ABOUT THE OTHER SUSPECTS: Stryker, now, or some other cop-the Curlys, or the Merrill guy, or even Jensen or Carr-or one of the Laymons, or Williamson. Did he, Virgil, have a perceptual problem? Did he come to town and view certain people as suspects because those were the only people he saw, or spoke to, or heard about? He'd gotten all over Williamson. Had he been conditioned to do that, because Joan had mentioned Williamson's name the first time he met her? He thought about it and decided: No. That might have been the case, except for the Revelation…
The book of Revelation at the Gleasons', the cigarette butt at the Schmidts', the anonymous note, and the corporate evidence on Judd's secretary's computer, all had pointed him at Feur, or Judd and Feur together. He was being pushed by somebody.
A PASSING THOUGHT: Bill Judd's secretary. Who was she? The evidence for the Judd-Feur connection came right out of her computer. He'd heard her name, but didn't remember it…
MORE IDEAS: Could he clear anyone? If he could clear Stryker or Williamson, or the Curlys, the Laymons, or the Judds, then he'd know something. Other suspects would come into sharper focus. Was Joan a suspect? She'd gotten close to him by noon on his first day in town. How about Jesse Laymon, or her mother, Margaret? How long had they really been waiting for Judd to die?
ALSO: In one way or another, the killer of the Gleasons and the Schmidts, and probably the Judds, had been in Jesse Laymon's closet. Stryker had been there, he thought. Who else? Technically, her mother, but her mother wouldn't be framing Jesse…at least, not for any reason that Virgil knew of. There was the additional problem that the Laymons' house could be entered by any teenager with a stick…
HUH.
VIRGIL GOT his gun, clipped it under his jacket, put on his straw hat, and called Stryker.
'When we were in Judd's office, looking at the secretary's computer…What was her name again?'
'Amy Sweet. You think we ought to talk to her?'
'No need to bother you. I might stop by and have a chat,' Virgil said. 'Sort of at loose ends, is what I am. Can't get over Junior getting hit like that.'
'Yeah. Still think it was Feur…You still think it wasn't?'
'I've moved a few inches in your direction,' Virgil said. 'But keep your ass down anyway.'
A MY SWEET WAS another middle-aged woman, who might have been a rocker at one time, too heavy now, round-shouldered, wrapped in a housecoat with pink curlers in her hair. 'I'd be happy to talk to you,' she said at the door of her small home, 'but I've got to be in Sioux Falls for a job interview at one o'clock.'
'Take a couple of minutes,' Virgil said.
'What was all the excitement a while ago?' She pushed her face toward him, squinting, nearsighted.
'Uh, there's been another murder.'
'Oh, noooo…' She stepped across the room, fumbled around on a TV tray, found steel-rimmed glasses, and put them on. 'Who?'
'Bill Judd Jr.'
'Oh, noooo.' Round, Swedish oooo's.
'Miz Sweet, when we were going through Judd Sr.'s office, we found some invoices on your computer, for chemicals that were apparently used in an ethanol plant out in South Dakota…'
'I heard about it on TV. That was the same one? The one where they were making drugs?'
'Yes, it was,' Virgil said.
'Oh, nooo.'
The sound was driving him crazy; she sounded like a bad comedian. 'Who in town knew about the ethanol plant?'
She turned her face to one side and put a hand to her lips. 'Well, the Judds, of course.'
'Both of them?' Virgil asked.
'Well…Junior set it up, but Senior knew about it.'
He pressed. 'Are you sure about that?'
'Well, yes. He signed the checks.'
'Did you see him signing the checks?' Virgil asked.
'No, but I saw the checks. It was his signature…'
'Do you remember the bank?'
She shook her head. 'No, no, I don't.' She frowned. 'I'm not even sure that the bank name was on the checks.'
'Did you ever talk to Junior about that?'
'No. It wasn't my business,' she said. 'They wanted to keep it quiet, because, you know, when ethanol started, it sounded a little like the Jerusalem artichoke thing. The Judds were involved in that, of course.'
'So how quiet did they keep it?' Virgil asked. 'Who else knew? Did you tell anybody?'
He saw it coming, the noooo. 'Oh, noooo…Junior told me, don't talk about this, because of my father. So, I didn't.'
'Not to anybody?'
Her eyes drifted. She was thinking, which meant that she had. 'It's possible…my sister, I might have told. I think there might have been some word around town.'
'It's really important that you remember…'
She put her hand to her temple, as though she were going to move a paper clip with telekinesis, and said, 'I might have mentioned it at bridge. At our bridge club. That a plant was being built, and some local people were involved.'
'All right,' Virgil said. 'So who was at the bridge club?'
'Well, let me see, there would have been nine or ten of us…'
She listed them; he only recognized one of the names.
WHEN HE WAS DONE with Sweet, he strolled up the hill to the newspaper office. He pushed in, and found Williamson behind the business counter, talking to a woman customer. Williamson looked past the woman and snapped, 'What do you want?'
'I have a question, when you're free.'
'Wait.' Williamson was wearing a T-shirt and had sweat stains under his arms, as though he'd been lifting rocks. 'Take just a minute.'
The customer was trying to dump her Beanie Baby collection locally-ten years too late, in Virgil's opinion-and wanted the cheapest possible advertisement. She got twenty words for six dollars, looking back and forth between Virgil and Williamson, and after writing a check for the amount, said to Virgil, 'I'd love to hear your question.'
Virgil looked at her over his sunglasses and grinned: 'I'd love to have you, but I'm afraid it's gotta be private, for the moment.'
'Shoot.' She looked at Williamson, who shrugged, and she said, 'Oh, well.'
WHEN SHE'D GONE out the door, Williamson said, 'I'm working. You can ask me out back.'
'You still pissed about the search?'
'Goddamn right. Wouldn't you be?'
Virgil followed him through the shop. Williamson's van was parked in the dirt space behind it, the side doors open. Williamson had been piling bundles of unsold newspapers in the van, and there were still twenty or thirty wrapped bundles inside the shop. Williamson propped the door open, picked up two bundles by the plastic straps, carried them to the van, and asked over his shoulder, 'What?'
Virgil grabbed a couple of bundles, carried them out and threw them in the van. 'When did you last see Junior?'
'About an hour and a half ago.'
'Alive.' They were shuttling back and forth with the bundles.
Williamson stopped and cocked his head. 'Day before yesterday…let's see. Down at Johnnie's, at lunch.'
'Did you hear him next door? Yesterday?' Virgil asked, heaving two more bundles into the van.
