“For the love of Mike,” I babbled hysterically, “he learned to shoot like that through the mail.”
8
On the face of it, it looked as if the show was over. I left the tidying up to Hoskiss. I wish now I had done it myself because they let Bat Thompson slide through their fingers. They threw a drag-net around Paradise Palms, but when they hauled it in, everyone who mattered was in it except Bat.
It worried me at first, but after thinking it over I decided that Bat by himself wasn’t a danger. He hadn’t the brains to think up trouble, and he was as near moronic as made no difference. But I would have liked to have seen him behind bars. The Feds were pretty sure that he had got away. It spoilt their case, since he was the guy who had bumped off Herrick, Giles and Brodey.
Killeano got twenty-five years. Speratza and Flaggerty were dead. Juan Gomez had been killed by one of the Federal officers in the fight outside 46 Waterside.
Once I was sure that Bat wasn’t in town, I asked Tim to fetch Miss Wonderly from Key West.
We were now in Palm Beach Hotel, trying to decide our future.
I sat on the balcony and looked at the green ocean. Only this time I didn’t have any presentiment of trouble. She sat on the balustrade.
“All right,” I said, after I had heard her argument. “I’ll get a job. I’ll go respectable if that’s what you really want.”
Her eyes were full of questions.