"Hello, is Sergeant Polhaus there? . . .
Will you call him, please?
This is Samuel Spade He stared into space, waiting.
"Hello, Tom, I've got something for you. . . .
Yes, plenty.
Here it is: Thursby and Jacobi were shot by a kid named Wilmer Cook."
He described the boy minutely.
"He's working for a man named Casper Gutman."
He described Gutman.
"That fellow Cairo you met here is with them too. . . .
Yes, that's it. . . .
Gutman's staving at the Alexandria, suite twelve C, or was.
They've just left here and they're blowing town, so you'll have to move fast, but I don't think they're expecting a pinch. . . .
There's a girl in it too—Gutman's daughter."
He described Rhea Gutman.
"Watch yourself when you go up against the kid.
He's supposed to be pretty good with the gun. . . .
That's right, Tom, and I've got some stuff here for you.
I think I've got the guns he used. . . .
That's right.
Step on it—and luck to you!"
Spade slowly replaced receiver on prong, telephone on shelf.
He wet his lips and hooked down at his hands.
Their palms were wet.
He filledhis deep chest with air. His eyes were glittering between straightened lids.. He turned and took three long swift steps into the living-room.
Brigid O'Shaughnessy, startled by the suddenness of his approach, let her breath out in a little laughing gasp.
Spade, face to face with her, very close to her, tail, big-boned and thick-muscled, coldly smiling, hard of jaw and eye, said:
"They'll talk when they're nailed—about us.
We're sitting on dynamite, and we've only got minutes to get set for the police.
Give me all of it—fast.
Gutman sent you and Cairo to Constantinople?"
She started to speak, hesitated, and bit her lip.
He put a hand on her shoulder.
"God damn you, talk!" he said.
"I'm in this with you and you're not going to gum it.
Talk. He sent you to Constantinople?"
"Y-yes, he sent me.
I met Joe there and—and asked him to help me.
Then we—"
"Wait.
You asked Cairo to help you get it from Kemidov?"
"Yes."
"For Gutman?" She hesitated again, squirmed under the hard angry glare of his eyes, swallowed, and said:
"No, not then.
We thought we would get it for ourselves."
"All right.
Then?"
"Oh, then I began to be afraid that Joe wouldn't play fair with me, so—so I asked Floyd Thursby to help me."
"And he did.
Well?"