“Not very.” He chewed and swallowed. “Good enough to try if we got nothing better. Evidently they have nothing at all. If they had — but you heard them.”
“Yeah. You told them they have all the facts you have, but they haven’t. The one I gave you about Mrs. Moyse? That’s not the one you’re interpreting privately?”
“No.”
“She might be still around, waiting. I might possibly get something better than the one you’re saving. Shall I go try?”
He grunted. I took it for a yes, and moved. Outside the door to the hall and stairs stood one in uniform with whom I had already had a few little words. I addressed him. “I’m going down to buy Mr. Wolfe a pickle. Do I need to be passed out or in?”
“You?” He used only the right half of his mouth for talking. “Shoot your way through. Huh?”
“Right. Many thanks.” I went.
5
It was dumb to be so surprised, but I was. I might have known that the news that the Giants had been doped out of the game and the series, and that Nick Ferrone, the probable rookie of the year, had been murdered, would draw a record mob. Downstairs inside the entrance there were sentries, and outside a regiment was stretched into a cordon. I was explaining to a sergeant who I was and telling him I would be returning, when three desperate men, one of whom I recognized, came springing at me. All they wanted was the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. I had to get really rude. I have been clawed at by newspapermen more than once, but I had never seen them quite as hungry as they were outside the Polo Grounds that October night. Finding they wouldn’t shake loose, I dived through the cordon and into the mob.
It looked hopeless. The only parked cars in sight on the west side of Eighth Avenue were police cars. I pushed through to the fringe of the throng and made my way two blocks south. Having made inquiries of two Giants hours previously, I knew what I was looking for, a light blue Curtis sedan. Of course there was a thin chance that it was still around, but if it was I wanted it. I crossed the avenue and headed for the parking plaza. Two cops at the end of the cordon gave me a look, but it wasn’t the plaza they were guarding, and I marched on through. In the dim light I could see three cars over at the north end. Closer up, one was a Curtis sedan. Still closer, it was light blue. I went up to it. Two females on the front seat were gazing at me through the window, and one of them was my glommee. The radio was on. I opened the door, swung it wide, and said hello.