“Three thirty-one.”
“Let’s go,” the lawyer said.
It was Jimmy Driscoll who carefully closed and locked the bedroom door, after first making certain no one was loitering in the corridor. Then he opened his arms to Rita Swaine, and said, “Never mind, sweetheart, we’ll see it through together.”
Mason walked across the room, sat on the bed, flung an elbow over the brass rail at the foot, crossed his long legs and said casually, “You folks don’t need to keep that up, you know.”
“Keep what up?” Rita Swaine asked, spinning around to face him.
“That phony love act,” Mason said, “Your sister might get jealous, Rita.”
“What do you mean?” Rita Swaine demanded.
“You know what I mean,” Mason told her, and then kept them waiting while he fished a cigarette case from his pocket, went through the motions of offering a cigarette to the others, selected one, sat back, lit it, and said, “After all, you know, I’m not Mrs. Snoops.”
Driscoll said ominously, “I’m not certain that I like that crack, Mason.”
Mason locked eyes with him. “No one asked you to, Driscoll.”