“He’s had his dinner! I mean, I fixed him a lunch before he left!”

“You mean he’s outside when maybe the sun will stop shining pretty soon and it’ll start raining to beat heck, and he’ll probably spoil his clothes and get himself an awful cold?” I said. “Now, that ain’t takin’ very good care of your brother, honey.”

Myra’s face began to swell, kind of like she was blowing out her cheeks. She stared at me, her eyes popping, and god-dang if she didn’t sort of tremble all over.

“Why for did Lennie go out in the daytime, anyways?” I said. “He can’t peek in no windows when it’s light.”

“You!” Myra said, pushing herself up from the chair. “Y-You—” She pointed toward the door, her hand shaking like a leaf. “You get out of here, you hear me? GET OUT OF HERE!”

“You mean, you want me to leave?” I said. “Well, you should’ve said so sooner. Maybe given me a little hint.”

I put on my hat, and told her to be sure and call me when dinner was ready. She made a wild grab for the sugar bowl, and I got on down the stairs pretty fast.

I sat down in my office. I tilted my hat over my eyes, and put my boots up on the desk. It looked to me like it was a good time to take a little nap, because people still weren’t getting around much on account of the mud. But this was one day I just couldn’t keep my eyes closed.

Finally, I stopped trying. There just wasn’t much point to it with me so scared-worried. I figured the best thing I could do was to get things over with; get some fellas together and start the hunt for Tom. Then, whatever happened, I’d know what it was, at least, and I wouldn’t have to fret myself anymore.

I got up and started for the door. The phone rang, and I went back to answer it. And just as I did, Lennie came busting in.

He was waving his arms, burbling and spitting all-the-heck over everything with excitement.

I waved him to simmer down, and spoke into the phone. “Just a minute, Robert Lee. Lennie just came in, and it looks like he wants to tell me somethin’.”

“Never mind. I know what he wants to tell you,” Robert Lee Jefferson said, and he told me what it was. “Now, you better get right down here and take charge.”

I said I’d do that, and I did.

It was Henry Clay Fanning, a farmer who lived a couple miles south of the Hauck place, who’d found the bodies. He’d been out cutting cordwood at the time, and he’d just pitched ‘em up on top of his load and brought ‘em on into town.

“Didn’t waste a minute,” he said proudly, spitting snuff into the mud. “You reckon the county’ll sort of take care o’ me for my trouble?”

“Well, I’m not real sure they will, Henry Clay,” I said, noticing how Uncle John’s head was crushed between the wood and the wagon bed. “After all, you was comin’ to town anyways.”