“You’ ll give me?” Pohl sounded nasty and looked nasty. “You’re a paid employee, and you won’t be that long, and I’m part owner, and you say you’ ll give me! Trying to order the staff around, am I? I’m giving the staff a chance to tell the truth, and they’re doing it. Two of them have spent an hour in a lawyer’s office, getting it on paper. A complaint has been sworn against Broadyke for receiving stolen goods, and he’s been arrested by now.”
Talbott said, “Get out,” without raising his voice.
Pohl, not moving, said, “And I might also mention that a complaint has been sworn against you for stealing the goods. The designs you sold to Broadyke. Are you going to try to alibi that too?”
Talbott’s jaw worked a couple of seconds before it let his lips open for speech. His teeth stayed together as he said, “You can leave now.”
“Or I can stay. I’ll stay.” Pohl was sneering, and it made his network of face creases deeper. “You may have noticed I’m not alone.”
I didn’t care for that. “Just a minute,” I put in. “I’ll hold your coats, and that’s all. Don’t count on me, Mr. Pohl. I’m strictly a spectator, except for one thing, you haven’t paid me for your sandwiches and coffee. Ninety-five cents before you go, if you’re going.”
“I’m not going. It’s different here from what it was in the park that morning, Vic. There’s a witness.”
Talbott took two quick steps, used a foot to shove the big ebony chair back free of the desk, made a grab in the neighborhood of Pohl’s throat, got his necktie, and jerked him out of the chair. Pohl came forward and tried to come up at the same time, but Talbott, moving fast, kept going with him, dragging him around the corner of the desk.
I had got upright and backed off, not to be in the way.
Suddenly Talbott went down, flat on his back, an upflung hand gripping a piece of the necktie. Pohl was not very springy, even for his age, but he did his best. He scrambled to his feet, started yelling, “Help! Police! Help!” at the top of his voice, and seized the chair I had been sitting on and raised it high. His idea was to drop it on the prostrate enemy, and my leg muscles tightened for quick action, but Talbott leaped up and yanked the chair away from him. Pohl ran. He scooted around behind the desk, and Talbott went after him. Pohl, yelling for help again, slid around the other end, galloped across the room to a table which held a collection of various objects, picked up an electric iron, and threw it. Missing Talbott, who dodged, it crashed onto the ebony desk and knocked the telephone to the floor. Apparently having an iron thrown at him made Talbott mad, for when he reached Pohl, instead of trying to get a hold on something more substantial than a necktie, he hauled off and landed on his jaw, in spite of the warning I had given him the day before.