`How did you do that?'
`I put a little note in Mr. Hillman's mailbox, before I left El Rancho. I couldn't just leave him dangling, when I knew.'
`What did you tell him?'
`Just that I'd heard from Tommy, and he was alive.'
`It was a kind thing to do.'
`But it broke my promise. He said I wasn't to tell anyone, especially not his parents.'
`Promises have to be broken sometimes, when there are higher considerations.'
`What do you mean?'
`His safety. I've been afraid that Tom was dead. Are you absolutely certain you talked to him?'
`I'm not telling a lie.'
`I mean, you're sure it wasn't an imposter, or a tape recording?'
`I'm sure. We talked back and forth.'
`Where was he calling from?'
`I don't know, but I think it was long distance.'
`What did he say?'
She hesitated again, with her finger raised. `Is it all right for me to tell you, even after I promised?'
`It would be all wrong if you didn't. You know that, don't you? You didn't come all the way here to hold it back.'
`No.'
She smiled a little. `He didn't tell me too much. He didn't say a word about the kidnappers. Anyway, the fact that he's alive is the important thing. He said he was sorry I'd been worried about him, but he couldn't help it. Then he asked me to meet him and bring some money.'
I was relieved. Tom's need for money implied that he had no part of the payoff. `How much money?'
`As much as I could get hold of in a hurry. He knew it wouldn't amount to a great deal. I borrowed some from the people at the beach club. The secretary of the club gave me a hundred dollars of her own money - she knows I'm honest. I took a taxi to the bus station. You know, I never rode on a bus before, except the school bus.'
I cut in impatiently: `Did you meet him here in Los Angeles?'
`No. I was supposed to meet him in the Santa Monica bus station at nine o'clock. The bus was a few minutes late, and I may have missed him. He did say on the phone that he mightn't be able to make it tonight. In which case I was to meet him tomorrow night. He said he generally only goes out at night.'
`Did he tell you where he's staying?'
`No. That's the trouble. I hung around the bus station for about an hour and then I tried to phone you and when I couldn't I took a taxi here. I had to spend the night somewhere.'
`So you did. It's too bad Tom didn't think of that.'
`He probably has other things on his mind,' she said in a defensive tone. `He's been having a terrible time.'
`Did he say so?'
`I could tell by the way he talked to me. He sounded - I don't know - so upset.'
`Emotionally upset, or just plain scared?'
Her brow knit. `More worried than scared. But he wouldn't say what about. He wouldn't tell me anything that happened. I asked him if he was okay, you know, physically okay, and he said he was. So I asked him why he didn't come home. He said on account of his parents, only he didn't call them his parents. He called them his anti-parents. He said they could probably hardly wait to put him back in Laguna Perdida School.'
Her eyes were very dark. `I remember now what I was dreaming before you woke me up. Tommy was in that school and they wouldn't let him out and they wouldn't let me see him. I went around to all the doors and windows, trying to get in. All I could see was the terrible faces leering at me through the windows.'
`The faces aren't so terrible. I was there.'
`Yes, but you weren't locked up there. Tommy says it's a terrible place. His parents had no right to put him there. I don't blame him for staying away.'
`Neither do I, Stella. But, under the circumstances, he has to be brought in. You understand that, don't you?'
`I guess I do.'
`It would be a rotten anticlimax if something happened to him now. You don't want that.'
She shook her head.
`Then will you help me get him?'
`It's why I came here, really. I couldn't sic the police on him. But you're different.'
