“Well, now,” the sheriff drawled, “guess I’ll drop in at a restaurant and...”
“A restaurant!”
“Uh huh. My sister-in-law’s stayin’ up at my house.”
Quinlan laughed. “Come on up with me — no, hang it, if you don’t change your wet clothes you’ll catch cold. Get up to your house and get into some dry clothes.”
The sheriff looked down at his wet trousers, sighed wearily and said, “Well, I s’pose I’ve got to.”
5
It was a few minutes before nine when Beryl Quinlan saw Boy Jasper turn the corner and come walking toward the house.
Beryl ran to the door, whipped it open, and dashed down the stairs.
Roy saw her coming and flung up his arm in a gesture of greeting.
They met at the edge of the sidewalk.
“Roy!”
“Hi, Beryl!”
She gave him her lips in a swift eager kiss, then pulled away.
“Hey,” he said, “what’s the idea of such a nervous little peck?”
“We may have an audience. Come on, I want to talk to you. When did you leave the fort?”
“Last night — late.”
“Been up all night?”
“Just about. Couldn’t get a bus until after midnight. Travel sure is heavy these days.”
“Where were you when you telephoned me, at the fort?”
“Just outside of the fort, a row of telephone booths there. Why?”
“Oh, just wondering. Let’s not go in for a minute. Dad’s been out pretty much all night on a case and came home soaking wet, took a hot bath, changed his clothes, and has to go to the office in a minute. The family will engulf you if you go inside. Let’s sit out on the porch.”
“Suits me,” Roy said. “This isn’t front-porch weather, though. Been raining here?”
“Just a drizzle. It quit about an hour and a half ago. Let’s sit here. How about a cigarette?”
“How about a kiss, Baby? We don’t have an audience here.” She gave him her lips.
“That’s better. What’s the matter, Honey?”
“Just getting a good look at you. How about the discharge?”
“Don’t know yet. Think I may get it.”
“And how about my cigarette?”
Roy casually produced a silver cigarette case, snapped the catch with his thumb, opened it and extended it to Beryl.
“Roy!” she exclaimed.
He glanced up quizzically at the sound of her voice.
“That’s the case I gave you for Christmas.”
“Sure. What’s funny about that?”
“I... I thought perhaps you’d lost it.”
His forehead puckered into a puzzled frown. “Now what gave you that idea? And do you really want a cigarette?”
“Of course,” she said, taking a cigarette.
He took one and lit her cigarette, then his own. He dropped the case back into his pocket, regarding her thoughtfully. “What’s the big idea?” he asked.
“I... Oh, nothing... Roy, how much did you pay for that telephone call last night?”
He threw back his head and laughed. “I really got even with the telephone company that time,” he said. “I let one of the other boys come in and place a call to a nearby town while I was waiting. The rate there is only twenty-five cents. I guess the operator got the calls mixed. Anyway she told me mine was twenty-five cents and that’s all I paid, twenty-five cents.”
“What happened to the other boy?”
“Don’t worry about him,” Roy said. “He wouldn’t have paid any more than twenty-five cents on his call, and they couldn’t make him. I got to feeling a little cheap about it afterwards. I hope they don’t take it out of the telephone girl’s salary, but, honey, you know how it is. I’ve been stuck so many times when I’d stay in a hotel, and put in a call...”
“That’s wasn’t the fault of the telephone company. That was the fault of the girl at the hotel switchboard. She didn’t clear the line right away and naturally the telephone company had to charge you for all that extra time.”
“Well,” he admitted, “I felt cheap about it afterwards, but there was nothing I could do. You see, honey, you were on the line and I didn’t want to take time then telling her she’d made a mistake in my favor and having her wait and look up the call. I...”
The door opened. George Quinlan took two or three steps before he caught sight of the couple from the corner of his eye. He whirled almost apprehensively, then laughed nervously and said, “I didn’t know you two were out here. Hello, Roy. When did you get in?”
“Just now.”
Quinlan came across and shook hands. “Been up all night,” he said, “and I’m a little jumpy. Had breakfast?”
“Yes, thanks, had it more than an hour ago.”
“There’s some coffee on the table. Mrs. Quinlan will be glad to see you.”
“We’ll be in a minute,” Beryl said, and then smiling at her father said, “tell Mother, will you?”
That gave the undersheriff his cue. He said, “I will. See you later, Roy,” and went back into the house.
“What’s the big case?” Roy asked.
“A murder down at the old Higbee place. I understand she’s a girl around my age, blonde, stabbed in the back.”
“The old Higbee place?” Jasper asked, frowning.
“Yes. A man named Beckett bought the place and had started to plow. He found the body.”
“Beckett?” Roy repeated the name after her as though trying to refresh his recollection. “Oh, yes, Sam Beckett. I know him. What in the world was this girl doing in the old Higbee place?”
“No one knows. They don’t seem to have any clue as yet to her identity.”
Jasper finished his cigarette. Almost mechanically he opened the cigarette case, took out another, and lit the second cigarette from the end of the first. “Guess that’s going to keep your father busy,” he said. “How about going in and getting some of that coffee, Beryl?”
6
Sheriff Bill Eldon propped the Rockville Morning Register in front of his coffee cup.
The Register had gone to press about two o’clock in the morning, and had relied on large headlines and bold-faced type to obscure the fact that the paper had but few facts concerning the murder.
The editorial attitude of the paper was hostile to the entire County administration and Sheriff Eldon expected no quarter from it. On the other hand, it did a pretty good job of news coverage, although it occasionally slipped some editorial barb into its factual reporting.
Bill Eldon read the account carefully and then slowly reread it in order to give himself that semblance of preoccupation which would curb the conversation of his sister-in-law.
Finally Doris could stand it no longer. She said, “Well, if you ask me, somebody’s making an awful fool out of you officers.”
The sheriff’s silence was a courteous suggestion that no one was asking her.
“Or,” Doris went on, “perhaps you’re making fools of yourselves.”
“Could be,” the sheriff admitted laconically.
“Will you kindly tell me, Bill Eldon, how in the name of sense any person can walk over moist, freshly plowed, loamy soil and not leave any footprints?”
“I didn’t say it could be done.”
“The newspaper says it has been done.”
“Well, I’m not responsible for what the newspapers say.”
“The way they talk about you makes you sound like an old fossil.”
“The Register is on the opposite side of the political fence.”