The Silver Tombstone

Chapter Two

It was still dark when Johnny Fletcher opened his eyes. For a moment he lay still. Then the events of the evening before rushed back into his mind and he sat up. He reached out and shook Sam Cragg.

“Up, Sam!”

Sam Cragg groaned and stirred. “Whatsamatter?” he mumbled. “It ain’t morning yet.”

“It will be in a little while. We’ve got to get moving.”

“Why?”

“Because we haven’t got any gas,” Johnny snapped. “And no ignition key.”

The bed creaked and Sam Cragg sat up. “Oh!” he grunted. “It comes back now.”

Johnny climbed out of bed and walked to the window. Brushing aside the curtain he looked out. “Dawn’s breaking. Come on.”

Not having undressed the night before their preparations for departure were simple. They merely walked out the door.

Outside the sky was greying. A light was on in the office building, but all the cabins were still dark. Shivering in the cool morning air, Johnny and Sam went to the old jalopy. From the glove compartment Johnny took three objects: a piece of wire, a length of rubber tubing and a canvas sack of the kind used for water by desert travelers. He handed the last two objects to Sam.

Sam scowled. “You know I don’t like this stuff, Johnny.”

“I don’t like it, either, but we have between us the sum of sixty-five cents, which may or may not buy us enough gas to get to Los Angeles.”

Sam sighed. “All right, all right.” He moved off toward a convertible parked nearby — Joe Cotter’s car. While he busied himself about the gas tank, Johnny performed his own little job, which consisted of attaching the piece of wire to the starter, so that a spark would jump from the ignition — sans ignition key.

Sam returned with a canvas sack full of gasoline and poured it into the gas tank of the jalopy. “Better get another,” Johnny suggested. “Seeing it’s Joe’s car.”

Two minutes later with Sam beside him, Johnny stepped on the starter. The motor caught instantly and they started out of the motel yard. As they passed the office a man came out and called to them, but Johnny pretended not to hear.

Johnny drove quickly through San Bernardino. With the lights of the city behind them he began chuckling. Sam looked at him. “What’s so funny?”

“I’d like to see that cowboy’s face when he finds our car missing.”

“I’d just as soon have stayed there and had it out with him,” Sam said. “The big palooka!”

He hunched down lower in his seat, scowling. After a moment he glanced surreptitiously at Johnny and drew a booklet from his pocket. Johnny shot a quick sideward glance and saw the title of the book: “Astrology In 12 Easy Lessons,” he read aloud. “Here we go again.”

“Go ahead, laugh,” Sam said. “But I’ve got a funny feeling — as if something’s about to happen.” He turned the page. “Let’s see — today’s the ninth. Yeah, Uranus is rising in Jupiter. Sons of Aquarius should be very careful all day, lest ill fortune befall them...”

“That was yesterday,” Johnny interrupted. “Everything’s in reverse. You predicted good luck yesterday and we had bad. Today...”

Sam Cragg, turning his head casually, jerked and cried out in horror.

Johnny’s head swiveled, and the car careened wildly across the road. He regained control before it went into the ditch, brought it over to the right side and braked it. Then he looked into the tonneau of the flivver.

A man was sprawled there — his legs on the floor, the upper part of the body on the seat. The handle of a knife protruded from his back.

“He’s dead!” Sam gasped. Then his eyes widened. “Uranus rising in Jupiter. The sons of Aquarius...”

“Ah, hell,” Johnny snarled. “The woman who screamed next door during the night—”

“A woman couldn’t have dragged this baby out and lifted him into the car,” Sam mumbled, shaking his head.

“There’s a car coming,” Johnny exclaimed. He whirled and stepped on the starter. Fortunately he had not removed the wire and the motor caught. He shifted into second, stepped on the accelerator and moved into high.

“He’s coming pretty fast,” Sam cried.

Fifty feet ahead, a narrow paved road cut the main highway. Johnny turned into it.

“He’s gone past,” Sam reported.

Johnny nodded. Suddenly he drove the car off the pavement, over a shallow ditch into an orange grove. Twenty feet from the road he stopped the car.

“End of the line,” he said, shortly.

“You gonna dump him here?”

“No — I’m going to leave the car here.”

“Why not just the body?”

“We can’t take a chance. They’ll know us by the car...”

“But they’ll check up on the license plates.”

“Let them. They’ll find that a Mort Murray of New York City bought the plates. I never bothered to have the registration changed when I bought the heap from Mort... Mort’ll cover up for us. He’ll say the car was stolen from him and since it had no value he didn’t report it. Which is almost true.”

“The car isn’t that bad. It brought us all the way across the country.”

“Which was the eighth miracle of the world... Better take the books. We’ll need a stake.”

Sam hesitated then reached gingerly into the rear of the car, almost under the lower half of the torso, and brought out a large, heavy carton, tied with a heavy cord.

Johnny took one last look at the car, then shook his head and started for the road. A few minutes later they were back on the main highway.

A car came along and Johnny used his thumb. The driver grinned derisively as he sped past.

“Maybe it’s just as well we don’t get any more lifts,” johnny said philosophically.

Sam Cragg was of a different opinion. “Everybody can’t be like that cowboy. It’s forty-some miles to L.A. You don’t think I can walk that far, do you?”

“In one day? It’s pretty stiff. But we ought to make it by tomorrow... Unless... what’s that ahead, Sam?”

“Car with a flat tire. And... yeah, I see what you mean...”

A hundred feet ahead a yellow convertible was parked at the side of the road. The left rear tire was flat. Surveying it was a girl in a yellow suit that almost matched the color of the car. As they approached Johnny saw that the girl was in her early twenties. She was tall and slender... yet filled out in the right places. Johnny liked her very much. Beside him Sam Cragg whistled softly.

The car had New York license plates.

“Hello,” Johnny greeted the girl. “Shall we change your tire?”

“Why?” the girl asked.

“Because it’s flat...”

“Oh, is it? How observing.”

Johnny grinned. “Right from Times Square!”

“Times Square?”

“Us, too.” Johnny kicked the flat tire. “Sam, take this off.”

“Oh, don’t bother,” said the girl. “Someone will come along...”

“Someone has come along.” Johnny walked around to the far side of the car and, leaning over, reached into the glove compartment for the driver’s registration card. “Helen Walker,” he read. “How do you do? I’m Johnny Fletcher and my friend here is Sam Cragg. Strange — three people from Times Square meeting out here in California.”

“There must be at least fifty thousand people from New York in California,” said the girl. “And about a half million from Iowa.”

“Yes, but Iowans don’t stick together like New Yorkers.” Johnny nodded toward Sam, laboring with the spare tire. “One New Yorker always does a good turn for another... when they meet away from home...”

The girl looked at Johnny, somewhat puzzled. “We’re going to L.A.,” he said, significantly.

She got it, then. Although she made no comment. Sam Cragg took out the jack from under the car and returned it to the luggage compartment, along with the flat tire. He let the door slam down and dusted his hands.

The girl opened the car door. “I’m sorry,” she said, “but I never give rides to hitchhikers. It isn’t safe.”

Johnny blinked. “Hitchhikers!”

The girl nodded to Sam Cragg. “Thank you for changing the tire.” She got into the car.

“Wait a minute,” cried Johnny. “You’ve forgotten something!”

Helen Walker turned and looked inquiringly at him.

“Our charge for changing tires is one dollar,” Johnny said, tightly.

She looked at him steadily for a moment, then opened her purse. “Of course. Here’s a dollar... and a quarter for yourself, my good man.”

Johnny took the money. The girl started the car and it jerked away.

Johnny stood looking after it. Sam Cragg came up beside him. “Jeez, Johnny,” he said. “That was pretty raw.

And what about her? ‘I never give rides to hitchhikers.’ ” He muttered something under his breath. “At least we can ride in a bus now.”

Sam brightened a little. “Yeah, I wasn’t so keen on hanging around this neighborhood.”