“All I’m saying is that we don’t have any idea who to look for. That’s all I meant.”
“Whoever it is,” he said, “he must be rattled now. After making a mistake like that…”
“What are you thinking? This has to be somebody who was close to Wiley, right?”
“Probably. The film was in his basement. Which reminds me…”
“What?”
“Two agents were just here a minute ago,” Maven said. “Not Long and Fleury, two other guys from Detroit. They went out to Bad Axe as soon as they found out about this. You know what they found?”
“What?”
“Somebody broke into that house on the lake. The feds had it all locked up tight, because they were still processing stuff. But sometime between yesterday evening and this morning, somebody got in, went down to the basement, and turned the whole place inside out.”
“Looking for the film,” I said. “Gotta be, right?”
“You would think. But whoever it was, he didn’t find it.”
“So what about Connie and Sean? Did the agents talk to them?”
“Naturally. Neither of them was alone last night. They both seem to have airtight alibis.”
“They seem to?”
“Yeah, and neither of them has any idea who could have broken into the house. Of course, I’m getting all of this secondhand.”
“We’ve been down this road before,” I said.
“Last time around, secondhand wasn’t good enough for you, you mean. So you ran off to see for yourself.”
“Pretty stupid thing to do. As usual.”
He nodded slowly. “The kind of thing I’m always yelling at you for.”
“You stay here with your daughter,” I said. “I’ll call you as soon as I can.”
Bad Axe was about two hours away from Lansing. I took the expressway due east through Flint, but then I had to cut north on a smaller two-lane highway, all the way north into the thumb. So the last hour was hard driving.
When I finally hit Bad Axe, I knew exactly where to go. I parked in the lot next to the theater and went across the street. I pressed on the buzzer next to the Grindstone Productions plate, but nobody answered. I pressed again and took a peek through the window. It was dark inside. I rapped on the window a few times, then I turned and left. I went across to the theater and tried the door. It was locked. Not a big surprise. It wasn’t even noon yet. I knocked on the door, but nobody answered.
Okay, think, I said to myself as I walked back to the truck. Where do I try next?
I played back my last trip down here and realized I knew exactly where Sean lived, at least. I had followed him home to his apartment that first night. It wasn’t far from the theater, just a few blocks away from that motel I stayed in. I pulled out and retraced the route.
When I got to his building, I didn’t see his green Corvette anywhere. Another swing and a miss, I thought. Not a good start. I got out and went to the front door, gave it a quick knock just for the hell of it. I was surprised when the door opened. A young woman stood there looking out at me. She looked vaguely familiar.
“Is Sean here?”
She shook her head. She was clearly upset about something.
“My name’s Alex,” I said. “Are you okay?”
She shook her head again.
“Can I come in and talk to you? It’ll only take a minute, I promise.”
She backed away from the door. She still hadn’t said a word.
“Where have I seen you before?” I said. Then it came to me. “Wait a minute, you were the girl in the sandwich shop. Behind the counter, that first day I came in. I didn’t realize you and Sean were…” I wasn’t quite sure which word to pick, but it didn’t seem to matter. She was looking down at the floor now and was obviously not listening to me at all.
“You weren’t there in the shop the next day,” I said, “when I sat down with Sean.”
I leaned in closer to get her attention.
“We had a long talk,” I said, “Sean and I. Did he say anything about it to you?”
“Yes,” she said, finally finding her voice. “He told me a private investigator talked to him.”
“Okay. Good. So tell me what’s wrong.”
“I… can’t.”
I took a step inside. She didn’t stop me.
“Please talk to me,” I said. “Maybe I can help.”
She turned away from me and went to the center of the room. She had her arms folded around herself. As I followed her, I saw all the movie posters decorating their living room. Casablanca, The Maltese Falcon, Chinatown, and right there in the middle of it all, that same Road Hogs poster I had seen in Wiley’s lake house.
Then I saw something else. On the bookshelf, occupying an obvious place of honor. An old movie camera.
I went up close to it and looked at it carefully without touching it. The body of the camera had a textured black surface, and the dials and buttons and lens were all gleaming silver. It was like a work of art.
“That’s his Bolex,” the young woman said.
“He got it from his grandfather, right? I remember what he told me when we were sitting in the sandwich shop. If you’re a Wiley kid, the old man gives you a camera as soon as you’re old enough to hold one.”
“That’s right.”
“Let me ask you something. Does he ever let anybody else use it?”
“What, that camera? No way. He won’t even let me touch it.”
I turned to face her. “I’m sorry, I didn’t get your name.”
“Delaney.”
“Delaney, that’s a nice name. So tell me… I understand the FBI was here this morning?”
She looked at the floor again.
“You’ve got to talk to me,” I said. “Where’s Sean right now, anyway?”
She didn’t answer.
“Come on, sit down.”
As gently as I could, I guided her into one of the chairs. I got down on one knee, right in front of her. I didn’t want to push her too hard, but at the same time I needed her to tell me what the hell was going on.
“You know I was trying to help Sean…”
She nodded.
“So let me help out again. Where’s Sean?”
“He left.” She wiped her nose with the back of her hand.
“Where did he go?”
“I don’t know. He wouldn’t tell me.”
“When did he leave?”
“Right after he talked to the agents.”
“Did you hear their conversation?”
“Only part of it. One of them took me aside and talked to me in the other room. They just wanted me to tell them where Sean was all last night and this morning.”
“I understand. And he was with you the whole time?”
“Yes, he was. I swear.”
“Okay, I got it,” I said. “So what happened next?”
“I just heard the end of what they were saying, but it sounds like they were asking him if he knew anybody who might have broken into his grandfather’s lake house. Sean was saying, ‘No, sorry, I can’t help you, I really don’t know.’ So they left.”
“Then when did Sean leave? Right after that?”
“No, first he pulled out his cell phone, because I guess somebody had been calling him the whole time he was talking to the agents. He thought it was his father, but then when he looked at his phone, he was like, ‘Who the hell is this?’ He called the number back and that’s when he ended up going outside.”
“You didn’t hear any of it?”
“Not really, but he was like, ‘Hey, what’s going on? What? What are you talking about?’ And he got a real weird look on his face. He looked over at me and then that’s when he went outside. I could see him pacing all over the place, walking up and down until he finally went and sat inside his car. He was really upset about something, I could see that from the window.”
“You didn’t get a name? Like did he say, ‘Hey, so-and-so,’ or anything like that?”
“No, I can’t remember anything like that. But when he came back inside, he was still talking. It was like he was trying to end the call, but whoever was on the line wouldn’t let him go, and Sean was just like, ‘Okay, okay. Just go there and I’ll meet you there. Yeah, you told me how to get there, I got it. Yeah, yeah, I’ll bring it, I’ll bring it. Don’t worry. Just go there and don’t do anything else.’”