Involuntarily he looked behind him. Had he caught the sound of light footsteps?
There was no one in sight. “Boo! Who’d bother to bump off a city detective!” He laughed a low, unpleasant laugh. “We’re supposed to be too dumb to do anything disturbing to criminals.
“All the same!” He straightened up with a snap. “This is a case where we must win. We simply must! The Red Rover must be in the line-up when the big day comes. And it’s up to Drew and me!” Howe was a loyal son of Old Midway. Loyalty to his Alma Mater compelled him to do his best. More than that, Red Rodgers was the type he admired, a silent worker.
“He works,” Drew Lane had said once, with a note of admiration in his voice. “He’s like you, Howe. He digs in and says never a word.”
“Digs in,” Howe muttered. “That’s what we must do; dig in hard.”
With that he went gliding down the aisle to pause before Section Nine.
“Ah!” he breathed as he parted the curtains. “Seems I am in time. Nothing disturbed.”
His keen, hawk-like eyes took in all at a glance. The hammock, where clothing was deposited for the night, was gone.
“Just yanked it down and took it, clothes and all. You might think from that that Red had something they wanted in his clothes. Guess not, though.”
His eyes wandered from corner to corner of the narrow space. “Covers gone. Wrapped him in them and tied him up. Need to do that. Scrapper, Red is. Take six of those soft, beer-soaked bums to hold him if he had an even break. You—”