Nine
Closing the door behind me, I walked on into the room. I took a chair across from him and, moving slowly, pulled out a cigarette and lit it. I smiled at him.
“You won’t shoot me,” I said. “You’re too big a man to do your own dirty work anymore. Besides, the hotel probably wouldn’t let you stay here again.”
“I could claim self-defense.”
“You?” I laughed. “With your record, do you think anybody would believe you?”
“All right,” he said. “I didn’t ask you here to shoot you. I’m holding the g*n just in case you get any ideas. And don’t think Harry Manfred’s gone soft just because I can hire people to work for me. I can shoot just as well as in the days when I was working for the Brooklyn mob. If you don’t think so, try me.”
“I don’t want to shoot you. I want to see you go to court. D
