Frank looked at me. “I don’t know what time exactly. What time did I leave you, Johnny?”
“About eight-fifteen,” I said.
Marshall looked at me too. “You were with him last night?”
“Yeah. Until eight-fifteen. Maybe a little later.”
“I see,” Marshall said. “That would place Olsen in the apartment at about eight-twenty-five or eight-thirty. That’s the time the neighbors heard the shot. All right, Olsen, what happened when you discovered them together?”
Frank started talking in a low voice. He told about his suspicions of Lesser, about Alice’s coldness and about her backing out of going to Wisconsin with him. He told everything and it sounded fine. He built just the kind of story I was sure he would.
Then he said, “When I walked in they were sitting on the couch drinking. They both jumped up when they saw me. He had his coat off and she wasn’t wearing much besides one of those hostess gowns. I don’t know what I did. I yelled something at him and then I hit him. He fell down and I picked him up and hit him a few more times. Alice was pulling at my sleeve and yelling at me and I turned and slapped her, hard. She fell down against the couch. I just stood there for a while. If I had a gun I would have killed him. Then I got out. I just walked around — I don’t know how long — and then a squad car pulled up and a couple of cops jumped out. They brought me down to the station. That’s about all, I guess.”
When he got through Marshall said, “Very well, Olsen. I’ll check into all of that. The thing we have to do is place you somewhere else at the exact moment that shot was fired. If you didn’t fire the shot you must have been somewhere else. Possibly some one saw you on the street when the shot sounded. One connection like that and we can create a reasonable doubt in a jury’s mind and that’s all we need.
“One other thing. Don’t talk to anybody from now on. The police will bother you but tell them to see me if they want any information. You’ve been indicted and no one can talk to you or even see you without your permission. Remember that. I’ll be in to see you in a day or so.”
He stood up and said, “Olsen, I’ll be frank with you. The police have a good circumstantial case against you. Motive, opportunity, and by your own admission you were at the scene of the murder at approximately eight-thirty. That all adds up. If we go before a jury with that set-up against us I might not be able to help you. That is if you insist on a not-guilty plea. But if you take a guilty plea I could almost guarantee you an acquittal. Think it over. If you did do it, for Christ’s sake say so and we’ll have you out of here in a month.”
“I didn’t do it,” Frank said.
“All right, we’ll work on it from that angle then,” Marshall said. He looked at me. “Ready, Johnny?”
“Yeah.” I gave Frank a smile. “Don’t worry about a thing, kid.”
He stood up and leaned forward until his face was just an inch or so from the bars. “Johnny, have you talked to Alice?”
“No, I haven’t.”
“You don’t know how she is?”
“No.”
“Well give her a message from me, will you Johnny? Tell her I’m not mad. Tell her I forgive her, Johnny.”
“Sure, I’ll tell her,” I said.
We left then and went down to my car. Marshall didn’t have anything to say. When we were driving back to the Loop, I said. “Well, what do you think?”
He shrugged. “I can clear him if he pleads guilty. No jury would convict a veteran under these circumstances. The unwritten law, defense of her honor and all of those old tear-jerkers are still better than the best police case in the world. But if he sticks to his story, and I can’t find some way to prove it, he’ll lose the jury’s sympathy. They’ll figure he did it, and they’ll think he just doesn’t have the courage to admit it. We can’t use any tricks if he sticks to this story. All the tear jerkers will go out the window and we’ll have to fight the state with evidence. And our supply of evidence is pretty thin compared to theirs.”
“Well,” I said, “if he didn’t do it, he didn’t do it.”
“Do you think he’s innocent?” he said.
“I don’t know. He says he didn’t, that’s all I know. I think he ought to stick to that.”
Marshall looked at me queerly. “You want him to stick to this story?”
“I didn’t say that,” I said.
Marshall was still looking at me. “Johnny, let’s be straight. What’s your angle in this case?”
“He’s a friend of mine, that’s all.”
“What kind of a woman is his wife?”
I didn’t know what he was after, but I felt scared.
“Just another babe,” I said.
“I see.” He frowned out the window for a while and he didn’t say any more until I was almost at the City Hall.
Then he said. “This case is going to take some time. I’ll need a thousand dollars for a start. Still interested?”
“You’ll have a check in the morning,” I said.
He chuckled. “It’s going to be an interesting case. I hope you get your money’s worth.”
I dropped him at the City Hall and then I drove over and parked my car in the hotel garage. That thousand dollars was going to hurt. It would leave me two hundred in the bank and I spend that much in a month on tips.
But I wasn’t worrying about that. The thing I was trying to figure was whether Marshall was shaking me down. Was he making a long guess about where I stood? If he was that wasn’t any good. If he could make that good a guess somebody else might, too.
I went up to my room, trying to push away the feeling that something was about to slip.
Chapter X
I went up to my room and I thought about having some food sent up but I wasn’t hungry. I hadn’t eaten, but I still felt nervous and jittery. I took off my coat and tie and made a long drink, and then I sat down and tried to push the worry out of my mind.
I guess the drink helped. The cops thought Olsen was guilty, and he didn’t have anything to prove he wasn’t. If he stuck to his story Marshall was sure he’d be convicted.
That was the way I’d planned things and that’s the way it was working. There wasn’t anything to worry about.
About then the phone rang. The operator said, “There’s a man on his way up to see you, Mr. Ford.”
“Damn it,” I said. I said, “I don’t want to see every tie peddler that comes along. Why didn’t you see who he was and find out if I wanted to see him?”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Ford,” she said, “but he was a detective. He showed me his badge and said he was going up and then he told me to tell you he was on his way. He said his name was Harrigan.”
“Okay,” I said and put the phone down slowly. I lit a cigarette and tried to think but my thoughts ran around in circles. Nothing came from those thoughts.
There was a knock on the door a little later and when I opened up he was standing there, his hat shoved back on his head.
“Sorry to bother you, Johnny,” he said.
He came into the room, a tall thin guy with a pale face, graying hair and quick restless eyes. He sat down and hooked a leg over the chair and took his hat off and put it beside the chair on the floor.
“Drink?” I said.
“Good idea. I’m off duty, you know.” He grinned at that.
I made two drinks, handed him one and then sat down myself.
“What is it?” I said.
“Routine stuff,” he said. “I just want to get an idea of what happened last night.”
“I thought you had all that,” I said. “I was supposed to drive him down to the station, but he doubled back and caught this guy with his wife. What else do you want?”