My apartment is in Hollywood’s Spartan Apartment Hotel, and I’d just finished cleaning and oiling my .38 Colt Special, since it seemed possible that I’d be using it, when the buzzer sounded. It was nearly four p.m., when I expected Jim Brandon, but I loaded the revolver and snapped the cylinder shut before going to the door, g*n dangling in my left hand.
It couldn’t have taken more than a couple of seconds, but we crowded a lot into it. A lifetime. I swung the door open and saw the young guy standing there, saw the odd-looking g*n pointed at my head, and almost instantly automatic reflexes sent me slamming sideways against the door.
There was a little popping sound and then my g*n was jarring the palm of my left hand. I wasn’t conscious of lifting my arm and pulling the trigger, but I sa
