with the D.A. this afternoon,” he told Polhaus while they waited for his change.
“He send for you?”
“Yes.”
Polhaus pushed his chair back and stood up, a barrel-bellied tall man, solid and phlegmatic. “You won’t be doing me any favor,” he said, “by telling him I’ve talked to you like this.”
A lathy youth with salient ears ushered Spade into the District Attorney’s office. Spade went in smiling easily, saying easily: “Hello, Bryan!”
District Attorney Bryan stood up and held his hand out across his desk. He was a blond man of medium stature, perhaps forty-five years old, with aggressive blue eyes behind black-ribboned nose-glasses, the overlarge mouth of an orator, and a wide dimpled chin. When he said, “How do you do, Spade?” his voice was resonant with latent power.