Sam Rogers had small tight features and he looked as though something always bothered him.
“What kind of a car was he driving?”
“A 1956 sedan. Dark blue,” She gave me the license number.
I wrote that down. “A 1956 sedan?”
“Sam thought it better not to be too conspicuous. Some country people distrust a stranger in a new car.”
Something else occurred to me, though I didn’t think it was too likely. “Have you ever thought that he might just have run out on you?”
Her face became expressionless. “If he did, I want to know about it.”
I could have started from the top of Irene’s list, but I thought it was more interesting to work from the bottom up. And I like twenties.
I got to Eaton City a few minutes after seven on Friday and stopped at Harrison’s Drugstore. I bought another two packs of cigarettes and while I was lighting up, Harrison got around to his punchboard.
On the fourth try, I handed him the tape and looked surprised. “First time I ever won anything in my life.”
He sighed when he handed me the twenty and looked up at the clock. “I should have closed at seven like always.”
There was one other place in Eaton City. Turk’s Service Station and Garage.
My tank was full, the oil okay, and the tires had the air they needed. I disconnected my horn and drove down the main street until J found the place.
A kid of about nineteen or twenty came out of Turk’s small office.
“Something seems to be wrong with my horn,” I said.
He nodded and pulled up the hood.
I got out of the car and watched him. “Are you Turk?”
He grinned. “No. Just work here. Turk’s inside.”
I glanced through the open garage door. Turk was a burly man under a car on the rack. He looked like he didn’t care for what he was doing for a living.
The kid found the wire after a few seconds. “Just disconnected, mister. Must have slipped off.”
While he was there, he checked the oil and the water, and then put down the hood. “Gas?”
“No. Filled up a couple of miles back and then got this trouble. How much do I owe you?”
He shrugged. “Nothing. Didn’t take more than a minute.”
He was about to go back inside the station without bringing up the subject of the punchboard.
I put my hand on the door lever of my car. “Stopped in at a drugstore down the street. The man had a punchboard and I lost half a buck.”
The kid wiped his hands on a rag. “Turk had one of them things too. Had it four days and along come somebody and hits the big number. Cost Turk twenty bucks.”
That could have been Sam Rogers — or maybe some one else punched the lucky number. I clicked my tongue sympathetically. “Probably somebody driving a Cadillac. Some people have all the luck.”
He shook his head. “No. ’56 Ford. Sort of small man. Worried looking. I thought he was even a little bit sick. Came in around seven-thirty in the evening.”
I thought I could figure it from there. Sam had stopped here and picked up the twenty. Then he went on to Harrison’s Drugstore. But Harrison closed at seven or soon after.
The chances were that Sam had decided to spend the night in town — it was late enough to call it a day. He could pick up the twenty at Harrison’s in the morning and move on. But he had never gotten there.
I stretched. “Long day on the road. Is there any place in town where I could put up for the night?”
“The Liston House is the only place we got. It’s small, but everybody says the beds are good. Right down on Main Street, back a block.”
I parked my car on a side street and took my overnight bag to the Liston House.
It was an old-fashioned three-story building and the lobby was empty. The man behind the desk put aside his magazine and rose. He was in his middle forties and wore rimless glasses. He watched me sign in. “Staying long?”
“Can’t say. Got some business in town. Might take a couple days.” I glanced at the names above mine and saw that I was the only one who’d registered today. “Business slow?”
“That’s right.”
I turned back a page of the register.
There was a trace of sharpness in his voice. “What are you doing?”
“Just checking to see if Sara got here. Sara Rogers. Friend of mine.” I found his name. He had registered a week ago. I looked up. “What room is he in?”
The clerk swiveled the register back into place. “He’s not here. He checked out after one night.”
I raised an eyebrow. “That’s funny. He told me he’d be here a week or more.”
“Well, he wasn’t. He left the next morning. Early.”
I frowned thoughtfully. “Did he get a telephone call?”
“There was no phone call.”
“Or a telegram?”
“No telegram.” He moved a pen back and forth on the blotter a couple of times. “You say you’re a friend of his?”
“We’re like brothers. He tells me everything.”
He got a key from the board. “You’re in Room 204. Want me to show you?”
“Never mind.” I picked up my bag. “You’re the bellboy too?”
“I’m everything,” he said sourly. “Bellboy, switchboard operator, everything. Seven in the evening until seven in the morning.”
But I didn’t think things were too rough for him. There was a well-worn couch behind the counter and he probably slept most of the night.
I left my bag in the room and went out for something to eat.
Sam Rogers had spent the night at the Liston House — or at least he had registered. He could suddenly have decided to take off and disappear. I would have to wait until tomorrow to do the checking I wanted and then I thought I would know more.
After eating I went to a bar, mostly to kill time. There isn’t much else to do in a small town on a Friday night.
I got back to the Liston at about ten-thirty.
There was a knock at my door a few minutes later.
The florid-faced man had a .45 in his hand. He backed me into the room and closed the door behind him. “You’ve been picking yourself up a little change, haven’t you, boy? Twenty here and twenty there?”
I said nothing.
The smile didn’t go to his eyes. “Where’s Sam? Or maybe I should ask what you did to him?”
“You got the wrong man. I don’t know anybody named Sam.”
He shook his head sadly. “Let’s not play that way. We both know who and what I’m talking about.”
I shrugged. “All right. I know somebody named Sam. And I’m supposed to have done something to him?”
“It’s a guess. How else did you get hold of the list? And don’t tell me you just got lucky on those punchboards. Who the hell are you anyway?”
The .45 steady in his hand told me it was time to stop fooling around. “Mike Regan.”
“That’s just a name. Toss over your wallet.”
He flipped it open and saw my credentials. He looked up.
“Mrs. Rogers hired me to find her husband,” I said. “He’s missing.”
He worked on that a few seconds and then tossed back the wallet. “Why didn’t she tell me?”
“Why should you be interested?”
“The name’s Pete Cable. I guess Irene would have told you about me.”
I nodded. “If you didn’t know that Sam was missing, just what brought you here?”
He glanced at the automatic in his hand and then slipped it back into his pocket. “The last few weeks, Sam’s been claiming that times have been bad. When he makes his collections, the odds say that about once in twenty times somebody lucky could get to the big number on the board before he does. I’m a reasonable man and I’ll even settle for once in ten. But for almost a month Sam’s been reporting that three or four times out of ten the number was already punched when he got there. I just didn’t buy that.