“Frankie Weiss. I’m just a collector, that’s all. I make the rounds and collect the percentage off the beggars. I hand the dough over to Frankie an’ he pays me off. That’s all I got to do with it.”
“A beautiful, literate, well-motivated story,” the Saint said. “Except one point. You forgot to say why you took Miss Varing up an alley.”
“She was a new one. She hadn’t joined our... She told me to go to hell. People what don’t want to kick in, we sorta convince ’em.” Junior’s voice trailed off weakly.
“A beating usually does the trick, I imagine,” Simon said very lightly. “Did you by any chance help to convince a beggar named John Irvine?”
“I didn’t have nothing to do with that. Honest to God!”
“Then who did?”
Junior swallowed.
“It could have been Frankie.”
There was an almost inaudible ping, and Junior clapped a hand to his cheek with a startled expression, as if he had been sharply stung by some unsuspected insect.
“It should have been in de eye,” Hoppy Uniatz said enigmatically. “Ya lousy stool-pigeon.”