the retard tried to deny that he had messed up the form, Cooper would mess him up in a way he'd never forget.
He smoothed the paper as best he could, looking around to see if the reetard was watching him, possibly anticipating his ploy. He noticed the girl looking at him, her face lowered to suck milk shake from a straw, — her eyes peering out from under her brows. When he returned her look, daring her to keep staring, she smiled and didn't turn away the way everyone else did. What the hell was her problem? If she didn't stop gawking at him, he would be her problem pretty damned fast.
The bitch stood up and crossed towards him, still sucking on the straw.
She looked about eighteen, old enough to be legal, anyway, and not bad looking but if she didn't stop staring at him, he'd gouge her eyes out.
'How ya doing'?' she asked, releasing the straw at last.
A drop of chocolate shake rode her lower lip. She thrust out the tip of her tongue and licked it away.
'What?' Cooper thought she was referring to the application and he smoothed it again.
'Said 'hi,' ' she said. 'Forget your glasses?'
'What?'
'I see you're having a little trouble with the form there, I figured you forgot your glasses. Want me to read it to You?'
Before Cooper could figure out what the trick was, she had slipped into the booth opposite him and swiveled the paper to face her.
'It's wrinkled..
'I don't imagine that matters,' the girl said. ' 'They just want the facts, ma'am.'
' She grinned as if she had made a joke and Cooper squinted at her, trying to figure out what she was up to.
'Well, now,' she continued, 'let's see what they want from you. Name; well, you got that one right. Hello, Darnell Cooper. Are you really thirty-three? You don't look it, you look much younger.'
'What are you studying me for?' Cooper asked.
'You're what they call well-preserved, I guess,' she said. There was a smile in her voice even when she wasn't smiling. 'Now here where it says previous employment… have you ever worked before?'
'Sure.'
'… Want to tell me where?'
'The kitchen.'
'Well, now, Coop, I think they want more information than that.'
Cooper was confused by the use-of his nickname. 'You don't know me,' he said, almost certain it was true.
'Have you forgotten so soon?' she asked, then laughed. 'No, I don't know you, and I'd remember somebody like you, believe me. God, you look strong.'
'I'm stronger than just about anybody,' Cooper said.
'I believe it. Where'd you get that tattoo?'
'Somewhere.'
'I like tattoos.'
'Uh-huh.'
'I have one, you know.'
Cooper was silent. How was he supposed to know that?
'But it's in a place I can't show you until I know you better.' She laughed at herself again. 'They tell me I'm shameless. Do you think I'm shameless?'
'I don't think about you at all,' Cooper said.
'We'll have to get you over that… you're not one of them, are you?'
She flopped her wrist at him.
Cooper stared at her. He could see part of her cleavage.
She had it showing like that so he could reach his hand in there, he knew that. That's why women dressed the way they did, to make it easier for you.
'You're not an old fag, are you? There's an awful lot of that going around these days, and it's always the best-looking ones. Why is that? … They say a lot of body builders are like that… Just my luck…
It's not that I have anything against it, it just seems like such a waste, that's all… Are you?'
'What?'
'They say Stallone is, but I don't believe it. Are you?'
'What?'
'A fag.'
Was she asking if he was a faggot? Cooper could not believe it.
'I killed one once,' he said, immediately regretting it.
But she didn't seem to mind.
'Well, you look like you could, easy enough.'
'I could. I did.',
'I'll bet you did… Are you as strong everywhere as you are with them arms?' She looked like she was blushing all of a sudden, but Cooper couldn't imagine she had suddenly turned shy.
'Yeah,' said Cooper.
'Tell you what, why don't I fill this thing out for you… you know, since you lost your glasses. And then you could take me out for a milk shake.'
'You just had a milk shake.'
She grinned. 'You don't miss a trick, do you? Maybe we could find me another one. I'm insatiable.'
She put her hand atop his for a moment, still grinning like they were sharing a joke. Cooper grinned back at her and looked at her cleavage.
She took the pen from his fingers.
When she bent over the tabletop to do the form, she showed even more of her breasts.
I could kill you so fast you wouldn't believe it, he thought. I could kill you just like that. Then he remembered the girls in the coal mine.
Or I could kill you real slow. I could take forever.
She seemed to know he was thinking about her because she looked up at him and smiled again.
'I'm fudging things just a little bit,' she said. 'When I'm finished they'll put you in charge of the place…
'Cause we want to keep a great big hunk like you around town, don't we?'
'Have you ever been in a coal mine?' Cooper asked.
'Darling,' she said, 'I'll try anything once.'
The third letter was different. It didn't exist.
The envelope was the same, addressed to Becker in care of the FBI, and the postmark was still Decatur, Alabama, but Becker opened it to find nothing inside. No letter, no message written in the envelope itself, nothing, not so much as lint.
Had his correspondent simply forgotten to put the clipping from The Times into the envelope? Or was he under sudden pressure and unable to do so for reasons of his own safety? Or had someone taken it out? If the correspondent was dependent on someone else posting his mail, as Becker suspected, then it was possible the man had been caught. And if he had been caught, what had become of him?
Becker held the envelope to the light to see if it was the medium for the message itself. There was no imprint of something having been written without ink. There were no holes in the envelope.
Feeling foolish, Becker lit a match and held the envelope over it to bring out any invisible ink. There was none.
Searching through Jack's room, he came up with a magnifying glass and perused the envelope inside and out.
Again, nothing that he could find. There were vastly more sophisticated ways to hide a message, and to discover it, but Becker was certain his correspondent did not expect him to take the stationery to the FBI lab.
Both messages had been sent to him, not the Bureau. Whatever message there was-, the correspondent
