Salem's Lot

11

When Parkins got back to his office in the Municipal Building, he called, ‘Nolly? You here, Nolly?’

No answer. Parkins nodded. Nolly was a good boy, but a little bit short on brains. He took off his coat, unbuckled his galoshes, sat down at his desk, looked up a telephone number in the Portland book, and dialed. The other end picked up on the first ring.

‘FBI, Portland. Agent Hanrahan.’

‘This is Parkins Gillespie. Constable at Jerusalem’s Lot township. We’ve got us a missin’ boy up here.’

‘So I understand,’ Hanrahan said crisply. ‘Ralph Glick. Nine years old, four-three, black hair, blue eyes. What is it, kidnap note?’

‘Nothin’ like that. Can you check on some fellas for me?’

Hanrahan answered in the affirmative.

‘First one is Benjaman Mears. M-E-A-R-S. Writer. Wrote a book called Conway’s Daughter. The other two are sorta stapled together. Kurt Barlow. B-A-R-L-O-W. The other guy-’

‘You spell that Kurt with a "c" or a "k"?’ Hanrahan asked.

‘I dunno.’

‘Okay. Go on.’

Parkins did so, sweating. Talking to the real law always made him feel like an asshole. ‘The other guy is Richard Throckett Straker. Two t’s on the end of Throckett, and Straker like it sounds. This guy and Barlow are in the furniture and antique business. They just opened a little shop here in town. Straker claims Barlow’s in New York on a buyin’ trip. Straker claims the two of them worked together in London an’ Hamburg. And I guess that pretty well covers it.’

‘Do you suspect these people in the Glick case?’

‘Right now I don’t know if there even is a case. But they all showed up in town about the same time.’

‘Do you think there’s any connection between this guy Mears and the other two?’

Parkins leaned back and cocked an eye out the window. ‘That,’ he said, ‘is one of the things I’d like to find out.’