Martinelli said: “Turn right at the next corner.” The cab driver nodded; they turned off North Broadway into a dimly lighted street, went several blocks over bad pavement.
Martinelli pounded on the glass, said: “Oke.” The cab slid to an abrupt stop and Martinelli got out and paid the driver, stood at the curb until the cab had turned around in the narrow street, disappeared. He went to a door above which one pale electric globe glittered, felt in the darkness for the button, pressed it. The door clicked open; Martinelli went in and slammed it shut behind him.
There were a half dozen or so men strung out along the bar in the long dim room. A few more sat at tables against the wall.
Martinelli walked to the far end of the bar, leaned across it to speak quietly to a chunky bald-headed man who sat on a high stool near the cash register:
“Chief here?”
The bald man bobbed his head, jerked it towards a door behind Martinelli.
Martinelli looked surprised, said mildly: “He’s on time for once in his life!”
The man bobbed his head. His face was blank.
Martinelli went through the door, up two short flights of stairs to a narrow hallway. At the end of the hallway he knocked at a heavy steel-sheathed fire-door.
After a little while the door opened and a voice said: “Come in.”