‘How rough was your day?’ I asked.
‘Too many lakes,’ she said.
‘Maybe moving the car was dumb.’
‘No; it was risky, and daring, and I love you for it.’ Then, likely realizing she’d said something she didn’t mean to say, she added, ‘I called my office every hour. I said only that my father was up here and might have gotten stranded on one of the small lakes. Of course, they’ve been watching the news…’
‘Not unusual. Most people in Chicago are following the Confessors’ Club story.’
‘No one said anything, but it would be impossible for them not to assume my father’s caught up in all of that.’
We tried making jokes about what I might learn from the books she’d bought but mostly we just made silence.
Agent Krantz found us at eight o’clock, lapsed into sitting stiffly at the bar like two strangers on a train. He had to perch on the other side of Amanda because I’d taken the stool at the end of the bar so I could lean against the wall. The manager came in and Krantz ordered a low-carb beer. It figured.
‘I assumed you’d gone back to Chicago,’ I said, by way of an enthusiastic greeting.
‘I promised we’d talk again today, and I didn’t want to disappoint,’ he said, taking a pull at the beer and not grimacing. ‘There have been developments.’
Amanda glanced sharply at him.
‘No news about your father, I’m afraid,’ Krantz said quickly.
‘Herman Canty?’ I asked.
‘Nor him, either, though the sheriff’s people did find a note that Canty’s girlfriend, a Wanda something, taped to the door at the Loons’ Rest. It said she was off on an adventure of some sort.’
‘That’s a development for sure,’ I said, agreeably.
‘Except Canty’s truck was found parked on a side street.’
‘In plain view?’
He nodded.
‘Wow,’ I said. ‘There’s been some ace sleuthing done.’
Undeterred, he said, ‘One of those tool bin things is bolted inside the truck bed, behind the rear window. Want to guess what was in it?’
‘Not tools,’ I said, ‘because people around here say Canty never did much.’
‘There was a freshly packed duffel bag inside. Our Mr Canty was planning a trip.’
‘With the lovely Wanda, as her note said?’
‘Could be, or not could be. That is the question.’
I groaned, but said nothing to spoil the taste of his low-carb beer.
‘There was a fresh set of tire tracks in the fire lane closest to Lamm’s camp, made by tires almost bald of tread,’ he said. ‘Jeep tires, just like yours, Elstrom. And just a few feet away, we found evidence that someone had been digging at the base of a tree.’
‘I told you I got trussed up in Lamm’s cottage. The fire lane was where I parked. As for the digging, there are beavers and raccoons up here.’
‘One of my men had a peek inside your Jeep earlier this morning.’
‘I’ve been meaning to clean out all those hamburger wrappers.’
‘Why is your spare tire inside, instead of mounted on the bracket on the back?’
‘It’s out of air,’ I said.
‘And why was the hood warm?’
Amanda inhaled sharply, but stared straight ahead.
‘From the sun,’ I said, patting the crutches I’d leaned against the wall. ‘Obviously I can’t drive.’
He leaned forward so he see could more directly past Amanda. ‘My warrant came through to search Second Securities.’
‘What did you find?’ I leaned back so he’d either have to almost lie across the bar to maintain eye contact, or lean backward and risk tipping over. It was immature and felt appropriate.
He chose to lean back. ‘Not much except the identity of a girl who worked there. She told an odd story. The front door is all glass, and has a mail slot in the metal at the very bottom. She hadn’t been paid the wages she was owed, so she walked out, pushing the key inside the mail slot after locking up for the last time. Later, she realized she’d left behind a bottle of black nail polish. She went back to reach in for the key so she could retrieve the nail polish, but the key was gone.’
‘Another employee opened up, and took the key?’
‘She was the only employee. Here’s the odd part, Elstrom: When my agents arrived there this morning, the key was lying inside the locked front door, right where the girl said she’d left it.’
‘Obviously, the key was there all the time,’ I offered reasonably. ‘The girl just got confused.’
‘Or an intruder showed up after the girl quit, snagged the key through the mail slot, used it to go in the front door, locked that, and left by the garage. Since there were no signs of forced entry, it’s a plausible explanation, especially since…’ He let the thought dangle, prompting.
‘Yes?’ I asked.
‘There were signs of forced entry inside. Someone smashed the inner door to get in the garage. The girl said it hadn’t been that way when she worked there, and that it was always locked.’
‘What did you find in the garage? More tire treads?’
‘Fresh ones, pulling out. And little rubber cuppy marks.’
‘Little rubber what?’
‘Concentric circles, three of them, totaling an inch and three-quarters in diameter.’ He pointed to my crutches, leaning against the wall. ‘Exactly the sort of marks made by the rubber caps they put on the tips of crutches, to prevent them from slipping.’
I could see Amanda had caught her breath. I wanted to hold my own, too, for fear Krantz was going to ask to see my crutches.
‘Trouble is, almost every crutch manufacturer uses those same caps,’ he said, looking straight at my eyes. ‘That garage smells like something’s been dead in there for quite some time.’
‘What was it?’
‘We found nothing… yet.’ He took another maddeningly delighted pull on his beer. ‘Still, you know what’s even more bothersome than that?’
‘Apparently not your low-carb beer,’ I said.
He frowned, but only a little. Obviously they spent hours teaching self-control at IRS Agent school. ‘It’s the two-million-dollar cash payout on Grant Carson’s life.’
‘Why?’
‘Only one million dollars was found in that case in the Buick.’
‘You said that at the clinic.’
‘A number which you confirmed at the time.’
‘I was medicated and confused.’
‘I was in the local tap in Bent Lake, having a brew with the locals-’
‘Low carb?’ I interrupted.
‘They didn’t have any-’ He caught himself and stopped. Then, ‘They remembered you, especially your wit. Seems you came in carrying a metal case that looks exactly like the one we recovered from the Buick. When they asked you what was in it, you cracked them up by saying you had two million dollars in there.’
‘That’s right.’
‘That’s right?’ Krantz set down his beer.
‘My wit did sparkle that evening,’ I said.
Amanda laughed, just once, but continued to stare straight ahead at the glasses gathering dust above the bar.
‘I could haul you down to Chicago, keep you for forty-eight hours.’
‘I had my briefcase in the bar that night. Somebody stole it from my Jeep when I was in the clinic.’
Krantz looked at me, and looked at Amanda. He stood up, knocked back the last of his de-carbed beer and left, looking less happy than when he’d arrived.