While we were screaming through the streets, making time behind the siren and red lights, the D.A.’s man did a lot more thinking. He said, “Now, listen, Lam, you know the position we’re in. We don’t want a false identification any more than you do.”
“Personally,” I said wearily, “I don’t give a damn. If she identifies me, I can spring an iron-clad alibi for the whole damn night. It’s just the principle of the thing, that’s all. If you’d played fair with me, I’d have come down and gone to the hotel with you in the morning. I didn’t like that bum’s rush, that’s all.”
“Well, you’re sure rusty when you get rusty. How the hell did you get that woman and the lawyer tipped off so they were waiting at the airport?”
I yawned.
“Any leak out of your place, Bill?” the investigator asked one of the officers.
The officer shook his head. “It looks fishy to me,” he said.
The D.A.’s investigator stared at me. “Say, listen, suppose you tell me about your alibi first. Maybe we could check on that, and we wouldn’t have to bother getting this girl up out of bed. Why didn’t you tell me about that sooner? I could have used a telephone and maybe saved you a trip down.”
“To tell you the truth, I didn’t think of it. The way you folks gave me the rush act — you know how it is. Try thinking where you were every minute of the time two or three nights ago, and—”
“Well, where were you? What’s the alibi?”
I shook my head. “We’re down here now,” I said, “and it’ll be easier to get this girl out of bed than to get all of my witnesses out of bed.”