"That brings me down," Stryker said.
"Thing is, the Gleasons and the Schmidts…that has the smell of craziness about it."
Stryker: "Let me share something with you, Virgiclass="underline" George Feur is pure, one hundred percent, grade-A high-test bat shit."
"In the wrong way," Virgil said. "If we're right about him, if they've been pumping meth out of that ethanol plant, then you've got a guy who believes in organization and networks and conspiracies. He sets up cover companies. He raises start-up funding. The guy who killed the Gleasons, and the Schmidts…this guy believes in chaos and oblivion. He believes he's the only real soul in an ocean of puppets."
"Ah, fuck." Stryker peered out his side window, watching the summer go by. "Ah, fuck me."
"Speaking of fuckin' you, how are things on the Jesse front?"
"Shut up."
THEY WENT STRAIGHT to the house of Chris Olafson, the accountant. Stryker banged on the door off and on for three or four minutes, before she finally came to the door in a dressing robe. "Come in. I'd just finally gotten to sleep."
"We haven't been to sleep yet," Stryker said. "What'd you find?"
She shook her head: "Junior's goose is cooked."
"How cooked?"
"Very cooked."
Junior had gotten all the tax-free gifts he was entitled to, some two million dollars. That meant the total estate was taxable. But the total estate was less than anyone had expected, at a little more than six million, and that included "assets" of two million in loans to Junior.
"The state and federal government are going to want roughly four million. That means that Junior won't get anything. He just won't have to pay off the loans. But the fact is, if Jesse Laymon is entitled to half of the estate, Junior is going to owe her a million. If you look at his earnings from the Subways at face value, he might just be able to do it. However…"
"However…" Stryker repeated.
"If you look at the tax returns, everything seems okay. But I know the kind of money you make from a fast-food place, because I do all the McDonald's and Burger Kings and Arby's around here. A Subway does not do a McDonald's business, but Junior's places do, according to his tax returns. They are selling sandwiches as fast as they can make them-which is strange, because if you go into one of Junior's stores, there's hardly anyone in there."
Virgil said, "He's reporting more than he's earning?"
"Yes. I think so. He's piping in money from somewhere else, running it through the Subways, paying taxes on it-and then it's clean. He's running a money laundry."
"Ah," Stryker said.
"The downside of that is…" She hesitated, and then peered over the top of her glasses at Stryker. "The downside is, your friend Jesse Laymon could make a claim for half of the loan assets-half of the Subway franchises-and then find out that there's nothing there. The most successful Subways in Minnesota suddenly can't sell a sandwich."
"So he's broke?"
"Not as long as he keeps running those Subways. But without the extra money…he's in trouble."
"Is he sticking it someplace? Like his old man?"
"Can't tell you that," she said. "But I can tell you, he owes taxes and penalties on all his illegal earnings, so after the IRS gets finished with him…" She shrugged.
VIRGIL SAID, "Chris, I want all the paper back. I don't want you to mention to anybody that you talked to us. I don't think you're in danger, but I can't promise that you're not. Some people have probably seen us come in here…"
"…I'm sure."
"…so word will get around town. You want to be very careful for the next couple of days."
"Then what?"
"Then we'll see," Virgil said, grinning at her.
AS THEY were leaving, Virgil asked her, "You mentioned Jim's friend Jesse Laymon. Would you have any more specifics on that friendship?"
She shrugged and smiled at Stryker. "Word was, you were seen heading up toward the dell."
Stryker said, "I'm moving to California."
"She's a very pretty girl," Olafson said. "Too bad about her inheritance."
AT THE COURTHOUSE, Stryker got out of the truck and said, "I'm running out of gas. Too old for this overnight shit."
"Yeah, I'm gonna take a nap," Virgil said. "Gotta call Joanie. Maybe you should call Jesse, the four of us could go out somewhere."
Stryker yawned. "I'll ask Jesse. Give me a call when you get up, but not too early. Like, six-thirty or seven."
JOAN'S CELL PHONE kicked over to the message service. Virgil said, "I'm just going to bed. Jim and I were talking, maybe the four of us could go out tonight, later on…"
He took a while going to sleep; went down deep when he did. His cell phone rang five times before he realized what it was. By the time he got to it, it'd stopped ringing. He punched up the number: didn't recognize it, but it was from the Twin Cities. He redialed, and Shrake came up.
"Hey, Flowers. It's me and Jenkins. We're looking at your old guys. You want us to run them in?"
"Jeez, Shrake, where are you?"
"In their living room. Their daughter's living room," Shrake said. "You want us to take her, too?"
"Shrake, what are you doing? Where are you?"
"Okay, then," Shrake said. "We'll leave her. I don't think she'd last too long with all the muffin crunchers down at Ramsey."
"They can hear you," Virgil said. "You're scaring them, right?"
"You got that right," Shrake said, and he laughed.
Virgil said, "Okay. You tell them to glue their asses to the couch and I'll be there in four hours. Tell them if they go anywhere, I honest to God…Wait. Let me talk to them. Let me talk to Gerald."
A moment later, Gerald came on the line, and Virgil said, "Gerald, you motherfucker. You know something about that picture. I'm going to put your ass in jail and your wife's ass in jail, for murder, if I don't find out what it is. You sit there: I'm leaving Bluestem right now and I'll be there in four hours. Now: gimme Shrake."
Shrake came back up and said, "Yeah?"
"Take the rest of the day off," Virgil said.
"It's Saturday, dickweed. This was my day off."
"Then take tomorrow off, too. I don't think Gerald's going anywhere. Gimme the address. The daughter's name is, what, Jones?"
"Cornelia Jones, that's correct. DOB six eighteen forty-seven. We're at her house in Apple Valley, get off at Cliff Road…"
VIRGIL HAD grille-mounted LED flashers on the 4Runner, and a removable roof-mount flasher that plugged into his cigarette lighter. He'd never used them for criminal inquiries, but occasionally did use them when he felt like driving fast.
He called the highway patrol district office in Marshall, told them that he was making an emergency run back to the Cities east on I-90 and north on I-35, as part of a murder investigation, and asked them to advise the other districts; and told them that he'd be using the flashers.
He got Joanie as he left town. "I didn't think you'd be up yet…" she began.
"I'm heading for the Cities in a hurry," Virgil said. "Back tomorrow, I hope."
"What happened?"
"Got the Johnstones and they know some shit. Tell Jim when he gets up-he'll be getting up in an hour or so."
"I will. Be safe, Virgil."
THE 4 RUNNER would do an honest ninety, but at one hundred, it was breathing hard, and starting to move around the road. Virgil backed off to ninety-eight, put it on cruise control, turned on some music, and made it into the south end of the Cities in two and a half hours, got off at the main Apple Valley exit, drove in circles for a while, finally cut Roan Stallion Lane, which was half a block long, and pulled up in the driveway of Cornelia Jones.
The house was suburban-comfortable; its distinguishing characteristic was that the lawn was essentially a field of hosta plants. Thousands of them, like a midget army from Invasion of the Body Snatchers.