“Lots of reasons. First place, Max wouldn’t have done it himself. He’d have had somebody else do it, and he’d have been way off with an alibi nobody could shake. Second place, Max carries a .38, and anybody he sent to do the job would have had that much gun or more. What kind of a gunman would use a .32?”
“Then who did it?”
“I’ve told you all I know,” she said. “I’ve told you too much.”
I stood up and said:
“No, you’ve told me just exactly enough.”
“You mean you think you know who killed him?”
“Yeah, though there’s a couple of things I’ll have to cover before I make the pinch.”
“Who? Who?” She stood up, suddenly almost sober, tugging at my lapels. “Tell me who did it.”
“Not now.”
“Be a good guy.”
“Not now.”
She let go my lapels, put her hands behind her, and laughed in my face.
“All right. Keep it to yourself—and try to figure out which part of what I told you is the truth.”
I said:
“Thanks for the part that is, anyhow, and for the gin. And if Max Thaler means anything to you, you ought to pass him the word that Noonan’s