“Yeah,” I said. “These boys who live in the past are hard to take.”
She didn’t say anything.
A double knock on the front door brought me to my feet.
“That sounds like the Law,” I said, twirling the Luger.
“Are you scared?” she asked, staring at me. “I wouldn’t have thought anything would scare you.”
“You’d be surprised,” I returned, grinning. “Spiders give me goose pimples.” I opened the room door. “Come on,” I said. “I want you to talk to the Law. You won’t throw an ing-bing?”
“No, I won’t do that,” she said. “I suppose if I tell them you’re here, you’ll shoot me?”
I shook my head. “I’ll have to shoot the coppers, and that’d be a shame,” I said.
We went down the passage to the front door. I stood against the wall in the shadows where I could see without being seen.
“You don’t want to be told what to say, do you?” I asked.