“But I’m sure he went this way,” Holly insisted. “I would have seen him myself if he’d turned toward Roulsville. You know how our road angles off in that direction. Well, I thought if I raced along the shortcut and we took your road maybe we could head him off if he turned toward Farringdon. I have to get my typewriter back. Can’t you drive a little faster?”
“Not without turning the car over. We’ll pick up speed on the straight road. Then, if we can’t find him, we’ll report the stolen typewriter when we get to Farringdon. Did he take anything else?” Judy asked.
“No, just the typewriter.”
“That’s strange.” Judy couldn’t quite picture a thief running into Holly’s house, grabbing her typewriter, and not touching anything else. She had a rare old paperweight and a brand-new tape recorder in the first-floor room she called her study. Either of these things would have been worth more than her typewriter, to say nothing of the valuables stored in what she had once called her forbidden chest.
“There was nothing strange about it,” declared Holly. “He would have taken more if I hadn’t surprised him and called Ruth. She was busy with the baby and didn’t pay any attention. Doris had just left in her car—”
“That’s it!” Judy interrupted. “The thief probably saw your sister Doris leaving and figured you were all out.”
“Well, we weren’t. I was there, and I saw him run out of the house toward a green car. Please drive faster, Judy! I have to get my typewriter back.”
And suddenly, like rain from a clear blue sky, Holly burst into tears. She was crying over more important things than a stolen typewriter, Judy knew. It wasn’t easy living with a married sister whose whole interest centered on her own husband and baby. Holly’s other sister was on her way to a teaching job at some private school in Maine. The girls’ uncle had died while Judy and Peter were in Washington. Holly said she had never felt more lost and alone.
“First it was my parents and then Uncle David. It’s always this way,” she sobbed. “I told my sisters I wouldn’t dare love them. It’s bad luck for me to love anybody. Even the things I love have to be taken.”
“We’ll find your typewriter,” Judy resolved as she drove on toward Farringdon as fast as safety allowed.