“Who was he, and what was he up to?”
“I do not know, sir. There is four automobiles with men getting out of them into that cellar of which I tell you the strange Chinese live. After they are gone in, one man comes out. He wears his hat down over bandage on his upper face, and he walks away rapidly. I try to follow him, but he turns that corner, and where is he?”
“What time did all this happen?”
“Twelve o’clock, maybe.”
“Could it have been later than that, or earlier?”
“Yes, sir.”
My visitors, no doubt, and the man Cipriano had tried to shadow could have been the one I swatted. The Filipino hadn’t thought to get the license numbers of the automobiles. He didn’t know whether they had been driven by white men or Chinese, or even what make cars they were.
“You’ve done fine,” I assured him. “Try it again tonight. Take it easy, and you’ll get there.”
From him I went to a telephone and called the Hall of Justice. Dummy Uhl’s death had not been reported, I learned.
Twenty minutes later I was skinning my knuckles on Chang Li Ching’s front door.