III
From the jail I went up to Vance Richmond’s office and turned my news over to him.
“Ashcraft is getting his mail in Tijuana. He’s living down there under the name of Ed Bohannon, and maybe has a woman there. I’ve just thrown one of his friends—the one who handled the mail and an escaped con—in the cooler.”
“Was that necessary?” Richmond asked. “We don’t want to work any hardships. We’re really trying to help Ashcraft, you know.”
“I could have spared this bird,” I admitted. “But what for? He was all wrong. If Ashcraft can be brought back to his wife, he’s better off with some of his shady friends out of the way. If he can’t, what’s the difference? Anyway, we’ve got one line on him safely stowed away where we can find it when we want it.”
The attorney shrugged, and reached for the telephone.
He called a number. “Is Mrs. Ashcraft there? … This is Mr. Richmond. … No, we haven’t exactly found him, but I think we know where he is. … Yes. … In about fifteen minutes.”
He put down the telephone and stood up.
“We’ll run up to Mrs. Ashcraft’s house and see her.”
Fifteen minutes later we were getting out of Richmond’s car in Jackson Street near Gough. The house was a three-story white stone building, set behind a carefully sodded little lawn with an iron railing around it.
Mrs. Ashcraft received us in a drawing-room on the second floor. A tall woman of less than thirty, slimly beautiful in a gray dress. Clear was the word that best fits her; it described the blue of her eyes, the pink-white of her skin, and the light brown of her hair.
Richmond introduced me to her, and then I told her what I had learned, omitting the part about the woman in Tijuana. Nor did I tell her that the chances were her husband was a crook nowadays.
“Mr. Ashcraft is in Tijuana, I have been told. He left San Francisco about six months ago. His mail is being forwarded to him in care of a café there, under the name of Edward Bohannon.”
Her eyes lighted up happily, but she didn’t throw a fit. She wasn’t that sort. She addressed the attorney.
“Shall I go down? Or will you?”
Richmond shook his head.
“Neither. You certainly shouldn’t go, and I cannot—not at present. I must be in Eureka by the day after tomorrow, and shall have to spend several days there.” He turned to me. “You’ll have to go. You can no doubt handle it better than I could. You will know what to do and how to do it. There are no definite instructions I can give you. Your course will have to depend on Mr. Ashcraft’s attitude and condition. Mrs. Ashcraft doesn’t wish to force herself on him, but neither does she wish to leave anything undone that might help him.”
Mrs. Ashcraft held a strong, slender hand out to me.
“You will do whatever you think wisest.”
It was partly a question, partly an expression of confidence.
“I will,” I promised.
I liked this Mrs. Ashcraft.