“What’s the second thing?”
“In November I have a one-woman show,” she said. “The opening is a big, pretentious party, and they’re awful. They’re boring, frightening, and embarrassing all at the same time. You will be my escort. The women will be nice to look at, but you won’t be able to, or I’ll be angry. The men are not all bad, either, but there will be a few . . . you’ll want to pinch their heads off. You won’t do that, either.”
“Why would you want me as an escort?”
She walked toward the steel door, and opened it for him. “I don’t have to tell you that, so I won’t. It’s my price. I’ll be waiting to hear from you.”
12
Prescott took the film to the photography lab and went to his hotel to sleep. When he awoke in the evening, he picked up the two hundred color prints. The diminished size of the photographs made the painting even sharper and the impression of perfection more striking. He was tempted to call Cara Lee Satterfield and tell her, but she had known long before he did. Instead, he packed his bags, took a cab to the bus station, and bought a ticket to Philadelphia. When he got there, he rented a car and drove west, deeper into Pennsylvania. What he wanted now was easier to obtain in some places than in others. After he had reached the hills, where there were farms and small towns, he made his first stop. He picked up the local newspaper, checked the bulletin boards in the first laundromat he saw, and then looked for flyers left at convenience stores. He was looking for announcements of private sales.
Prescott liked estate sales best, but not if they were big enough to be held as auctions. What he needed was a person he could talk to, and he preferred the closest female survivor. He would look over the dead man’s belongings, maybe buy something that was expensive and portable, like a rare book, a watch, or a set of cuff links. That would get him talking to the woman. He would talk about her wisdom in passing on possessions that someone else could use, listening for her lament that there were things she didn’t know what to do with. He would let slip that he was sure his wife—or daughter—would have the same problem: he was a gun collector, and guns were hard to resell. In some places, this was likely to give the woman the creeps, and the conversation would be over. But in these rural areas, more often than not, he would be led into the house to look over a gun cabinet.
Sometimes the cabinet was a metal locker in a den, but sometimes it was a big, polished piece of furniture like a glass-fronted armoire. Behind the glass would be a row of long guns: usually at least a pump shotgun for fowl, a .22 rifle for vermin, and a bolt-action .308 or .30-06 deer rifle. But plenty of these cabinets had much more exotic and expensive rifles, custom guns with carved stocks, antiques, military assault weapons. He would look them over, appraise and appreciate them, sometimes buy one or two. But he would make it clear that what interested him most was handguns. In a few minutes he might be on his way out with a pistol or two that, if they had ever been registered at all, were still the official property of a dead man.
In the first town, the estate sale included no guns. After he left the turnpike near Hoyerstown, he passed a large building on the road into town. It was surrounded by fields, and backed by a long, low barrow that looked like the back of a sleeping animal. The big sign above the door said THE GUN CLUB, and the small one said OPEN.
He pulled his car into the lot and got out. Before he had taken two steps he heard the familiar thud of a gun being discharged behind a soundproofed wall, then several more shots. He opened the front door and the noise was louder. Three men wearing yellow earphones stood beyond a Plexiglas window, firing down adjoining cinder-block tunnels at small paper targets on wires that ran overhead. A wooden counter enclosed with the same thick Plexiglas dominated the entrance.
The slight man inside was only about thirty, but he had a shiny bald head. Prescott smiled at him and rested his elbows on the counter, so the man came to the window and opened it. “What can I do for you?”
“I’m from out of town,” said Prescott. “Is it possible to rent a weapon and get a little practice while I’m here?”
The man said, “Sure. For twenty bucks an hour, I can give you a .38 Smith & Wesson revolver. Ammo and targets are extra, and the range fee is fifteen bucks a half hour.”
Prescott said, “How about ear protectors?”
“Those are five.”
Prescott gave him sixty dollars, accepted a weapon with a big red number 12 painted on the grip. He bought a box of twenty-five rounds and went to the range. He could tell from the expression of habitual worry on the man’s face that this was a business that had not lived up to his hopes. Probably he had told himself that indoor shooting would catch on as a family sport, and then the world would flock here to hand him money. The world seemed to be otherwise engaged.
Prescott clipped his target to the wire, pressed the button on the pulley, and watched the target skitter down to the end of the range. He loaded the pistol and snapped the cylinder into place. The .38 was lighter than the weapons he was accustomed to, and he expected it would have little muzzle rise with target ammunition, so he took a comfortable one-handed stance, extended his arm, and squeezed off six shots in rapid succession. Then he pressed the button again to bring the target back on the wire. He unclipped it, held it up to look at it, then turned to set it on the shelf beside the ammunition. He found that the owner was out of his booth, standing behind Prescott’s tunnel to watch.
The man’s eyes were on the target, looking at the six holes all within the inch-wide black circle. Prescott knew he had him. The man was one of those guys who were so hooked on a hobby that they could think of little else.
Prescott knew that he needed to appear careful and methodical. The man owned a business, after all, and since the business involved handing a firearm and ammunition to a total stranger and telling him to fire at will, he was understandably anxious. Prescott sent a new target down the wire, emptied the pistol of its spent casings, set them on the shelf neatly, held the weapon so the muzzle was low and downrange, then reloaded and fired his second six into the bull’s-eye. He cleared the pistol again, brought the target back, and took his time getting around to unclipping it, so the owner could satisfy his curiosity. Prescott was getting used to the feel of the gun, so this time the pattern was even tighter. He kept at it, showing the man that he was a consistent, practiced, competent marksman, and that he was never careless. That part was important.
When he had finished, he brought the gun up with the cylinder open, and set it on the counter. The man had warmed up considerably. “You’re a hell of a shot.”
Prescott said, “Shooting relaxes me. I spend a lot of time on the road, though, so it’s hard to keep my hand in. When I’m away from home I try to keep a list of places where I can fire a few rounds.”
“You come through here often?”
“Never have before, but I expect to be in the neighborhood for a month or two. I’m a civil engineer, and there’s a project going up near Philadelphia that I have to keep an eye on.” He paused. “Maybe you can help me. I live in California and I don’t travel with my own firearms. You know where I can pick up a gun around here?”
“What are you looking for?”
“What I’d like would be a good used nine-millimeter. I’ve been looking for a couple of days, but haven’t seen anything I liked. Something like a Beretta Model 92. Maybe a Glock or a SIG if one turned up.”
The man looked disappointed. “You know, I sold a Model 92 about two months ago.” He seemed to feel uncomfortable, and said, “I wasn’t the one that sold it, really. It’s just that when somebody has something to sell, they usually tell me, and I mention it to the people who come in and ask.”
“I hope you get a commission,” said Prescott. “It’s only fair.”
The man looked down slyly. “Well, yeah. Usually I get ten percent.”
“I’d like something right away, so if you hear of anything, keep me in mind.” He started to go, then said, “In fact, I’ll tell you what. I’ll be in the neighborhood for a while. If you find something for me today, I’ll pay you twenty percent above the sale price, and what you get from the seller is between you and him.”
The man looked pleased. He held out his hand. “I’m Dave Durbin. What’s your name?”
Prescott said, “I’m Mike. Michael Kennison.”
“I’m going to put in a call to the gunsmith who maintains our weapons for us. He refurbishes used guns and resells them. If you’ll hang around for a few minutes, I’ll find out what he’s got right now.” He retreated behind the counter with the Plexiglas window and went to his desk.
