The Postman Always Rings Twice by James M. Cain Page B

bed, and I jerked it open. The cop was halfway down the hall, chinning a nurse. Sackett burst out laughing. "No, no dictaphones in this. They don't use them anyway, except in movies."
          I let a sheepish grin come over my face. I had him like I wanted him. I had pulled a dumb trick on him, and he had got the better of me. "O.K., judge. I guess it was pretty silly, at that. All right, I'll begin at the beginning and tell it all. I'm in dutch all right, but I guess lying about it won't do any good."
          "That's the right attitude, Chambers."
          I told him how I walked out on the Greek, and how I bumped into him on the street one day, and he wanted me back, and then asked me to go on this Santa Barbara trip with them to talk it over. I told about how we put down the wine, and how we started out, with me at the wheel. He stopped me then.
          "So you _were_ driving the car?"
          "Judge, suppose _you_ tell _me_ that."
          "What do you mean, Chambers?"
          "I mean I heard what she said, at the inquest. I heard what those cops said. I know where they found me. So I know who was driving, all right. She was. But if I tell it like I remember it, I got to say I was driving it. I didn't tell that coroner any lie, judge. _It still seems to me I was driving it_."
          "You lied about being drunk."
          "That's right. I was all full of booze, and ether, and dope that they give you, and I lied all right. But I'm all right now, and I got sense enough to know the truth is all that can get me out of this, if anything can. Sure, I was drunk. I was stinko. And all I could think of was, I mustn't let them know I was drunk, because I was driving the car, and if they find out I was drunk, I'm sunk."
          "Is that what you'd tell a jury?"
          "I'd have to, judge. But what I can't understand is how she came to be driving it. I started out with it. I know that. I can even remember a guy standing there laughing at me. Then how come she was driving when it went over?"
          "You drove it about two feet."
          "You mean two miles."
          "I mean two feet. Then she took the wheel away from you."
          "Gee, I _must_ have been stewed."
          "Well, it's one of those things that a jury might believe. It's just got that cock-eyed look to it that generally goes with the truth. Yes, they might believe it."
          He sat there looking at his nails, and I had a hard time to keep the grin from creeping over my face. I was glad when he started asking me more questions, so I could get my mind on something else, besides how easy I had fooled him.
          "When did you go to work for Papadakis, Chambers?"
          "Last winter."
          "How long did you stay with him?"
          "Till a month ago. Maybe six weeks."
          "You worked for him six months, then?"
          "About that."
          "What did you do before that?"
          "Oh, knocked around."
          "Hitch-hiked? Rode freights? Bummed your meals wherever you could?"
          "Yes sir."
          He unstrapped a briefcase, put a pile of papers on the table, and began looking through them. "Ever been in Frisco?"
          "Born there."
          "Kansas City? New York? New Orleans? Chicago?"
          "I've seen them all."
          "Ever been in jail?"
          "I have, judge. You knock around, you get in trouble with the cops now and then. Yes sir, I've been in jail."
          "Ever been in jail in Tuscson?"
          "Yes sir. I think it was ten days I got there. It was for trespassing on railroad property."
          "Salt Lake City? San Diego? Wichita?"
          "Yes sir. All those places."
          "Oakland?"
          "I got three months there, judge. I got in a fight with a railroad detective."
          "You beat him up pretty bad, didn't you?"
          "Well, as the fellow says, he was beat up pretty bad, but you