valise from under the bed. Out of the valise he took a pair of brass knuckles and a shiny revolver.
“Here! I want some information. I don’t want you to knock anybody off for me.”
“I don’t knock ’em,” he assured me, stuffing his weapons in his hip pockets. “Just carry these—maybe I need ’em.”
I let it go at that. If he wanted to make himself bowlegged carrying a ton of iron it was all right with me.
“Here’s what I want. Two of the servants ducked out of the house down there.” I described Yin Hung and Hoo Lun. “I want to find them. I want to find what anybody in Chinatown knows about the killings. I want to find who the dead women’s friends and relatives are, where they came from, and the same thing for the two men. I want to know about those strange Chinese—where they hang out, where they sleep, what they’re up to.
“Now, don’t try to get all this in a night. You’ll be doing fine if you get any of it in a week. Here’s twenty dollars. Five of it is your night’s pay. You can use the other to carry you around. Don’t be foolish and poke your nose into a lot of grief. Take it easy and see what you can turn up for me. I’ll drop in tomorrow.”
From the Filipino’s room I went to the office. Everybody except Fiske, the night man, was gone, but Fiske thought the Old Man would drop in for a few minutes later in the night.
I smoked, pretended to listen to Fiske’s report on all the jokes that were at the Orpheum that week, and grouched over my job. I was too well known to get anything on the quiet in Chinatown. I wasn’t sure Cipriano was going to be much help. I needed somebody who was in right down there.