“Max Thaler, you’re a lousy little—”
He whispered, very deliberately:
“Shut up and get out of the way.”
She surprised me by doing both, and she kept quiet while he spoke to me:
“So you and Noonan are trying to paste his brother’s death on me?”
“It doesn’t need pasting. It’s a natural.”
He curved his thin lips at me and said:
“You’re as crooked as he is.”
I said:
“You know better. I played your side when he tried to frame you. This time he’s got you copped to rights.”
Dinah Brand flared up again, waving her arms in the center of the room, storming:
“Get out of here, the whole lot of you. Why should I give a Goddamn about your troubles? Get out.”
The blond kid who had sapped Rolff squeezed past Jerry and came grinning into the room. He caught one of the girl’s flourished arms and bent it behind her.
She twisted toward him, socked him in the belly with her other fist. It was a very respectable wallop—man-size. It broke his grip on her arm, sent him back a couple of steps.