“Two days,” he said — “two more days at least. Then you can go out for a little while, if you take it easy — on crutches.”
Kells was sweating; his eyes burned and he yawned a great deal. He said: “Maybe I’d better have one more load in the arm, Doc — to sort of taper off on.”
“You’ll taper off on whiskey and milk, young fella — and like it.” The doctor put two small yellow capsules on the stand. “If you get too jumpy you can take these before you go to sleep.”
Janis and Beery went out together; Beery was going home. Borg played solitaire for a while and Kells sat up in bed, tried to read the papers.
Borg said: “Denny Faber is still trailing around with Gilroy.”
“You can call him off — Gilroy ought to be okay by now.”
At eleven Borg stood up, stretched, said: “I’m going byebye.” He went into the bedroom — Kells was on the wall bed in the living room. Borg came back in his underwear, got Kells a glass of water, made a pass at tucking him in.
“If you want anything,” he said, “just yell and fire a few shots and throw your shoe through the window. I’m a very light sleeper.”
Kells said he would.
Borg went back into the bedroom and Kells turned out the lights, tried to sleep. He heard the bell in the big church on Sunset Boulevard strike twelve. Rain drummed against the windows, and the wind was blowing.