In a framed box was a detailed description of the girl, with an appeal from the police for anyone seeing her to get in touch with them.

The general belief seemed to be that Karen had been kidnaped by the robbers who had invaded the house, had had a gunfight, and had decamped.

Stolz said that nothing seemed to be missing.

Not a word about the money, Eddie thought. He put the paper down, tried to figure out what had happened. Stolz had his money safe, that was sure. He was keeping quiet about it, too. Then another hunch struck Eddie with dreadful impact.

Skip had been shot in that room. Stolz had killed him and hidden his body, dumped it somewhere. Or else Skip was wounded and was hiding somewhere and perhaps dying slowly.

A terrific sense of treasonous guilt shot through Eddie. His course was plain to him. He would have to go back to L.A. and find Skip.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Mrs. Mosby locked the front door of the café and clicked off all the lights in the dining area. She showed Eddie where the cot was, stuck up high in the rafters, the pad tied in a roll beside it; and while he was getting the cot down, setting it up and unrolling the pad, she went to her house and brought back two pillows in fresh cases, a couple of sheets and a blanket.

When she had gone again, when the bed was made, Eddie flopped on it and stretched himself with a sigh. “I’m beat. Chrissakes, I’m beat to the socks,” he said. Then he looked around for Karen. She had disappeared into the kitchen. “Hey, what are you doing?”

“I’ve got to scrub and wash my hair,” Karen called back.

Eddie lay and listened to the wet splashy noises from the sink, and then he drowsed. He hadn’t worked so hard since the last time he’d been in honor camp, repairing the roads in a county park. He woke when Karen sat down beside him. She’d found an old broken comb, was using it to straighten her hair. She smelled fresh and clean. He lifted himself and pulled her close, loving the clean smell and the softness. Then he had to talk about what he’d read in the paper.

“I’ve been trying to figure it out. Stolz must have caught Skip and shot him, but Skip somehow got away. He’ll need help; my God, he might be bleeding to death somewhere this minute.”

A bleak frightened look settled in her eyes. “Don’t talk about him. Don’t think about him. Forget him.”

“I can’t do it.” Eddie spoke in resignation, bitterly.

“We have each other,” she said desperately. “We don’t need him.”

“I shouldn’t have run away, ditched him like that. It wasn’t any kind of a thing to do.”