Lucas thought; The join was imperfect, a ridge running around the ceiling and walls. 'Dope money,' Del said. 'A goddamn dealer's wet dream.'
The Woodbury plainclothesman wandered toward them, and Lucas asked, 'Find anything like a wall safe?'
'No, no, nothing like that.'
'You might want to tear the place up a little,' Lucas said. 'It's about five-to-one that he has a little hideout someplace in here.'
'Check the power outlets, see if any of them don't work,' Del said. 'That's a longtime crowd favorite.'
Lucas had stopped in the kitchen. A book of matches lay open on the counter next to the sink.
'You think he smoked?' Lucas asked Del.
Del looked at the ceiling, then at the curtains, sniffed, and said, 'I don't think so. Why?'
'Had these matches sitting here' Lucas picked them up, then looked at the sink. Grains of black stuff in the strainer. He put his finger in it, rubbed lightly, and took it out.
'What?' Del asked. The Woodbury cop strained to see.
'Looks like ash,' Lucas said.
'He burnt something?'
'Maybe,' Lucas said.
And that was it: a group of cops standing around on a carpet with too-deep burgundy pile, looking at the Leroy Neiman print.
'What're we gonna do now?' Del asked.
'You think it's a suicide?'
'Yeah, I could buy ititwould solve a lot of problems. I'd like to know a little bit about his medical history, though,' Del said.
'Doctors?'
'Yeah. See if he was depressed, if he'd ever been treated. But maybe he just saw the walls coming down, walked up to that atrium and just an impulse.'
'From the second floor? Christ' Lucas shook his head.
'That's a high second floor. You look down from there, you know you ain't gonna bounce. I'm seeing a guy who's freaked out, he's got TV all over his ass, he knows he's in trouble on the dope, he's built up this fortune and he sees it drifting away maybe he's even guilty about Alie'e. Who knows? Anyway, he puts down his bag and dives over the rail.'
Sounded good. 'Maybe.'
'I'd give it a strong maybe,' Del said. 'Reserving the right to change my mind.'
'So let's see what the ME says.'
Lucas dropped Del back downtown, thought about going over to see Jael, decided against. Thought about calling Weatherbut she wasn't the one to talk to about death and destruction, not when they might be limping back to some kind of reconciliation.
And was that what they were talking about? Is that what she meant when she said he could call her? What the fuck did she mean? And why was he screwing around with Jael? And Jesus, he didn't even want tothink about Catrin.
So he went home, thought about the game for a few minutes, then took a shower and crawled onto his bed. Ran it all around his head, and drifted off to sleep.
He woke twice during the night, lay awake for an hour each time, running it through. In the morning, he shaved, showered, and, still tired, headed into downtown St. Paul. On the way, he took out his cell phone and called the department photo guy.
'I got a picture I want you to take,' he said.
Chapter 25
Friday. The seventh day of Alie'e.
Rodriguez's building had been cleaned up and was open for business; except for the cops working on his computer, nobody would have known. Lucas stopped at Rodriguez's office and was introduced to Rodriguez's secretary, a young woman who was dealing with her loss with equanimity. 'I'll be working tomorrow night,' she told Lucas. 'In this economy, a dead guy could get a job. Whoopsmaybe I oughta rephrase that.'
'Do you think that Richard would have committed suicide?' Lucas asked.
'He wasn't the moody type,' she said. But she pressed a finger to her lips, thinking. 'On the other hand, when he decided to do something, he'd do it, impulsive-like. Real quick. So, I mean, with all this publicity But I don't know. Maybe you really don't know a person until he does something like this. And then, of course, you don't know him at all, because he's dead. So, like you never really get a chance to know anybody, you know? When you think about it.'
In the hall, Lucas told the St. Paul cop, 'She seems to be dealing with it.'
'Yeah. A little too well, if you ask me. I wouldn't be surprised if she was holding a little cash for the boss, or a little product.'
'Cash, maybe. Not dope. She's too ditzy to be trusted with dope,' Lucas said.
'We'll probably find out that she's the brains behind the operation.' They both looked at her through the window slit beside the office door. She was talking to another cop, unconsciously twirling a ringlet of hair with an index finger. Lucas and the St. Paul cop looked back at each other and simultaneously said, 'Maybe not.'
'You know what I really need,' Lucas said. 'I need to find the maintenance guy.'
The maintenance man looked worried. 'I'll do anything I can to help.'
'What I need to know is, how would you get out of this building if you couldn't go out the ramp and you couldn't go out the front door and you couldn't go out the Skyway?'
'You mean, like, if there was a mystery man here last night?'
'Exactly.'
The maintenance man thought about it. 'Couldn't do it,' he said finally. 'He'd need a key. But all the keys are on two rings, and you have to know what you're looking for before you can use one. Otherwise, it's just a bunch of numbers on the keys. So if you wanted to get just one, you'd have to steal the whole ringwhich nobody did. Even then, you still wouldn't know which key opened what until you tried them all. That'd take a couple of days if that's all you did.'
'So let's say the guy didn't have a key.'
'Well, there are some windows on the second floor that open, so he could lower himself downbut that'd be pretty obvious. I mean, thereare cars on the street at that time of night.'
'And it's a long way down,' Lucas said. 'He'd need a big rope.'
'Yeah.' The maintenance man thought for another minute, puzzled. 'You say he can't go out through the garage.'
'Nope.'
'Well, if it were me, I'd hide in the building until the cops were gone, and then I'd just jump out and walk away with the crowd. Lots of places to hide.'
'St. Paul went through here pretty thoroughly, last night and this morning.'
'No kiddinghad me running around like a madman.'
'How about access to the alley?'
'Nope. Them overhead doors lock with padlocks and Ohh. Wait a minute.'
'What?'
'The regular door there. There's a great big dead bolt on it, but'
'It opens from the inside,' Lucas said.
'Yeah. I never use it. If we got a big delivery, they ring and we open the overheads'
