The Classic Mystery Novel MEGAPACK®. Hay James
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him, to prevent the meeting. Jack set foot on the running board. Immediately the other man stepped forward.
“Here I am,” he said.
Perhaps because he had resented the trip Jack pretended a greater cordiality than he actually felt. He grasped the other’s hand in a hearty fashion. “You’re Mr. Lewis?”
The stranger submitted to a limp handshake. “I’m Lewis. You have kept me waiting at least ten minutes.”
Jack was a little dashed, but politely apologetic. “Sorry. I was looking through the station. This is my wife, Mr. Lewis.”
“So I guessed. I’ve stood here watching her.”
“I was almost on the point of speaking,” said I.
“Well,” said Lewis in a flat, nasal voice, “you took your time about it.”
This ungracious speech resulted in an awkward pause. Jack broke it by opening the rumble seat and attempting to relieve our guest of his baggage. Lewis drew back sharply.
“Never mind! I prefer to place my own bags.”
Whereupon he dropped one bag into the rumble seat and shoved the other into the seat with me. After settling his luggage, he climbed nimbly into the rumble seat. The drizzle was still intrusive; the evening air moist and dank. Jack’s instincts toward hospitality, sinking fast, were not yet entirely dead. He entered a mild protest.
“You had better get in front. You will find it wet riding in the open.”
“I don’t mind wet weather.”
“There’s plenty of room up here for three,” I interposed. “You can ride with us and we can put both bags behind.”
“I’m staying where I am.”
Jack, still standing on the curb, was thoroughly annoyed by now. I glanced through the window at him and shook my head. He shrugged his shoulders resignedly. When he spoke to Lewis again it was with an emotionless civility.
“Just where do you want me to take you?”
“Crockford.”
“Where in Crockford?”
The thin lips parted to disclose a row of white teeth, very square and even. “Don’t you know where I want to be dropped?”
“How should I?”
For the first time Lewis seemed uncertain. Then he recovered himself and his glance was hard and level. “I will make the arrangements after we reach your cottage.”
“Our cottage is six miles on the other side of Crockford.”
“Then I’ll go that far with you. I want to see the cottage. Mrs. Coatesnash requested it.”
At a complete loss, too astonished to voice the obvious objections, Jack put an end to the conversation by getting into the car and starting it with a terrific jerk. I lurched backward.
“Sorry, Lola. That was meant for Lewis, and I rather hope he breaks his neck.”
We flowed into traffic, crossed the bridge beyond the lighted railroad offices, debouched into the Post Road, quit the Post Road for our own. The night was desolate. Wind sighed and moaned and blew the light little car along. A few drops of rain hissed at the windows. For awhile we didn’t speak.
Then, “I think he’s crazy,” said I, low.
“Why should Mrs. Coatesnash ask him to go to the cottage?” growled Jack. “We’ve paid our rent; he’s got no right there.”
“It’s beyond me. Do you suppose he came up from New York simply to look at our place?”
Jack irritably sought to fathom the puzzle. “Mrs. Coatesnash may be planning to sell. That might explain why she didn’t condescend to write us. She wouldn’t risk losing rent till she was sure of a sale. Not that dame!”
“Then you think Lewis is a real-estate agent?”
“A real-estate agent with the winning attractiveness of a surly baboon!”
The peak of traffic was over. Occasionally, not often, another car shot by. We sped into darkness intensified by empty fields and the ghostly arms of telegraph poles. Like a twisted ribbon ahead, lost in an endless perspective, stretched the lonely country road. The bag on the seat—Lewis’s bag—jostled continually against me. Once as I caught the braided leather handle to shift position, I happened to glance back into the rumble. Lewis was watching. He had half risen, one hand gripped the side of the car,, his spectacled eyes peered at his bag and at me. I expelled a sharp breath.
“What’s wrong, Lola?”
“Nothing.”
I was ashamed to admit I had been startled by a pair of staring eyes. Then, glancing at the windshield mirror, I perceived that Lewis remained in the odd, half-erect position. It seemed impossible that he could maintain it, yet he did. He kept one hand in his overcoat pocket. The other supported his weight. His dense blue eyes were glued upon the bag with the braided handle. Snatching at the curtain which covered the back window, I pulled it down Jack roused from the reverie that overtakes good drivers on a clear highway.
“What is it, sweetheart? You’re trembling.”
“Mr. Whozis makes me nervous. He keeps staring in. Please let’s hurry.”
Jack grinned, undisturbed. He had hunted too many nonexistent burglars during our life together to take seriously any intuitive fears.
“Please hurry, Jack.”
Usually I am a great girl for caution, Jack cocked an eyebrow. “Forty miles an hour is fast enough with the roads in this condition.”
“Drive faster, please. The stores will be closed. We need eggs for breakfast.”
“I’ll get them in the morning.”
“Please, Jack.”
“Have it your own way!”
He made a vigorous surrender. The car shot forward as if pushed by a giant hand; the speedometer needle leaped from 40 to 45, danced a jig at 55. A few miles outside Crockford, over the banshee howl of the wind we heard the pop-pop of a pursuing motorcycle. A State policeman whizzed abreast of us. Jack gave me one look.
“Your party, Lola.”
We pulled dismally to the side of the road. Coughing and snorting the motorcycle stopped and a dark slim man in shiny boots alighted and approached us from the rear. I recognized the policeman, and instantly rallied my feminine charms. Lester Harkway, if not a friend, was at least an acquaintance, the first person we had met in Crockford. He had directed us to the cottage, and afterward, when we passed him patrolling the roads, he always touched his cap. He regarded us now with frank disfavor.
“You kids were hitting fifty-five. This is a public road not a merry-go-round.”
“It’s late,” I said appealingly. “I was in a hurry to get home and talked Jack into it.”
“I should say you were in a hurry. I’ve got a good notion to give you a ticket.”
Harkway, pretending a greater anger than he felt, intended, I was sure, to let us go with a warning. At this point Elmer Lewis projected himself into the affair with a lack of tact and in a manner which I had begun to believe was typical. Leaning from the rumble seat, speaking in brisk, insulting tones, he informed Harkway that he personally had no time to waste on “hick policemen.” Jack’s jaw dropped and my eyes popped out. Harkway was Irish. He made up his mind at once, scribbled a ticket, ripped it off the pad. His face was bright red.
“It’s tough on you,” he said to Jack, “but damned if I’ll swallow your friend’s lip. By rights he ought to pay the fine.”
Again Lewis interrupted. “That suits me. Hand it here.” He reached for the slip of paper.