Дэвид Балдаччи - One Good Deed

Yet when Archer looked at the problem every which way, not a single answer or viable path of investigation reasonably presented itself. And he wasn’t a shamus, anyway. Though Shaw had taught him a few things and said that Archer had good instincts, what did he really know about detecting? He found himself staring out the window of his hotel room for hours on end, his mind a muddle.

He checked his watch and wondered how Jackie had reacted to seeing her father’s body at the mortuary. Jackie might have broken down and cried, despite being estranged from her father.

As day grew into night, he finally decided to act. And that act would take the form of his going back to where all this had started. So at nine o’clock sharp, his legs took him in the direction of the Cat’s Meow. It was hopping at this hour, but he was able to wedge in at the bar.

The same string bean bartender came over to him. “What’s your poison, son?”

“Rebel Yell. Straight up.” Archer stacked three fingers one on top of the other this time.

The old man grinned. “I remember you now. You was talking to Mr. Pittleman.” He shivered. “Damn shame what happened to him.”

“Yeah,” agreed Archer.

The man poured out the Rebel and slid it across to Archer, who slipped him a buck and told him to keep the change.

“Right kind of you.”

“That night I was in here, you see anything funny?” asked Archer.

“Funny how?”

“Just funny.”

“Naw, not that I can remember.”

“You knew Hank Pittleman and Jackie Tuttle?”

“Sure, seen ’em in here many a time. Don’t really know ’em though.” The man grinned, showing multiple gaps in his teeth. “We don’t really run in the same circles of high-falutin’ society.” He cackled at his little joke. “Did you know Mr. Pittleman owned this place?”

Archer nodded, edged his hat back, lit up a Lucky Strike, and blew smoke sideways out of his mouth. He took a swallow of the Rebel and said, “You know Lucas Tuttle?” Archer wanted to see if word had gotten around about the man’s murder.

“Know of him. Never seen him in here. Apparently, he’s not much of a drinker like his daughter. But I seen him around town sometimes in that big car ’a his.”

“Ever seen him with Jackie Tuttle?”

“Not that I can say, no. Hey, why all the questions, fella?”

Archer handed him another dollar, which the man gripped and made disappear into his pocket. “I’m just trying to figure stuff out.”

“You ain’t been in town long, have you?”

Archer shook his head and continued to smoke down his Lucky Strike. “Want to know the truth? I’m an ex-con in from Carderock. On parole.”

The man’s features changed.

“What?” asked Archer, noting this.

“Now that is funny.”

“What is?”

“You being on parole.”

“Come again?”

“Made me think of that Ernestine Crabtree gal.”

“What about her?”

“She runs the parole office. Why I thought of her just now.”

“I know she does, friend. She’s my parole officer.”

“I figured that.”

“So how do you know about her?”

“I got buddies who did time and got out not too long ago. They went to her, too.”

“She’s the only game in town when it comes to parolees, but what’s funny about that?”

“The night you were in here before?” he began.

Archer looked at him through his cloud of cigarette smoke. “What about it?”

“Miss Crabtree was here, too. Sitting right over there.” The man pointed to his left, to a table against the far wall that would not really be in Archer’s sight line at the bar.

Archer looked that way and then back at the man. “She was? Are you sure? Lot of people in here. And I don’t recall seeing her.”

“No, I saw her for sure. She comes in pretty regular. Hell, she was here the night before they found poor Mr. Pittleman dead.”

“That’s right, I saw her go inside that night. Said she was meeting somebody. You know who that was?”

“Oh yeah, it was her.”

Archer stood up straight and gaped at the man. “ Her ? It was a woman? Do you know who it was?”

“You already said her name. Jackie Tuttle.”

Archer stood there more stunned than he had ever been in his whole life. Even more than during the darkest days of the war, when it seemed every hour someone he knew and had fought alongside had been shredded by bullets, or else made to vanish from the earth by a well-placed mortar round.

“Hold on, mister, are you saying she was meeting up with Jackie? But Jackie was here with Pittleman.”

“Well, yeah. But Mr. Pittleman started drinking with some other folks he knew, and Jackie Tuttle went over and sat with Miss Crabtree.”

“You sure they know each other?”

“Oh, yeah, they hung out a lot at the bar. Real good friends. I mean, real good.”

“And Pittleman didn’t mind?”

“Sometimes he got a little bent out of shape, but Miss Jackie, she knew how to handle him all right. And it’s not like Miss Jackie was with another man .”

Archer couldn’t find any words to say.

“You okay, fella?” The bartender was studying him closely.

Archer nodded, drank down his remaining two fingers, passed the bartender another buck, and left. His long legs ate up the distance to Ernestine’s house. When he reached it, he didn’t go up to the door, but rather waited across the street and studied the place. He was on a scouting expedition now and intended to do it by the book, as he’d been trained.

There were no lights on, and he couldn’t hear a sound coming from the place.

He finally walked over and knocked on the front door but got no response. He used the key the woman had given him to open the door. He went right to her bedroom and looked through her closet. It didn’t take long. It was empty. All her clothes were gone and so was the scrapbook.

Archer sat on the woman’s bed and, for one of the few times in his life, had no idea what to do.

Late the next morning, Archer was lying on his bed in his pants and undershirt, gazing at the ceiling and thinking hard about all that was troubling him, when someone knocked on his door. He opened it and found Irving Shaw leaning on the doorjamb and staring back at him.

“What?” said Archer.

“Got a problem.”

“Dammit, Mr. Shaw, every time you come to see me you say something like that.”

“Don’t blame me. It sure as hell ain’t my fault.”

He barged past Archer and into the room.

Archer slowly shut the door and watched as the lawman paced the small footprint of the room.

“You gonna tell me or do I have to guess?” asked Archer finally.

“We went out to Lucas Tuttle’s house this morning.”

“Who did?”

“Me and Jackie Tuttle.” Shaw sat down in the sole chair. “You been here the whole night?”

“Yeah. Man at the front desk can tell you that. Why?”

“Just wondering.”

“Why, what did you find out there?”

“I’ll tell you what we didn’t find.”

Archer sat on the edge of the bed. “Okay, shoot.”

“We didn’t find anything in the man’s safe. I mean, not a damn thing.”

Archer said nothing. He just gaped at the man like he’d been uttering Chinese.

“You look surprised.”

“Well, that’s because I am. There was all kinds of stuff in that safe, I’m telling you. Including gold bars. I never had the pleasure of carrying gold bars, but I imagine they’re pretty damn heavy.”

“They are.”

“Well, where the hell did it all get to?”

“Now, that’s the question.”