She wanted to signal him somehow that her husband was not at his best, but the way in which he greeted them both made it clear that he had grasped that immediately. This time he did not offer to sit down, instead he delivered what news he had to give standing up. “I believe that I may have picked up your boy’s trail,” he said. “I can’t be certain, but there is a good chance that he may be on his way to Anaheim.”
“To Anaheim?” Maggie asked, not understanding.
“Yes, that’s where the California Angels have their baseball stadium.”
“But it’s a long way, isn’t it?”
“Yes, Mrs. McGuire, it certainly is, but there is bus service. We’ve almost certainly established the fact that Johnny showed up at an all-night filling station early this morning and used the washroom. Then he asked for instructions as to how to get to Anaheim.”
“Was he all right?” Maggie asked anxiously.
Before Tibbs could answer Mike cut in. “But he wouldn’t go oil just to see a ball game like that, not when he’d know that me and his ma would be sitting here worried sick about him!”
“No, sir, I don’t think he would. But you told me something last night that may explain his actions. I don’t want to go into it now, but I believe that it would be a very good idea if you would come with me to Anaheim. If we find your boy there, he may need his father’s comforting presence very much.”
Maggie looked at him swiftly, aware quite suddenly that he understood her husband much better than she had expected.
“I’ll come,” Mike responded. He picked up a sweater which was across the back of a chair and then looked at his wife. “What if Johnny comes home while we’re away?” he asked.
Maggie drew breath, but Virgil answered for her. “If that happens, Mrs. McGuire, call the police department immediately. They’ll get in touch with us by radio. I have a set in the car.”
Relieved, Maggie saw the two men to the door and watched while they got into the official car parked at the curb below. When she had seen them drive away she returned to the kitchen, carefully opened another can of soup, and put it on the stove over a low flame. If her boy came home, she was not going to let him go hungry a minute longer than necessary. The police would have to arrest him, she understood that, but he was going to get a warm meal first.
The ball game which was underway at Anaheim was going forward with more than usual speed. Both pitchers were effective, which kept the batters coming up to the plate in a steady succession. The defensive play on the part of both California and Detroit was sparkling. By the end of the sixth inning there had been no errors on either side, while Bobby Knoop had definitely saved a run by a sensational play at second base.
As the game progressed, a number of isolated events began to shape themselves into a pattern. On the Santa Ana Freeway Charles Dempsey in his rebuilt car was making all reasonable speed toward Anaheim and the baseball stadium. There were events likely to take place there in which he was vitally interested. The more that he could witness and later describe firsthand, the greater would be the impact he would be able to make upon his return.
A notice to appear in traffic court was mailed to Mike McGuire at his home. At the same time the attorney for the man whose car he had forced into the center freeway divider sent him a stiff letter demanding payment for all damages under threat of an immediate lawsuit.
At Disneyland the security force was on the sharp lookout for a boy carrying a shoe box, or any apparently unaccompanied youngster of the proper age who might be Johnny McGuire. It was considered likely that he might have disposed of his dangerous weapon at some convenient opportunity. In response, an intensive search for it was put on with every possible part of the grounds being combed for the gun. Despite the thoroughness of the effort, it was so skillfully done that literally none of the thousands of visitors who were enjoying the park had any idea that something might be amiss.
Several young boys were spotted who at first seemed to be alone. When no parents or other escorts appeared three of them were quietly questioned. All three were able to establish their identities to the satisfaction of the security personnel concerned. Four shoe boxes were discovered to be in the park; cautious investigation disclosed that two of them contained bona fide lunches, the other two held shoes brought along for the relief of aching feet. At the end of two and a half hours the Disneyland authorities considered it most likely that if the gun was anywhere on the grounds, Johnny McGuire had probably managed to throw it unnoticed into one of the many ponds and waterways which crisscrossed the grounds. If this were the case, then its prompt recovery would be almost impossible.
Then a positive break came through: the Los Angeles Police Department located the off-duty plainclothes officer who had been stationed in the bus depot that morning. He recalled at once having seen a boy, apparently unaccompanied, carrying a shoe box. The boy had purchased a ticket and then joined a group headed for Disneyland. He had not been wearing a red jacket and there had been nothing about him at the time to excite any undue suspicion, other than the fact that he had been briefly alone. He had had none of the earmarks of a runaway.
As soon as this information reached him, Captain Lindholm notified the Anaheim authorities that the probabilities were now strongly increased that Johnny McGuire was in their jurisdiction. The word was immediately passed to the stadium police detachment and to Disneyland, then it was put on the air and an acknowledgment was received from Virgil Tibbs, who was en route near Downey.
Armed with this additional fact, the Disneyland security chief put additional measures into effect. He was considerably concerned that if a child accidently found the gun, and mistook it for a cap pistol, a very serious accident could occur. Apart from the immediate danger, there was also the threat of the damage such an event could do to the park’s reputation. As part of the renewed search, a special crew began a recheck of all of the trash and waste receptacles located anywhere on the grounds.
On the Santa Ana Freeway a minor traffic accident temporarily blocked one lane. Immediately cars and trucks began to pile up behind the stalled vehicles as some motorists fought to get around the obstruction while hundreds of others slowed down to a crawl to see what was going on. Caught in this unexpected congestion Virgil Tibbs accepted it as one of the facts of life; Mike McGuire, his passenger, fumed impatiently and had difficulty understanding that the Pasadena police car could not simply make use of the red lights and siren with which it was equipped somehow to force a way through the stalled traffic.
Eighteen minutes later the shoe box was discovered. The intelligent guard who found it realized immediately that it and its contents had undoubtedly been kept in one of the lockers nearby. He was decidedly disappointed that the box did not contain the gun, but the crumpled paper towels which were inside suggested what their purpose might have been. At the security office the box was expertly examined and a faint trace of what might have been gun oil was detected. Disneyland notified the Anaheim police that it was practically certain that Johnny McGuire’s shoe box had been recovered, but that no trace of the weapon it had contained had as yet been found. A crew was then dispatched to search the parking lot which was now the most likely place where the gun might have been discarded. In the comparative privacy between the closely parked cars it would have been easy to slide the weapon somewhere out of sight behind a tire. The fact that he had discarded the shoe box pointed to the likelihood that the missing boy was tired of carrying the gun and anxious to dispose of it. How he might have carried it undetected out of the front gate remained an open question.