Half an hour of this convinced me that I wasn’t going to get much information about my people here.
I went to the phone in the passageway and called the agency. The boy on the switchboard told me MacMan was in the operatives’ room. I asked to have him sent up to me, and went back to the living-room. Joe and Peggy took their heads apart when I came in.
MacMan arrived in less than ten minutes. I let him in and told him:
“This fellow says his name’s Joe Wales, and the girl’s supposed to be Peggy Carroll who lives upstairs in 421. We’ve got them cold for conspiracy to defraud, but I’ve made a deal with them. I’m going out to look at it now. Stay here with them, in this room. Nobody goes in or out, and nobody but you gets to the phone. There’s a fire-escape in front of the window. The window’s locked now. I’d keep it that way. If the deal turns out OK we’ll let them go, but if they cut up on you while I’m gone there’s no reason why you can’t knock them around as much as you want.”
MacMan nodded his hard round head and pulled a chair out between them and the door. I picked up my hat.
Joe Wales called:
“Hey, you’re not going to uncover me to Babe, are you? That’s got to be part of the deal.”
“Not unless I have to.”
“I’d just as leave stand the rap,” he said. “I’d be safer in jail.”
“I’ll give you the best break I can,” I promised, “but you’ll have to take what’s dealt you.”