know whether to be relieved or depressed to identify the rumbling bark of Sheriff Pat Millhaus.
As you go through the door you enter a corridor which has been narrowed by the addition of a waist-high counter on your right. Pat Millhaus lounged behind the counter with an inch of dead cigar in the corner of his mouth, a blue sports shirt—sweat-dark at the armpits—strained across the mound of hard belly. He was talking across the counter to a man I did not know, an old gentleman in a white linen suit that had turned to an ivory yellow with age.
Pat stared at me, his little dark eyes opening very round and wide, and suddenly they were squeezed into slits in the dark hard flesh of his face as he began to laugh. He laughed a lot longer than was necessary.
When he paused for breath, LeRoy Luxey asked gently, “You’d maybe be laughin’ at me, Sher’f?”
There was, implicit in that mild question, a terrible and innocent ferocity. Pat had half-tamed a wild thing and was using it for his own purposes. But it had to be handled with extraordinary care. I sensed, and so did Pat Millhaus, that if he had answered yes, the stringy little man would have immediately begun the blind and automatic and inescapable process of trying to kill his superior officer. The structure of his pride would have permitted no alternative.
The sheriff sobered at once and said, “I’m laughing at this damn fool you brung in, LeRoy. I’ve known him … just about eleven years. What’s the story on him, LeRoy.”
“I was checking the beach like you said on account of the B and E that’s been a-goin’ on out there, and I come on this Brice sneakin’ along behind of the Gulfway Furniture. I putthe light on him and ast him what’s he doing, and he makes me some smart-mouth talk and comes at me, so I thumped him some and brang him on in. This here is the money wallet I took off’n him, and he’s got no knife or gun, Sher’f.”
“He talked smart, LeRoy, because he keeps forgetting somehow he isn’t a big time operator with his name in the papers any more. What were you doing out there, Sam?”
“I had the feeling I’d left the back door at Tom Earle’s office unlocked. I parked my car at Gus Herka’s place and walked back to check it. I was going back to Gus’s to get a beer and then go home when I was stopped by … your eager little assistant.”
“Would you be stupid enough to get any fancy ideas about lawing LeRoy here for assault and false arrest?”
“I think I asked for what I got, Pat.”
“We’ll get your name on a release form before you go, just in case. Unloose him there, LeRoy.”
When my hands were free, I fingered the damage. The one over the ear had left a knot the size of half a plum. It had creased the skin slightly, but the blood had caked in my hair. The other was smaller.
“If you can give me that release form,” I said.
“I think we ought to set and talk some,” Pat said. “We’ve never had a chance to talk since you come back to town, you know that?”
“I’ve never had the urge,” I told him. “I don’t have it now.”
“I could whip his haid a little more so’s he’d talk polite,” LeRoy said earnestly.
“I think you better get back on duty, LeRoy,” Pat Millhaus said. “This man has no record—at least not down here. He just has the habit of thinking he’s a little bit better than anybody else.”
The old gentleman, after staring at me with open curiosity, said good night to Pat and left. Pat took me down a corridorpast his radio communications center to his office. He directed me to a straight chair in the middle of the room, facing his desk. He went behind his desk and lowered himself into a big green leather chair and stared at me with bland satisfaction. Except for black hair cropped so short the brown skull shows through, he looks like one of those old prints of the fat Indian chiefs who got annoyed with Custer.
Pat Millhaus is a good politician and a reasonably
As you go through the door you enter a corridor which has been narrowed by the addition of a waist-high counter on your right. Pat Millhaus lounged behind the counter with an inch of dead cigar in the corner of his mouth, a blue sports shirt—sweat-dark at the armpits—strained across the mound of hard belly. He was talking across the counter to a man I did not know, an old gentleman in a white linen suit that had turned to an ivory yellow with age.
Pat stared at me, his little dark eyes opening very round and wide, and suddenly they were squeezed into slits in the dark hard flesh of his face as he began to laugh. He laughed a lot longer than was necessary.
When he paused for breath, LeRoy Luxey asked gently, “You’d maybe be laughin’ at me, Sher’f?”
There was, implicit in that mild question, a terrible and innocent ferocity. Pat had half-tamed a wild thing and was using it for his own purposes. But it had to be handled with extraordinary care. I sensed, and so did Pat Millhaus, that if he had answered yes, the stringy little man would have immediately begun the blind and automatic and inescapable process of trying to kill his superior officer. The structure of his pride would have permitted no alternative.
The sheriff sobered at once and said, “I’m laughing at this damn fool you brung in, LeRoy. I’ve known him … just about eleven years. What’s the story on him, LeRoy.”
“I was checking the beach like you said on account of the B and E that’s been a-goin’ on out there, and I come on this Brice sneakin’ along behind of the Gulfway Furniture. I putthe light on him and ast him what’s he doing, and he makes me some smart-mouth talk and comes at me, so I thumped him some and brang him on in. This here is the money wallet I took off’n him, and he’s got no knife or gun, Sher’f.”
“He talked smart, LeRoy, because he keeps forgetting somehow he isn’t a big time operator with his name in the papers any more. What were you doing out there, Sam?”
“I had the feeling I’d left the back door at Tom Earle’s office unlocked. I parked my car at Gus Herka’s place and walked back to check it. I was going back to Gus’s to get a beer and then go home when I was stopped by … your eager little assistant.”
“Would you be stupid enough to get any fancy ideas about lawing LeRoy here for assault and false arrest?”
“I think I asked for what I got, Pat.”
“We’ll get your name on a release form before you go, just in case. Unloose him there, LeRoy.”
When my hands were free, I fingered the damage. The one over the ear had left a knot the size of half a plum. It had creased the skin slightly, but the blood had caked in my hair. The other was smaller.
“If you can give me that release form,” I said.
“I think we ought to set and talk some,” Pat said. “We’ve never had a chance to talk since you come back to town, you know that?”
“I’ve never had the urge,” I told him. “I don’t have it now.”
“I could whip his haid a little more so’s he’d talk polite,” LeRoy said earnestly.
“I think you better get back on duty, LeRoy,” Pat Millhaus said. “This man has no record—at least not down here. He just has the habit of thinking he’s a little bit better than anybody else.”
The old gentleman, after staring at me with open curiosity, said good night to Pat and left. Pat took me down a corridorpast his radio communications center to his office. He directed me to a straight chair in the middle of the room, facing his desk. He went behind his desk and lowered himself into a big green leather chair and stared at me with bland satisfaction. Except for black hair cropped so short the brown skull shows through, he looks like one of those old prints of the fat Indian chiefs who got annoyed with Custer.
Pat Millhaus is a good politician and a reasonably
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