“How long do you think it’ll be before one of Nick’s suckers in one of the towns we’ve played starts to talk?” Stan demanded.
Tom inspected the small gun and swung the muzzle toward Stan. “Never in this here world thought I’d end up killing both you boys,” he said with a harsh giggle.
Stan’s mouth went suddenly dry. “There’s a thirty-eight aimed right at your head, Tom,” he said. “Lieutenant Bandred is in the closet with the door opened just far enough. Come on out, Lieutenant.”
The lean dark man stepped out of the closet and took the small automatic out of Thomas Gaylord Schurtz’s limp hand. “Sure glad we were able to clean this up before you got out of town, Mr. Schurtz. All this makes me feel better about it happening here, though.” He turned to Stan and said, “You cut it pretty close, Haverly.”
“I had to. He didn’t admit it until the last. And there wasn’t any real proof.” Tom sat collapsed in the chair, staring at the far wall. The brass had gone out of his voice as he said, “Right on almost everything. Except I didn’t want to kill Nick. He wanted another two hundred a week. Said he had to have it. He laughed at me. There was a piece of pipe in the alley—”
After Tom had been taken away, Stan told Mary Adams. She sat in numb apathy until the shock dissolved itself into tears, accompanied by sobs that shook her heavily. He went over to her and after a while her sobs were less violent, and she took his hand and held it tightly.