“And I shouldn't tell the other policemen?”
“I'm not advising you not to tell the police what they asked you to tell them. Unless there's some good reason, you should always help the legitimate authorities with official investigations. I'd just like to know. Maybe you could call me first, if you'd feel comfortable doing that. If not, I'll understand.”
She fixed Winter with her stare, then nodded slowly.
“I don't see why not. You are a policeman.” She smiled. “And you're a polite young man.”
“I always try to be, Ms. Hughes.”
“There is one thing…” she said. “Late last night, I woke up and-my bed's on this side, and after the rain it was so restful with the windows open. Well something woke me up, you know how it does sometimes when you hear something and you aren't sure about it. So I wasn't sure what woke me, but at the time I thought it was the sound of their toilet flushing.”
48
John Adams pulled up to the curb near the Monteleone Hotel, just inside the French Quarter.
“I'll be back with the radios in two minutes. Think you can keep the car from being stolen?” he said to Nicky before he climbed out.
“I reckon I can manage it,” he replied. “If you get lost in there, just fire that Glock three times in the air and I'll come get you.”
Nicky Green watched the FBI agent worm his way through the weekenders cluttering the sidewalk and vanish through the doors. The agent moved with a fluidity that added to Nicky's doubts that Adams was what he claimed to be. Nicky was sure that whatever Adams's purpose was, it wasn't what he had claimed. Adams had the eyes of a predator, not a cop. If Massey was as good as Nicky thought he was, he didn't believe Adams's story either. How had Adams gotten to town so fast, located them, and bugged the car?
Nicky decided that he needed to learn more about the man. After Adams had been gone for thirty seconds, Nicky climbed out, made his way into the hotel, and strolled to the bell captain's kiosk. The bell captain was middle-aged, dressed in a navy sport jacket with the hotel's logo over the pocket, starched white shirt, and striped tie. Telephone to his ear, he was jotting down notes. Nicky placed his hand on the desk and parted his fingers to reveal a one-hundred-dollar bill. The bell captain saw the bill but didn't acknowledge its presence.
“How may I help you, sir?” he said, hanging up the phone.
“A minute ago, a man named John Everett Adams came in here. You might have seen him. Gray suit. Five-ten, one-sixty-five. Crew cut.”
“I don't know the gentleman by sight, sir,” the bell captain said.
“Well, see, I'm hoping he's registered under John E. Adams.”
“He might be. And?”
A couple approached.
Nicky stepped aside.
The bell captain listened to their question about jazz clubs on Bourbon Street, which he answered by scribbling down the names of three he told them had good Dixieland. They left five dollars lighter.
Nicky returned to front and center. “Adams isn't exactly what he seems,” Nicky said.
“Is that so?”
“He is a married NASCAR driver. He is meeting with an actress whose name is a household word. I just need to know what room he's in so I can see if it is possible to set up a camera to see in the window.”
The bell captain inhaled deeply. Then he turned his sad gray eyes on Nicky. “You want to give me a hundred dollars for the room number of a guest so you can photograph him from a nearby rooftop while he's in bed with an actress?”
“That's about the size of it,” Nicky said, holding the man's gaze. “A tasteful picture of her at the window with him would do.”
“Private investigator?”
“Did I say that?”
“I should ask you to leave the hotel.” He cut his eyes at the front desk, sniffed, put his fingers between Nicky's, and slid the bill out. Sighing, he flipped open a book and at the same time slipped the bill into his pocket. He ran a finger down a list, then snapped the book closed.
“I would be fired if I gave you information on this John Everett Adams. It's against hotel policy. At any rate I cannot help you because, even if I told you he was in room four-sixteen, there is no place from which you could see into that room unless you get on our window-washing platform, which isn't available for that sort of tomfoolery.”
“Damn it!” Nicky frowned like he was disappointed, then turned and walked away. Greed was so predictable. Nicky crossed the lobby to the front doors, passing by a ten-foot-tall grandfather clock as he went.
He got back to the car less than a minute before Adams appeared carrying a small leather satchel.
Nicky pulled down the bill of his cap to make it appear that he had been napping. Adams opened the driver's door and, tossing the case into the backseat, climbed in behind the wheel, cranked the car, and swung it easily into a gap in the traffic.
Nicky lifted the cap. “I see you didn't lose your way.”
“Breadcrumbs,” Adams replied,
49
The lock on Kimberly and Faith Ann's back door was a deadbolt, so it took Winter, not exactly a Houdini, over a minute to pick it and enter the utility room, which was open into the den. He found nothing there but saw where the computer had been, an empty space next to the printer and scanner. As he moved up the hall, Winter was appalled by the senseless mess the cops had made in the master bedroom, that small private bath. What could have been the point of the destructive behavior of the searchers? Faith Ann's bedroom was upside down. There had been both aquarium and Audubon Zoo posters on the bedroom wall, now torn up and scattered over the floor. A shattered boom box, ripped-up stuffed animals, glass shards…
It struck him that the men must have done this so they could say that Faith Ann had done the vandalism herself, the girl running amok while still in a fit of rage after murdering her own mother. It made sense to stack up as many pieces of evidence against her as possible. Framing someone was like painting a canvas-only talented artists knew precisely when to put the brush aside, before one more stroke diminished the painting. Tinnerino and his partner were certainly not artists.
In the hallway bathroom he surveyed the chaos and spotted the dog clippers. There was something else-something very interesting. On the floor beside the counter, on one of the white towels, were several long hairs. He pulled one of them off to inspect it. Smart kid. He folded the hairs into a towel and placed it in the cabinet under the sink. He inspected the plastic gap on the clippers and judged the length of her hair. He wondered if the other searchers had made the same discovery and prayed they hadn't. If he was right, the pictures of Faith Ann would not accurately reflect the child who was now running from them. It was a small thing, but it was an edge-it meant she was thinking like a survivor.
He took a quick look around the kitchen, dining and living rooms but found nothing useful. Winter went back out, locking the deadbolt behind him. Locking it took forty seconds. He wanted to see why the woman had gone under there.
Upon turning the corner, he spotted the movable wood lattice panel because it hadn't fully closed. Winter went the length of the house and found the concrete porch with its square opening. It was pitch-black inside, so he took out a disposable cigarette lighter he always carried in his pocket, thanks to not having one a year before when he had needed a source of light. He flicked it to life and, holding it inside, spotted the yellow poncho. Bracing himself, he slid inside the cool damp enclosure.
In the flickering light he saw there was something under the plastic. His heart fell, thinking Faith Ann's curled-up body might be concealed beneath it. He lifted the edge of the poncho and discovered a pillow. He studied the plastic shell that had contained a Walkman, looked at the shears and the pair of batteries remaining in the packaging. He thought about the empty cassette recorder in Kimberly Porter's office Manseur had mentioned to him. There was a tape… and Faith Ann has it.