Beware the Curves

to my motions. “Well?” the sheriff asked.
    “Let me think it over.”
    “You’ve thought it over.”
    “Sellers is a nice guy. I hate to disappoint him.“
    “He says you’re too damned smart to be trusted.“
    “That was nice of him.”
    “I thought so.”
    “That makes sense,” I said.
    “Sellers said it would.”
    “All right,” I told him, picking up the brief case. “I hate to waste the money but I’m starting back.”
    The Orange County sheriff said, “I’m not entirely satisfied with this, fellows.”
    “Neither am I,” the third man said.
    I put eagerness in my voice. “Want me to stick around for a day or two?” I asked. “Perhaps by that time I can have a real story.”
    “No,” the Orange County sheriff said, “on second thought we want you the hell out of here and we want you out now. You’ll have an hour to get started. Well show you the right road out of town in case you aren’t on your way by then.”
    “There’s no trouble finding the road out of town.“
    “There might be for you.”
    “I hate to be run out like this.”
    “We know you do, but it’s a personal favor for Sergeant Sellers—unless of course you’re up here representing a client.”
    I told them good-by, walked out, got in my car and slipped the piece of paper from my pocket. There were faint indentations on it. I took my knife, cut the point of a soft pencil to powdered graphite, rubbed the black powder over the paper with my finger and soon had a legible imprint of what the sheriff had written down: “Stella Karis, 6825 Morehead Street, Los Angeles. License No. JYH 328.”
    I went to my motel. The manager said the sheriff had phoned to move the things out of my unit and give me my money back.
    I opined that was real thoughtful of the sheriff.
    I drove down to the second boulevard stop, parked my car and waited. It was dark now but street fights enabled me to read license numbers.
    An hour passed.
    I was ready to give up and was just starting my motor when my car came along, a Ford, license number JYH 328.
    A young woman was driving it and when I fell in behind her I realized she was breaking all speed laws. I tagged along behind for a ways.
    Suddenly the red brake lights blazed on in the car in front. The driver pulled over to the side of the road and stopped. The door on the driver’s side opened. I saw a beautiful pair of legs, a flash of skirt, and then she was standing in front of me on the highway.
    I slid rubber getting to a stop.
    She didn’t budge.
    I opened the door and got out.
    “Now just what do you think you’re doing?” she demanded.
    “Me?” I said. “I’m going to Reno.”
    “Yes, I know you’re going to Reno, but you’re afraid you might get lost so you want a pilot car to keep ahead of you and you’ve been tagging me for the last twenty miles. Now suppose you just get that car of yours going and keep it going until you get to Reno.
    “However, if, as I suspect is the case, you’re a local minion of the law making certain that I’m leaving the county, you can go back to Susanville and tell them that I don’t want any part of the place.”
    I said, “I’m not connected with the Susanville law. I’m on my own. And if you don’t mind my saying so, a good-looking young woman like you could get into serious trouble stopping her car to find out who had been following her for the last twenty miles.”
    “That’s right!” she blazed at me. “I mind your saying so. It was so nice of you to think of it first. Now get going, and keep going! How many of you are in the car?”
    “Just me.”
    She walked over to the car and took a look.
    “All right, go on ahead.”
    “I might have something in the line of information that you could use,” I said. “My name’s Donald Lam.”
    “I don’t care a hoot what your name is. As far as I’m concerned you can get lost.”
    I climbed in the car and pulled ahead of her. I rolled on down the road about five miles until I found a crossroad, then brought my car to a stop, backed into the crossroad, switched off the lights and the ignition, and waited.
    Headlights appeared down the road. I could hear the whine of tires on the highway. A car rocketed on past. It wasn’t the car the girl had been driving.
    This was out in the wilderness and cars were relatively few and far between. I sat behind the steering wheel and waited.
    Another car rocketed past. That wasn’t the girl’s car. Five minutes after that another car came