”What is it?” she asked.
“There’s a charge-a-plate in it and the sales slip for the stockings! She charged them, and I forgot all about it.”
She came instantly alert. “Well, maybe we can find the purse.”
I shook my head. “I don’t think there’s a chance.”
“Think,” she ordered. “Try to remember about how far you ran, and in what direction, after you jumped out of the car.”
“Oh, that part’s easy,” I said. “It was only three blocks, and I could find it blindfolded from there. But I don’t know where I jumped out of the car. I was lying on the floor. I don’t know how long. Part of the time I may have been unconscious. All I can remember is that it was a little neighborhood business district, maybe two or three blocks long. There was a movie theater on one side of the street and a drugstore on the other, and a filling station down at the end of the block. There are probably a hundred little districts like that in the city.”
“Hah! And you’re supposed to be a navigator.” She grinned. Springing up, she went into her study and returned with a city map. She spread it out on the coffee table. “I’ll bet we can find it in thirty minutes. Now come around here so we’re on the same side.”
I moved over. “Look,” she said, “right here is where I picked you up. Octavia, in the 700 block. See? Now, which way did you approach Octavia?”
“Down this street,” I said, tracing it with my finger, four or five blocks.”
“All right. And did you turn into that street from the right, or left?”
“Hmmm—I made a right turn.”
She nodded. “Good. Then you were coming from this section. From the west. So let’s extend this line a short distance and leave it for the moment, then try from the other end. Do you remember what bus she took?”
“Wait—” I said. “I do. It was a number seven. And we got off at Stevens Street.”
“I think we’re in business,” she said. She went over to the telephone, looked up the number of the Transit Company, and called it.
“Could you tell me where your number seven line crosses Stevens?” She held on for a moment, and then nodded, “On Bedford? Thank you very much.”
She came back and sat down. Referring to the street index at the bottom of the map, she said, “Bedford Avenue—R-7. Hmmm. Here we are. You were going north on Bedford. Here’s Stevens.”
I ran a finger along the line. “And here’s the playground, three blocks from the bus stop. That’s where they jumped me.”
“Right,” she said. She made a mark there with her pencil. “You were put in the car there. And that’s south and west of Octavia Street. You approached Octavia from the west, so they were taking you in a generally northeasterly direction.” She extended the two lines until they intersected and drew a circle around them some fifteen or twenty blocks in diameter. “Now hand me the telephone directory again.”
I put it in front of her. She flipped through the yellow pages to Theaters. “Read them off, with the street addresses,” she said. “I know most of the downtown ones, so we can eliminate them and just concentrate on the neighborhood houses.”
It took about ten minutes. We wound up with two neighborhood movies whose street addresses fell inside the circle. “It’ll be one of those,” she said.
“Probably this one,” I said. “The Vincent, on Stacy Avenue. It’s nearer Octavia. I couldn’t have walked much over a mile.”
She stood up. “Let’s go get it.”
I put on my shirt, tie, and coat, and was just reaching for the topcoat when I stopped abruptly. “The key!” I said. “My God, I don’t know what I did with that. The address is no good if I can’t get in.”
I’d had it in my hand when he grabbed my topcoat. Had I held onto it? I shoved a hand into the right topcoat pocket and sighed. There it was. I must have dropped it in there while pretending I had a gun in it
“You still have it?” she asked.
“Yeah. I guess I’m getting tired.”
I went out first and she picked me up a block away. “Listen,” I said, “this time, if I get in trouble, run.”
She shook her head. “Relax. I’m getting the feel of this business of being a fugitive.”
Fifteen minutes later we turned off an arterial into Stacy Avenue. It was strictly residential here. We went straight up it for about ten blocks.
“That’s it,” I said excitedly. “Right ahead there.”
It was after midnight now, and the theater marquee was dark, as well as the big drugstore across the street, but the service station was still open down at this end of the block.
“Turn right at the corner beyond the drugstore,” I said. “Then it’s less than three blocks.”
She made the turn. The streets were deserted now, and nearly all the houses were dark. We went slowly past the mouth of the alley in the second block. “That’s it,” I said. “But go on for another block, and I’ll walk back.”
She crossed the next intersection and parked under some trees at the curb. She switched off the lights. I got out, softly closed the door, and walked back. When I reached the mouth of the alley there was no one in sight anywhere. I ducked in. It was on the left, about halfway to the other end, I thought. When I was almost there I could make out the gate, still open.
It was pitch dark inside the yard, but I could see the blacker mass of the oleanders in the corner. I slipped toward them and bumped into something. It was a garbage can. It fell over, the lid clattering. I froze, crouching beside the high board fence. A minute passed, and then two, but no lights came on in the house. I eased past the fallen can and reached into the oleanders. Kneeling, I pushed into them, groping with my hand. In a moment my fingers touched it. I slid it out, clamped it under my arm, and hurried to the car.
“Well, that was fast,” she said softly, as she pulled away from the curb. She turned, went back to Stacy Avenue, and swung left, toward the arterial.
I set the purse on the floor between my feet, and bent over it, flicking the cigarette lighter. Taking out the little bag containing the nylons, I extracted the sales slip. The imprint of the charge-a-plate was inked on it. Frances. Celaya, it said. 1910 Keller Street. Apt. 207.
“Keller Street,” I said. “You know that one?”
“No,” she replied. “We’ll have to look it up on the map.”
I pulled it from the glove compartment and unfolded it. At that moment she made a turn into the arterial and pulled to the curb under a street light. We both bent over the map.
“Here we are,” she said quickly. “K-3.” She ran a finger out along the line and found it. “That’s in the same area as Randall Street. Only five or six blocks over.”
“Maybe we’ve got her this time,” I said. “But, God, I hope she’s lost that gorilla.” I put the map away.
She had lifted the purse onto the seat and was taking everything out of it. I checked the wallet. There were five or six dollar bills in it, but no other identification except a Social Security number. I was about to drop it back into the purse when I noticed it had a zippered compartment in the back. I, opened it. At first glance it appeared to be empty, but then I saw a folded scrap of paper down in one corner. I fished it out and unfolded it. There was a telephone number penciled on it, and a girl’s name. GL 2-4378 Marilyn.
“What is it?” she asked.
I showed it to her. It looked as if it had been in the wallet a long time. “Odd way to write it,” she remarked. “With the number first.”
It probably wasn’t important, but I shrugged and dropped it in my coat pocket. “Nothing else?” I asked.
She shook her head and began replacing everything in the purse. “That seems to be it.” She turned and dropped the purse in the back, and we pulled away from the curb.