“I may at that,” Sellers said, watching the whisky with hungry eyes.
“Why don’t you break down and be human, Sellers?” I asked. “After all, you can’t stay on duty twenty-four hours a day. And as far as this investigation is concerned you’re all finished.”
“Who says I’m finished?”
“I do. You’re up against a brick wall.”
Carlton tossed down his drink and said drunkenly, “I don’t want any sympathy. All I want is to be left alone. I don’t know what the hell I came to California for, anyway. I was just lonesome. I wanted to see my wife. I saw her — stretched out on a slab in an undertaking parlor.”
“Everyone knows about it. They read it in the papers. A cheap, sordid little affair out at an auto court. My God, I don’t think it was even a first-class dump. Okay, I’m the fall guy. I’ve got to arrange for her burial. I’ve got to go down and pick out the coffin. I’ve got to go to the funeral. I’ve got to listen while some concealed voice sings The End of a Perfect Day to organ music. I wish to hell I’d have been the one to…”
“Take it easy,” I said. “Little Pitchers, over here, has big ears.”
“So he does,” Carlton said, turning to Sellers. “I’d almost forgotten about you.”
Sellers said, “Some day, Lam, I’m going to take you to pieces just to see what makes you tick.”
Sellers heaved himself up out of the chair, crossed over to the bureau, poured bourbon into a glass and then dumped in ginger ale.