“Well?” I asked.
“I told him to let you go through to LOS Angeles, have the Los Angeles police pick up your trail, see if you met the girl, and if you did to pinch you both; otherwise, to leave you alone. He wouldn’t listen to me. He said it was a cinch you were the one who shot him, that from all reports, you were a pencil-necked little chap who would spill everything you knew if we jerked you off the train, rushed you back here, and didn’t do any talking on the way.”
I yawned.
Kleinsmidt’s car slid smoothly through the streets, deposited me at the Sal Sagev Hotel.
“How about you, Lieutenant?” I asked.
“What do you mean?”
“What were you doing last night between eight-forty-five and nine-twenty-five?”
“I was hunting for Beegan.”
“Didn’t find him, did you?”
“Go to hell,” Kleinsmidt said, and grinned.