Next thing I knew, the guys on the stretcher picked me up, and followed the young guy, White, out of the courtroom. Then they went with me on the double across a couple of halls into a room with three or four cops in it. White said something about Katz, and the cops cleared out. They set me down on the desk, and then the guys on the stretcher went out. White walked around a little, and then the door opened and a matron came in with Cora. Then White and the matron went out, and the door closed, and we were alone. I tried to think of something to say, and couldn’t. She walked around, and didn’t look at me. Her mouth was still twitching. I kept swallowing, and after a while I thought of something.
“We’ve been flim-flammed, Cora.”
She didn’t say anything. She just kept walking around.
“That guy Katz, he’s nothing but a cop’s stool. A cop sent him to me. I thought he was on the up-and-up. But we’ve been flim-flammed.”
“Oh no, we ain’t been flim-flammed.”
“We been flim-flammed. I ought to have known, when the cop tried to sell him to me. But I didn’t. I thought he was on the level.”
“I’ve been flim-flammed, but you haven’t.”
“Yes I have. He fooled me too.”
“I see it all now. I see why I had to drive the car. I see it, that other time, why it was me that had to do it, not you. Oh yes. I fell for you because you were smart. And now I find out you’re smart. Ain’t that funny? You fall for a guy because he’s smart and then you find out he’s smart.”
“What are you trying to tell me, Cora?”