"Right."
"No idea."
"You have any idea where your friends are?"
"If you mean the West sisters, I was kind of looking around for them myself."
"Or Noah Chandler."
"He's probably with them. But I have no idea where."
"You came out here because of them. If the man in your room was following you, it probably had to do with them."
"That's sort of what I was thinking."
"So he has something to do with the Rick Hennessy case."
"Maybe," I said. "A celebrity like Tandy, there could be a lot of people after her for a lot of different reasons."
"You're probably right. We don't get many celebrities out here."
"Consider yourself lucky."
She sat on the edge of the double bed across from me. She looked beautiful and sweet in the light from the lamp. The soft light dulled the redness of her scar and made it less noticeable.
The phone rang. She picked it up, said hello, listened. Then held the phone out to me. "For you."
"Me?" I stood up to take the call.
She nodded. "The Chicago Police Department."
Brady. "What's going on? A cop answered your room phone."
"I'll explain later." I smiled at Susan. She didn't smile back.
"Turns out I had to check a license number myself. Some bastard sideswiped my daughter in a supermarket parking lot. Broad daylight. Guy's drunk out of his mind. Luckily, Cindy got his license number. So I checked out your guy while I was at it."
"And?"
"Private investigator name of DeWayne Kibbe."
"How was his record?"
"Was?"
"He's why a cop answered my room phone."
"He's dead?"
"Unless he's awful good at faking, he is."
"You have all the fun, Robert. His record was clean."
"He part of an agency?"
"Freelancer. But most of those boys hire out to the big agencies all the time. The agencies like the setup because they don't have to pay any bennies."
"You got a phone number for the guy?"
He dragged out his yellow pages. Gave me the phone number. "You have an address?"
"You don't want much, do you, Robert?"
"His address'll tell me something about how well his business was doing."
"You should be a detective. It's a lot of fun. We've got a secret handshake and everything."
He gave me the address. It wasn't exactly what you'd call tony.
"How about one more favor?"
"I won't mow your lawn."
"See if he's listed in the residences."
"You should be mowing my lawn." There was a pause while he looked it up. "Sorry this is taking so long."
Susan Charles said, "He was a private investigator?"
"Right."
"Here you go, Robert." He gave me the address and phone number. "I've got to haul ass out of here. I've got Cub Scouts with my youngest kid tonight."
After hanging up, I said, "He was a long way from Chicago."
"He certainly was."
This time, I didn't sit down. "I didn't kill him."
"You probably didn't."
"There's a ringing endorsement."
"I can't rule it out."
"No, I suppose you can't."
She stood up. "I'd better get back to your room and see what's going on. The SBI boys will be wondering where I am. They like to write nasty things about local police chiefs whenever possible."
"Sounds like a love affair."
"They're helpful but arrogant."
"That's what city cops used to say about the bureau."
She smiled. "And it was probably true."
"It probably was."
She walked to the window. Peeked out between the curtains.
"It's starting to look like the county fair out there." She turned back to me. "This is the second homicide since Rick Hennessy killed Sandy. Before that, we didn't have a homicide for six years."
"I suppose you'll want me to stick around for a day or two?"
She seemed surprised. "I thought you were working with your good friends the witches."
Her tone irritated me. "If you mean Tandy, she's a very serious person. She actually has psychic gifts. I can't explain them and she can't either. But I've seen them work so I believe in them."
"If I didn't know better, I'd say you had a crush on her."
I thought of how infatuated I'd been with Susan this afternoon. There was a divide between us now, and it seemed to widen by the minute.
"No crush," I said. "I just wanted to keep the facts straight."
"I hope you'll defend me like that sometime. I like that kind of loyalty, Robert. I really do." Then, "Sorry if I was nasty."
"It's all right."
"And I'm sorry we didn't get to go bowling."
"Me, too." I liked her again. Just like that. She looked oddly lonely just then, and I wanted to put my hand on her shoulder.
She walked over to the door and looked out. "They're out there."
"Who?"
"Tandy and her sister and the big hunk."
"Chandler?"
She looked back at me. "I remember his cop show on the tube. It was terrible and so was he. There's something about him I don't trust."
"Me, either."
Then she was gone.
I went outside. Scent of burning leaves and diesel fuel from passing trucks. An orange half moon and ranks of cars in the motel lot. Giggles and gawking from the little kids; somber adult eyes peering out from beneath the bills of John Deere caps, men and women alike. Teenage boys found this a fine brave time to put protective and possessive arms around the shoulders of their girls, keeping them safe from the savage randomness of death, while being every bit as dry-mouthed and shaken and baffled as the girls themselves.
Tandy and Laura and Chandler stood off to the right, leaning against the front of a van, watching it all.
I walked over to them. The crowd was six or seven yards to my left. Cars kept pulling into the lot, radios blasting. Rap music sounded strange out here in the boonies, especially on the radios of white farm boys. They wore green John Deere caps just like their fathers, except they wore them backwards in the style of city kids.
"So much for the myth of the small town," Chandler said. He sounded drunk. His words weren't quite enunciated. "I thought it was supposed to be safe out here."
"They said a man was murdered," Laura said.
"Yeah. And they found him in my room."
"What?" Tandy said.
"I was the one who found him. He was pushed back in the closet. I didn't even see him at first."
"Who was it?" said Laura.
"A Chicago PI named Kibbe."
"A private detective?" Tandy said.
Laura said, "And he was from Chicago. I wonder what that's all about?"
"What's the big deal about Chicago?" Tandy said.
"We're from Chicago," Chandler said.
"I still don't get it."
"Think about it," Laura said. "The coincidence. What's the likelihood of a Chicago private investigator being here while we're here?"
"You mean he's here because of us?" Tandy said.
"Was here," Chandler said, not sounding as drunk as he had at first.
Tandy looked at me and said, "Do you think he was here because of us, Robert?"
"Too soon to tell. We need to know a lot more."
"I think it's damned strange," Laura said.
"Me, too," Chandler agreed.
"He could have been here because of me," I said.
"Why you?" Chandler said. He sounded almost disappointed that he might have to give up the spotlight. Kibbe's presence here would be ever so much more interesting if it had to do with Chandler.
I told them about my path crossing with Kibbe's today.
"But why would he be following you?" Tandy said.
"I have no idea."
"Is there any way we can check on this guy?" Chandler said.
"I have his home phone number. Hopefully, he had a wife and she'll be able to help me. But I need to wait till she's been officially notified by the authorities. That'll be an hour or so yet." I paused. "He could have been following the girl, too."