Heat Lightning

aristocratic manner.
    “What?”
    Sinclair glanced at Mai. “When the Vietnamese execute a prisoner—a political prisoner, or even a murderer—they’ll gag him by stuffing a lemon in his mouth. Hold it there with tape. Duct tape. Keeps them from talking while they’re walking out to the wall.”
    “That’s pretty goddamn interesting,” Virgil said.
    Mai rolled her eyes. “And probably an urban myth.”
    “What would you know about it?” Sinclair snapped.
    His daughter turned her face, embarrassed by the sudden pique. “It’s too dramatic, it’s too weird. Why would anybody do something like that? It’s got the earmarks of a legend; if you’d studied literature, you’d know that.”
    “Ahh . . . They did it, take my word for it,” Sinclair said irritably. To Virgil: “ We don’t have anything to do with any of this, but it sounds to me like it goes back to Vietnam. Somehow. I’d take a good close look at Sanderson. See what unit he was in. See if there’s anything blacked out in his file. Some of these Vietnam vets, they’re crazier than a barrel of wood ticks. They’re getting old and ready to die. You might have an old rogue killer with an agenda. He might be good at it, if he was Phoenix, or something. . . .”
    “I heard about Phoenix when I was in,” Virgil said. “You’d hear about it from these old sergeants-major. Sounded like there was an element of bullshit to it.”
    “Of course there was! Of course there was!” Sinclair said, leaning forward and rapping on the table with his knuckles. “But there’s a core of reality to it, too. We did have assassins. We did murder people in their homes. We did hire men with silencers and guns and no useful skill but murder. We even had a name for it—wet work! Look it up! Look it up!”
    Virgil exhaled, stuck his notebook in his hip pocket, and said, “I better find Ray.”
    Sinclair relaxed, suddenly affable again, and he smiled and said, “Good luck to you.”
     
 
MAI TAGGED ALONG to the front door, walking close to Virgil’s side. He said, “I would be delighted to take you dancing anytime you want, ma’am, except not tonight, because I gotta find this guy.” His words were tumbling out, a little confused, but that was one of his more endearing traits, he’d been told, so he worked it. “I can’t make any promises about tomorrow or any other night, because of this murder thing, but if I could call you about six o’clock, some night when I’ll know what I’m doing . . .”
    “I’m usually home by then,” she said. “You’re a good dancer?”
    “I gotta couple moves,” Virgil said. He tried to look modest.
    “I noticed that, but I was talking about dancing,” she said. They both laughed and Virgil said, “I got your number someplace.”
    “Here.” She stepped over to an entryway table, pulled open a drawer, and took out a pen. Taking Virgil’s hand in hers, she wrote a number in his palm, a process so erotic that Virgil feared erective embarrassment. He left hastily, Mai in the doorway, watching him all the way through the front door, smiling.
    If Jesus Christ had a girlfriend, Virgil thought, that’s what she’d look like.

7
    VIRGIL WALKED down to his truck, climbed in, thought about it for a minute, then drove around the block so the back of the truck was looking down at the Sinclairs’ condo. He shut the truck down, got his laptop, phone, camera, and an oversized photography book called Photojournalism , and crawled into the back.
    Minnesota allows only a certain level of window tinting in cars, so that highway patrolmen won’t walk into a gun they can’t see. Virgil’s was twice as dark as the permissible tint, which was okay for police vehicles used for surveillance. Virgil didn’t use the 4Runner much for surveillance, but since it was always full of fishing tackle or hunting gear or camera equipment, the heavy tint worked as insurance, keeping the eyes of the greedy out of the back of his truck.
    And it also worked for surveillance, as intended.
    Sitting in the back, he was invisible from the outside, and a camping pillow made a comfortable-enough seat. If he’d jolted Sinclair in any way, then he might make a move. If not, he had things to do, which could be done from the back of the truck.
    He called Carol and asked, “So where’s Ray Bunton?”
    “Can’t find him. The cops at Red Lake are all out working, there’s nobody to talk to us. But they’re gonna call back,” she