“I know,” Peppi smiled, “otherwise I wouldn’t have bothered. Now there’s no chance of you getting away until I say so, you may be interested in some details. Then we can talk business.”
“Go ahead,” I said airily, “I’ve got nothing to lose.”
For all that, I was interested. There was a lot to clear up and if Peppi wanted to talk I wouldn’t stop him.
“Ansell was right. There were two girls,” Peppi said, flicking ash into the empty fireplace.
“It wanted believing, but it didn’t take me long to see how it all added up.”
“I bet it didn’t,” I said bitterly, “you were always a smart guy. Didn’t some columnist say you had more brains in your little finger than you had in your head?”
“Shall I hit him?” Lew asked casually, puffing a short rubber club from his hip pocket. Peppi shook his head, “Not yet,” he said, “there’s time for that.” He turned back to me,
“You remember this guy Kelly?”
“Sure,” I said, “you’d never heard of him when I was here the other day.”
Peppi smiled, “I wasn’t ready to talk then,” he explained. “Kelly told me about the Shumway girl. She interested me. She gypped Kelly and he wanted me to get the 25 grand out of her. I didn’t help him. It wasn’t my line, but I wanted to see the girl I quite liked her.” Peppi flicked more ash, “She’s quite a dish. So, I got rid of Kelly and kept her here for a while. Her father got in the way, too. But, I gave him a little money and got rid of him. Then she told me about you, and what happened in Mexico.” He moved over to the window, glanced out and then wandered back to the middle of the room. “I didn’t believe it at first, but she convinced me. She’s a restless dame.” He shook his head. “I don’t know where she gets to. Now, there’s this trouble about your pal Ansell. She shouldn’t have rubbed him out, but, in a way, it suits me.”