Chapter 9. I was back at robbery homicide and had been for over an hour. They had me in room

number six, which was one of the small ones, just me and two suits I didn't know particularly

well. I half expected a good going over, but they were all business. Kept on me about every

little detail about my date with Blondie in the notary's office, and I knew that Ted Holm

had given me up to Sabian. I didn't begrudge him that, my fellow's got to live after all,

and I had expected it. But I had also expected Sabian to cuss Ted out, and that would be the end of it.

They were taking all of this way too seriously. The detectives applying the questions were named

Long and Bradley. I felt like

there might be a joke in there somewhere, but it never quite came to me. They seemed half

disinterested in this activity as though they regarded it as a waste of time, but cops do that

sometimes in the hopes that you'll let your guard down. If they're talking to you at all,

it was best to assume that they were dead

serious. After half an hour they switched gears again, and I realized that I had been right. They were

playing me. Now they were playing angry, but doing it badly. I had been through the story just as I

told it to Ted, but leaving out the name of my client. That was none of their business, and giving

it up was bad business for me. There was a good chance that they already knew it, but from the

way they kept harping on it, I got the feeling that Holm might have left it out, too. The cops

and I had played this little game a few times before. I was of the opinion that my clients

were entitled to confidentiality, like a lawyer.

The cops thought that was very cute, but since there was no such law forcing them to respect that,

they would like me to spill and do it before they got angry. It never amounted to very much,

but it was usually enough to get me before a review board. This had me going through a mental checklist as I ran through the events of the

...