Spade's face was solemn except for wrinkles at the corners of his eyes.
"You're not hiring me to do any murders or burglaries for you, but simply to get it back if possible in an honest and lawful way."
"If possible," Cairo agreed.
His face also was solemn except for the eyes.
"And in any event with discretion."
He rose and picked up his hat.
"I am at the Hotel Belvedere when you wish to communicate with me— room six-thirty-five.
I confidently expect the greatest mutual benefit from our association, Mr. Spade."
He hesitated.
"May I have my pistol?"
"Sure.
I'd forgotten it."
Spade took the pistol out of his coat-pocket and handed it to Cairo.
Cairo pointed the pistol at Spade's chest.
"You will please keep your hands on the top of the desk," Cairo said earnestly.
"I intend to search your offices."
Spade said:
"I'll be damned."
Then he laughed in his throat and said:
"All right.
Go ahead.
I won't stop you."
VI.The Undersized Shadow
For half an hour after Joel Cairo had gone Spade sat alone, still and frowning, at his desk.
Then he said aloud in the tone of one dismissing a problem,
"Well, they're paying for it," and took a bottle of Manhattan cocktail and a paper drinking-cup from a desk-drawer.
He filled the cup two-thirds full, drank, returned the bottle to the drawer, tossed the cup into the wastebasket, put on his hat and overcoat, turned off the lights, and went down to the night-lit street.
An undersized youth of twenty or twenty-one in neat grey cap and overcoat was standing idly on the corner below Spade's building.
Spade walked up Sutter Street to Kearny, where he entered a cigarstore to buy two sacks of Bull Durham.
When he came out the youth was one of four people waiting for a street-car on the opposite corner.
Spade ate dinner at Herbert's Grill in Powell Street.
When he left the Grill, at a quarter to eight, the youth was looking into a nearby haberdasher's window.
Spade went to the Hotel Belvedere, asking at the desk for Mr. Cairo.
He was told that Cairo was not in.
The youth sat in a chair in a far corner of the lobby.
Spade went to the Geary Theatre, failed to see Cairo in the lobby, and posted himself on the curb in front, facing the theatre.
The youth loitered with other loiterers before Marquard's restaurant below.
At ten minutes past eight Joel Cairo appeared, walking up Geary Street with his little mincing bobbing steps.
Apparently he did not see Spade until the private detective touched his shoulder.
He seemed moderately surprised for a moment, and then said:
"Oh, yes, of course you saw the ticket."
"Uh-huh.
I've got something I want to show you."
Spade drew Cairo back towards the curb a little away from the other waiting theatre-goers.
"The kid in the cap down by Marquard's."
Cairo murmured,
"I'll see," and looked at his watch.
He looked up Geary Street. He looked at a theatre-sign in front of him on which George Arliss was shown costumed as Shylock, and then his dark eyes crawled sidewise in their sockets until they were looking at the kid in the cap, at his cool pale face with curling lashes hiding lowered eyes.
"Who is he?" Spade asked.
Cairo smiled up at Spade.