“I don’t know where she is,” Bert responded in a guarded voice. “She left last Saturday. Left me a note. Said she’d be in touch later.”
Arthur nodded. “We’re aware you don’t know where she is right now, but you may be able to help us find her. We’d be happy to help you out with your bail, if you’d like to assist us.”
“Bail?” He thought about this long enough to flavor it with his usual bias. “Well, if you’d like to include a little something for my time and effort, I might be able to help you.”
His mustache hiding a lip sneeringly lifted at one corner, the visitor said, “Of course. A hundred a day for your trouble.”
Bert smiled, disclosing teeth evenly coated with ocherous velour. “Happy to be of help to my country,” he said, puffing a miasma into his visitor’s face.
“We’ll take care of it,” said Arthur, not breathing as he turned his face aside. “Here’s my card. We’ll call you at your home tonight.”
“Yeah, sure,” said Bert, with another smile, from which his visitor hastily averted his eyes. “I hate to mention it, but I’m … a little short right now. And since my car’s . . . out of commission, I’ll need a little cash to get home.”
“I’ll leave some money with the people up front.” The visitor rose and left, while Bert watched him every step of the way. So little old holy-cow Benita was in trouble! Benita was never in trouble. With some effort, he focused on the card which gave him no information except the name, Prentice Arthur, Security and, in the lower left corner, an Albuquerque phone number. Now why in hell did a national security suit have a local number?
Half an hour later, supplied with a hundred dollars in twenties, Bert headed unerringly for the nearest bar. When he soared out, two hours later, who should he run into but one of those fags his wife worked for.
“Good afternoon, Bert,” this person said. “I got a postcard from Benita today. Seems she’s taken a new job in Denver. We’ll miss her. Nice to see you. Bye.” The person, conscious of being watched, then walked to the corner, and when around the corner and unobserved, vanished.
Bert hadn’t been able to bring the face quite into focus. Which one was it? Was it Goose or was it the other one? Never mind which one. So she was in Denver. Sure, that made sense. Not too far away to take the bus. When he’d talked to Carlos this morning, Carlos said she’d taken a bus wherever she was. Bookstore job made sense, too, sure, big city like that had lots of bookstores. And Carlos said it had to be someplace on mountain time.
Well, so there he was, he already had it half figured out! He sure as hell wasn’t going to tell Mr. What’s-his-name about Denver, though. Not when they were paying him a hundred a day to find her. Wait a week. String him along. A hundred a day was too good to pass up.
Across the street, in the front seat of a large van, Prentice Arthur asked, “Dink, who’s he talking to?”
Dink flipped through a notebook. “Looks like the guy that runs the bookstore where the target used to work. Rene Guselier, usually called Goose.”
“Did you pick up the conversation?” asked Arthur, over his shoulder.
“Got it,” said a disembodied voice from the back of the van. “The woman’s got a job in Denver.”
“He didn’t say what kind of job?”
“No mention. Wouldn’t it be another bookstore? That’s the only place she’s ever worked. How many can there be? Denver’s a sports town, isn’t it? Sports fans don’t read, do they?”
“Their wives probably do,” said Arthur. “Since they have a great deal of time on their hands. Get us on the next plane to Denver.”
As the car pulled away, the voice asked, “Didn’t you tell the guy you’d meet him this evening?”
Prentice Arthur shook his head. “Look at him! By evening he won’t be in condition to meet anyone. It’s only a two-hour flight if we have to come back to pick him up.”