to it. Beyond the gate was a lieutenant’s office way off in one
corner and then nothing else except three pairs of back-to-back
desks covered with phones and paper. There were file cabinets
against the walls. The windows were grimy and most of them
had skewed and broken blinds.
There was no receptionist at the desk. There were two
detectives in the room, both of them wearing tweed sport coats,
both of them sitting with their backs to us. Clark was one of
them. He was talking on the phone. I rattled the gate latch.
Both guys turned around. Clark paused for a second, surprised,
and then he waved us in. We pulled chairs around and sat at the
ends of his desk, one on each side. He kept on talking into
the phone. We waited. I spent the time looking around the
room. The lieutenant’s office had glass walls from waist-height
upward. There was a big desk in there. Nobody behind it. But
on it I could see two plaster casts, just like the ones our own
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pathologist had made. I didn’t get up and go look at them.
Didn’t seem polite.
Clark finished his call. Hung up the phone and made a note
on a yellow pad. Then he breathed out and pushed his chair
way back so he could see both of us at the same time. He didn’t
say anything. He knew we weren’t making a social call. But
equally he didn’t want to come right out and ask if we had a
name for him. Because he didn’t want to look foolish if we
didn’t.
‘Just passing through,’ I said.
‘OK,’ he said.
‘Looking for a little help,’ I said.
‘What kind of help?’
‘Thought you might give us your crowbar notes. Now that
you don’t need them any more. Now that you’ve found yours.’
‘Notes?’
‘You listed all kinds of hardware stores. I figured it could save
us some time if we picked up where you left off.’
‘I could have faxed them,’ he said.
‘There’s probably a lot of them. We didn’t want to cause you
the trouble.’
‘I might not have been here.’
‘We were passing by anyway.’
‘OK,’ he said again. ‘Crowbar notes.’ He swivelled his chair
and got up out of it and walked over to a file cabinet. Came back
with a green folder about a half-inch thick. He dropped it on his
desk. It made a decent thump.
‘Good luck,’ he said.
He sat down again and I nodded to Summer and she picked up
the folder. Opened it. It was full of paper. She leafed through.
Made a face. Passed it across to me. It was a long, long list of
places that stretched from New Jersey to North Carolina. There
were names and addresses and phone numbers. The first ninety
or so had check marks against them. Then there were about four
hundred that didn’t.
‘You have to be careful,’ Clark said. ‘Some places call them
crowbars and some call them wrecking bars. You have to be
sure they know what you’re talking about.’
‘Do they have different sizes?’
249
‘Lots of different sizes. Ours is pretty big.’
‘Can I see it? Or is it in your evidence room?’
‘It’s not evidence,’ Clark said. ‘It’s not the actual weapon. It’s
just an identical sample on loan from the Sperryville store. We
can’t take it to court.’
‘But it fits your plaster casts.’
‘Like a glove,’ he said. He got up again and walked into his
lieutenant’s office and took the casts off the desk. Carried them
back one in each hand and put them down on his own desk.
They were very similar to ours. There was a positive and
a negative, just like we had. Mrs Kramer’s head had been a
lot smaller than Carbone’s, in terms of diameter. Therefore
the crowbar had caught less of its circumference. Therefore the
impression of the fatal wound was a little shorter in length than
ours. But it was just as deep and ugly. Clark picked it up and
ran his fingertip through the trench.
“Very violent blow,’ he said. ‘We’re looking for a tall guy,
strong, right-handed. You seen anyone like that?’