I wished he’d slow down; there were a dozen questions I wanted to ask. “You mean they got one of them,” I said, “and he admits there was somebody else, but won’t say who? They can’t get anything out of him?”

He tossed the words back over his shoulder. “Mister, they won’t never get anything out of that feller. He tried to pull a gun on Calhoun, and he was dead before he hit the ground.”

“Who’s Calhoun?”

“That big cop that stopped you from clobberin’ Frankie.”

“Hell, I wasn’t going to hit him—” I stopped. Of all the idiotic things to waste time on.

“You look like a man that could take care of hisself just about anywhere, but let me give you a tip. Don’t start nothin’ with Calhoun.”

“I’m not about to,” I said impatiently. I was sorry I’d asked.

“You think that’s fat. Mister, I got one word for you. It’s not fat. You know, I seen that man do things—” He paused, sighed, and shook his head. “Salty. What I mean, he’s salty.”

I wished he’d shut up about Calhoun and get on with it. “All right,” I prodded, “you say one was killed instantly, resisting arrest. So he didn’t say anything. Then how do they know there was another one? Did Calhoun catch him in the act?”

“No. That is, not exactly—”

We pulled to a stop before the Silver King. Heat shimmered off the highway, and the glare from the white gravel of the parking area was dazzling. I could hear a jukebox inside, and through the big window opposite us I could see some men drinking coffee at a counter. The driver put his arm up on the back of the seat and turned to look at me.

“What do you mean, not exactly?” I asked.

“Well, it was like this,” he said. “When Calhoun jumped this man—Strader, his name was—he was down there in the river bottom about four-thirty in the morning tryin’ to get rid of the body. Strader was drivin’ Langston’s car, and Langston hisself was in the back wrapped in a tarp with his head caved in.”

“Yes, I can see where that might look a little suspicious,” I said. “But was there anybody else in the car with Strader?”

“No. But there was another car, maybe fifty yards back up the road. It got away. Calhoun heard it start up and saw the lights come on, and ran for it, but he couldn’t catch it. He was just going to put a shot through it when he stumbled in the dark and fell down. By the time he could find his gun and get up, it was gone around a bend in the road. But he’d already got the license number. They got them little lights, you know, that shine on the back plate—”

“Sure, sure,” I said impatiently. “So they know whose car it was?”

”Yeah.