The Midnight Line (14 page)

It was in a mud room near the back door. In a closet where snow clothes were kept. A pair of snow pants had slipped off a hanger. Some kind of stiff nylon. They had hit the floor like spears, and then half crumpled and half stayed rigid, like wobbly legs, like a cartoon picture of a guy who just received a nasty shock. They had toppled backward and had ended up half propped in the corner. Reacher moved them, purely out of habit, and behind them he found a pair of women's snow boots. A technical product, with hooks and loops. A woman's size six. Which was small.

He said, “Boots in the closet is a thing, right? She spent quality time here.”

“If it was her. Could have been anybody.”

“I agree. But it's evidence a guy two separate people described as a loner living alone actually had a companion in his house. Which should have tilted the investigation a little, when such a guy shows up dead. Maybe we can forgive the sheriff. He had a preconceived notion. And I bet everyone in Wyoming has a closet like that. Hard to see what you always see. But whoever came along afterward should have seen it. They should have had fresh eyes. Makes me wonder who they were. And what they were doing. Maybe they didn't really look at anything. Maybe it really was a fast in-and-out, to get something back. Has to be. Nothing else has been touched.”

Bramall said, “We should check the other closets.”

They did, but there was nothing in them, except Porterfield's own stuff. Apparently he had been a guy who liked blue jeans, and saw no problem at all with laundering things until they went threadbare.

No women's clothing.

No dresses, no blouses, no pants.

Bramall said, “Why would she leave only her boots behind?”

“She left at the start of spring. She hadn't used them for a month. She forgot them. Or maybe they were uncomfortable. Maybe she left them on purpose. Maybe she was fixing to buy new. But she was here. Or someone was. Porterfield didn't live alone. Not all the time.”

“That's a lot to read into a pair of boots.”

“I bet we find more.”

They did. But not much more. After two hours they had a very modest haul. More persuasive than conclusive. They saved time by ignoring what was on open view. Instead they looked inside things, and under things, and behind things.

They found a woman's comb between the sofa cushions. It was made of pink plastic. All the teeth were widely spaced. Not half and half, like a regular comb. In the master bathroom they found two sinks, each with a soap dish, one with a dried-out cake of scented soap, and one with a dried-out cake of plain. Also in the bathroom they found two sets of towels laid out. In the laundry room behind the dryer they found a pair of women's athletic socks. Some kind of miracle fiber, small in size, pink in color, stuck all over with dust bunnies.

That was it.

Not enough for a courtroom. But suggestive. Reacher said, “She was here. Or someone was. At least some of the time. Maybe just a casual on-again, off-again type of thing. But she was here long enough to get somewhat ingrained. When she left, she did it in style. She made a clean break. Some kind of statement. She scoured the place and packed up everything of hers she could see, leaving behind only the few things she couldn't. Like her lost comb. She couldn't take her soap anyway. At the time it was all wet and slimy. Couldn't just toss it in a bag with her clothes. She didn't count the towels. Who would? She forgot her snow boots. But it's the socks I like best.”

“Why?”

“They prove she still has two legs. The Purple Heart might not be as bad as it could be.”

“If it's her.”

“Suppose it was. Porterfield must have gone to her place from time to time. Where would that be? How far from here? Suppose you were a guy like Porterfield. How far would you drive to get laid?”

“Depends.”

“On what?”

“A number of things.”

“Look on the bright side. Maybe not Miss America exactly, but assume she's a nice-looking person.”

“This is Wyoming. They drive epic distances for a loaf of bread. For a girlfriend, two hours, maybe. A hundred miles.”

“Which doesn't help us,” Reacher said. “That's too big of an area to contemplate.”

Bramall nodded. “I was going to say our next move should be go talk to Porterfield's neighbors. But I don't know exactly what that means out here. Everyone lives twenty miles from everyone else. I bet they never see each other.”

“But I guess they depend on each other. Suppose they get a sudden emergency. Who are they going to call? The police department or the fire department two hours away? Or their nearest neighbor, who could be there in fifteen minutes? Maybe that's the country way. Maybe country neighbors are closer than you suspect. Maybe they're always into each other's business and have plenty to tell us.”

“You're very cheerful.”

Reacher didn't answer. He was alone in the kitchen, perhaps subconsciously needing to keep his exit in view. The open window, with the broken glass and the torn-out screen. A cool breeze came in. And borne on it, sounds. Most of them were inoffensive. Wind in the trees, the beat of a heavy bird's wing, a bee flying by, and pausing, and flying on.

One sound was different.

Very brief, and very distant. Barely audible. A fragment only. A tiny scratch, or a tiny crunch, or a tiny squelch. A small part of a familiar local sound. A Wyoming sound. Like all sounds, made from a mix of different components. Like DNA.

Grit was involved.

And rock.

And rubber.

“We need to get out,” he said. “There's a car on the driveway.”

Bramall went first. Less likely to get stuck. Reacher followed him successfully, and Bramall put his arm back in and wound the handle to close the window. Then they hustled to the front.

Nothing yet.

“We should get in the car,” Bramall said. “Just in case.”

Reacher said, “If in doubt, run them over.”

They climbed in the Toyota and Bramall started the motor.

A truck came up over the final rise and started across the plateau.

It was a Ford pick-up truck, loaded with a police-department version of a camper shell. Its paint was clean and shiny. All white, except for the doors, which had gold stars about two feet wide and two feet high, with the county's name in a curve above, and
Sheriff's Department
in a curve below. A little like a West Point ring.

Sheriff Connelly.

Connelly parked close by the Toyota, at a casual angle, partly to look nonchalant and unworried and therefore unthreatening, but mostly, Reacher thought, to subtly block off the Toyota's forward path. The guy had judged it well. Not obvious, but the Toyota would have to back up and loop around.

Connelly buzzed his window down. He was wearing his hat in the car. Plenty of room. It was a tall truck.

Reacher buzzed his window down. He was closest.

Connelly said, “You told me you had no connections to Porterfield.”

Reacher said, “I don't.”

“Yet here you are at his house.”

“The woman I'm looking for was here, at least for a few months. I'm trying to figure out where she went next.”

“Porterfield lived alone.”

“Not always.”

Connelly said, “Have you been inside the house?”

“Yes,” Reacher said.

“How?”

“There was a previous break-in here, a year or more ago. We went in the same hole.”

“What break-in?”

“You searched this place when he died. You found what you found, and you locked up and drove away. Then someone else came by and went in the window.”

“Show me,” Connelly said.

They got out of their cars and trooped back to the far corner of the house. Connelly took a good long look. He unfolded the torn-out insect screen and held it in place, as if re-creating the original scene. He rubbed the mildew between finger and thumb, and sniffed it.

He said, “Could be a year and a half.”

Then he said, “How are things inside?”

Reacher said, “No mess, no damage, nothing pulled out or overturned. This wasn't a burglary, or squatters.”

Connelly said, “Why do you think there was a woman living up here?”

They moved to the porch rail, facing the rear view, all lined up, looking straight ahead at trees and mountains. Bramall talked through the boots, and the comb, and the soap, and the towels, and the small pink socks.

Connelly said, “The boots don't mean much, or the comb or the socks. They could be historic. Twenty years ago there could have been nieces and cousins here every summer and winter. That kind of stuff stays lost a long time.”

“But?” Reacher said.

“I'm prepared to admit when I make a mistake. I like the soap and the towels. Two sinks in use always means a couple, and if one soap is smelly, it's a man and a woman. And soap and towels is real-time evidence. That's exactly how the room looked the morning Porterfield died. I guess I missed it. But no one came forward at the time. No one ever has. All the evidence said Porterfield was a loner and no one else had barely even met him. So where was the woman then, and where is she now?”

“That's what we're trying to figure out.”

“If it's the same woman.”

“Nothing says it isn't.”

Connelly said, “The ring you showed me was pretty small.”

“Yes, it was,” Reacher said.

“Are you judging this thing by the size of the socks? Because maybe they shrunk.”

“The boots didn't. They're small, too.”

“Where did she serve?”

“Iraq and Afghanistan, five times.”

“A tough character.”

“Like you wouldn't believe.”

“If it's the same woman.”

“It might be.”

“Would such a woman come home and use smelly soap and wear pink socks?”

“I'm sure she would do exactly that. Stuff like that is the whole point of coming home.”

Connelly turned around and looked back at the house.

At the broken window.

Reacher said, “I know.”

“You know what?”

“We can't figure out who would have done that either. It's good clean professional work. A neat break-in, and nothing disturbed inside. Feels like training and experience were involved. Feels like government work. Except that's ridiculous.”

Connelly said, “Mostly because what would the government want with Porterfield? Whatever he was, he was small-time. And a government agency would have called me first. As a courtesy, at least, and for practical assistance too. Which I could have given them in this case. I had the keys.”

“Then regular petty criminals are getting neater these days.”

“That hasn't been my experience.”

“Then who was it?”

“Fancy criminals, maybe. The kind who can afford the best.”

“What would they want with small-time Porterfield?”

Connelly didn't answer.

Bramall said, “We apologize for trespassing. We intended no disrespect to the laws of the county.”

Connelly said, “I can't help you with the woman. There's no evidence of a crime. I can't take soap and towels to a county board budget hearing. I'm sorry. I have no manpower.”

“Who could help us?” Bramall said. “Neighbors?”

“They might. I'm their sheriff, but I don't know any of them. In fact this is only the second time I've ever been out here. It's a quiet corner. The squeaky wheels get all my attention.”

“We should get going,” Bramall said. “Sheriff, thank you for your time.”

At that moment three hundred miles away in Rapid City, South Dakota, Gloria Nakamura was sitting in her blue car, on the cross street, artfully positioned, this time watching Scorpio's back door, not his front. She had been there close to two hours, and she had seen nothing of interest.

Until.

A Harley with a Montana plate pulled into the alley. The sound beat back off the walls. Then it shut down. The rider got off, and the back door opened, and the rider went in.

Nakamura made a note.

Four minutes on her watch later, the rider came out again. He got on his bike, and started the noise again, and rode away.

Nakamura made a note.

Then she drove back to the station.

Bramall and Reacher drove the ranch track back to the dirt road, and turned west, which was where they thought they would find the bulk of the local neighborhood population, such as it was. Bramall watched the left-hand shoulder, and Reacher watched the right. They agreed they would take the first track they saw, whichever side of the road it was on, because by definition whatever dwelling lay at the end of it was Sy Porterfield's nearest next-door neighbor.

The first track came eleven miles later. On the left. They nearly missed it. It was a plain and inconspicuous entry. After which it twisted and rose through the trees, steep and tight in places, but better maintained than Porterfield's. The Land Cruiser rolled on, implacably, more than three miles, and then all of a sudden the trees opened up and gave out on a flat acre with a long view east. There was a one-story house up on a stone foundation. It was made of brown boards, in places twisted and silvery. It had a front porch, with ancient millwork holding up the rail. On the porch was an old church pew, pressed into service as a place to sit and take the air in the morning sun.

Bramall parked a respectful distance from the house.

He checked his phone.

“Two bars,” he said. “Coverage is actually pretty good here. She could have called from anywhere.”

They made to get out of the car, but before they could the house door opened and a woman stepped out. She must have heard their tires. She looked lean and strong and tanned by wind and sun. She was wearing a faded red dress, over bare legs and cowboy boots. She was maybe forty, but it was hard to tell. Reacher would not have ventured an opinion. If forced, he would have said thirty, just to be safe, and wouldn't have been surprised if the truth was fifty. She stood there, hands on hips, just watching. Not hostile. Not yet.