Cretin-Vandalia, and turned left toward home. The guy had no chance.
At ten o'clock the next morning, a cop called to say that Olson was moving. 'We don't know what he's doing. He got out on the interstate and he's done a couple of laps around the St. Paul side. He stopped once at White Bear Avenue to get gas.'
'How close has he gotten to Highland Park?'
'He took 35E from 94 to 494, so he went right past Spooner's exit at Randolph or at Seventh. If he'd gotten off at either one, we would have been screaming our heads offbut he's just driving.'
'Keep calling me,' Lucas said.
Weather called while he was in the shower. 'I've got a problem,' she said.
'No lunch?' he asked, dripping water on the hallway floor.
She could hear the disappointment. 'I'm sorry, but this thing just came up and I've got to deal with it.'
'Doesn't sound medical,' Lucas said.
'Its not. Lucas, I'm being damnit, we need to sit down and talk this out. I have not had a sexual relationship since we split up.'
'Why face a disappointment any sooner'
'Will you shut up? Will you just shut the fuck up for a minute?' she said.
'All right,' he said.
'I have not had a sexual relationship, but there was this doctor'
'The Frenchman?'
'You know about this?' she asked.
'I know you were going out with some Frenchman.'
'Not going out with. I went out with him three times. Or four times. Or maybe, I don't know, five or six times. We never really stopped or anything. I was busy or he was busy and it sort of drifted, and then he had to go back to Paris for a while.'
'He came back.'
'Yeah. He called last night and he wanted to have lunch today,' she said. 'He was pretty insistent, even when I said I was pretty busy I think I've got to go talk to him.'
'And?'
'I'm ultimately not interested in Frenchmen,' she said.
'Well, Jesus, Weather, why don't you just tell him to blow it out his froggy ass?'
'I don't think that would exactly be a diplomatic way to handle it'
'You aren't the fuckin' State Department.' He let himself get a little angry about it.
' and I've got to work with him. He's an important guy around here.'
They talked for another minute or two, and he let himself get a little angrierand at the bottom of it, was satisfied that she was impressed by the anger. Then he went back to the shower, finished cleaning up, and got dressed. All right. He picked up the phone and dialed Jael.
She answered on the third ring, and he said, 'Your problem is, you're too Victorian.'
'That's my problem, all right,' she said lazily. 'Hang on' He could hear her yell, 'It's okay, it's for me,' and then she was back.
'Have you had breakfast?'
'I'm barely awake. It's not even ten-thirty,' she said.
'I'll come get you if you want.'
'Can't. I've got a half-dozen people coming at noon. We're working out a joint show, and we've got way too many people. We're trying to figure out how to screw some of them. You're welcome to come over, but you wouldn't like the people, and I don't want any of them thrown out any windows.'
'Goddamnit. I can't find anyone to talk to this morning,' he said.
'And tonight, my dad's getting in. We're all going over to the airport to pick him up. So'
'No dinner. No midnight snack.'
'You ever tried phone sex?' she asked.
'Tried once, but it doesn't work. I feel like a silly jerk-off.'
'That's sort of inevitable,' she said.
'On the other hand, I'm good at giving it. I wouldn't want to use the wordbrilliant, but then, I'm a modest kind of guy.'
'Really? That's interesting,' she said. 'I mean, how would you start it?'
'Are you still in bed?'
'Yeah.'
'What are you wearing?' he asked.
'A flannel nightshirt and underpants and socks,' she said.
'Socks? Jesus. That makes it a little harder,' Lucas said.
'Come on, Davenport.'
'All right. You know that fake Indian dreamcatcher you've got hanging over your sink?'
'Yeah?'
'Go get it,' he said.
'Go get it? What for?'
'Listen, are you going to do this, or not?'
'Well I just wanted to know'
'You're gonna need that hawk feather,' he said.
After a moment, she said, 'Hang on.'
'Wait a minute! You still there?'
She came back. 'Yes?'
'Didn't I see one of those Lady Remington leg shavers in the bathroom?'
'Yes?'
'Bring that too,' Lucas said.
'I'll tell you right now, I'm not shaving anything,' she said.
'You don't use those things toshave,' Lucas said. 'You use them toshave? You naive little waif, you.'
'I'll be right back,' she said.
The City Hall was quiet; there were fewer TV trucks at the curb, and the Homicide office was mostly empty. Del called on the cell phone and said, 'Hot damn, you've turned it on.'
'Yeah. What's going on?'
'Nothing. I was just calling to ask.'
'All right. I'm turning this fucking thing off.'
'Nodon't do that. Listen, I'm gonna take off with the old lady this afternoon. Go see an aunt of hers, and then maybe go look at some carpet.'
'You're doing carpet?'
'Yeah, maybe for the family room.'
'All right. Well. See you later.'
He wound up in his office with all the paper on the case; he found nothing new, but strengthened his sense that Spooner was at the bottom of it. Then Lester called, and said that the gay friend of John Dukeljin, who had identified Spooner as being at the party, and carrying a shoulder bag, remembered seeing a man with a bag but couldn't pick Spooner out of a photo spread.
'Par for the course,' Lucas said. 'You find anybody else?'
'Two other people think they saw him. But the guy is sort of a nebbish, and the light was bad, they had those strobe things you dance to So that's what we sot.'
Rose Marie called and said, 'Here's a mystery for you. Why would the head of the state highway patrol call me up at home and say, 'Tell that fuckin' Davenport to knock it the fuck off?'
Lucas thought for a moment. 'Must be political,' he said. 'He's a Republican.'
'I thought it might be something like that,' she said.
'Is Olson coming in this afternoon?' Lucas asked.
'No. I told him we'd call if there were any serious developments.'
