Durkin took two steps. “Look here,” he said, “you can’t sit there and accuse me of a thing like that. I don’t have to stay here and take it, that kind of thing. I don’t have to, and I’m not going to.”
He started for the door, but Lew Baker was suddenly there in his path and speaking. “Back up, Beaky. I said back up!”
Beaky did so, literally. He backed until his rump hit the edge of the table, and felt for the edge with his hands, one on each side, and gripped it.
Wolfe was grim. “I was supposing, Mr. Durkin, not accusing. But I am now ready to accuse, and I do. I explained, when I was calling you X, how and why you acted.” His eyes moved. “Gentlemen, I ask you to look at him. Look at his face, his eyes. Look at his hands, clutching the table in dismay and despair. Yes, I accuse him. I say that that man drugged your drinks, caused you to lose your game, and, threatened with exposure, murdered your teammate.”
They were making sounds, and they were on their feet, including Art Kinney.
“Wait!” Wolfe said sharply, and they turned to him. “I must warn you, you approach him at your peril, for I have no proof. It will be gratifying to crush him, to press a confession out of him, but a confession is not evidence, and we need some. I suggest that you try for it. He did it for money, and surely he was paid something in advance, unless he is pure fool. Where is it? Certainly not on his person, since you have all been searched, but it is somewhere, and it would do admirably. Where is it?”
Lew Baker got to him ahead of the others. He told him in a thin, tight voice, so tight it twanged, “I wouldn’t want to touch you, Beaky, you dirty rat. Where is it? Where’s the jack?”
“Lew, I swear to God—”
“Skip it. You swearing to God! You fixed us, did you? And Nick — you fixed him. I’d hate to touch you, but if I do, God help you!”
The others were there, Kinney and Doc Soffer with them, crowding in on Durkin, who had pulled back onto the table, still gripping the edge. I went to the end of the table and stood. They were strong and hard, and their nervous systems had had a tough day. Aside from the killing of Nick Ferrone, whom they may or may not have loved, this was the bird who had made them play ball like half-witted apes in the most important game of their lives, to an audience of fifty million. If they really cut loose there could be another corpse in that room.