I stared at him. “Why should they?”
“Well, let’s call him up anyway, shall we? I want to meet him.”
His words made me vaguely anxious, and I dressed quickly and went downstairs to the ’phone. I called Larry’s house and asked to speak to Tom O’Dowd. Evidently it was his landlady at the other end, for the answer was short and to the point. “He’s not here—and he ain’t been here sence yestiddy. Nice goings on fer a respectible house!”
“Do you mean to say he didn’t come home last night?” I shouted.
“He did not!” the woman shouted back and slammed up the receiver.
I started back to Pride with a horrible sinking sensation in the pit of my stomach. It would be too rotten luck if anything had happened to the two of them on the way home.
But before I reached my room I turned back to the telephone and called up Mrs. Trevor’s house, whither I had directed the taxi with Natalie and Larry. Mrs. Trevor herself answered the ’phone.
“Hello, Mrs. Trevor. This is Clayton speaking. May I speak to Miss Van Cleef?” I inquired.
Mrs. Trevor’s voice was at once tearful and resentful. “Surely, Mr. Clayton, you know that Natalie can’t be found?”
“My God,” I shouted, “didn’t she get home last night?”