Spokane was hot, sunny and dry. The car rental place in the air-conditioned terminal was not busy and the couple was promptly on their way. Marjorie was at the wheel of a lovely dark blue late-model Lincoln Navigator. It had all the bells and whistles Ford designers and engineers ever thought of, a big step up from Lockem’s sporty vintage Austin Healy 100-six back home in his garage. This thing was a tank. They hummed east along the highway, straight toward the looming Rocky Mountains. A comfortable hour and a half ride and after rounding yet another outcropping of granite saw, across this humungous piece of water, a town. Grand Lac. Their destination. Leaving the freeway, they dipped down to lake level and crossed a bay on a long straight concrete bridge. It reminded Lockem a little of the concrete causeway between the tip of Florida and Key West. The town of Grand Lac is one of the northernmost vacation destinations in the country. It’s an easy drive up the valleys to the Canadian border. The lake for which the settlement is named is a big, sprawling glacier lake with a ragged, wandering shoreline in a deep valley of the Rocky Mountains. There are long stretches of open water that attract sailors and there are islands and many tiny bays that attract secrets. The single stretch of sand beach lies at one edge of the city limits and is walled off by parkland and the railroad spur.
The surrounding mountains attract skiers year-round although the resorts are not listed among the premiere of the premier. Grand Lac is served by a very small airport and the Northern Pacific Railroad. The airport operates during daylight hours and the train arrives from east or west around midnight, assuming it’s on schedule. Apart from the resorts, logging and a little mining, ranching and associated business activities keep folks busy and mostly out of trouble. There are a number of retirement establishments as well. Once Kane and Lockem arrived, they noticed that their age cohort fit in well.
There are advantages to being members of the younger geriatric set. Retirees are often considered harmless, having lost their edge, and most of their influence, if they ever had any, and are likely to be targeted as victims. Fit as they are, governments and many people tend to ignore or dismiss them. But as Marjorie Kane once remarked, “We develop magical powers, because we become invisible.” It’s a mistake many people make.
In the case of Lockem and Kane, truth was a whole different circumstance. True, they looked aged. Well preserved, perhaps, but older. Lockem sometimes smiled at the idea. If you could see those tanned and toned long legs my companion wears when she dances, he mused or practices her Tai quon do, or wraps them around my waist in the shower, you’d change your mind. As for Lockem, long years of many jobs plus some specialized training helped him keep his edge. He was, Lockem might say immodestly, still quick on his feet.
“First, let’s check in at the NoName Hotel. Then, I think, a quick reconnoiter of the center of town is in order,” murmured Lockem, perusing a detailed map of the local area. “I always like to develop a good mental picture of my new surroundings. Once I became comfortable in a new location, reacting appropriately in a crisis is more easily accomplished and less dangerous.”
“Thus endeth the first lesson,” interjected Marjorie with a grin.
As was his habit, Alan Lockem did a quick visual scan of the lobby as they walked to the registration desk. No alarm bells sounded. The couple was greeted warmly by a tall smiling woman with a cap of closely cropped, very black hair and deep blue eyes.
Their hotel suite was comfortable enough and Marjorie quickly found an acceptable network for her wireless laptop connection. The couple almost never carried files on these jaunts, unless it was to provide cover. Marjorie had a tricked-out laptop computer and a small printer that gave them whatever they needed when they traveled out of town.
Casually dressed, they scampered down two flights to the street and surrounded themselves with street traffic. In short order they had identified the city offices and places where the local law seemed to hang out when not actively patrolling. They also found a nice watering hole that served an acceptable brand of good scotch (for Lockem) and an equally nice Pinot Noir for Marjorie.
“You are drawing notice, my dear,” Lockem murmured.
“Are you sure she isn’t checking you out?”
“I wonder what the local attitude is toward same-sex marriage.”
“Unless it affects our present task, I’m only passingly interested,” Marjorie said. Lusty and upfront about her sexuality, Marjorie Kane had the goods, but she also had the smarts and education so she fit in pretty much anywhere it was called for. Her experience as a stripper had helped her develop a keen sense of awareness in social and business situations. Lockem wasn’t bad at divining evil intent, but Marjorie was a star.
The woman at a table across the room had been staring at Marjorie just a bit too long. Now she said something to her companion and came across the room. Standing quietly among a small crowd, say, she would have been unremarkable. But when she walked there was an instantaneous change. Not exactly cat-like, she had an obvious sinuous quality to her stride.
“Excuse me, I’m probably wrong, but I have a feeling I know you.” The woman stopped with her right hip just an inch away from Lockem’s fingers at the table edge. She addressed her opening comment to Marjorie.
“I doubt it,” Marjorie said coolly. “I’ve never been to Grand Lac before in my life.”
“No, no, I don’t mean here in Grand Lac. I think I recognize you from somewhere else. Seattle, maybe?”
Marjorie shrugged. “I’ve been to Seattle a few times, but not recently.”
“Well, sorry to have bothered you.” The woman went away and Marjorie leaned into her companion. “See the way she walks? Not long out of the business, I’ll bet.”
“Mmm,” Lockem inhaled his companion’s perfume. “Is that a new scent?”
She elbowed him gently in the ribs. “Pay attention. She walks like a dancer. I expect if we check we’ll discover she and I were on the same bill at some club in Seattle.”
“But that must have been years ago.”
“Of course. You know I haven’t taken my clothes off in public since you and I hooked up.”
Lockem smiled. “There was that day we were on the beach at that little lake outside of Hackensack last July.” He smiled wider at the memory. She smiled back.
Marjorie’s cell phone trilled softly from the depths of her purse. She fished it out and looked at the screen. Then she took the call. “Hi there, Edie. How are you holding up?”
“Yes, we’re getting settled in. We have rooms at the No Name, that independent in town.” She listened. “No, hon, I told you. It’s better, especially now, that we stay away from you for the time being.” She listened some more. “I know you have the room, sweetie, but we’re just fine. For a day or two at least. We need to sort of blend in like a couple of tourists. Assess the lay of the land. For the time being. Yes. I’ll be sure to call you every day. Try not to worry.”
“Annie Fanny,” she said putting her phone away.
“Excuse me?”
Marjorie nodded toward the woman who had come to their table. “Annie Fanny. That was her stage name. We were on a couple of bills together. Back in the day.” The woman and her companion were standing, preparing to leave. The woman glanced back over her shoulder and sketched a sort of goodbye wave by wiggling her fingers at Lockem and Kane.
“I can see why she got the label,” he said, watching the woman switch her prominent behind back and forth as she and her companion left the restaurant.
“Hon, that’s nothing. You should see her in a sequined thong prancing around a stage. Drove the kiddies wild with that ass. Looks like she’s staying in shape, too.”
Lockem turned his head and looked at his lovely companion. “Tsk. Such language. I assure you I’m more than happy with the bottom presently within reach.” Kane bobbed her head. In spite of protestations to the contrary, she loved compliments about the state of her body. It was understandable. For several years, Marjorie’s livelihood rested almost totally on lusty male appreciation of her physical attributes displayed on stages.
“Well, to business. Edie doesn’t understand why we aren’t bunking with them, but she won’t rush down here to greet us until we give her the word. What next?” Kane tapped a few symbols into her cell phone.
“Let’s go wander these blocks over east of us. And I want to get a look at City Hall.”
* * *.*
City Hall and the lockup weren’t far away. Nothing is too far away from anywhere else in Grand Lac. The town is in a valley, surrounded by the northern Rocky Mountains and higher by a thousand feet than where the two live. Doesn’t seem much, but the sun is brighter, the air lighter, and any kind of strenuous exercise is quickly more difficult. Most traffic goes north and south, following the rivers and a few mountain passes. The topography restricts flexibility of access unless you happen to be a moose or a mountain goat. Was that important? Probably. A block from City Hall around a corner, they sauntered east. Shouting rose up ahead in the next block. They drew closer and found two men who were blocking the sidewalk. They confronted each other almost jaw to jaw. They wore straw Stetson-style hats, Edwardian-style coats, although nobody out here called them that, tight jeans and pointy-toed, prominently heeled boots. In short, they were dressed like every other male in town over the age of thirty. These details are important for a number of reasons. Male profiles, particularly in the dark, tend to be mighty similar and running, that is flat-out running in cowboy or western-style boots is pretty near impossible. Stomping on a critter or riding yer odd hoss is a different matter.
Neither Lockem nor Kane was inclined to get involved with the shouting match, especially since other people on the street were ignoring the two men and going about their business. They stopped a discreet distance away and looked at a mildly interesting window display of local crafts.
“I don’t give two hoots er’ a holler for what you think, McCracken. You and that dang city council is messing in where they don’t belong. I can hardly wait for the next election.”
“Henry, we’re just trying to do what’s best for the whole county, even if some county commissioners don’t agree. If you’d take a breath and step back and think for a change, you’d realize that.”
The man called Henry, shorter than McCracken by a head and looking older by decades, had his hands fisted and looked ready to swing at the other man. There was a tense moment and then McCracken shrugged and stepped aside and off the curb. There was a blast on a horn and the screech of tires. McCracken had almost stepped in front of a big Chevy truck that was just passing.
Lockem turned his head to catch the two men in the reflection off the storefront glass while Marjorie looked directly at them. “McCracken,” she murmured. “Must be the Mayor. He’s too old to be the public works McCracken.”
“Could the other guy, Henry, wasn’t it? Could that be Henry McReady?”
“It is indeed,” Marjorie said. “I recognize him from the picture I lifted from the Internet. He’s coming past us.”
McReady stomped past, obviously steaming over the mayoral disagreement. He was not in such a state that he failed to notice the bosomy older woman at Lockem’s side. In the glass, Lockem watched his eyes roam up and then down Marjorie’s form. His lips, under the thick grizzled mustache twitched. He didn’t alter his stride, just surveyed Marjorie’s body as he went on down the street.
“An old lecher,” Marjorie murmured, canting her eyes at her companion.
“Well, excuse me, ma’am, I bet he’s younger than I am.”
She nodded. “Probably, but I wasn’t referring to his chronological age. His type I know well, unfortunately. Plenty of money and careful with it.”
“There’s a supper club down this street I believe. Let’s see if we can find it.”
“I’m not hungry, are you?”
“No,” Lockem said, “but it’s a place we might want to visit another day for dinner, or for an afternoon drink.”
“Really.”
He nodded. “Plus, it’s on the list you pulled. The list of real estate investment holdings of the mayor of this fine community.”
“Ah, I see.” So said, she took his arm and they ambled on down the street until they found themselves in front of Joe’s Bar an ordinary glass-fronted place with several neon beer signs hanging in the window. It was dark enough or the sun in the street was bright enough that they couldn’t see inside.
“I guess I wouldn’t mind a glass of beer about now,” Marjorie said and tugged Alan toward the door. Two couples exited the place and they went in. Lockem slid his sunglasses to the top of his head and looked around. Rock and Roll music emanated from a jukebox or sound system somewhere toward the back of the building, but it wasn’t loud enough to be intrusive. There was a bar with stools along it to their left and tables and booths filled the rest of the long wide space. The establishment was larger on the inside than it had appeared from the street. There was no one at the bar except the bartender. All the comfortable-appearing stools were empty. Said bartender was a large man with a graying ponytail in a neat knot and big hands. He moved in a way that indicated he could handle himself.
“Howdy, folks,” he called.
Alan Lockem raised a hand in greeting and continued to scan the room. Toward the back of the dimly lit place was a hallway that led, presumably, to rest rooms and a back door. He couldn’t see the door but knew commercial establishments in Idaho were required to have at least two exits. Marjorie walked confidently toward the bar. She knew Lockem would follow her. In their time together he’d followed her into some pretty gamey places. She’d done likewise with Alan. They grabbed stools and looked at the array of bottles on the back bar. It appeared to Lockem like every other back bar he’d ever gazed at.
“I’d like a Stoli and tonic,” Marjorie said in answer to the unasked question from the bartender. “Add a slice of lemon and just two ice cubes, if you please.”
Lockem was sure he’d heard her say, on the street outside, that she wanted a beer, but there you go.