“Hey-hey, Metts,” I tell him. “I am speakin’ to you from the local morgue—because that’s what it looks like. I have gotta couple stiffs out here an’ I figure that you might collect ’em before mornin’.”
I tell him what has happened. He ain’t surprised much. He says that he figures that Fernandez saved me a lotta trouble by gunnin’ Periera an’ gettin’ himself bumped off.
I ask him how things are at his end. He says that everything is swell. Henrietta is stickin’ around talkin’ things over with Maloney an’ tryin’ to figure out just what the hell I am playin’ at. Maloney is so sleepy that he can’t keep his eyes open an’ Metts is playin’ solitaire by himself.
“Swell,” I tell him. “Now there’s just one little thing that you can do for me. Get one of your boys to get around an’ dig up a casket
