years old. He had no wife and no children. No ex-wives, either.
He was wedded to the military, I guessed. He was listed at
six-four and two hundred twenty pounds. The army needed
to know that to keep their quartermaster percentiles up to
speed. He was listed as right-handed. The army needed to
know that because bolt-action sniper rifles are made for right
handers. Left-handed soldiers don’t usually get assigned as
snipers. Pigeon-holing starts on day one, in the military.
I turned the page.
Marshall had been born in Sperryville, Virginia, and had gone
all the way through kindergarten and grade school and high
school there.
I smiled. Summer looked at me, questions in her eyes. I
separated the pages and slid them across to her and stretched
over and used my finger to point out the relevant lines. Then
I slid her the memo paper with the Jefferson Hotel number on it.
‘Go find a phone,’ I said.
She found one just inside the door, on the wall, near the
register. I saw her put two quarters in, and dial, and talk, and
wait. I saw her give her name and rank and unit. I saw her
listen. I saw her talk some more. I saw her wait some more. And
listen some more. She put more quarters in. It was a long call. I
guessed she was getting transferred all over the place. Then
I saw her say thank you. I saw her hang up. I saw her come
back to me, looking grim and satisfied.
‘He had a room,’ she said. ‘In fact he made the booking
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himself, the day before. Three rooms, for him, and Vassell, and
Coomer. And there was a valet parking charge.’
‘Did you speak to the valet station?’
She nodded. ‘It was a black Mercury. In just after lunch, out
again at twenty to one in the morning, back in again at twenty
past three in the morning, out again finally after breakfast on
New Year’s Day.’
I riffed through the pile of paper and found the fax from
Detective Clark in Green Valley. The results of his house-to
house canvass. There was a fair amount of vehicle activity
listed. It had been New Year’s Eve and lots of people were
heading to and from parties. There had been what someone
thought was a taxi on Mrs Kramer’s road, just before two
o’clock in the morning.
‘A staff car could be mistaken for a taxi,’ I said. ‘You know, a
plain black sedan, clean condition but a little tired, a lot of miles
on it, the same shape as a Crown Victoria.’
‘Plausible,’ Summer said.
‘Likely,’ I said.
We paid the check and left a dollar tip and counted what was
left of my sergeant’s loan. Decided we were going to have to
keep on eating cheap, because we were going to need gas
money. And phone money. And some other expenses.
‘Where to now?’ Summer asked me.
‘Across the street,’ I said. ‘To the motel. We’re going to hole
up all day. A little more work, and then we sleep.’
We left the Chevy hidden behind the lounge bar and crossed
the street on foot. Woke the skinny guy in the motel office and
asked him for a room.
‘One room?’ he said.
I nodded. Summer didn’t object. She knew we couldn’t afford
two rooms. And we weren’t new to sharing. Paris had worked
out OK for us, as far as night-time arrangements were concerned.
‘Fifteen bucks,’ the skinny guy said.
I gave him the money and he smiled and gave me the key to
the room Kramer had died in. I figured it was an attempt at
humour. I didn’t say anything. I didn’t mind. I figured a room a
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guy had died in was better than the rooms that rented by the
hour.
We walked together down the row and unlocked the door
and stepped inside. The room was still dank and brown and
miserable. The corpse had been hauled away, but other than
that it was exactly the same as when I had first seen it.
‘It ain’t the George V,’ Summer said.
‘That’s for damn sure,’ I said.