Read "The High Window" by Raymond Chandler online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
After a while Breeze got tired of looking at me and dug a cigar out of his pocket. He slit the cellophane band with a knife and trimmed the end of the cigar and lit it carefully, turning it around in the flame, and holding the burning match away from it while he stared thoughtfully at nothing and drew on the cigar and made sure it was burning the way he wanted it to burn.
Then he shook the match out very slowly and reached over to lay it on the sill of the open window. Then he looked at me some more.