I took the charred scrap from my wallet and looked for the letters
I made photocopies of the three pages and headed back to the Ramada.
In my room I did my hair, watching with some amazement as the black became white and then gray and by degrees I took on the appearance of my father. I quit when it seemed right. When it dried, I hit it with the grease pencil, giving myself a slightly speckled look.
I redid my face and made a better job of it.
There was a kind of fatalistic rhythm to my movements. I was doing what I had to do and time no longer mattered. Eleanor was either dead or alive: if she still lived, I rather liked her chances for the immediate future. He wasn’t about to kill her, not after all this grief, till he had what he wanted. Never mind the ashes: appearances could be deceiving, and the feeling persisted that what I wanted was still out there somewhere, alive and well. If I could find it first, I’d have a strong bargaining chip, and there was a fair chance we’d even converge in the hunt. I didn’t know Seattle, I had no idea where Pruitt or the fat man’s kid might do their drinking, but I did know books. I’d let the cops do the legwork—the job I’d set them on at no small personal risk to myself, the work they had the manpower and the skill to pull off—and I’d go after the book.
It was now after ten-thirty. Supercop would be finished with Trish, at least for the moment, and he’d be on the phone to Denver, going after my mug shot and stats. I pictured the looks on Hennessey and Steed and almost laughed at the thought. It would go against Steed’s grain, but he’d have to honor supercop’s request and wonder to himself if I had finally popped my buttons and started cutting out paper dolls. As for Hennessey, I’d have some serious fences to mend there, but what else was new?
I knew I was tired—the last real sleep I could remember was the Rigby loft, more than forty-eight hours ago—but I didn’t want to stop. I sat on the bed and began working the phone. I opened Eleanor’s little address book to the Grayson page and decided to start with Allan Huggins, the man who knew more about the Graysons than they had known about each other. I punched in the number, but there was no answer.
I kept going. I called Jonelle Jeffords in Taos. A machine answered. “Hi, this’s where Charlie and Jo live. If you’ve got something to say that I might want to hear, leave a number, maybe I’ll call you back.”
No bullshit there: old Charlie cut right to the short strokes. I hung up on the beep.
I sat for a while looking at the name Rodney Scofield. It seemed vaguely familiar, like something I’d heard once and should’ve remembered. Finally I called his number cold, a Los Angeles exchange.
A recording came on. I wondered if it’s possible in this day and age to punch out a phone number and actually speak to a living human being.
I hung on through the entire recording, hoping for some hint of what Scofield was about. A female voice began by telling me I had reached the business offices of Scofield Plastics on Melrose Avenue. Their hours were nine a.m. to five p.m. , Monday through Friday. At the end was a menu of punch codes: if I wanted to reach the voice mail of various department heads, I should punch one, two, three, and so on. Finally, there was this:
“If you have business pertaining to the Grayson Press, please press number eight, now.”
I punched it.
The phone rang.
A recording began on the other end.
“This is Leith Kenney. I’m not here but I do want to talk to you. If you have Grayson books for sale, or information about single books or collections, please call me back or leave a number where you may be reached. You may also reach me at home, at any hour of the day or night. We are interested in any primary Grayson material, including letters, photographs, business records, broadsides, and even incomplete projects and partial layouts. We pay top cash money, well above auction rates. We will match any offer for important material, and we pay equally well for information that results in major acquisitions.”
He gave a home number and I called it. Again came that scratchy, unmistakable sound of a recording machine. There again was Kenney’s voice, apologizing. He had stepped out but would return soon. Would I please leave a number?
No, I would not.
