Mad River

dead-enders with a gun. We’ve gotta find that pickup, Lewis. The problem is . . . we might find more dead folks when we find the pickup.”
    “I’ll get onto Marshall, have them check the place street by street,” Duke said. “And every other town for fifty miles around. We won’t be able to keep it quiet. We’ll start getting the media messing with us.”
    “That’s not all bad,” Virgil said. “The more people spotting for us, the better. We’ll just have to put up with the bullshit that comes with it. Or really, you will—you’ll be the face on this thing, until we get them or there’s more shooting.”
    “So maybe instead of sneaking around until they find out, we oughta just go ahead and bring the media in right away. Make an appeal.”
    Virgil nodded. “Think about how you want to do that. We’re not even sure that these kids are involved . . . but we do need to find them.”
    “Let me think about it,” Duke said. “What’re you going to do?”
    “Call people up on the telephone,” Virgil said.
    •   •   •
    DAVENPORT, working the phones with a couple of other BCA agents, had tracked down Jimmy Sharp’s last known address, a room in a postwar house on St. Paul’s East Side. The owner, whose name was Ronald Deutch, had originally rented the room to another man from Shinder, named Tom McCall. McCall had let Jimmy and Becky sleep in his room for the week before Deutch kicked all three of them out for non-payment of rent.
    “As far as we could tell, all three of them were effectively homeless,” Davenport said. “Deutch was renting them the room for fifty dollars a week, and they were two weeks overdue and couldn’t come up with even a night’s rent. They left there two weeks ago, and the landlord hasn’t seen them since.”
    “So there might be three of them, instead of two,” Virgil said.
    “Yeah. You gotta see what you can find on this McCall guy.”
    “I’ll do that,” Virgil said.
    •   •   •
    VIRGIL HAD BEEN WORKING the telephone from his truck, where he could keep the phone plugged into the charger. He’d just hung up from the Davenport call when a man stepped up beside the truck and knocked on the passenger-side window. He was a thin man who wore a cowboy hat, a tan, western-style canvas sport coat, and rimless eyeglasses. Virgil ran the window down and the man said, “I’m Ross Price. I’m the—”
    “Investigator,” Virgil said. “Hop in. We need to talk.”
    Price got in and said, “Five dead. These kids have gone crazy.”
    “If it’s them,” Virgil agreed. “I’ve talked to Duke about the murders Friday night, but I’d like to get the details.”
    “I’ve been writing up everything. I’ve got files on my computer I could send you.”
    “Do that. But just tell me what you’ve seen so far.”
    Price looked out the window, scratched his forehead, then said, “It seems simple, but it feels complicated. I’ve never been the lead investigator on a murder where we really needed investigation. I’ve done two murders, but we knew who did both of them the minute we walked in the door. One was a bar fight, the other one was a domestic. But this one . . .”
    Virgil nodded: “I know what you mean. My first murder investigation, you know, a real investigation, I was so confused that I didn’t know if I was coming or going. But, after a while, it smooths out. So just tell me what you saw, and what people told you.”
    •   •   •
    THE MURDER VICTIM was named Agatha Murphy, shot in the head during what looked like a burglary gone bad. Or a robbery gone bad—Price wasn’t sure which it was.
    “They came in like burglars. We think three of them, but it could have been two—the surviving witness wasn’t sure about that. At least one was a woman. But two men and a woman, that fits with what you’ve got going here.”
    “Yes, it does,” Virgil said. “What kind of neighborhood was it? Was the house picked by chance?”
    “I can’t say,” Price said. “They passed a lot of houses that looked as good as the O’Leary house. That had me confused. But now that it seems like these kids are from here in Shinder, it makes more sense. Mrs. O’Leary was from here in Shinder, and I guess she was flashing some expensive diamonds. . . .”
    Price repeated the story about O’Leary and her jewelry. He said one of the intruders apparently came in through a back window that had been left unlocked, and then opened a