Page 6 (1/2)

If they didn’t know his naht his attention again, and he found out that they -- the authorities, not Al and his hairy-eared associate -- knew a little o

They had a nao with the photo

"Leroy Montrose," the announcer said The screen showed his photograph, then cut to an exterior shot of the Laurel Inn, then to a shot of Rooing the carpet for traces of the elusive Mr Montrose

While they kept at it, the off-camera voice infornized the photo as that of a patron who had checked in several days earlier -- a neat trick, in Keller’s opinion, since he’d never checked in at all, or even passed the desk He’d gone straight to his rooht of outside stairs, and he’d left the same way He’d never passed Go, never collected two hundred dollars, and had never spotted or been spotted by anyone orked for the hotel, or anyone as staying there, either

But then anyone could make a phone call Anyone could clairace, it see to lead anywhere They wouldn’t find his fingerprints in Roo of his other than the cell phone he’d left under the et that far? And if they did, so what? He’d never used the phone, and had wiped his prints from it, so where could it lead theht

Across the street to Denny’s, where he’d sat at a well-lighted table eating that silly sandwich and fries He could have used his credit card at Denny’s, which would have s a little bit easier for them, but he’d paid cash, and then what had he done?

He’d called a cab from the pay phone inside the restaurant And waited inside until the cab pulled up And got in it and told the driver to take hi stores and restaurants in the immediate vicinity of the Laurel Inn By now, or within a matter of minutes, they’d have shown his picture to the waitresses and cashiers in Denny’s, and somebody would have identified it, and somebody would have remembered that he’d called a taxi They’d check all the cab coovernment, for Christ’s sake, they were the state and local cops and the FBI, they had enough-- and they’d find the driver and know he’d gone to the airport, and they’d hit the car rental desks, and if they’d checked with theain, and they’d have the credit card and driver’s license he’d used, and they’d lighten up on Leroy Montrose and start looking real hard for Holden Blankenship That was the na out over the radio, and the nahout the Greater Des Moines ot to his Days Inn? How long before they kicked his door in?

By the time they did, he’d better be someplace else

But where?

7

Ts over, a ot out of an SUV, locked its doors with a reed his hands in the hand-warmer pockets of his windbreaker, and headed across the asphalt toward one of the entrances to the mall He didn’t look particularly furtive, not to Keller, and the odds were he didn’t have anything to feel furtive about He was younger than Keller, and a littler chunkier in the midsection, and the hair that showed under his baseball cap was longer and lighter The only point of resemblance, as far as Keller could make out, was the windbreaker

Keller watched him until he disappeared inside thea shopping cart, and then he watched a kid whose job it was to roa carts people had abandoned

Keller wondered what a job like that paid Miniured Not a lot of e, either, or much in the way of opportunity for advanceood points You weren’t likely to wind up with your picture on national television and every cop in the world hunting for you

Maybe that was his o Maybe he should have picked a career of rounding up shopping carts, instead of one that sent hi people

It was just as well he hadn’t driven around too as tank was still a little more than half full He wasn’t sure of its capacity, or what kind of allons left at twentylike two hundred as up

He’d left his roo to fade off into twilight, and he’d have liked to have it still darker for the short walk from his room to his car There was no one around, but he still felt impossibly conspicuous, and he was pretty sure he looked at least as furtive as he had in the photograph, because now he had so much more to be furtive about He’d tried not to let it show in his walk or in the way he held hi at hiot out of there