“I’m comin’ to that, see? Give me time. Give me time. As I was sayin’, I’m pretty sure it was on a Monday, for it was wash day, and the wife never washes except on Monday. I mean she never washes clothes except on Monday. She herself, why, she washes _every_ day, of course. Anyway, it was Monday.” “That was the day dad disappeared,” prompted Frank. “You don’t say! Well, I saw him that day.” “Where?” “I’m comin’ to that. As I was sayin’, it was Monday, and when I went down to the garage the boss, he says to me, says he, ‘Sam, I want you to run a truckload of furniture down the shore road.’ So I said, ‘Well, boss, I guess that’s what I’m here for,’ so he told me that this here load of furniture had to go to one of them farmhouses away down near the Point. So we loaded the truck and I filled her up with gas and away I went. It must have been about nine o’clock by then I guess.” “And you went down the shore road?” “Sure. And it was a nice mornin’ for drivin’ too. Anyway, I went out past the Tower Mansion—you know, Hurd Applegate’s place, them people you and your father got back the Tower treasure for—and I was drivin’ along without a care in the world and whistlin’ away, quite happy-like, when I sees that I was comin’ near that haunted house up on the cliff. You know the place—where old Polucca was murdered.” “The Polucca place!” “Yeah! Well, anyway, I was comin’ by there and I didn’t drive slow either, for they say there’s ghosts in that place and I ain’t takin’ no chance with nothin’ like that, so the truck was going along at quite a clip, when what should I see but a man walkin’ along the road.” “Dad!” “Yeah, it was your father. Well, anyway, nobody ever said Sam Bates wouldn’t give a guy a lift, so I slows down a bit and I says, ‘Hey! D’you want a ride?’ just like that, see? Then this guy turned around so I seen who it was. I didn’t know until then, see? So when I seen who it was I said, ‘Good day, Mr. Hardy, would you like a lift?’ but he thanked me and said he was just takin’ a little walk. So I drove on past him and the last I seen of him he was walkin’ along beside the road.” “Did he go down the lane to the Polucca place?” “I dunno whether he did or not. He hadn’t quite reached the lane when I seen him last. But I didn’t meet him on my way back, so I don’t know where he went. Matter of fact, I didn’t think nothin’ more of it until this mornin’ when a bunch of the boys were sittin’ around the garage talkin’ and one of them said that you two lads had been huntin’ all over the city for your old man—I mean your father—and you couldn’t find him. So I says to myself, ‘Sam, mebbe you can tell ’em somethin’ they don’t know.’ So I just thought I’d come up.” “And we’re very grateful to you,” Frank assured him. “You’ve given us some valuable information. We didn’t know whether our father had gone out of the city or not. Now I think we’ll know where to look for him.”