Free Black-Eyed Stranger by Charlotte Armstrong

said. “I can’t help it.”
    â€œBut what solution?” The gray man craved order. “Is there no way to apprehend these people?”
    â€œNo way that I know.”
    â€œAnd no way to prove they exist, either,” said Alan Dulain. His face was red.
    Sam’s whole head was red inside.
    â€œUnless Lynch is willing to be a little more helpful,” Dulain went on, “give us names, dates, places. At least something to check. Something besides a word of his, based on his intuition.”
    Sam said, thickly, “I’ll give no names. And it can’t be checked. And I was never here. Excuse me for intruding.”
    â€œLynch.”
    Sam had reached the door, somehow. He turned to the father. “Call the police. Say you’ve had a tip. And if you’ve got any charity, don’t say where you got it. But first of all, get her a bodyguard. Do something. Because it won’t be a kidnaping for long. It’ll be murder.” Then he flung himself out of the room with an after-image of the gray stunned face on his retina.

Chapter 7
    CHARLES SALISBURY clenched his hands. “What must we do? What do you think? Who is he, Alan?”
    Alan was still flushed. “Told you, sir. Lynch is a cheap writer, a sensationalist. He is supposed to be on friendly terms with some very crooked people. That type. No good. Intelligent, yes, but absolutely no good.” His face grew grimmer.
    â€œBut, Kay said he was a friend.”
    â€œMy fault, sir. I took her to a place I should never have taken her and … well … they met.”
    â€œI won’t have her in contact …” began the father angrily.
    â€œI know it, sir. I know it too well. She begged me. I thought if once she saw how cheap and flashy such a party could be—” He began to pace. “What concerns me, you see, it’s possible he would know. He is just the man who might know.” Charles Salisbury’s hand was on the phone. “What I do not get, is why … why! He is not the type to tell, sir. Now, whether Kay appeals to him … Frankly, I don’t see … The place was full of flashy women. This could be a nasty kind of hoax. Lynch writes for these hideous junk magazines.”
    Salisbury took his hand off the phone and clenched it again. He was a decent man and he had thought that, on the whole, his world was a fairly decent one. “I won’t forgive you, Alan, if because you took Kay somewhere …”
    â€œI can’t fit it in,” said Alan. “The only thing that happened, in the fifteen minutes she was there, is that she met Lynch. I can’t help wondering if Lynch is back of all of it.”
    â€œHow could that be?”
    Alan shook his head. “A twisted, a devious type. God knows what he thought he might get out of you. You had no way of knowing his background. Suppose I hadn’t been here?” He made this sound a serious speculation, nothing vain.
    But the older man said, gravely, “Suppose his story is a bare fact and the man is acting in common decency? You dislike him. I could see that.”
    â€œIt’s true, I have no patience with his type. He’s intelligent, and yet, to me, he makes a mockery of the whole effort … well … of men to combine and … well … rise. For some reason he violently dislikes me. Oh, I react to that.” The blond boy smiled ruefully. “It’s difficult to be fair. Meantime …”
    â€œYes. Yes, what? ”
    Alan reached for the phone and the book. “A guard, of course. There’s a very competent firm … private investigators. I think it’s imperative to have a guard. But we had better go about it as quietly as possible, sir.”
    â€œI know some people,” said Salisbury suddenly, “in the Police Department. If influence—”
    â€œI think this is a better way, sir.” Alan dialed. Salisbury sat, watching, with that