Unexpected Night by Elizabeth Daly Page B

there may have been a code, after all.”
    â€œI don’t believe there was a code.” Sanderson gulped coffee, and went on: “I think he was just checking up on his plan, as I told you this morning. He’d want to keep Atwood posted right up to date—about his being sick, and being late, and all the rest of it. For all I know, that second call at the Ocean House may not have been camouflage at all; it may just have been another attempt to O.K. the arrangements as made. Of course he’d pretend he didn’t know how to get through by way of Tucon.” Sanderson drank some more coffee, and added: “He liked to feel that he was behaving in a sophisticated way, you know. I think he would have thought a code silly.”
    â€œAnd that’s for you, Mr. Gamadge,” Mitchell sputtered.
    â€œYes. Thanks. Well, your tip worked out, Sanderson; even if it doesn’t help much. We know Atwood got a message, and that’s the important thing. What’s more,” said Gamadge, “that fact shifts the whole business to the Cove, and to Atwood.”
    â€œGives us something to tackle him about,” agreed Mitchell.
    A boy of fourteen jounced across the hand-mown stubble on his bicycle, stopped in front of the doorway, and supported himself with one foot on the sill.
    â€œI couldn’t help it, I couldn’t help it,” he shouted. “Mr. Callaghan took it away from me. Mom says you can’t do anything to me.”
    â€œWhat’s the trouble, son?” enquired Mitchell.
    â€œMrs. Gootch says the telephone company is after me for not delivering that telephone message personal.”
    â€œYou didn’t give it to Atwood himself?”
    â€œNo, but he got it. I went out on the pier, and Callaghan stopped me at the door. He said Mr. Atwood was busy, and I couldn’t go inside. So I just gave him the paper.”
    â€œAnd then what?”
    â€œHe went in, and I waited to see if there was an answer. I always do. I heard him say ‘Here’s a message,’ or something like that, and Mr. Atwood said: ‘Now what?’ And then he said: ‘The boy’s been sick. He means to come on to-morrow, but I wonder if he’ll make it.’ Something like that… ”
    â€œIt was Atwood talking, was it?”
    â€œYes, it was. I called out, ‘Any answer?’ And he called back, ‘No, I won’t bother. All right, kid. Thanks.’ Only of course I can’t just remember the exact words.”
    â€œYou’re doing fine. Didn’t you try to see indoors?”
    â€œNo. I’ve seen inside that theatre lots of times. Nothing to see. It’s only an old fish-house.”
    â€œAnd then you left, did you?”
    â€œMr. Callaghan came out and paid me, and asked me if the fog was bad in the lane yet. I said it was, but my lamp’s a good new one, and I could see good enough. I started down the gangway, and Mr. Callaghan stood in the door. He called back inside: ‘Don’t you think you ought to try and get in touch with him?’ And I heard Mr. Atwood call back: ‘No, let it stay right there on the knees of the gods.’ I’ve taken lots of messages down to him; I’d know his voice any place.”
    â€œIs he given to classical allusion?” asked Gamadge, amused.
    â€œYes, he’s always funny.”
    Mrs. Gootch came up, disapproval gleaming through her pince-nez. “I say you hadn’t ought to have delivered that paper to anybody but the feller himself, Lefty Brown,” she declared. “Suppose it had been a private message, and this manager had read it? That ain’t right. The telephone company—”
    â€œLet’s forget the telephone company, Miss Gootch,” said Mitchell. “They haven’t any more to do with this than that pig in the window. The responsibility, if there is any, rests with you people here. If you want personal delivery insured,