That's fact one.'
John nodded. Quill began to pace around the room. 'Fact two is that the matchbook showed up on the balcony. He must have been there. He must have tried to push her over the edge.'
'Wouldn't Mrs. Hallenbeck have seen him?'
'She said she was in the bathroom. He's been in our back room any number of times, delivering meat; he'd seen the drum of sulfuric acid. If Mavis called him, like she called you, he'd have a lot of time to set it up. The register's out all the time at the desk; he could have found out what room they were staying in, no problem. And he was here in the Inn while Mrs. Hallenbeck and Mavis were at dinner. And he lives right across from the pond. He said himself he was home alone. And of course, he was right there at the play.'
'But what's his motive? And how would he know Mavis before she came to the Falls?'
'Did his brother work for the company?'
'For a while. He was a salesman. Most kids from Hemlock Falls end up either at the paint factory, or working for Doggone Good Dogs.'
'And Mavis knew all the dirty secrets.' Quill stood still, closed her eyes, and concentrated hard. 'Meat...' she said slowly. 'Tainted meat. That D.O.H. memo Marge was waving at me said something about tainted meat. E. coli bacteria. I went to Tom's to check on the shipment of beef that Meg said was spoiled. Tom got very weird about it. Doggone Good Dogs is a large customer for meat shipments. Help me out here, John.'
Quill opened her eyes and discovered that Indians could turn pale.
'Jesus Christ,' said John. 'That's it. The beef is delivered directly to the franchise from the slaughterhouse. The franchise is the point of inspection. We had a real run on rejections from the restaurants just before I...' His lips thinned. 'I was just about to take our inspector out to an Ohio supplier when...'
'Elaina happened.'
'Yes.'
'But what would Tom Peterson want with tainted meat?'
'Resale,' John said. 'Selling meat to third-world countries would give you the biggest money. Reselling to small restaurants and diners wouldn't be worth it. But if you shipped the containers offshore... I don't know, Quill, this is all guesswork.'
'We'd need proof,' said Quill. 'What if we checked out Peterson's warehouse?'
'There'd be no need for him to have the trucks move through here.'
'Somehow we got some of it,' said Quill. 'Isn't there. some indication where the stuff came from? If we could find the truck that had the stuff we got, wouldn't there be some bill of lading, or whatever, that would tell its point of origin?'
'The carcasses are tagged,' John said. 'But there's all kinds of ways to fake the documentation. Except for the tattoos.'
'The tattoos?'
'On the carcasses. They're stamped by the USDA. If they've been rejected, there's a code for that. It's inked onto the carcass. Of course, it can be cut off, but if we could find a whole carcass we'd have proof.'
'I'm going over there,' said Quill. 'Right now. Coming with me?'
John grinned. 'Sure. What the hell?'
'What the hell,' Quill agreed. 'Just give me a few seconds to change into my burglar outfit.'
'We'll need a rope, a camera, and a flashlight.'
Quill pointed to the credenza. 'Camera and flashlight in there. Rope's in the car trunk.'
Quill re-emerged from her bedroom minutes later dressed in a black turtleneck, jeans, and running shoes. 'Do you think I should black my face?'
'No. But it's a good thing you're not blond.'
The July air was soft and still. John and Quill crept to her car. After a fierce whispered discussion about who should drive, Quill started the motor, and kept the lights off until they reached the end of the drive and turned on to Route 96. Quill's heart was beating faster than usual. Her palms were damp. Her sense of time was warped; the ride to the Peterson warehouse seemed endless, but when she pulled into the gravel road to the buildings, it seemed as though no time had passed at all.
'Park behind that shed,' said John in a low voice. 'We'll I walk up on the grass. It'll be quieter.'
In the open air, Quill felt exposed, sure that a floodlight would go on and a siren sound any minute. 'Over the top, Ma,' she hissed at John's back. She bit her lip to keep the nervous giggles down.
'Only you,' John whispered, 'would do Jimmy Cagney imitations at a time like this.'
The chain-link fence loomed up at them. John put both hands in the wire and leaped lightly upward. The wire chinged in the darkness. John clung for a moment, then moved rapidly toward the top, his feet finding purchase where Quill could see none at all. She grabbed the fence, and the wire bit into her palms. John dropped lightly to the other side. Quill pressed her face close to his. 'I don't think I can climb this,' she mouthed. 'There's a dug-out spot a little farther down. I'm going to go under.'
She followed the line of the fence to the hole where the German shepherd had made his escape, and wriggled under. Her long hair caught in the tom wires at the bottom, and she bit her lip to keep from yelling. She rolled free and got to her feet. John was already at the warehouse door.
'Can you pick the lock?' she said into his ear.
He shook his head. 'It's bolted from the inside.' He pointed up, then motioned her to wait. He unwound the rope at his waist and made a quick lasso, spun it rapidly a few times, and tossed it into the air. It caught on the
