Free Psycho by Robert Bloch Page A

night, just before closing time. Took a hell of a beating on the deal, too. But I got all the info on the title, and a full description of the heap she drove out with. Heading north.
    "So I headed north, too. But I couldn't go very fast. I was playing one hunch—that she'd stick to the highway because she was coming here. Probably drive straight through, the first night. So I drove straight through, for eight hours. Then I spent a lot of time around Oklahoma City, checking motels along the highway, and used car places on the road. I figured she might switch again, just to be on the safe side. But no dice. Thursday I got up as far as Tulsa. Same routine, same results. It wasn't until this morning when the needle turned up in the haystack. Another lot, another dealer, just north of there. She made the second trade early last Saturday—took another shellacking and ended up with a blue 1953 Plymouth, with a bad front fender.
    He took a notebook from his pocket. "It's all down here in black and white," he said. "Title dope, engine number, everything. Both dealers are having photostats made and sending them back to the home office for me. But that doesn't matter, now. What matters is that Mary Crane drove north out of Tulsa on the main highway last Saturday morning, after switching cars twice in sixteen hours. As far as I'm concerned, this is the place she was heading for. And unless something unexpected happened—unless the car broke down, or there was an accident—she should have arrived here last Saturday night."
    "But she didn't," Sam said. "I haven't seen her. Look, I can dig up proof, if you want it. Last Saturday night I was over at the Legion Hall playing cards. Plenty of witnesses. Sunday morning I went to church. Sunday noon I had dinner at—"
    Arbogast raised a hand wearily. "Okay I get the message. You didn't see her. So something must have happened. I'll start checking back."
    "What about the police?" Lila asked. "I still think you ought to go to the police." She moistened her lips. "Suppose there was an accident—you couldn't stop at every hospital between here and Tulsa. Why, for all we know, Mary may be lying unconscious somewhere right now. She might even be—"
    This time it was Sam who patted her shoulder. "Nonsense," he muttered. "If anything like that had happened, you'd have been notified by now. Mary's all right." But he glared over Lila's shoulder at the investigator. "You can't do a thorough job all alone," he said. "Lila's being sensible. Why not let the police in on it? Report Mary missing, see if they can locate her—"
    Arbogast picked up the gray Stetson. "We've tried it the hard way so far. I admit it. Because if we could locate her without dragging in the authorities, we might save our client and the company a lot of bad publicity. For that matter, we could save Mary Crane some grief, too, if we picked her up ourselves and recovered the money. Maybe there wouldn't be any charges that way. You've got to agree it was worth a
    "But if you're right, and Mary did get this far, then why hasn't she been to see me? That's what I want to know, just as badly as you do," Sam told him. "And I'm not going to wait much longer to find out."
    "Will you wait another twenty-four hours?" Arbogast asked.
    "What do you have in mind?"
    "More checking, like I said." He raised his hand to forestall Sam's objections. "Not all the way back to Tulsa—I admit that's impossible. But I'd like to nose around this territory a bit; visit the highway restaurants, filling stations, car dealers, motels. Maybe somebody saw her. Because I still think my hunch is right. She intended to come here. Perhaps she changed her mind after she arrived, and went on. But I'd like to be sure."
    "And if you don't find out in twenty-four hours—?"
    "Then I'm willing to call it quits, go to the police, do the whole Missing Persons routine. Okay?
    Sam glanced at Lila. "What do you think?" he asked.
    "I don't know. I'm so worried now, I can't