Gleason said in a dry, strangled voice, “She ain’t in.”
Duffy swung his legs over the balcony and sat there. “I’m coming down,” he said. “Don’t start anything. I’m itching to blast you.”
He pushed himself off, breaking his fall with one hand. Gleason’s face was a little drawn. He kept both hands folded in his lap.
Duffy walked over and sat on the edge of the table. He held the Colt down by his side. He reached out a foot and kicked Gleason’s gun under a chair, away from Gleason. He said, “I gotta lot to talk to you about.”
Gleason looked at him, twitched his mouth a little, but said nothing.
Duffy said, “You’ve double-crossed me once. You’ve pulled a fast one at my joint, and another at the Villa. You tried to slap a murder rap on me. Well, you’ve had fun. Now I’m going to have some.”
Gleason said in a thin voice, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
His race was so blank that Duffy stopped talking and stared at him. “Okay, you don’t know anything about it,” he said. “What do you know?”
“I’m dealing it off the top deck,” Gleason said. “I want the book, you got it, and I’m paying for it. I went to the ‘Red Ribbon’ with the dough as arranged, but you didn’t show up. I came back here and you ’phoned. That’s all.”
Duffy rubbed the short hairs on his nape with the flat of his hand. Then he said, “Who killed Weidmer?”