Hard Line by Michael Z. Lewin

Author:Michael Z. Lewin [Lewin, Michael Z.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pan Macmillan

Chapter Twenty

Powder rose very early. Quietly he made coffee and filled a vacuum flask. He drove to William Weaver’s house, where he parked across the street and waited.

Weaver opened his garage door at seven-fifteen. He backed his car out, closed and locked the garage door, and then drove off. Powder followed.

His interest was whether Weaver picked anyone up before he went for his camping trip, but Weaver drove directly to Kentucky Avenue, which ran southwest into Route 67, the road to McCormick’s Creek State Park. Powder followed as far as Valley Mills. Then he turned around and drove to his office.

Midmorning Agnes gave Powder details of Ricky’s salary, a copy of his last bank statement and current balance, and the information that Ricky had no outstanding loans from commercial sources.

Around noon. Sergeant Bull came to the Missing Persons office to tell Powder that he had located the missing taxi driver, who had a room in a small boarding house. The man had been in debt and under financial pressure, and he had driven cabs at night as well as holding a day job to ease the situation. Bull would be interviewing him shortly about the case of the partially burned body.

Powder thanked Bull genuinely for keeping him informed.

In the middle of the afternoon, Powder tracked down the telephone number of the manager of the McCormick’s Creek State Park’s campsite. He called the man, identified himself, and asked whether, Weaver had arrived.

“Yes, sir,” the man said. “He checked himself in this morning.”

“Was he alone?” Powder asked.

“He was alone when he got here, yes, sir.”

“And now?”

“I ain’t saying it’s different now. He’s at the far end of the site, about as far away as he can git, and I can’t say as to whether he’s still alone there or not.”

“Is he where he is because you’re full, or by choice?”

“We’re pretty busy, but he picked his spot out when he booked it.”

“He booked the site in person?”

“Yes, sir. I recall it clear as the sky is blue. Kinda fussy fella. Wanted a site just so. Right size, right kind of ground, not too close to neighbors, that kind of thing.”

“When did he book it?” Powder asked.

“I can look the date up if’n you want me to.”

“Yes, please.”

The man took two minutes to find that Weaver had booked the site eleven weeks before, in the beginning of April.

“You seem to remember him pretty clearly,” Powder said.

“I do. I don’t do full-time on the campsite here till first of May, but I got other duties around the park. He come and found me where I was, working on one of the bridges on Two Mile Trail. Fella made me leave what I was doing to sign him in, this one particular spot.”

“Did he say why it had to be that particular place?”

“He said it was gonna be his wife’s first time camping and—” the man stopped himself. “Hey, that’s funny.”

“What?”

“That he ain’t got his wife with him, after all that fuss and bother.”

“I take it,” Powder said, “that usually people don’t request specific sites.

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