face with frightened red and swollen eyes.
He did not get up from his seat on the desk-corner. He said: “Sure. That’s all right. Forget it.”
“But, Sam,” she wailed, “I sent those policemen there. I was mad, crazy with jealousy, and I phoned them that if they’d go there they’d learn something about Miles’s murder.”
“What made you think that?”
“Oh, I didn’t! But I was mad, Sam, and I wanted to hurt you.”
“It made things damned awkward.” He put his arm around her and drew her nearer. “But it’s all right now, only don’t get any more crazy notions like that.”
“I won’t,” she promised, “ever. But you weren’t nice to me last night. You were cold and distant and wanted to get rid of me, when I had come down there and waited so long to warn you, and you–”
“Warn me about what?”
“About Phil. He’s found out about–about you being in hove with me, and Miles had told him about my wanting a divorce, though of course he never knew what for, and now Phil thinks we–you killed his brother because he wouldn’t give me the divorce so we could get married. He told me he believed that, and yesterday he went and told the police.”
“That’s nice,” Spade said softly. “And you came to warn me, and because I was busy you got up on your ear and helped this damned Phil Archer stir things up.”
“I’m sorry,” she whimpered, “I know you won’t forgive me. I–I’m sorry, sorry, sorry.”
“You ought to be,” he agreed, “on your own account as well as mine. Has Dundy been to see you since Phil did his talking? Or anybody from the bureau?”
“No.” Alarm opened her eyes and mouth.
“They will,” he said, “and it’d be just as well to not let them find you here. Did you tell them who you were when you phoned?”
“Oh, no! I simply told them that if they’d go to your apartment right away they’d learn something about the murder and hung up.”
“Where’d you phone from?”
“The drug-store up above your place. Oh, Sam, dearest, I–”
He patted her, shoulder and said pleasantly: “It was a dumb trick, all right, but it’s done now. You’d better run along home and think up things to tell the police. You’ll be hearing from them. Maybe it’d be best to say ‘no’ right across the board.” He frowned at something distant. “Or maybe you’d better see Sid Wise first.” He removed his arm from around her, took a card out of his pocket, scribbled three lines on its back, and gave it to her. “You can tell Sid everything.” He frowned. “Or almost everything. Where were you the night Miles was shot?”
“Home,” she replied without hesitating.
He shook his head, grinning at her.
“I was,” she insisted.
“No,” he said, “but if that’s your story it’s all right with me. Go see Sid. It’s up on the next corner, the pinkish building, room eight-twentyseven.”
Her blue eyes tried to probe his yellow-grey ones. “What makes you think I wasn’t home?” she asked slowly.
“Nothing except that I know you weren’t.”