“Then I guess we’ll have to handle it right,” he said, and moved back to the bar. As he was pouring himself a whisky, he added with a sneering little smile, “We usually do handle things right, Captain.”
“There’s always a first time not to handle it right,” McCann growled, annoyed he hadn’t scared Seigel.
A door by the bar opened and Jack Maurer came in, followed by Abe Gollowitz, his attorney.
Maurer was a short, squat man around fifty. He had put on some weight during the past three or four years. His swarthy fleshy face showed a heavy beard shadow. His thick, oily black hair was turning grey at the temples, but the greyness didn’t soften his face, which reminded McCann of a photograph he had once seen of the death mask of Beethoven. At first glance Maurer would strike anyone as no different from the thousand rich, powerful business men who vacationed in Pacific City, but a closer examination would show there was a difference. He had the flat snake’s eyes of the gangster; eyes that glittered and were as cold and as hard as frozen pebbles.
Gollowitz, one of the most brilliant attorneys on the Coast, was built on the same lines as Maurer, only he was fatter, older and going bald. He had thrown up his lucrative practice to handle Maurer’s business and legal affairs, and had succeeded so brilliantly that he was now Maurer’s second-in-command.
“Glad to see you, Captain,” Maurer said, crossing to shake hands. “You’ve got all you want — a cigar, perhaps?”
“Sure,” McCann said, who believed in never refusing anything.
Seigel offered a cigar box and McCann took a fat, torpedo-shaped cigar, sniffed at it and nodded his head. He bit off the end, accepted the light which Seigel held out to him, puffed smoke to the ceiling and nodded his head again.
“A damn fine cigar, Mr. Maurer.”
“Yes. I have them made for me.” Maurer looked over at Seigel. “Have a thousand sent to the Captain’s home, Louis.”