“The keys,” Ollie Hurst said again. “I’ll get them one way or another, Dave. I’ll get them if I have to kill you. Toss me those keys.”
“Sure, Ollie. If you’ll tell me where Ruth is.”
“First the keys.”
“No deal,” Tully said. Was he lying? If Ruth were dead, wouldn’t Ollie tell the hiding place in return for the keys without bargaining? He must be telling the truth...
And suddenly it came to him, as the other revelations had come to him, in a flash, whole and perfect. The tines were very close to his throat now, and he had to fight to ignore them.
“Or would this be it, Ollie? Where would an amateur like you find a hideout for your kidnap victim on the spur of the moment? You couldn’t have made any preparations. It would have to exist — safe, isolated, ready for use.
“There’s a place like that available to you, Ollie,” Tully said, “the only place you could take her that fits the specifications. The place you and Norma call the old place, that Norma’s great-grandfather built up in the hills. That’s why you talked Norma out of going up there... The root-cellar would be a good spot. Ruth’s in the root-cellar of the old place, isn’t she, Ollie?”
The tines wavered. “Dave,” Ollie Hurst said faintly. “Please—”
“George has phoned the police by this time, Ollie,” Tully said. He felt as big and sure as a mountain. “Julian Smith... Ollie, listen! Hear it?”
It was the creeping hysteria of a police siren from far away.
“What’s the use?” Tully asked the rigid man softly. “You’ll only get yourself killed if you run. It isn’t over by a damn sight, Ollie. Not while you’ve still got friends. Like me. And even Ruth. Give it to me?”
He carefully extended his hand.
Oliver Hurst collapsed. Everything gave way at once, head, arms, legs.
Tully took the pitchfork away from him.
“Ruth?”
He heard a gagged, frantic moan.
Tully smashed in the root-cellar door.