Free Operation Fireball by Dan J. Marlowe Page B

calendar wristwatch. “Then, if I were to prove to you that a month ago lacking a day I wasn’t within two thousand miles of White Pine County, wouldn’t that conclude your conversation?”
    “Unless maybe you might want to be helpful,” Calkins conceded.
    “My topcoat is in the cloakroom in the lobby,” Erikson said. “I ran upstairs to take a long-distance call. Let’s go down and I’ll show you evidence that will take me out of the picture entirely.”
    “You could still know—”
    “I don’t. But let’s go downstairs. I want to relieve your mind of its last lingering doubt about me.”
    Erikson shepherded Calkins through the doorway. The instant it closed behind them, I bolted into action. I reholstered the .38, dashed into the bedroom, grabbed my overnight bag from the closet, dumped the remainder of the $50,000 into it, threw in my clothes on top, and walked out the door carrying the bag with my coat slung over it.
    I had the good luck to find a bellboy on the elevator. “Here,” I said, thrusting bag and coat at him. “Hold these at the bell captain’s desk for me. I’ll pick them up in half an hour.” I gave him two dollars.
    He handed me a thin metal disc and I watched while he attached its counterpart to my bag. The boy got off in the lobby, carrying my things. I rode the cab down to the basement and walked back up the stairs. At the lobby level again, I walked directly into the bar and selected a stool that gave me a full view of both the lobby’s cloakroom entrance and the bell captain’s desk. There was an element of risk in leaving the money in the unlocked bag, but I wouldn’t be out of sight of the bag.
    I sat and watched the cloakroom door. Erikson could have got rid of Calkins already, or they could still be inside. Erikson had gone up a couple of notches in my estimation. If I’d been him, I don’t know if I’d have had the wit to claim to be Drake. It had taken the sword right out of Calkins’ hands when the two descriptions failed to match. It irked me, though, that I had had to be rescued by Erikson, the amateur. And it had been a rescue. Without him, I might easily have had to shoot my way out of that hotel room.
    Five minutes went by and I was beginning to think they had left already. Then Erikson and Calkins emerged together from the cloakroom. Calkins went directly to the front entrance and walked outside to the street. I was too far away to see his expression, but he could hardly have been happy with the result of his investigation.
    Erikson came into the bar. Without breaking stride he continued on to the men’s room. I gave it two minutes and followed him. There was one other man inside. I washed my hands until he left. Then Erikson and I stood with Erikson halfway into one of the private toilets so he could step inside and close the door if anyone else happened to enter.
    Now that I was rid of Calkins, I really had only one other thing on my mind. After having his nose rubbed in the subject of Hazel Andrews just now, and in circumstances that left neither Hazel nor me looking particularly bright, what was Erikson’s reaction going to be when he found Hazel behind the stick at The Castaways?
    Erikson spoke first. “The deputy is satisfied that he’s run into a stone wall. He’s not as unhappy about it as you might expect. He let it slip that he felt the sheriff had given him a job to do that the sheriff had felt it politically inexpedient to take upon himself.” Erikson was studying me. “From the sound of things, you ought to get yourself a less conspicuous woman. Calkins spoke of her size, her looks, her money, and her temper. It was hard to tell which impressed him most.”
    He said it almost jovially. I couldn’t understand it. Then it came to me. Just as it had been a relief to me to find that Erikson could handle himself capably in an emergency, he must be feeling the same way about me after learning from the deputy the details of what had taken place at