‘What you really mean is if I have the gun I naturally go first.’
‘What a sweet, charitable mind you’ve got. I honestly don’t know why I work for you.’
‘Probably for the money, and who but you calls it work?’
We were moving silently along the terrace while we whispered at each other, and as we neared the lighted window I motioned him to be quiet. He gave me a little shove forward, milking signals for me to go ahead.
I went ahead while he watched me. When I reached the open casement door, I peered into a long rectangular room, furnished in Mexican style with rich rugs on the floor, saddles and bridles ornamenting the walls and big, lounging settees by the windows and before the vast empty fireplace.
On the table were the telephone and an untouched tumbler containing whisky and probably soda. A cigarette stub had fallen off the glass ash-tray and burned a scar on the highly polished table.
There was no one in the room.
I beckoned to Kerman.
‘Pretty lush,’ he said, peering over my shoulder. ‘Imagine living in a joint like this. What do we do now?’
I walked into the room. The cigarette stub worried me; so did the untouched whisky.