“I not only might have,” he said evenly — “I was. I only got home about a quarter of an hour ago.”
Green glanced at the square heavy watch on the inside of his left wrist; it was fifty-two minutes after one.
Sallust turned his head. “This is Paula, my sister. This is Nick Green. You’ve probably heard me speak of him.”
She was half sitting, half lying on a low couch against one of the long walls of the room, a very dark, very diminutive girl with porcelain-white skin, a deep-red mouth and large oddly opaque eyes.
She nodded and Green bowed again slightly.
“We went to a theater.” She sat up slowly. “We went to a theater and John brought me home afterwards — it must have been about ten-thirty — and then he went for a walk.”
Green smiled. “That’s simply dandy. Now, if you two can jump into your hats and coats and the three of us can get out of here in about one minute flat” — he raised one snowy eyebrow and grinned at Sallust — “you won’t have to take another of those very unpleasant trips to jail.”
Paula leapt to her feet, almost screamed: “Jail!”
Sallust’s thin face twisted to a wry smile. “You choose a rather bizarre time to joke, Mister Green,” he said softly.
Green was looking at his watch. “Maybe in two minutes,” he whispered as if to himself.