"We haven't got a thing," Riley admitted, "but the chief thinks they're holed up somewhere in town. The identification was too fast to let them get far."
"Maybe," I said, "and maybe not."
Riley hitched his chair closer, and his face wrinkled up a bit in a smile. "There's that possibility that the chief might be right, anyway Johnny thinks so."
I felt blood pressure rising in me for the first time since my transfusion. I started to tell Riley just what I thought of a cop who wouldn't even draw his gun to save his own life. And then Riley pulled the thing that gave me my second shock within a week, and somehow it hurt me more than the slugs did.
"Yeah, Johnny," he said, "he thinks the chief may be right. He's a bright kid, too, smart as they come. He should be, he's my nephew and I put him through college."
"He's—he's your nephew?" I said.
"Sure, and a swell lad; he'll go high on the force. And Southern, you'll die laughing at this—he thinks you're about the bravest cop and finest man he ever met."
Well, that clinched it; I couldn't say a thing about the kid. I knew it wasn't the right thing to do; I should have reported him the moment I got out of the hospital, but the memory of Riley's pride stopped me before I could speak. Instead, I laughed and joked with the cops at the station, and tried not to be alone with Burke. I knew that I might tell him exactly what I was thinking if he rubbed me the wrong way.
And then on the tenth day after the shooting, Tony and his mob still in hiding, I went back into 27 with Johnny Burke. To all outward appearances we must have appeared to be the same old team, but there was a difference.
I was still taped, and the bandages irritated me every time I moved. But there was an irritation in Johnny that shifting a bandage couldn't help.