SIX

Promptly at six o’clock on the following Friday evening, a miracle happened.

Ottorino Respighi came into the back room of Fairvale’s only hardware store to play his Brazilian Impressions.

Ottorino Respighi had been dead for many years, and the symphonic group—_l’ Orchestre des Concertes Colonne_—had been conducted in the work many thousands of miles away.

But when Sam Loomis reached out and switched on the tiny FM radio, the music welled forth, annihilating space and time and death itself.

It was, as far as he understood it, an authentic miracle.

For a moment, Sam wished that he weren’t alone. Miracles are meant to be shared. Music is meant to be shared. But there was no one in Fairvale who would recognize either the music itself or the miracle of its coming. Fairvale people were inclined to be practical about things. Music was just something you got when you put a nickel in a jukebox or turned on the television set. Mostly it was rock-'n-roll, but once in a while there’d be some longhair stuff like that William Tell piece they played for westerns. What’s so wonderful about this Ottorino What’s-His-Name, or whoever he is?

Sam Loomis shrugged, then grinned. He wasn’t complaining about the situation. Maybe small-town people didn’t dig his sort of music, but at least they left him the freedom to enjoy it for himself. Just as he made no attempt to influence their tastes. It was a fair bargain.

Sam pulled out the big ledger and carried it over to the kitchen table. For the next hour, the table would double in brass as his desk. Just as he would double in brass as his own bookkeeper.

That was one of the drawbacks of living here in one room behind the hardware store. There was no extra space available, and everything doubled in brass. Still, he accepted the situation. It wouldn’t go on this way very much longer, the way things were breaking for him these days.

A quick glance at the figures seemed to confirm his optimism. He’d have to do some checking on inventory requirements, but it looked very much as if he might be able to pay off another thousand this month. That would bring the total up to three thousand for the half-year mark. And this was off-season, too. There’d be more business coming in this fall.

Sam scribbled a hasty figure-check on a sheet of scratch paper. Yes, he could probably swing it. Made him feel pretty good. It ought to make Mary feel pretty good, too.

Mary hadn’t been too cheerful, lately. At least her letters sounded as if she were depressed. When she wrote at all, that is. Come to think of it, she owed him several letters now. He’d written her again, last Friday, and still no reply. Maybe she was sick. No, if that was the case he’d have gotten a note from the kid sister, Lila, or whatever her name was. Chances were that Mary was just discouraged, down in the dumps. Well, he didn’t blame her. She’d been sweating things out for a long time.

So had he, of course. It wasn’t easy, living like this. But it was the only way. She understood, she agreed to wait.

Maybe he ought to take a few days off next week, leave Summerfield in charge here, and take a run down to see her. Just drop in and surprise her, cheer her up. Why not? Things were very slack at the moment, and Bob could handle the store alone.

Sam sighed. The music was descending now, spiraling to a minor key. This must be the theme for the snake garden. Yes, he recognized it, with its slithering strings, its writhing woodwinds squirming over the sluggish bass. Snakes. Mary didn’t like snakes. Chances were, she didn’t like this kind of music, either.

Sometimes he almost wondered if they hadn’t made a mistake when they planned ahead. After all, what did they really know about each other? Aside from the companionship of the cruise and the two days Mary had spent here last year, they’d never been together. There were the letters, of course, but maybe they just made things worse. Because in the letters, Sam had begun to find another Mary—a moody, almost petulant personality, given to likes and dislikes so emphatic they were almost prejudices.

He shrugged. What had come over him? Was it the morbidity of the music? All at once he felt tension in the muscles at the back of his neck. He listened intently, trying to isolate the instrument, pinpoint the phrase that had triggered his reaction. Something was wrong, something he sensed, something he could almost hear.

Sam rose, pushing back his chair.

He could hear it now. A faint rattling, from up front. Of course, that’s all it was; he had heard something to bother him. Somebody was turning the knob of the front door.

The store was closed for the night, the shades drawn, but maybe it was some tourist. Most likely would be; folks in town knew when he closed up, and they also knew he lived in the back room. If they wanted to come down for anything after regular hours, they’d phone first.

Well, business was business, whoever the customer might be. Same turned and went into the store, hurrying down the dim aisle. The blind had been pulled down on the front door, but he could hear the agitated rattling very plainly now—in fact, some of the pots and pans on the traffic-item counter were jiggling.

This must be an emergency, all right; probably the customer needed a new bulb for his kid’s Mickey Mouse flashlight.

Sam fumbled in his pocket, pulling out his key ring. “All right,” he called. “I’m opening up.” And did so, deftly, swinging the door back without withdrawing the key.

She stood there in the doorway, silhouetted against the street lamp’s glow from the curbing outside. For a moment the shock of recognition held him immobile; then he stepped forward and his arms closed around her.

“Mary!” he murmured. His mouth found hers, gratefully, greedily; and then she was stiffening, she was pulling away, her hands had come up shaping into balled fists that beat against his chest. What was wrong?

“I’m not Mary!” she gasped. “I’m Lila.”

“Lila?” He stepped back once more. “The kid—I mean, Mary’s sister?”

She nodded. As she did so he caught a glimpse of her face in profile, and the lamplight glinted on her hair. It was brown, much lighter than Mary’s. Now he could see the difference in the shape of the snub nose, the higher angle of the broad cheekbones. She was a trifle shorter, too, and her hips and shoulders seemed slimmer.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “It’s this light.”

“That’s all right.” Her voice was different, too; softer and lower.

“Come inside, won’t you?”

“Well—” She hesitated, glancing down at her feet, and then Sam noticed the small suitcase on the sidewalk.

“Here, let me take this for you.” He scooped it up. As he passed her in the doorway he switched on the rear light. “My room is in back,” he told her. “Follow me.”

She trailed after him in silence. Not quite silence, because Respighi’s tone poem still resounded from the radio. As they entered his makeshift living quarters, Sam went over to switch it off. She lifted her hand.

“Don’t,” she told him. “I’m trying to recognize that music.” She nodded. “Villa-Lobos?”

“Respighi. Something called Brazilian Impressions. It’s on the Urania label, I believe.”

“Oh. We don’t stock that.” For the first time he remembered that Lila worked in a record shop.

“You want me to leave it on, or do you want to talk?” he asked.

“Turn it off. We’d better talk.”

He nodded, bent over the set, then faced her. “Sit down,” he invited. “Take off your coat.”

“Thanks. I don’t intend to stay long. I’ve got to find a room.” . .

“You’re here on a visit?”

“Just overnight. I’ll probably leave again in the morning. And it isn’t exactly a visit. I’m looking for Mary.”

“Looking for —” Sam stared at her. “But what would she be doing here?”

“I was hoping you could tell me that.”

“But how could I? Mary isn’t here.”

“Was she here? Earlier this week, I mean?”

“Of course not. Why, I haven’t seen her since she drove up last summer.” Sam sat down on the sofa bed. “What’s the matter, Lila? What’s this all about?”

“I wish I knew.”

She avoided his gaze, lowering her lashes and staring at her hands. They twisted in her lap, twisted like serpents. In the bright light, Sam noticed that her hair was almost blond. She didn’t resemble Mary at all, now. She was quite another girl. A nervous, unhappy girl.

“Please,” he said. “Tell me.”

Lila looked up suddenly, her wide hazel eyes searching his. “You weren’t lying when you said Mary hasn’t been here?”

“No, it’s the truth. I haven’t even heard from her these last few weeks. I was beginning to get worried. Then you come bursting in here and —” His voice broke off. “Tell me!”

“All right. I believe you. But there isn’t much to tell.” She took a deep breath and started to speak again, her hands roaming restlessly across the front of her skirt. “I haven’t seen Mary since a week ago last night, at the apartment. That’s the night I left for Dallas, to see some wholesale suppliers down there—I do the buying for the shop. Anyway, I spent the weekend and took a train back up late Sunday night. I got in early Monday morning. Mary wasn’t at the apartment. At first I wasn’t concerned; maybe she’d left early for work. But she usually called me sometime during the day, and when she didn’t phone by noon, I decided to call her at the office. Mr. Lowery answered the phone. He said he was just getting ready to call me and see what was wrong. Mary hadn’t come in that morning. He hadn’t seen or heard from her since the middle of Friday afternoon.”

“Wait a minute,” Sam said, slowly. “Let me get this straight. Are you trying to tell me that Mary has been missing for an entire week?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“Then why wasn’t I notified before this?” He stood up, feeling the renewed tension in his neck muscles, feeling it in his throat and his voice. “Why didn’t you get in touch with me, phone me? What about the police?”

“Sam. I —”

“Instead, you waited all this time and then came up here to ask if I’d seen her. It doesn’t make sense!”

“Nothing makes sense. You see, the police don’t know about this. And Mr. Lowery doesn’t know about you. After what he told me, I agreed not to call them. But I was so worried, so frightened, and I had to know. That’s why, today, I decided to drive up here and find out for myself. I thought maybe the two of you might have planned it together.”

“Planned what?” Sam shouted.

“That’s what I’d like to know.” The answer was soft, but there was nothing soft about the face of the man who stood in the doorway. He was tall, thin, and deeply tanned; a gray Stetson shadowed his forehead but not his eyes. The eyes were ice-blue and ice-hard.

“Who are you?” Sam muttered. “How did you get in here?”

“Front door was unlocked, so I just stepped inside. I came here to get a little information, but I see Miss Crane already beat me to the question. Maybe you’d like to give us both an answer now.”

“Answer?”

“That’s right.” The tall man moved forward, one hand dipping into the pocket of his gray jacket. Sam lifted his arm, then dropped it, as the hand came forth, extending a wallet. The tall man flipped it open. “The name’s Arbogast. Milton Arbogast. Licensed investigator, representing Parity Mutual. We carry a bonding policy on the Lowery Agency your girl-friend worked for. That’s why I’m here now. I want to find out what you two did with the forty thousand dollars.”