Ten Day's Wonder by Ellery Queen

Author:Ellery Queen
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Published: 2012-01-15T12:10:45+00:00

* * *

The roadster was unoccupied.

Ellery sat down on Howard’s running board and wearily rubbed his streaming face with his streaming hand.

Where the hell was Howard?

Not that it mattered. Nothing mattered now except the deliriously unattainable, which was a hot bath and dry clothes afterward. But as a question of simple scientific interest, where had Howard gone?

Ah, for footprints.

But this mud would be as trackless as the sea.

Anyway, he didn’t have a flash.

Well, thought Ellery, I’ll wait a few minutes. Then if he doesn’t show up, the hell with it. Seeing was impossible. No moon . . .

Out of stern habit he got to his feet, although reluctantly, opened the roadster door, and felt around on the dashboard.

Just as he discovered that Howard had taken the keys, he saw the light.

It was a coy light, bobbing and curtseying and for brief moments disappearing altogether. But it kept reappearing. It would fix itself for a moment, then it would bob and curtsey again and disappear again and reappear a few feet away.

The light was performing these antics a good distance off, not up or down the muddy road, but off to the side, beyond the roadster.

Was it a field over there?

Sometimes the light was close to the ground. Sometimes it was waist-high to a man.

Then it steadied for a longer moment and Ellery caught a glimpse of a dark mass surmounted by a broad hat.

Howard using a flashlight!

Ellery slogged around the roadster with his hands before him. There was probably a flashlight in the convertible’s glove compartment but to go for it might mean missing something. And there was always the possibility that another light might frighten Howard away.

Ellery’s hands encountered a wet stone wall beyond the roadster. The wall came up to his waist.

He swung himself up and over, landing neatly in a thorny bush.

At this point Mr. Queen included Heaven itself in his imprecations.

Then, because part of him was pure leech, he wrenched himself from the embrace of the brambles and set a stumbling, groping course toward the light.

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