Cairo asked bitterly: “Don’t you think you’ve done enough to him without that?”
Spade said: “No.”
Cairo left the sofa and went close to the fat man. “Please don’t do this thing, Mr. Gutman,” he begged. “You must realize that—”
Spade interrupted him: “That’s settled. The question is, what are you going to do about it? Coming in? Or getting out?”
Though Gutman’s smile was a bit sad, even wistful in its way, he nodded his head. “I don’t like it either,” he told the Levantine, “but we can’t help ourselves now. We really can’t.”
Spade asked: “What are you doing, Cairo? In or out?”
Cairo wet his lips and turned slowly to face Spade. “Suppose,” he said, and swallowed. “Have I—? Can I choose?”
“You can,” Spade assured him seriously, “but you ought to know that if the answer is ‘out’ we’ll give you to the police with your boyfriend.”
“Oh, come, Mr. Spade,” Gutman protested, “that is not—”
“Like hell we’ll let him walk out on us,” Spade said. “He’ll either come in or he’ll go in. We can’t have a lot of loose ends hanging around.” He scowled at Gutman and burst out irritably: “Jesus God! is this the first thing you guys ever stole? You’re a fine lot of lollipops! What are you going to do next—get down and pray?” He directed his scowl at Cairo. “Well? Which?”
“You give me no choice.” Cairo’s narrow shoulders moved in a hopeless shrug. “I come in.”