Линкольн Чайлд - Verses for the Dead

The investigating officer, Sergeant Sweetser, was a professional who’d been quite thorough in his investigation. He’d copied from the motel’s register the names, car makes, and license plate numbers of the previous night’s fellow guests, along with brief descriptions of each occupant given to him by the manager.

Fauchet flipped through the interviews. There was nothing of interest. Nobody had seen or heard anything out of the ordinary, and all had accounted for themselves in normal, unsuspicious ways. Winters had had no visitors that anyone had noticed. And the night manager insisted he would have noticed, because anyone arriving or leaving by car would have to pass by his office.

Using Google street view, Fauchet looked at the façade of the motel, which still existed. It was along the highway, outside of town and not easily accessible on foot. That meant the killers were probably staying at the motel themselves.

Good old Sergeant Sweetser had interviewed six guests, but the rest had already checked out by the time the police arrived. It seemed likely to Fauchet the killers would have left early that morning; why hang around and get caught up in an investigation? So the killers would not have been among those interviewed. That was another important clue.

As she skimmed the list of license plates, she saw there was another Florida plate, on a 1997 Mercury Tracer wagon with the number JW24-99X. If the killer was from Florida, as Pendergast had implied in yesterday afternoon’s meeting, this could be another clue. And it made sense: if the killers were traveling up I-95 hunting for victims from Florida, it would be easy enough to cruise through a motel parking lot, looking for Florida plates.

According to Sweetser’s report, the motel register said the Tracer belonged to a man by the name of George Lehigh. The second occupant of the room was listed as his son, Travis.

Father and son. Master — and apprentice?

She felt a creeping chill. They were not among those guests who’d been interviewed. But Sweetser had obtained a description from the manager. She turned to it and was disappointed to find it perfunctory — both with brown hair, average height, average build, no distinguishing characteristics — except both father and son were wearing Marlins baseball caps. The son, Travis, “looked to be in his midteens.”

Fauchet put down the report and thought for a moment. Was Lehigh their real name? Almost certainly they would be traveling under false identities. It didn’t look like Sweetser had run any license plates — not surprising, given the supposed suicide. But surely there would be a record in some database, somewhere, of who was registered to that plate eleven years ago.

She took out Pendergast’s business card and started dialing the cell number. Then she stopped and laid down her phone. She shouldn’t go off half-cocked. After all, these potential clues were intriguing, but they were just that: potential clues. If she was freelancing, the least she should do was follow through the way Pendergast would: examine both files, dot her i ’s and cross her t ’s. After all, the Miami PD, whose job it was to examine such things, would know what to look for.

But wouldn’t it be wonderful, she thought, if she could deliver to Pendergast the identity of Brokenhearts on a silver platter... just like that?

She put away the Winters folder and turned to the accordion file labeled JASMINE ORIOL.

I figure there’s a pretty good chance we’ll get shot out here,” said Coldmoon, with a mirthless laugh, as they passed by a shabby trailer with five skeletonized cars out front, surrounded by bedraggled palmettos. “These crackers aren’t likely to pass up the chance to try and jack a Shelby.”

“Perhaps not,” said Pendergast. He’d been paging through the Vance file again, and now he slipped it into the pocket of the passenger door. “But if it eases your mind, I’d lay odds you could outrun them.”

Coldmoon downshifted the confiscated drugmobile as they approached a sharp turn. Beyond the smoked windows, the landscape whizzed past — stands of tall marsh grass, clusters of dense vegetation and trees, an occasional trailer or abandoned roadside attraction. And always, running everywhere, channels of lazy brown water, with the occasional alligator basking in the sun.

The first half hour had been the usual snarl of Miami traffic. But as they continued west, past the racetracks and par-three golf courses and trailer parks, he did his best to relax, forget he’d been the one to suggest this boring field trip, and enjoy the ride. The initial section of road was familiar from his drive to Cape Coral, anyway, and as that little jaunt taught him, the layout of Florida was bizarre: millions of people pressed against the coasts like ants, and in the middle nothing but lakes, orange groves, cattle ranches, and — of course — swamps.

After they made the turn, Okeechobee Road ran arrow-straight through the flat landscape, the asphalt shimmering in the heat, mirages coming and going on the road surface. They entered an area of wetlands, with tall trees rising upward, bulbous root systems extending into the water like a tangle of snakes. They passed a large family of basking alligators, lying in the muck along the verge, black and oily and gleaming in the patchy sun, slitty eyes open. Some were even lying on top of others. Didn’t the bastards ever shut their eyes? Coldmoon shuddered. God, he hated the look of those creatures — and all of a sudden they seemed to be everywhere, roughly corresponding to the abrupt drop-off in human habitation. He had no idea Florida had so many. They were like giant snakes with legs. He wondered why alligator leather was so expensive, when all you had to do was come to the bayous of South Florida and pick off as many as you liked.

“Our turnoff should be in about five miles,” Pendergast said.

Coldmoon checked his iPhone. Thank God it still had a couple of bars — the last time they drove out of town, he’d lost cell reception almost immediately. “Four point four miles to be exact,” Pendergast continued. “Then another ten to Paradise Landing and three more to Canepatch.”

“Great.” Coldmoon, eager to get the interview over with, accelerated again, this time to ninety. The chopped-down Mustang seemed to prefer high rates of speed: the engine settled down to a mild roar, and the laminar airflow kept them low and steady on the road. The biggest indication of speed was the insects now peppering the windshield like hail, once in a while a particularly large specimen leaving a huge yellow splat.

The turnoff came before he expected it. There was no sign, but it was the only one around. He braked smoothly and hard, swinging the Shelby onto the side road. It began as potholed blacktop, but within a few miles turned into a white lane of crushed oyster shells. The trailers and rusting hulks of engines they’d seen before were gone. Instead, they were now passing stands of brackish water, saw grass marshes, and tall, strange-looking plants.

“Is this the Everglades?” Coldmoon asked.

“I imagine we entered the preserve when we left the state highway.”

He looked around. “Can you imagine the drive this guy must make to buy beer?”

“Even longer, I would imagine, for a decent Bordeaux.”

Coldmoon was used to emptiness, but it was the emptiness of the South Dakota prairie. This kind of desolation felt strangely claustrophobic, as if he was hemmed in by the tropical growth that grew wilder with each mile they went. “Why would anyone live out here?” he muttered.

“Here we have a man,” Pendergast said, “who was sure his wife was brutally murdered. Rightly or wrongly, he was convinced it wasn’t suicide, but he couldn’t make anyone else believe him, especially law enforcement. He was dismissed, ignored, humored as if he was crazy. An experience like that can break a man. It’s no surprise he decided to retire from humanity.”