“About a hundred and twenty miles more,” said Briggs as they watched the gas tank being filled and the oil checked. “Good road. We ought to make it in time for some enchiladas and tequila over in Juarez. Texas looks big on the map — but it’s four times as big when you drive across it.”
“Enchiladas and tequila it is,” Savage smilingly agreed. “We’ve earned that much at least.”
Savage’s wrist watch marked off two hours and a half before he took his foot off the accelerator and let the throbbing motor fall into a leisurely purr through Isleta, a few miles from El Paso.
Briggs telephoned: “I’m bathed and dressed, Chief. Want me to take it in while you change?”
“You might as well,” Savage agreed, and pulled over to a stop under tall cottonwoods that lined the road.
They were rolling smoothly on the El Paso city pavement, passing the first neon tourist camp signs, when Savage finished dressing.
He was adjusting his cravat when an automobile horn sounded alongside. A man shouted something. Briggs pulled over to the curb and stopped. Savage slipped on his coat and stepped out.
The red tail lights of an automobile were at the curb just ahead of their outfit. A tall man wearing a broad-brimmed Western hat had stepped back and was speaking to Briggs. He turned as Savage came to him.
“Mr. Savage?”
“Yes. Who is it?”
Savage could see the stranger’s tanned angular face smiling. He thrust out a hand. The stranger’s grip was strong.
“I’m Van Duesen, from the Tri-State Agency,” the man said. “I’ve been waiting along here for two hours for you to show up. Clancy, in New Orleans, gave me a description of your car and trailer.”
“Glad to know you, Van Duesen. I was going to call your office as soon as we had something to eat across the river.”
“I was afraid you’d do something like that,” said Van Duesen. “I thought you’d rather have me head you off. The lady checked out of the hotel about dark, taking her suitcase. A car was waiting for her at the side entrance of the hotel.”
“Damn!” exclaimed Savage in disappointment. “So she got away again! Where did she go?”
Van Duesen chuckled.
“We followed her. She didn’t go far. Only to a small cottage just beyond the city limits on the Alamagordo road. The last report I had, about twenty minutes ago, had her still out there. I thought you’d want to rush out there and check up, since she seems to have left the hotel for good.”
“Quite right. Decent of you to catch me on the road this way. Briggs, I’m afraid the enchiladas and tequila will have to wait.”
“I can take you in my car,” offered Van Duesen. “I take it you don’t want to run this heavy outfit out there, or wait to get unhooked.”
“Your car by all means,” assented Savage. “My man can get this outfit parked while we’re gone. Do you know of a good place?”
“The vacant lot behind our office building should do. Matter of fact I meant to suggest it to you. Mrs. Van Duesen is with me. She can show your man where the lot is, while we cut across town from here.”
“By all means.”
Van Duesen stepped to his car, returned in a moment with a small demure looking young woman who smiled rather shyly at her husband’s introduction.
“We shouldn’t be gone more than half an hour, darling,” said Van Duesen. “But if we should be gone longer, you can drop in to that movie you wanted to see.”
“Be careful, don’t get hurt, dear!” Mrs. Van Duesen cautioned as her husband opened the car door to seat her beside Briggs.
“I’ll get a gun and a pair of handcuffs, just in case,” decided Savage, turning back to the trailer.
“Never mind. I have both,” Van Duesen assured him.
“I’ll feel better with the gun anyway, in this instance.”
In the trailer Savage slipped off his coat, buckled on a shoulder holster, and did feel better when he joined the detective in the front car. It was hard to tell what might happen if Larnigan was in that house.
“Did Miss Sullivan have any visitors?” he asked as Van Duesen drove briskly across town.
“We didn’t see any. She was in her room all day.”
“Waiting for a telephone call, I suppose.”
“I wouldn’t know. What sort of a case is this anyway, Savage?”
“Murder.”
Van Duesen whistled softly. “Murder, eh? Making an arrest tonight?”
“I’ll know better after I see whom the lady is with.”
Chapter XXIII
Trapped
They sped through the El Paso outskirts, on the north. An air beacon on a low mountain off to the left swept a finger of light rhythmically around the sky. The street lights ended. The black-surfaced highway lay straight and smooth ahead through a tangle of desert plants, with only an occasional house light visible beside the road.
“How far is it?” Savage asked.
“A couple of miles. It’s off the road a little. We have a couple of men out there,” said Van Duesen heartily. He was a hearty man, a big man; he began to whistle cheerfully between his teeth.
And Savage was conscious of rising excitement. The break was coming. The Sullivan woman must be with Larnigan. Once that knot was unraveled, other things would fall in line. This was more luck than he’d hoped for.
Van Duesen slowed the car, turned off the highway into two sandy ruts that wound out of sight through the tall desert plants. The highway was almost a quarter of a mile back when a man appeared in the road ahead of them.
“One of our men,” said Van Duesen cheerfully. He switched off the headlights.
But the lights went dark a second too late. The indistinct figure in the road had registered on Savage’s mind with an explosive shock. The shadowy indistinctness itself had released that explosion of memory, clearing thoughts back to the lower hall in Larnigan’s house in New Orleans, where a shadowy figure had dodged out of the dim flashlight beam and vanished.
Savage grabbed under his coat for the automatic. And realized at the same instant that Van Duesen was watching him in the faint dashlight glow.
“No you don’t!” Van Duesen rasped violently, lunging against him and snatching at the gun hand.
Van Duesen was as powerful as he was big. But Savage fought with a fury he had never before experienced. Like a tyro he had fallen eagerly into a trap — and he would get no more mercy than a trapped animal.
But Van Duesen had a steel grip. His weight jammed Savage back in the seat corner. Van Duesen was using both hands to hold the gun harmless in the armpit holster.
The struggle was silent, save for their quick gasping breaths.
Van Duesen could not get to his gun. Savage tried to hurl him back. He might as well have shoved at a stone wall.
Abruptly Savage relaxed, thumbing off the safety catch of his gun as he did so, trying to twist both holster and gun far enough around to bear on his assailant.
Van Duesen sensed the danger. He jammed an arm in against the holster. And Savage pulled the trigger again and again for what good it might do.
The crashing shots smashed at the eardrums in that closed space. They seemed to hammer and tear at Savage’s side as the blasting muzzle gasses burned through to his skin. The bullets passed harmlessly between their two bodies and into the seat.
A moment later the door behind Savage was jerked open. A torch poured light over the seat. Savage expected a shot — he couldn’t see what was coming — couldn’t have dodged it anyway.