Just outside of Daly City a taxicab passed me, going south. Jack Garthorne’s face looked through the window.
I snapped on the brakes and waved my arm. The taxicab turned and came back to me. Garthorne opened the door, but did not get out.
I got down into the road and went over to him.
“There’s a deputy sheriff waiting in Miss Shan’s house, if that’s where you’re headed.”
His blue eyes jumped wide, and then narrowed as he looked suspiciously at me.
“Let’s go over to the side of the road and have a little talk,” I invited.
He got out of the taxicab and we crossed to a couple of comfortable-looking boulders on the other side.
“Where is Lil—Miss Shan?” he asked.
“Ask The Whistler,” I suggested.
This blond kid wasn’t so good. It took him a long time to get his gun out. I let him go through with it.
“What do you mean?” he demanded.
I hadn’t meant anything. I had just wanted to see how the remark would hit him. I kept quiet.
“Has The Whistler got her?”
“I don’t think so,” I admitted, though I hated to do it. “But the point is that she has had to go in hiding to keep from being hanged for the murders The Whistler framed.”