Free Who Killed Bob Teal? and Other Stories by Dashiell Hammett Page B

chest.
    â€œNo! No!”
    â€œAll right,” I said. “I’ll answer it myself.”
    I untangled myself from her, got up and went into the passageway. She followed me. I tried again to persuade her to do the talking. She would not, although she didn’t object to my talking. I would have liked it better if whoever was downstairs didn’t learn that the woman wasn’t alone. But she was too stubborn in her refusal for me to do anything with her.
    â€œWell?” I said into the speaking-tube.
    â€œWho the hell are you?” a harsh, deep-chested voice asked.
    â€œWhat do you want?”
    â€œI want to talk to Inés.”
    â€œSpeak your piece to me,” I suggested, “and I’ll tell her about it.”
    The woman, holding one of my arms, had an ear close to the tube.
    â€œBillie, it is,” she whispered. “Tell him that he goes away.”
    â€œYou’re to go away,” I passed the message on.
    â€œYeah?” the voice grew harsher and deeper. “Will you open the door, or will I bust it in?”
    There wasn’t a bit of playfulness in the question. Without consulting the woman, I put a finger on the button that unlocks the street door.
    â€œWelcome,” I said into the tube.
    â€œHe’s coming up,” I explained to the woman. “Shall I stand behind the door and tap him on the skull when he comes in? Or do you want to talk to him first?”
    â€œDo not strike him!” she exclaimed. “It is Billie.”
    That suited me. I hadn’t intended putting the slug to him—not until I knew who and what he was, anyway. I had wanted to see what she would say.
    VII
    Billie wasn’t long getting up to us. I opened the door when he rang, the woman standing beside me. He didn’t wait for an invitation. He was through the doorway before I had the door half opened. He glared at me. There was plenty of him!
    A big, red-faced, red-haired bale of a man—big in any direction you measured him—and none of him was fat. The skin was off his nose, one cheek was clawed, the other swollen. His hatless head was a tangled mass of red hair. One pocket had been ripped out of his coat, and a button dangled on the end of a six-inch ribbon of torn cloth.
    This was the big heaver who had been in the taxicab with the woman.
    â€œWho’s this mutt?” he demanded, moving his big paws toward me.
    I knew the woman was a goof. It wouldn’t have surprised me if she had tried to feed me to the battered giant. But she didn’t. She put a hand on one of his and soothed him.
    â€œDo not be nasty, Billie. He is a friend. Without him I would not this night have escaped.”
    He scowled. Then his face straightened out and he caught her hand in both of his.
    â€œSo you got away it’s all right,” he said huskily. “I’d a done better if we’d been outside. There wasn’t no room in that taxi for me to turn around. And one of them guys crowned me.”
    That was funny. This big clown was apologizing for getting mangled up protecting a woman who had scooted, leaving him to get out as well as he could.
    The woman led him into the sitting-room, I tagging along behind. They sat on the bench. I picked out a chair that wasn’t in line with the window the Whosis Kid ought to be watching.
    â€œWhat did happen, Billie?” She touched his grooved cheek and skinned nose with her fingertips. “You are hurt.”
    He grinned with a sort of shamefaced delight. I saw that what I had taken for a swelling in one cheek was only a big hunk of chewing tobacco.
    â€œI don’t know all that happened,” he said. “One of ’em crowned me, and I didn’t wake up till a coupla hours afterwards. The taxi driver didn’t give me no help in the fight, but he was a right guy and knowed where his money would come from. He didn’t holler or nothing. He took me around to a doc that wouldn’t squawk,