could see the sign for the entrance ramp that read “I-270 East, Wheeling.” That was the route back to Boston. I knew I should take it and say to Hell with Ohio, to Lawrence Greene, to Sheriff Dannmeyer, and to those obituaries, but I wasn't ready to do that. Not yet. There was something about this whole business and the arrogant send-off I got from Greene and his buddy Dannmeyer that told me I was right and I needed to know more. So I drove on past the exit ramp. Going to the funeral in Columbus was probably my first mistake and driving past the exit ramp that would have taken me back to Boston was undoubtedly the second, but I was going to make a whole lot more before this day was over.
Farther down the street, I saw a cluster of economy motels. My dwindling funds being what they were, I opted for the Motel 6. I told the young, blond college girl with the bright blue eyes behind the desk that Dave sent me and asked if they really did leave the light on, but she just stared at me. I'd like to think she'd heard that one before, but maybe she just didn't get it.
After dinner, I made another call to Boston, to Doug Chesterton. “Is this him or his machine?” I asked.
“It's his machine.”
“When he comes back, tell him Pete Talbott got delayed a bit longer in Ohio.”
“Twice in one day? It's gotta be something you met in a bar. Heather? Bambi? Or was it George?”
“Yeah, right.”
“Well, just don't catch anything, Peter.”
“I'll be careful, coach.”
“Good. And get your ass back here as soon as you can. Those sub-routines were great and they got us back on track with the contract, but I can't crank on the next phase without you.”
“A couple of things came up that I gotta look into tomorrow morning, then I'll be back on the road. Honest.”
“Fine. But be here by Friday or I'm road kill, okay?”
“Gotcha, boss, Friday it is.”
I knew I should have taken Dave's room keys back to the desk and piled my stuff back in the Bronco right then and there. I could have made it into West Virginia or Pennsylvania that night, slept there, and cruised into Boston the next day, but I was exhausted from being up for two days straight. That was what I told myself, but I just couldn't make myself leave. As I sat there in the motel room and stared at the telephone, I realized this business with the obituaries, the funeral, and with Greene and Dannmeyer had lit some fires deep inside me that hadn't burned for a long, long time. I was no longer a stick-man walking. I felt alive, and I liked it.
The loss of the job and Terri had left me a cold, burned-out shell. For the first time in many months, I was hot about something. Love, hate, or whatever, I felt something and I knew I mattered again. Something terribly wrong was going on here and I had to find out what it was. If I cut and ran, and that would have been so easy for me to do, I'd be safe in my little shell, but they would have gotten away with it.
So I decided to stay in Columbus, for one night anyway.
CHAPTER FOUR
Pete, we hardly knew ya…
I needed sleep, but I was too wound up to try. One good thing about a Motel 6, the top drawer of the nightstand always contains a Gideon Bible and the drawer below it always has a phone book. Old Dave is nothing if not clean and predictable. The phone book was new. I let my fingers do the walking, flipping back through the white pages to the T’s. There were about four inches of Talbotts in Columbus, some with one T, some with two Ts, and a couple of Peters. Sure enough, towards the bottom, I saw: “Talbott, Peter E., 625 Sedgwick Ave, Worthington, 895-2612”.
Well, I'll be damned, I thought. Whoever the guy was, he had been using my name long enough to be listed in the phone book. That meant this wasn't some spur-of-the-moment thing. They had stashed their Peter Talbott here, him and his wife, and bought him a house and a business to settle into. An accident? Both of them? Not that the world would really miss one CPA more or less, but unless the coffins they buried this afternoon in Oak Hill weren't empty, someone went to a lot of time and trouble to put the guy and his wife here, and a lot more to make him go away.
I picked up the phone and dialed. After three rings, I heard what I expected to hear, “This number is no longer in service in Area Code 614. If you need assistance, please dial...” I hung up and flipped to the yellow pages, to the A's, where the Accountants dwelled, all five pages of them. I saw a simple two-line listing for “Center Financial Advisors, Accounting and Financial Services, 1811 N. Sickles, 758-9119.” No color graphics or snappy, modern logo like the big accounting firms, not even a boxed ad or bold type, only the two lines of plain black-and- white print. That meant the guy was either very, very successful and didn't need any additional business — and I had never known a bean counter who fell in that category — or his accounting business was so far down in the crapper that a small ad was all he could afford.
The clock radio on the end table said it was almost 6:00 PM. I would have at least an hour or an hour and a half more daylight, so I decided to check out my alter ego for myself. After all, my busy social schedule was clear for the rest of the night, so why not?
With my Marathon gas station road map spread out on the car seat next to me, the house on Sedgwick and the office on Sickles proved easy to find. They were a couple of miles apart further in toward town. The house was in a quiet, middle-class neighborhood on the northwest side, about three miles from the motel. It was an older Dutch Colonial with white clapboard siding, dark green shutters and door, flower boxes below the front windows, and two big oaks in front. I could imagine Beaver Cleaver skipping down the front walk on his way to school as Ward mowed the grass in his white shirt, tie, and cardigan sweater, smoking his pipe. Unfortunately, Ward wasn't taking care of this one. The grass was thin and mostly overtaken with weeds, the wood siding on the house had faded, the flowers in the window boxes hung limp and ratty, and the hedges were in desperate need of trimming.
I circled the block past the Neighborhood Watch sign with the big eyeball and parked in front of 625. After all, I was Peter Talbott, wasn't I? If this was my house, I had nothing to hide. I strolled up the sidewalk to the front door, rang the bell, and waited. Nothing. The drapes were drawn across the front picture window. There were no lights on, but leaning out as far as I could, I peeked around the edge and caught a glimpse inside. The house was empty. No furniture. No carpets. Nothing but bare walls and bare wooden floors. Interesting. The two bodies were barely in the ground, yet someone had already cleaned the place out.
Following a line of concrete stepping-stones, I walked around to the side of the house, whistling softly and acting as casual as I could in case anyone was watching. The path brought me to a gate in a wooden fence that ran around the back yard. I opened it and stepped inside. Again, empty. Not even a lawn chair, a rake, or a garden hose. They had picked the place clean.
“Can I help you, young man?” I heard a sharp-edged, woman's voice call to me.
I turned and smiled, knowing it wasn't a question. It was an accusation. On the other side of the fence stood a tall, craggy, gray-haired woman leaning on a long-handled garden rake, watching me like a sentry with a pike. She wore a man's oversized denim work shirt and she drew a steady bead on me with a pair of small, hawk-like eyes.
“You know, you just might,” I answered her with a big smile. “I've been trying to reach the Talbotts for a couple of days now.” I motioned toward the house. “I rang the bell, but nobody answered. Guess they aren't home.”
“Nope. Won't be coming back, neither. They're dead, both of ‘em, in a car wreck, three days ago.”
“That's awful. A car wreck, huh?”
“When you get to be my age, you don't want to speak ill of the dead, ‘cause you might be next. But the way Pete drove, didn't come as no surprise.”
“You knew them pretty well?”
“'Bout as well as I know you. They moved in maybe six months ago and kept to themselves. Didn't talk much to me or anyone else around here, far as know.”
I had to laugh. “Warm and friendly?”
“New Jersey. Same difference. She had a mouth on her could curdle milk. And him? All I ever heard from that
