The Luck Runs Out (16 page)

Matilda Gables shook her head. “I went over the wreckage inch by inch while I was waiting for you. I couldn’t see a speck of color anywhere.”

“That was good thinking, Miss Gables,” said Lubbock. “Did you run across anything at all that looked interesting?”

“Only this.”

She pointed to a scrap of metal that might once have been a door panel. “See those funny scratches? I think they must have been done deliberately. Doesn’t that look like an M to you?”

Helen gasped. “Peter, it is! I must have done that myself while I was tied up and blindfolded. I was right up against the back door, praying the load wouldn’t shift and squash me, and I could feel bare metal behind me. I got the notion of scratching my initials on it with the diamond in my ring. I don’t know why; it was just to make myself feel a degree less helpless, I suppose. Don’t you think that by a wild stretch of the imagination, those scratches look a little bit like H.M.S.? My maiden name was Helen Marsh,” she explained to Lubbock.

“Oh yes,” said Matilda Gables excitedly. “See where she tried to cross the H, and that squiggly one at the end could easily be an S. Besides, the scratches are quite fresh. I wiped the smoke off this little corner here, and it’s not a bit rusty underneath.”

“Say, what’s a girl like you doing in a cow college?” Sergeant Lubbock was almost bursting with admiration by now. “Ever thought of the police academy?”

Miss Gables flushed. “They wouldn’t have me. I’m too little.”

“No, you’re not. You’re the perfect size. I mean, well, sure they have certain regulations in the uniformed branch because you have to be able to do all that police brutality stuff like picking up old ladies who’ve been knocked down and mugged, and being run over by hopped-up kooks you’re trying to keep from killing themselves on motorcycles. But there’s lab work, lie detecting, fingerprint analysis, photography, toxicology, lots of real fun jobs. You’d be a whiz!”

“I don’t believe I ever fully appreciated the scope of police work before,” Miss Gables replied, her face losing some of its lost-kitten expression. “I’ve always thought of you people more as repressive tools of a property-oriented society.”

“Yeah, we do a little repressing now and then. But remember one thing, Miss Gables: the Force is always with us!”

She giggled. Shandy cleared his throat.

“Sergeant Lubbock, you have a—er—public duty to give Miss Gables further enlightenment on this interesting subject. However, I’m wondering if it might be done—er—for instance, over a cup of coffee at the Student Union? Mrs. Shandy and I have some rather urgent business back home. Miss Gables, can you manage to contact Professor Stott on that gadget and explain that you’re leaving the search party to—er—cooperate with Sergeant Lubbock?”

“Professor Stott isn’t my squadron leader,” said Miss Gables primly.

“Then who is?”

A flush began at the point of the tiny chin and spread to the roots of the soft light-brown hair. She spoke a name in hushed reverence.

“Hjalmar Olafssen.”

Sergeant Lubbock made a noise that might best be described as a snort.

“Oh, Jesus, that klutz! Sorry, Professor Shandy, that was undepartmental language, and feel free to report me if you so desire. I’ll bet you a nickel cash money, though, that we get a rush call for a bulldozer to pull him out of the only patch of quicksand in Balaclava County. Did you happen to be at the sheep trials two years ago, when he fell over the collie? I laughed so much I had to go home and get my mother to sew up my uniform seams.”

“I don’t find that the least bit amusing,” said Miss Gables huffily. “Were you there?”

“No,” she admitted. “I wasn’t in college then.”

“Oh. Too bad. We could have shared a beautiful memory. Of course I did think for a second or two that he was going to be mobbed and scalped by your entire student body. I was trying to remember what it says in the police manual about riot control when he sat up with that klutzy grin on his face and started apologizing to the dog. I guess Olafssen’s a sort of natural-born clown, eh? Okay, Miss Gables, let’s see if we can reach him, and explain carefully in words of one syllable that you’re leaving the area.”

Seeing that the young woman was, in real distress over this tearing down of her idol, Shandy remarked, “I shouldn’t care to have you get a false impression of the—er—mental caliber of Balaclava students, Sergeant Lubbock. Olafssen can and does show a high degree of intelligence at times. That—er—happened not to be one of the times.”

This apparently happened to be another. They made contact easily enough, but they couldn’t seem to make the squadron leader understand who Matilda Gables was. At last Olafssen was persuaded to consult the list Professor Stott had given him, find her name, and cross it off. The state police sergeant shook his head.

“You’re trying to tell me that guy has all his marbles and he can’t remember a dish—I mean a young lady like Miss Gables?”

“We—er—have a fairly large student body,” Shandy replied. “As a senior, Olafssen doesn’t have a great deal of contact with underclass—er—persons. He—er—no doubt knows her by sight if not by name.”

“If he doesn’t, he must be blind as well as dumb,” said Lubbock as he shepherded the midget sophomore up the bank, keeping, as Shandy noted with some amusement, slightly to the rear in order to enjoy the view.

It was as well he did. From the front, Miss Gables presented a less charming picture. Her face was scarlet and her hazel eyes behind their absurd barn-owl spectacles were blurred with tears. Shandy felt mildly sorry for the child, but was content to let Lubbock cheer her up. The young sergeant was obviously having a red-letter day, between Helen’s identification of the van and Miss Gables’s form-fitting jeans. Lubbock’s jubilation began to get on Shandy’s nerves.

“I must confess,” he said crossly, “I can’t see how this burned out van is going to be much help in rounding up those crooks.”

“Well get ’em,” said Lubbock. “We’ve sent out those Identikit sketches made from your description to all stations. We’re keeping up the roadblocks, and there’s just no way those guys are going to get through with a load like the one they’re toting.”

“Still, you have no tangible evidence as to where they might be?”

“No, sir,” Lubbock admitted. “They seem to have dropped out of sight. But at least we know now that they’ve shifted the loot to a hiding place or some other vehicle. That’s a step in the right direction, isn’t it?”

“I suppose so.”

The professor was surprised to realize how depressed he was. Those awkwardly scratched initials were too poignant a reminder of the danger Helen had been in, the agony he’d endured before she turned up safe, and of the pleasant woman who’d been murdered so soon after the only time she’d got to use the silverware they’d bought in her honor.

He clearly remembered helping Miss Flackley on with that brown mohair stole. It had felt thick and light in his hands, and he’d been glad the frail-looking woman had such a warm covering against the chill of the night.

Thinking of mohair reminded him of goats, which led to sheep and his intention to buttonhole young Olafssen on the subject of Birgit Svenson’s sulking fit. Why hadn’t he used that child’s walkie-talkie to find the senior and get it over with while they were back there in the woods? Perhaps because some part of his brain was still functioning. He couldn’t have let the others go with him, and if they’d left without him he might have been stuck for hours waiting to get a lift home. It didn’t matter. He could catch Olafssen later, assuming there really wasn’t any quicksand in Balaclava County. If there was, Hjalmar would surely find it. On the whole, “klutz” wasn’t such a bad description.

Was Matilda Gables beginning to think so, too? The petite sophomore appeared to be responding positively, though timidly, to Sergeant Lubbock’s sales pitch on the need for brilliant young women in the Force. At times she looked up at him with the dawning of a new interest. Once or twice she smiled as winsomely as any young man could expect. Helen sat watching the tableau with a benign smile twitching about her lips, and Shandy was able to derive some pleasure from seeing his wife thus entertained.

As they neared the college, however, Helen’s expression grew vaguely troubled, then definitely perplexed. Things were not going right in the front seat; in fact, Matilda was beginning to cry. When they neared her dormitory, she begged to be let out and dashed off before Sergeant Lubbock could so much as request her phone number for official purposes.

A trooper to the bone, Lubbock endeavored to hide his chagrin, but he couldn’t fool Helen. Leaning forward, she remarked ever so casually, “I’m afraid you struck a nerve with Matilda Gables, Sergeant. You’re quite right about her not belonging at Balaclava, too; but it’s going to be dreadfully hard for her to admit she’s made such a stupendous mistake. Matilda’s going to need a good deal of understanding and moral support. I’m afraid she may have a hard time finding it around this campus. Don’t you agree, Peter?”

A well-directed kick on the ankle prompted Peter to agree that he did agree, even though every fiber of his loyal being rose up in protest against the suggestion that understanding and moral support were in short supply at Balaclava. It should, he thought be clear to the meanest intelligence that his wife was just trying to make this infatuated young squirt feel better, but Lubbock swallowed Mrs. Shandy’s specious explanation hook, line, and sinker.

“Gosh, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to upset her. Do you think I ought to give her a buzz and apologize?”

“Why don’t you wait a day or so, then give her a call—here, I’ll write down the name of the dorm for you—and perhaps make a friendly suggestion that she join you somewhere for a chat and perhaps a bite to eat? I should warn you, though, that Matilda’s a vegetarian, so you’d better make it a salad bar instead of a hamburger joint.”

“Vegetarian, eh?” As he stopped in front of the brick house and moved to help Mrs. Shandy out, Lubbock’s face broke into a grin. “So that explains it. I was wondering how those things got into the cruiser.”

He nodded at the place where Matilda had been sitting. Scattered around the seat and floor were a number of sunflower seeds, perhaps twelve or fifteen. As a rule, either or both of the Shandys would have automatically picked them up and counted them. Right now, neither Peter nor Helen would have touched them with a ten-foot pole.

N
OT EVEN THE WARMTH
of Iduna’s welcome could dispel the chill that was gripping the pair as they entered their house.

“Peter, it’s just not possible,” Helen protested. “That child could not have—”

“But all that crying and carrying on—”

“Don’t you think that was only because Olafssen didn’t—”

“With Lubbock ogling her buttocks?”

Iduna emitted a ladylike, “Hem! I hate to break up an interesting conversation, but President Svenson’s waiting in the living room.”

“It needed only that,” said Shandy. “How long’s he been here?”

“About an hour. We’ve been having a nice chat. He says I remind him of his wife’s second cousin Ortrud.”

“It’s a good thing you don’t remind him of his wife. We have enough shenanigans around here already.”

He went to meet the inevitable. “Hello, President; to what do we owe the honor?”

“Urgh,” said Svenson. “Where you been?”

“Identifying the van Helen got kidnapped in. One of our students found it. Matilda Gables, know her?”

That was a stupid question. President Svenson knew a great deal about every one of his students.

“Sophomore. Little smarty-pants with big glasses. One of Birgit’s Viggies. Doesn’t belong here. Vassar, Bryn Mawr, some highbrow place. Stuck on Olafssen, like the rest of ’em. Wish the hell they wouldn’t. Plenty of good guys going to waste. What the hell was she doing finding vans? She’s supposed to be finding a pregnant sow, damn it! Too blasted intellectual to know the difference?”

“No, Miss Gables appeared to have a grasp on the—er—realities of the situation. It was just that the van—er—happened to be there.”

“Urgh,” said the President again, thus dismissing the student, the van, the entire subject. “Been to see Goulson. Got it set up. Tomorrow morning. Nine o’clock. Baptist church. Be there.”

“Naturally,” said Shandy. “Helen and I wouldn’t dream of not attending. We liked Miss Flackley very much. Why so early?”

“Why not?” Svenson replied reasonably. “Get it over before word spreads and the vultures gather. Goulson’s going to phone her old customers, neighbors, town fathers, people he thinks ought to pay their respects.”

Shandy started for the door. “I’d better tell Helen right now. She’ll want to order flowers.”

“Siddown. All ordered. One from my wife and me, one from the animal husbandry department, one from you, one from Stott. Goulson’s going to pick ’em out and send you the bill.”

“That’s nice,” Shandy grunted. “Have you informed Frank Flackley yet?”

“Ungh. Stopped in here a while back on the way from Hoddersville to Lumpkin Corners, for some damned reason. Twelve-mile detour. Man must be demented.”

“Er—not necessarily. All roads seem to lead to Miss Bjorklund these days.”

“Yesus, you got one, too? See why. Nice woman. Good-natured. Good pie. Good coffee. Good doughnuts. Keep her around.”

“We’re hoping to,” said Shandy. “I’ve been thinking that perhaps she and Tim Ames—”

Svenson burst into guffaws. “The mountain and the squirrel!”

“Jemima was a big woman,” said Shandy defensively.

“Not that big. Forget it, Shandy. You’re barking up the wrong shins.”

“But, drat it, President—”

Svenson wasn’t interested in Shandy’s protest. Having accomplished his mission, he heaved his great bulk out of the special chair Helen had bought to accommodate guests the size of him and Professor Stott and charged for the door.

“What was that all about?” Helen asked when Shandy went to find her, and perhaps a cup of coffee, in the kitchen.

“Miss Flackley’s funeral. It’s all set for nine o’clock tomorrow morning. The President has graciously ordered flowers to be sent in Stott’s and our names. We get the bills, of course.”