Trial By Fire

“You did all you could,” Nancy said.

“No. I could have reported them. If I had, Vera Harvey wouldn’t be walking with a cane today.”

Now Nancy was sure her suspicion was right. “Mr. Tyler, you’re A

“What?” A

Mr. Tyler turned pink. “Young lady, you’re too smart for your own good. But so am I. You’re that lawyer’s daughter, aren’t you? You were on the news. They said that you’re a detective.”

The reporter stood up. “You mean, she’s right?”

“She’s right. I’m sorry, Ms. Granger. It never occurred to me I’d get you and Mr. Drew in so much trouble. Believe me, I’d never have let them put you in jail. I’d have come forward. Still plan to. You just tell me when.”

A

“Well, let me know if you change your mind,” he said.

Nancy noticed that A

“As I said, I’m sorry about the trouble I caused,” Mr. Tyler went on. “I just couldn’t sit back and see anyone else hurt, so I called you.”

“But why the newspaper?”

“After Vera’s accident, I went to Brownley and Reston and told them if they didn’t do something about those cabs, I’d report them to the Hacks Bureau. I thought Reston would beat me up, he was so mad, but Brownley cooled him down. Said I was right and they’d take care of things.”

“But they didn’t,” A

“No, but I didn’t find out until recently. My daughter in New York City had been nagging me to go and live with her. Well, I tried it for almost a year, but that was enough. Too many people on that island. I moved back here and found the same old cabs in the same rotten condition. My grandson told me it’s a miracle one car lasts for an entire shift.”

“When did you move back here, Mr. Tyler?” Nancy asked.

“A couple of months back. I went to the Hacks Bureau, and they sent me over to Public Safety. I explained that I wanted to report Gold Star, and they sent me somewhere else. Took me awhile before I realized I was getting the runaround. Everybody seemed to be covering for Gold Star.”

Nancy thought back to the glowing reports she had gotten about Gold Star cabs from those very same offices, and wondered what she had stumbled onto.

“One thing about business today,” Mr. Tyler was saying, “they can’t operate without insurance. When nobody downtown would listen, I figured that if I told Mid-City about the rotten cabs, they’d either get rid of Gold Star or make them clean up their act, as the young folks say.”

“Only there was no Mid-City,” Nancy said, begi

“Right. But I thought it out. Expose Mid-City, and Gold Star would have to get another insurance company. To get one, they’d have to fix up their cabs. So that’s the route I took.”

“So you called me again telling me to talk to Mrs. Harvey,” A

“Yes. I found out Brownley and Reston had paid Vera’s bills themselves. If they did that, it meant they’d gone to Mid-City earlier to take care of the bills and found out it was phony then and there. But they’ve paid everybody’s bills and have never said a word to anybody. They’re as crooked as the Mid-City guys.”

“So there have been other accidents?” Nancy asked to be certain.

“Minor ones, mainly with Crimson Oaks people. But Gold Star’s got to be put out of business. And I’d like to be there when it happens. I’d give anything to know what they’re doing in that basement.”

Nancy frowned. “I thought you said it was empty.”

“No, I said they closed it off,” Mr. Tyler corrected her. “Before I left shipments of sealed boxes started coming in. Brownley stashed them downstairs. And he signed for the delivery of a brand-new air compressor. The garage had needed one for months. But where’d it go? Down to the lower level, and that was the last I saw of it.”

“Interesting,” Nancy said.

“I just hope they don’t discover that Jim Dayton is my grandson. They’re crooks and they’re hurting people, Ms. Granger. I was trying to stop them, that’s all.”

“I know you were,” answered A

“Sure thing.”

“He’s a nice man,” A

Nancy wondered what she had gotten into and what was on the lower level of that garage that she’d have to investigate.

“Nancy Nickerson” made even more money her second night on the job because she turned in her cab at twelve. To her surprise, another man was sitting in for Brownley. “He had some business,” the stranger told her.

Perfect, Nancy thought. She went back to her locker to get her other jacket before deciding what to do next. When she got there, she ran into Jim Dayton.

“Hi, remember me?” Nancy said.

“How could I forget?” he said, obviously happy to see her. “Just getting off?”

“Yes, how about you?”

“Yep. I worked late tonight, and boy, am I beat,” he said. “Don’t have to keep it up for much longer, though. Only two more weeks.”

“Well, I hope you make it,” Nancy said as she closed her locker door. And she meant it-in more ways than one. She wondered what would happen to him if the Gold Star management discovered that he was Tom Tyler’s grandson.

“Good night now,” she said.

“So long,” he said.

Nancy returned to her car to wait until she was sure the cabs on the midnight shift had all left.

She sat in the car for forty-five minutes. Then, rather than walk all the way around the block to Gold Star, she cut through the dark alley separating it from the car wash.

Back on the street she saw that the rollup door was down. The office was empty, and the inside parking area appeared to be dimly lit. The midnight shift had hit the streets.

As Nancy sneaked into the building, she heard voices in the back of the parking area. Brownley’s was one of them. The other brought goose pimples: Reston! She’d never forget his voice. Scurrying between two parked cabs, Nancy got as close to the two men as she could and peeked over the cars’ hoods. She could also see someone hiding in the shadows.

It was Jim Dayton!

Reston was opening the rear door of a cab whose engine was ru

Brownley gri

“Might as well. After Granger talks-and I promise, she will-our troubles will be over.”

Nancy smiled grimly. If they thought A

“We can get back on schedule,” Reston was saying. “Open the door. The sooner I get downstairs, the better.”

Brownley removed a ring of keys from his belt as Reston got back into the cab. “What about the Drew kid?” the dispatcher asked.

“What about her? We don’t need to worry about her. She hasn’t found out anything yet, and she never will. We’re too smart for her.”

Nancy wasn’t sure whether to be relieved or insulted.

“Call me when you’re ready to bring the cab up again,” Brownley said. “Oh, Mac may show up while you’re down there, but he always comes the back way.”

Nancy heard the jingle of keys, then watched as a section of the side wall at the rear slid open silently. A peculiar odor started wafting through the garage, but Nancy was too busy plotting her next step to identify it. There was a back way to the lower level! She had to find it!