The Maltese Falcon - Dashiell Hammett [65]
She shuddered and swallowed audibly. Spade began to chafe her arm and side and he put his mouth nearer her ear. “That’s fine. You’re doing fine. One, two, three, four. Faster, faster, faster, faster. That’s it. Step, step, step, step. Pick them up and lay them down. That’s the stuff. Now we turn. Left, right, left, right. What’d they do—dope you? The same stuff they gave me?”
Her eyelids twitched up then for an instant over dulled golden-brown eyes and she managed to say all of “Yes” except the final consonant.
They walked the floor, the girl almost trotting now to keep up with Spade, Spade slapping and kneading her flesh through yellow silk with both hands, talking and talking while his eyes remained hard and aloof and watchful. “Left, right, left, right, left, right, turn. That’s the girl. One, two, three, four, one, two, three, four. Keep the chin up. That’s the stuff. One, two …”
Her lids lifted again a bare fraction of an inch and under them her eyes moved weakly from side to side.
“That’s fine,” he said in a crisp voice, dropping his monotone. “Keep them open. Open them wide—wide!” He shook her.
She moaned in protest, but her lids went farther up, though her eyes were without inner light. He raised his hand and slapped her cheek half a dozen times in quick succession. She moaned again and tried to break away from him. His arm held her and swept her along beside him from wall to wall.
“Keep walking,” he ordered in a harsh voice, and then: “Who are you?”
Her “Rhea Gutman” was thick but intelligible.
“The daughter?”
“Yes.” Now she was no farther from the final consonant than sh.
“Where’s Brigid?”
She twisted convulsively around in his arms and caught at one of his hands with both of hers. He pulled his hand away quickly and looked at it. Across its back was a thin red scratch an inch and a half or more in length.
“What the hell?” he growled and examined her hands. Her left hand was empty. In her right hand, when he forced it open, lay a three-inch jade-headed steel bouquet-pin. “What the hell?” he growled again and held the pin up in front of her eyes.
When she saw the pin she whimpered and opened her dressing-gown. She pushed aside the cream-colored pajama-coat under it and showed him her body below her left breast—white flesh criss-crossed with thin red lines, dotted with tiny red dots, where the pin had scratched and punctured it. “To stay awake … walk … till you came…. She said you’d come … were so long.” She swayed.
Spade tightened his arm around her and said: “Walk.”
She fought against his arm, squirming around to face him again. “No … tell you … sleep … save her …”
“Brigid?” he demanded.
“Yes … took her … Bur-Burlingame … twenty-six Ancho … hurry … too late …” Her head fell over on her shoulder.
Spade pushed her head up roughly. “Who took her there? Your father?”
“Yes … Wilmer … Cairo.” She writhed and her eyelids twitched but did not open. “… kill her.” Her head fell over again, and again he pushed it up.
“Who shot Jacobi?”
She did not seem to hear the question. She tried pitifully to hold her head up, to open her eyes. She mumbled: “Go … she …”
He shook her brutally. “Stay awake till the doctor comes.”
Fear opened her eyes and pushed for a moment the cloudiness from her face. “No, no,” she cried thickly, “father … kill me … swear you won’t … he’d know … I did … for her … promise … won’t … sleep … all right … morning …”
He shook her again. “You’re sure you can sleep the stuff off all right?”
“Ye’.” Her head fell down again.
“Where’s your bed?”
She tried to raise a hand, but the effort had become too much for her before the hand pointed at anything except the carpet. With the sigh of a tired child she let her whole body relax and crumple.
Spade caught her up in his arms—scooped her up as she sank