Part 6 (1/2)
”Where were you?”
”I atching through a crack in theI knew there was soive me some old clothes for charity”
”Were she and Johnny members of your church?”
”They called the Joe Pullen was a member, but they never coer saw that Brody didn't get it, so he explained ”It's a Holy Roller church When the et happy they roll about on the floor”
”With one another's wives,” Coffin Ed added
Brody's face went sort of slack, and the police reporter stopped writing to stare open-er amended ”They just roll about on the floor and have convulsions, singly and in pairs”
The reporter looked disappointed
”Ahe his throat ”So when you first looked out of theyou saw Val's body lying in the bread basket with the knife sticking in it And you recognized the knife as the saive to Dulcy Perry?”
”There wasn't any bread there then,” Reverend Short stated
Sergeant Brody blinked ”What was there if there wasn't any bread?”
”There was a colored cop and a whitea thief”
”Ah, so you saw that,” Brody said, finally getting soible to put his teeth into ”Then youcommitted”
”I saw her stab him,” Reverend Short declared
”You couldn't have seen her because she hadn't left the flat then,” Brody said
”I didn't see it then I was pushed out of thethen I didn't see it until after I had returned to the room”
”Returned to what room?”
”The room where the casket was”
Brody stared at hian to redden ”Listen, Reverend,” he warned ”This is serious This is a ation This is no place to joke”
”I'ht, then, you htened his back and stared at Brody indignantly
”I saw it in a vision”
”And it was in this vision you saw yourself pushed out of the ?”
”It was after I was pushed out of thethat I had the vision”
”Do you have these visions often?”
”Regularly, and they're always true”
”All right, then how did she kill him--in your vision, that is?”
”She went downstairs on the elevator, and when she went outside there was Valentine Haines lying in the basket where I had fallen--”
”I thought you said there wasn't any basket?”
”There wasn't at the time, but the body of Christ had turned into a basket of bread, and it was in this bread that he was lying when she took the knife from her pocketbook and went up to hi there?”
”He was lying there, waiting for her to come out”
”And stab him, I suppose”
”He didn't expect her to stab hiht I don't buy any of that Did you see anyone actually leave the house--that is actually see them--while you were downstairs?”
”My eyes were veiled I knew a vision was coo,” Brody said, looking over the contents of Reverend Short's pockets lying on the desk before hiospel you haven't been very cooperative”
Reverend Short didn't move
Brody pushed the pocket Bible, handkerchief, bunch of keys and wallet across the desk, hesitated over the bottle of medicine and on sudden impulse drew the cork and smelled it He looked startled He tilted it to his lips and tasted it, spat it out on the floor
”Jesus Christ!” he exclaimed ”Peach brandy and laudanum You drink this stuff?”
”It's for my nerves,” Reverend Short said
”For your visions, you mean If I drank this stuff I'd have visions, too” To the cops Brody said disgustedly, ”Take hian to screaet away! Arrest her! Burn her! She's a witch! She's in collusion with the devil! And chink's her accomplice!”
”We'll take care of her,” one of the cops cajoled as they lifted hiot just the place for witches_and wizards, too, so you'd better look out”
Reverend Short broke frorasp and fell to the floor He rolled and threshed about convulsively, frothing at thea fit
”I see what you mean by Holy Roller,” Brody said
The police reporter snickered
”No, this is probably a vision coht face
Brody looked at him sharply