“Here’s where I last saw him standing. Right here; but he wasn’t there when I looked.” The man who had been about to begin work with the missing Jim indicated the far end of the room.
Callahan strode over with Napoleon-like firmness. A door was closed, there; a closet door. With a huge red hand the contractor grasped the knob and wrenched it open. There was an expectant silence, then Callahan took a step forward to see better. The closet was empty!
The group pressed nearer. Three sides of dark wood but nothing more. The contractor thumped the walls vigorously.
“You’re crazy, man!” he said to the puzzled wrecker. “Jim never disappeared from here.”
“Well, he disappeared from some place. He’s not here now,” insisted the friend of Jim.
Callahan was clearly disgusted. Just when everything seemed to be going well at last, something new had to crop up. What silly persons these men were. Like a bunch of sheep. Because a few not too intelligent Negroes claimed they had seen a ghost, these men, who ought to have more sense, were already showing signs of fright because one of their group could not be found. The contractor pulled his battered gray hat down over one eye and produced a new cigar from an apparently endless supply. Then began the slapping of his pockets for matches. He looked vaguely at Sim as though remembering that she had come to his rescue before, but this time she stared back at him uncomprehending.
Callahan went to the head of the stairs and shouted over the banister. “Danton!” he called, his powerful voice booming through the house. “Jim Danton!”
But not even an echo answered him and, giving the cigar a vicious bite, he strode over to the window. “Hey, you, Danton, come here!” he shouted, but the result was the same as before.
“Maybe he got sick and started home,” timidly suggested Sim in a voice that sounded ridiculously small after the Gargantuan tones of Mr. Callahan.
“Oh, no, miss,” answered the worried worker. “He couldn’t go back till the truck came to take him and all of us out the main road. He lives too far. Besides, this job meant a lot to Jim. It’s the first work he’s had in months.”