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the glove box. He found a cigar and two hundred dollars, with a note to say it was a small token of thanks. He counted it then put it back. He studied the map. The whiskey on his lips made him wish he had downed another. This was going to be tough. There wasn’t much to go on.
    Starting the engine, Jack joined the early evening traffic, heading out of Central City. Victor hadn’t discussed the stolen money but Jack knew it was the real hunt, worth a lot more than the paltry ten grand Victor was offering. Not Eddy, or anybody else, was going to stand in his way.
     
    Jack speeded out of Central City and on to country lanes. Darkness fell and the velvet night closed in around him. In the early hours of the morning, he pulled into a gas station. Daylight cracked through the sky as a new dawn beckoned. He sat in the small diner next to the gas station, reading a newspaper someone had left behind. It was full of news about the rebuilding of factories in Europe during the two years since the war ended. He ordered a breakfast of Canadian bacon, the best in his opinion, two eggs sunny side up and coffee. It was the perfect start to the case and would keep him going for the trip ahead.
    Catching, the eye of the young waitress Jack thought he’d try his luck. “Hey darling, you look swell. What’s a dame like you doing here and not shining on the big screen?”
    Jack’s first volley of charm didn’t help his cause. Was he that rusty at the dating game? She carried on serving coffee to a trucker near a jukebox. Downing the dregs of his coffee, he wiped his chin with his sleeve and whispered, “Have you any last wish?”
    Walking back from the jukebox, the waitress whispered, “I’d like to see Paris before I die… but Philadelphia will do.”
    Looking up from the table, Jack smiled. “My little Chickadee, good film doll.”
    The waitress laughed, realizing the P.I had no material of his own and preferred to spout movie quotes, fired a quote back in return. “Mister, what does it mean when a man crashes out?”
    Jack leaned forward, giving the dame a longing look. “Crashes out? That’s a funny question for you to ask now. You going steady, hun?” Jack asked as she wrote her number on her napkin. He’d call this Sandy when everything was sorted.
    A little while later he was off again, racing into the dawn and his first clue.
    It wasn’t long before he came to the lonely road with the broken stone wall. Beyond it was a steep drop. At the bottom of the cliff lay the remains of a blue Lincoln coupe. Luckily it hadn’t blown up, so finding some clues would be possible. He parked off the road and returned to the hole in the wall. Working his way along a crumbling ledge, Jack found some good solid handholds that led him down to the wreck of the car below.
    By the time Jack had reached the bottom of the cliff an hour had passed. He was sweating and tired. His hip was screaming, thanks to a shrapnel blast courtesy of Uncle Sam, plus the fact he was no mountain climber or movie hero. The damage the booze had done over the years wasn’t doing him any favors either. He cut through a small bush, and then wiped his shoe on a rock after stepping in lord knows what. Finally reaching the car, he tried the door with little joy, so decided to go in through the rear window instead, crawling into the upturned and confined space.
    The front of the car had crumbled in on itself. Jack got to work as best he could, scanning the inside. Dark red patches of blood smeared the back of the driver’s seat and the steering wheel, but what caught his attention was the bloody handprints on the driver’s door. Eddy Kovakx had somehow survived and was on the move.
    The driver was wounded, and from the amount of blood in the car, Jack guessed he was in a bad way. He had either been shot in the heist or the crash had done it to him. Either way, he had got out. Bleeding this badly, Jack figured he couldn’t have gone far. It might be worth checking the