“What a fine pal you are!” he spat.
“Be that as it may, you listen. You lay off Shirley, Ralph, or I’ll have your history published in the paper! I’ve hinted at it before. Now I tell you!”
Penoch’s were blazing into Kennedy’s, and his right fist was stabbing the air. He was set for the battle, be the result what it might.
“Just where do you think you’d end up in that case? And where do you come in to criticize anybody else?” sneered Kennedy.
His eyes seemed rat-like then, somehow, as if they were flickering about for an opening for escape.
“For the sake of argument, we’ll say nowhere!” Penoch fairly roared. “I’ve paid your bills and hauled you around, and introduced a man I wasn’t sure wouldn’t steal family jewelry, to plenty of people. So far, I haven’t had anything but worry over it. But this is different.”
“So you’re pulling the big blackjack, are you? Rough-stuff, huh? Well, I’m pretty good at that myself, Peewee. So you mind your own damn’ business—or else—”
Kennedy’s eyes were flat and green and cold, his lips drawn back in the suspicion of a smile, and he looked as close to cruelty incarnate as I care to gaze upon. And hard—gosh!
“I’ll do no such thing. And you get just exactly three days to wind up your little affair with Shirley, or I start talking. You can start at the same time, and be damned to you! But we’ll both go down together, big boy. You’ll go down farthest. My resignation’ll be in before I start shooting off my mouth; I figure on that.”
For a long ten seconds Kennedy’s unwinking eyes bored into blazing Penoch’s. The indomitable little flyer, as if carved out of granite, stood there and waited. Kennedy threw his cap on the table. His voice softened, and in a wheedling tone he said: