"Could be at one of those twenty-four-hour Sam's Club places," Sloan suggested. "Might go unnoticed for a while."
They all thought about it for a minute, then Fox said, "I don't know. There are some possibilities, but Charlie isn't a master criminal."
THEY WERE STILL STANDING in the parking lot, scuffing gravel, talking about possibilities, when Elle called.
"Lucas, I've been reading about this man Charles Pope," she said. "He is nothing like I expected."
"I know. We've been talking about that. We just went through his trailer… " He recapped the search, and then said, "This wasn't a sure thing, anyway. Just a guess. I wouldn't be surprised if the dumb shit caught a bus for California." He winced: "Sorry about the language."
"That's… never mind," she said. "Anyway, I'm skeptical. I'm very interested in what the DNA brings back. I would predict that we don't have a match. Will you call me when you know?"
"The minute I hear," Lucas said.
AND TEN SECONDS AFTER ELLE rang off, as they were saying good-bye to Fox, Carol called from Lucas's office. "Rose Marie wants you to call her," Carol said. "Right now. She's going to a music thing tonight so you won't be able to get her later. And about twenty reporters called."
"I thought they might. I'll get back to you," Lucas said.
FOX AND SLOAN WANDERED OFF, chatting, while Lucas poked in Rose Marie's number. When she picked up, Lucas told her about the trip to Owatonna, and the bad news: "We came up empty."
"I talked with the governor and McCord," she said. "The governor doesn't see anything in it for him, and McCord said he's too busy to front for the media. You're gonna have to do it."
He looked at his watch: "Ah, man…"
"Hey. You're good at it. Do it."
"All right. I'll do it. But I'm laying down some rules, and you have to back me up. I'll hold a press briefing at five o'clock, but that's it. Nobody goes around me."
"Make it four o'clock or they'll all be yelling at me about missing the early news."
"Fuck 'em. I got another stop to make. Five o'clock-maybe we can change it to four o'clock on other days."
"If you gotta-I'll pass the complaints along to Carol. She's probably gotten some calls already."
"About a million of them."
"So-handle it."
LUCAS CALLED CAROL BACK, told her to set up the press conference and to call Nordwall and invite him to make a statement. "He might want to get his picture on TV He's running this fall."
FOX LED THEM BACK to the I-35 connection, waved good-bye out the window, and Lucas spun down the ramp and they headed back north. "Sorta like the old days when we were operating in Minneapolis," Sloan said. "The old days were sorta fucked up, you know? Looking back?"
"You're just getting cranky," Lucas said. "What could be better than chasing assholes like Pope? Think of all the guys who never get to do anything. You can't sit on your ass until you die."
Sloan cleared his throat. "I'd thought maybe… I'd buy a bar."
Lucas looked at him for ten seconds, then said, "You're kidding me."
"I'm not kidding. I've been looking into it. Seriously," Sloan said.
"When did this come up?" Lucas asked. "You don't know anything about running a bar. That's a complicated business."
"Hey, I took a small-business class last semester at the community college," Sloan said. "The situation I'm looking at, it's not a big deal. The owner's getting old, wants to retire, but he'd work with me as long as it took. You know Bernie Berger…"
"The Pine place? Out by Golden Valley?"
"Yeah. Don't piss on it; it's not that bad a place."
"I wasn't gonna piss on it. It is a likeable place. Other than the fact that it's called the Pine Knot. But even if you got a deal, you're a cop, Sloan…"
"I'm tired," Sloan said.
"Ah, for Christ's sake." Lucas took his hands off the wheel and rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands, "If you quit…who's gonna chase the assholes with me?"
THE NEXT CITY NORTH was Faribault. The Rockyard was just outside the city limits on a county frontage road that ran parallel to the interstate. A yellow sign that said topless faced the highway, a beacon to truck drivers, but the paint was coming off the sign and it might not have been current. The bar itself had a gravel parking lot, fake yellow-log siding with a simulated hitching post, and a wooden boardwalk. A barbeque sign flicked an orange bbq-bbq-bbq out toward the county road, and a Coors sign said coors-coors-coors.
Four pickups sat in the parking lot, with an Oldsmobile with hand-sized rust spots down the sides and across the trunk. The Olds's license plate hung off the bumper on Wire loops.
"Good-looking place," Sloan said, as they got out of the Porsche.
"Ah, if I were seventeen…"
"And stupid…"
THE SALOON WAS COOL INSIDE, smelling of beer and fried hamburger. A woman bartender in a white blouse, black vest, and ribbon tie was wiping down the bar. A couple of guys were shooting pool in the back, nine ball, and three more watching, all of them with long-necks in their hands. Everybody turned their heads when Lucas and Sloan stepped inside. Sloan muttered, looking at the bartender, "That doesn't look like a Booger."
"C'mon," Lucas said; he'd been checking faces in the back.
They went on to the bar, and the bartender asked, "Gentlemen? What can I do you for?" She was a sturdy dark-haired woman, about fifty, with too-red lipstick and too much rouge. A cigarette was burning in an ashtray next to the cash register.
"Carl around?" Lucas asked.
"Can I tell him who's calling?"
"Yeah, the cops," Lucas said. He held out his ID. "We need a little help."
She looked at Lucas, then at Sloan, and asked, "Is he in trouble?"
"Can't tell yet," Lucas said.
"I'll see if I can find him," she said. She walked down behind the bar and out, and into a back room. The pool watchers were now all watching Lucas and Sloan, and Lucas smiled at them. Ten seconds later, the bartender reappeared. A fat man, with hair like a haystack, and who might have described himself as muscular, shambled along behind.
"Hi, I'm Carl," he said. "You're police officers? Is there a problem?"
"You know a guy named Adam Rice?" Lucas asked.
Carl blinked rapidly, then said, "Jesus. He was the guy. We weren't sure."
"Yeah, he was," Lucas said. Everybody in the bar was listening now. "You gotta place where we can go talk?"
CARL HAD A SMALL OFFICE, a cherry-laminate desk with a swivel chair, and two formed-plastic chairs for visitors. The desk was piled with paper, a well-used desk calculator to one side. Carl leane back in the chair, which squealed under the load, and said, "I know the guy. He'd come in, have a few beers, cry a little, listen to music. He was a sad guy. How'd you know he came in here?"
"Heck, everybody's been calling us," Sloan said. "You ever see him with a guy…"
Carl's eyes got thin: "The way you said that-you mean, a gay guy?"
"Yeah."
Carl snorted and leaned farther back in the chair. "A gay guy would not come in here. Or if he did, he'd sure as shit not let anybody know he was gay. I only saw Rice talking with a couple of guys, and then it was just random guy-shit, sitting at the bar, drinking beer."
"What about the girls?" Lucas asked.
Carl's eyes involuntarily wandered."He'd come in alone…" he began.