"You ain't goin'
nowhere."
The man who had spoken got up from his chair and came over to the sofa.
He was of medium height, very muscular looking, with cold, glittering
eyes. Rolled-up shirt sleeves revealed his powerful, hairy arms.
"Where am I?" Tom asked, suddenly remembering the events on the road
before he blacked out. "And what's this all about?"
The man said with a mirthless grin, "You're a prisoner. And you're goin'
to stay here until the cops let Dimitri Mirov go. It's up to you how
fast they spring him."
The huge man lifted a telephone from an end table adjoining the sofa and
set it on the floor alongside Tom.
"Here's a phone. Go ahead and use it, but don't try any funny stuff."
In spite of his headache, Tom's brain was racing. What to do now? He
shut his eyes and screwed up his face in an expression of pain,
pretending to be still groggy while he stalled for time to figure out
his next move.
"How can _I_ get Mirov out of jail?" Tom faltered.
"You figure it out!" the man snarled. "And you'd better get results if
you want to stay healthy!"
Through half-slitted eyes, Tom noted the telephone number printed on the
dial. Evidently his captor had not thought to remove it from the
instrument. A lucky break!
If only, Tom thought, he could devise some way to transmit the number to
Ames without arousing his captor's suspicion--the phone's location could
then be traced!
What about some sort of double-talk code? For instance, Tom told
himself, keep slipping numbers into the conversation in order to
transmit the digits of the telephone number.
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