He stopped. I waited.

“That’s all of it?” I said.

“What else? I mean, he went over, he was groaning, and I beat it,” Weiss said. “Look, the doorman saw me go in, maybe one look. He wasn’t there when I went out. One old lady in the lobby saw me going out fast, and that girl saw me when I went in. She didn’t hardly look at me. How can they be sure? You tell Freedman I was with you, and it’s us against Radford. A lot of guys look like me. He made a mistake.”

It was so stupid, so full of holes, it was pitiful. An animal running blindly from a forest fire.

“Sammy,” I said, “Radford knows your name.”

“He don’t!” Sammy said triumphantly. “I never told him.”

“Then how do the police know?”

“I figure he give a description. Freedman hears that and comes after me first off.”

“How do you know Freedman wants you?”

“I got friends. I made my window a jump ahead of the Cossack golem two hours ago. I shook him.”

“Maybe it’s something else.”

“I ain’t done nothing else. Gimme an alibi, Danny?”

“No. Go in. See what Freedman’s got. Don’t mention Radford until they do. If it is Radford, he started the fight.”

“He’s a blueblood, Danny, rich. Who listens to Sammy Weiss? They’ll drop a year on me at least. I can’t take it inside. All you got to do is alibi me. I know how it works. Our word against his. Only it’s got to be two of us.”

“No,” I said. “It wouldn’t help, and it’d hang me.”

His moon face looked straight at me for almost the first time. “Okay, Dan, sure. Only go talk to the guy. Make him tell he started it. Talk to Freedman, you know? Tell him I got friends. Look, I ain’t got two C-notes. I can get maybe fifty bucks.”