Read Online Where Is Janice Gantry? by John D. MacDonald - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: John D. MacDonald
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“Big, dumb, happy, generous broad!”
I caught the twelve o’clock news on the car radio. By the time they got down to the local news, I could have guessed how the news-hungry boys caught in the August doldrums were going to handle it.
“In the unexplained disappearance of Janice Gantry last night, local police authorities do not discount the possibility that Miss Gantry could have been abducted by Charles Haywood, escaped safecracker believed to have been seen on Sunday night within five miles of Florence City. All highway patrol units have been alerted to look for Miss Gantry’s car, a 1957 black Renault two door sedan bearing Florida license 99T313. Miss Gantry is twenty-nine years old, five-foot-ten inches tall, weighing approximately one hundred and forty-two pounds. She has black hair and dark blue eyes. When last seen she was wearing a maroon halter top, pale gray slacks and straw sandals, and she was carrying a straw purse with a floral design embroidered in yarn.”
When he began talking weather I turned him off. I didn’tneed him to tell me it was going to be hot with a possibility of afternoon thunderstorms. The weather forecasts for every day from July 15th to September 15th on Florida’s West Coast are exactly the same. Sometimes the storms threaten, but never quite get to you. Sometimes they hit early in the afternoon. Sometimes they hit late and last until midnight. It never changes.
I decided it was inevitable for the news people to tie the only two hot local stories together, to invent some link with or without evidence. I suspected I was the only one in the area, aside from Sis and Charlie, who knew how good the guess was—not abduction, but at least a joint effort—and neither of them would know that I knew. Charlie would have no special reason to tell Sis where he had found refuge. And it was out of character for the Sam Brice either of them knew to come lurking around, seeing them meet, following them. Following them up to that point when LeRoy Luxey put a hickory halt to the project.
If I had guessed right—if I had seen her phoning Charity Weber—then I had a ready-made starting place, if I could figure out what to do with it. For some reason I could not feel it would be a wonderful idea to go to the Weber house and ask if anybody had seen Sis and Charlie.
After a fast lunch in town I went out to the office and found a note for me to call Cal McAllen. I learned there was no news about Sis. The office was buzzing with excitement. People had been stopping in all morning, full of gossip, rumor and curiosity.
When I returned Cal’s call, he asked me if it would be convenient for me to come to his office. He sounded hesitant and apologetic. I said I’d be over in a few minutes.
The law firm of Wessel and McAllen occupies a suite of offices on the fourth floor of the Florence City Bank and Trust Building. I had talked to Calvin McAllen five times that I could remember on matters connected with my littleAutomotive Appraisal Associates, and on three of those occasions it had been a phone conversation.
As I drove over I reviewed what I knew about him. He had been a highly successful corporation lawyer in Washington. About six years ago his wife had died very suddenly and unexpectedly of leukemia. He had resigned, liquidated all holdings that required careful watching, and retired to Florida at about thirty-eight, after stowing his two sons in private schools in the North. He had lived alone in a beach cottage for about a year, doing nothing, and then had suddenly taken the Florida bar exams and gotten his license to practice law. The town didn’t pay any particular attention to him until he showed considerable shrewdness by going in with Wessel. You call him Hunk Wessel or Judge Wessel according to your station in life. He has more connections in three counties than any one man can use. Hunk isn’t exactly crooked, but he is known to be very fast on his feet.
The girl at the front desk
I caught the twelve o’clock news on the car radio. By the time they got down to the local news, I could have guessed how the news-hungry boys caught in the August doldrums were going to handle it.
“In the unexplained disappearance of Janice Gantry last night, local police authorities do not discount the possibility that Miss Gantry could have been abducted by Charles Haywood, escaped safecracker believed to have been seen on Sunday night within five miles of Florence City. All highway patrol units have been alerted to look for Miss Gantry’s car, a 1957 black Renault two door sedan bearing Florida license 99T313. Miss Gantry is twenty-nine years old, five-foot-ten inches tall, weighing approximately one hundred and forty-two pounds. She has black hair and dark blue eyes. When last seen she was wearing a maroon halter top, pale gray slacks and straw sandals, and she was carrying a straw purse with a floral design embroidered in yarn.”
When he began talking weather I turned him off. I didn’tneed him to tell me it was going to be hot with a possibility of afternoon thunderstorms. The weather forecasts for every day from July 15th to September 15th on Florida’s West Coast are exactly the same. Sometimes the storms threaten, but never quite get to you. Sometimes they hit early in the afternoon. Sometimes they hit late and last until midnight. It never changes.
I decided it was inevitable for the news people to tie the only two hot local stories together, to invent some link with or without evidence. I suspected I was the only one in the area, aside from Sis and Charlie, who knew how good the guess was—not abduction, but at least a joint effort—and neither of them would know that I knew. Charlie would have no special reason to tell Sis where he had found refuge. And it was out of character for the Sam Brice either of them knew to come lurking around, seeing them meet, following them. Following them up to that point when LeRoy Luxey put a hickory halt to the project.
If I had guessed right—if I had seen her phoning Charity Weber—then I had a ready-made starting place, if I could figure out what to do with it. For some reason I could not feel it would be a wonderful idea to go to the Weber house and ask if anybody had seen Sis and Charlie.
After a fast lunch in town I went out to the office and found a note for me to call Cal McAllen. I learned there was no news about Sis. The office was buzzing with excitement. People had been stopping in all morning, full of gossip, rumor and curiosity.
When I returned Cal’s call, he asked me if it would be convenient for me to come to his office. He sounded hesitant and apologetic. I said I’d be over in a few minutes.
The law firm of Wessel and McAllen occupies a suite of offices on the fourth floor of the Florence City Bank and Trust Building. I had talked to Calvin McAllen five times that I could remember on matters connected with my littleAutomotive Appraisal Associates, and on three of those occasions it had been a phone conversation.
As I drove over I reviewed what I knew about him. He had been a highly successful corporation lawyer in Washington. About six years ago his wife had died very suddenly and unexpectedly of leukemia. He had resigned, liquidated all holdings that required careful watching, and retired to Florida at about thirty-eight, after stowing his two sons in private schools in the North. He had lived alone in a beach cottage for about a year, doing nothing, and then had suddenly taken the Florida bar exams and gotten his license to practice law. The town didn’t pay any particular attention to him until he showed considerable shrewdness by going in with Wessel. You call him Hunk Wessel or Judge Wessel according to your station in life. He has more connections in three counties than any one man can use. Hunk isn’t exactly crooked, but he is known to be very fast on his feet.
The girl at the front desk
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