IT WAS COLD TUESDAY MORNING. The remnants of an Arctic air mass had pushed through overnight. The thermometer outside my kitchen window showed thirty-four degrees at seven A.M. Not frigid, but not what you’d expect in the second week of June.
I zipped through an early weight workout in my basement, then sliced an orange for breakfast and contemplated my next move. The weather being what it was, it seemed like a good day to work the phone. I called Susan Thompson, the reporter in Lincoln, and asked her to send as much background material on Hawkins as she could get. I called the International Society for General Semantics and confirmed that Carolyn Chang had been a member. Then I called Scott.
“That’s the way things work these days,” he said. “You kiss on the first date; you’re tying each other up on the second date.” After updating him on the case, I had recounted my Sunday with Jayne Smyers.
“Not like the good old days,” I joked.
“It’s like we’re living in the Victorian era,” he said. I smiled to myself, then suggested we resume our discussion of the case. “What about Fontaine and Underwood,” he said, “did they use this E-Prime?”
“No, I reread their articles last night.” There was no conversation for several seconds, but that’s not unusual when we brainstorm.
“If Carolyn helped write the article,” he said, “why didn’t she insist on being listed as a coauthor?”
“I’ve thought about that,” I said, “and the only answer I can come up with is that she didn’t want her name on it.”
“Is it that bad?”
“No,” I said, “but the thesis isn’t particularly original. It doesn’t break any new ground. When you sift through it, there’s not much scholarship.”
“That’s your opinion as an economist?”
“That’s my opinion as someone who has read far too many journal articles during the past month.”
We talked about various aspects of the case for another fifteen minutes. “Anything you want me to do?” he asked.
“Can’t think of anything,” I said. “The reporter in Lincoln is going to send me some background material on Hawkins.”
“Keep me posted,” he said. I promised I would.
It was too early to check my mail, so I drove to Wanda’s for some coffee and a chance to read the paper. Someone had already snagged the News, so I began with the Boulder Daily Camera. I was surprised when I turned to the sports section and saw Finn’s smiling mug staring at me. The young professor had finished third in a local triathlon, and the paper had devoted a quarter page to a feature story on him. I read it, then refilled my coffee. That’s when I saw Missy.
“Hi, Pepper,” she said. She was standing near the register in faded jeans and a white peasant blouse with colorful embroidery around the neckline and sleeves.
“Hi, Missy, how are you?”
“I’m great,” she said. One of Wanda’s female helpers handed her a cup of Red Zinger tea.
“Where’s Luther?”
“He’s in Aspen,” she said. “The band’s there all week.”
“Why didn’t you go?” I asked.
“Didn’t want to miss my group,” she said. “We’re exploring our past lives.” I nodded to show I understood. No tables were available, so I invited her to share mine. “Hey,” she said as she noticed the newspaper, “that’s the guy.” She pointed to the photo of Finn.
“What guy?”
“The guy at your house,” she said. “That’s him.”
“That’s the man you saw walking around my house?”
“Yeah, I’m positive.” She had described the stranger as being “real big” and having blond hair. Missy was about five-two. Finn stood six-three. Though I would have described him as lanky, I realized someone like Finn might seem “real big” to Missy. I questioned her again about what she had seen, but learned nothing new. One of her female friends—another aging earth mama—joined us and they started talking about a candlelight vigil they were planning to protest something or other. I said good-bye, stopped at the post office to collect my mail, then drove home and noticed the flashing message light. I let Buck and Wheat out, listened to the message, then phoned Gilbert.
“Congratulate me,” he said, “I’ve got another grandchild.”
“That’s great, Dick. Is it a boy or a girl?”
“Little boy,” he said. “Eight pounds, seven ounces.”
“A linebacker,” I said. He laughed, then said he had to put me on hold. The phone system was set up so I could listen to Paul Harvey while waiting, but Gilbert came back on the line within thirty seconds, so I never learned the “rest of the story.”
“Sorry about that,” he said.
“No problem.”
“Anyhow,” he said, “I did some checking on Bailey Green, but something’s not right.”
“I’m listening,” I said.
“Green’s a federal prisoner. He was arrested in Denver last August for bank robbery. Walked into a bank in broad daylight and stuck a gun in a teller’s face. Feds found him in his apartment two hours later with red dye all over him.”
“What about the gun?”
“The reports indicate he used a five-shot Taurus, and the last four digits of the serial number on the weapon they confiscated match the one we have.”
“How many were manufactured with those as the last four digits?”
“Just one,” he said. “I checked with the manufacturer.”
“Which raises the question of how a handgun seized in Denver last August was used to kill a math professor in Walla Walla in September.”
“I thought that was a pretty good question myself. So I called the bureau in Denver and spoke with one of the agents. Laid it all out for him. He called back ten minutes later and told me they had Green’s gun in their evidence room. Said our forensic people had made a mistake.”
“Who’d you speak with?” I asked.
“Some guy named Polk. You know him?”
“Yeah, I’ve known him since law school. He’s one of the ones who worked on the fractal case.”
“He never mentioned that, but I suppose they’ve moved on to bigger and better things.” I said nothing because my mind was racing. “I don’t know,” he muttered, “maybe our people are wrong about the serial number.”
“Think so?”
“I’ll have them take another look at it.”
“Can’t hurt,” I said. But I knew there had been no mistake.
I called Gombold that afternoon to confirm what I already knew. My stated purpose was to pick his brain concerning the use of E-Prime in Hawkins’s most recent article. He agreed it was suspicious.
“So, what’s new in your neck of the woods?” I asked when we had finished kicking it around.
“Same old shit,” he said, “but more of it.” He sounded fatigued. “Dittmer has us working extra hours to take up the slack caused by the increase in counterterrorism ops, and some congressman wants us to investigate a waste-removal firm that put Smokey the Bear on its trucks without the secretary of agriculture’s permission.” I laughed.
“Don’t laugh,” he said. “That’s a federal offense. You can get six months in prison for that.”
“Glad you warned me,” I said. “Hey, before I hang up, whatever happened with that case where you couldn’t find the gun? What was that guy’s name, Green?”
“Yeah, Bailey Green. He pled guilty last week. We never did find the weapon, so the U.S. Attorneys agreed not to file a habitual offender rap on him. The powers that be figured that was a small price to pay to keep the missing gun out of the papers.”
“Probably just as well,” I said. “You don’t want to do anything that might alert potential jurors to the fact that the bureau sometimes makes mistakes.”
“God help us if that ever gets out.”
“Get some sleep, Tim. You sound tired.” I hung up and began writing a list of things to do.
There was no shortage of work. In addition to gathering as much information as possible on Hawkins, I wanted to learn more about Polk. For reasons unknown, he had lied to Gilbert about the missing revolver. And he had tried his best to discredit me with Dittmer when he’d learned Jayne had hired me. So I wanted to dig into his background. On top of all that, the image of Finn sneaking around my house kept making its way into my mind. I tried to let it go, but I wanted an explanation.
Hawkins. Polk. Finn. I’d have to learn more about each of them.