‘What’s this about the end of the world?’ the cop asked. ‘My tea leaves didn’t say nothing about it.’
‘Maybe you use the wrong make of tea. Why don’t you run away and make yourself some more? If you don’t want to drink the stuff, and if you’ve made enough of it, you can always drown yourself in it.’
The cop considered this, cocking his head on one side and squinting at Burns.
‘This could be a pinch, fel a,’ he said amiably. ‘I haven’t made a pinch for a week, and it’s time I did.
Suppose you and me take a ride down to headquarters.’
Burns shook his head.
‘I’ll play cops and robbers with you some other night,’ he said. ‘I’ve got work to do right now. Be a nice guy and fade away. If you’re al that hard up, why don’t you go pinch yourself a tart?’
‘You’l do,’ the cop said, his voice suddenly aggressive. ‘The Sarge hates funny men. He’l put you in cell 6, the one that leaks and has beetles. Start rolling, brother, you and me are going for a ride.’
With an air of bored weariness, Burns produced a card and pushed it under the cop’s nose.
‘Take a look at that, ambitious, if you can read. My old man and Lieutenant Olin are like that.’ He held up two fat fingers, pressed tightly together. ‘Interfere with me and you’l lose your badge so fast you won’t know it’s gone til you come to clean it — if you ever do clean it.’