Part 26 (2/2)
”Young man, I might say that I do not look with great antic.i.p.ation on basing my case on the a.s.sumption that somebody entered your apartment while you were sleeping and put the body in your closet.”
”That's what happened!”
”Kindly stop repeating yourself. I accept that. Let me see. May. I'll have until early December to prepare.”
”December! Can you get me out of here?”
”There is no bail for a first degree charge. You remain here until then.” He looked around the cell and sniffed.
He said, ”Of course we can see that they make you a good deal more comfortable than this.”
”Kruslov and his people knocked me around a lot. Can you make anything out of that?”
”I doubt it. If you had signed a confession we could start thinking about physical duress. But you signed nothing, so we'll just have to forget that. My fee, young man, will be five thousand dollars, plus expenses if I should decide to employ an investigator.”
”That's a lot of money.”
”I'm a lot of lawyer, young man.”
I grinned at him.
”Okay.”
”I will do some thinking and review the facts we have and come back and bring a tape recorder and we'll go into this in detail, young man.”
”What happened to... Miss Mac Rae my secretary?
I'm anxious to keep her out of this.”
”That investigator, France, reported where he had found you. Kruslov had her brought in. She was here when they brought you in. Kruslov was willing to be convinced that she had no part at all in the murder. He knows her father, and I guess his brother knows her. He talked to France about it. So the papers didn't get it yet. But I think they will when it comes to trial. The prosecution will want to show that you acted like a guilty man. That includes hiding, and whoever hid you.”
”The company will fire her.”
He looked at me sadly.
”They're not likely to give you a medal, Mr. Sewell.”
At about six o'clock they took me to the same room, that shabby defeated room with its smell of violence, where they had roughed me up. Toni was waiting there for me. They closed the door and left us alone. I suspected the influence of Jerry Hyers in that nice arrangement.
We kissed and both talked at once and kissed again.
She put gentle fingertips against my swollen face and cried about that, and about us and about the whole miserable mess.
”It can't be true, Glint. It's hideous. It can't really be true.”
”Part of it was true.”
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