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themselves. Even here we ve had to be damn careful. So it s possible he could
still be here in town.
Okay. Keep on it. Huddy nodded, dismissing Drew. Degrasse and Nichols moved
to join him, but Huddy stopped them sharply. Not you two. I m not through
with you yet.
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They halted irritably. Huddy let them stand there and stew in their own
worries while he turned his attention to the two bath towels laid out on the
foot of the bed. One supported a tiny mound of threads. They weren t half as
intriguing to Huddy as the disassembled .38 Special that was spread out on the
other towel. It looked as if it had been broken down by a small-arms expert.
They still hadn t found the hollow-point shells.
He tapped the barrel. This just fell apart, you say?
The locals exchanged a look. Huddy prodded them. Come on, guys. I know a
helluva lot more about this old man and what s really going down than Drew
does. I m a lot more inclined to believe anything you say than he is.Anything
.
Nichols hesitated, then said quickly, There wasn t any doubt about it, sir.
The gun just came apart.He did it. The old man. I don t know how he did it,
but he did it. I m not sure I d want to know how he did it. He was eyeing the
pillows as if Pickett s ghost might suddenly materialize to give them another
demonstration.
And after that, you panicked.
Hey, look ... Degrasse started to protest.
Huddy raised a calming hand. I m not criticizing you, just trying to
establish a sequence of events. They gun fell to pieces, and you panicked.
Okay, so we panicked. Degrasse still sounded resentful. You would ve too,
if you d been there. Huddy didn t comment.
Excuse me. A very thin young man was leaning through the open doorway.
What is it? Huddy was irritated at having been interrupted.
Well sir, it s only that. . .. You are the man from California, aren t you?
Yes, yes. Spit it out, man.
He stepped all the way into the room, eyed the other two men uncertainly. I
was on duty at the far end of the motel last night, when everything went down.
Over by the manager s office.
What about it? Huddy didn t like people wasting his time, especially now
that he had no time to waste.
It s not like I actuallysaw the old man get on the bus, but I
Huddy instantly forgot about the pistol and the pieces of rag. Wait a
minute. What bus?
There was a Greyhound parked over at the Ramada Inn next door. I checked it
out, sir. It s the regular Benson stop.
That s it, said Huddy with grim satisfaction. That s got to be it. The old
man has a heart condition. He s in no shape to be running any marathons. I
don t see any tourists stopping to pick him up in the middle of the night.
That s it. What s your name, kid?
Jason, sir.
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Well, Jason, you hustle your ass over to the Ramada Inn and pick up a copy
of the Greyhound schedule. Find out where that bus was coming from when it
stopped here last night and where it s going. You two. Degrasse and Nichols
all but snapped to attention, relieved to be subject to something like orders
instead of unanswerable questions. Start checking all the towns along the
interstate where that bus stopped between leaving here last night and now.
They re mostly all small towns between here and Texas.
Huddy s mind worked furiously. Of course the old man could work to confuse
his trail. He could get off anywhere. Change buses, change systems, take a
roundabout route; only he didn t credit Pickett with that much imagination.
From the first the old man had struck Huddy as a simple, uncomplicated type.
For now, anyway, they d proceed on that assumption.
If he s still aboard the same bus, then we ve got him.
Yes sir. Degrasse and Nichols moved to follow the young man out of the
room. They were glad to be rid of the snooty executive from the Coast.
Alone in the room, Huddy let himself lean back on the bed. Sure, Pickett had
snuck onto the bus last night. No wonder Drew s people hadn t been able to
find him. This next time they wouldn t charge in early in the evening. They d
wait until they were certain he was asleep. Surely he couldn t do his little
tricks in his sleep. Now where would be the best place to pick him up?
There were several maps crammed into his jacket. He found the one he now had
to use. It covered the Southwestern United States. On it a number of towns had
been circled in red and had code numbers inscribed next to them.
The particular map Huddy was studying showed Consolidated Chemical and
Mining s America. The coded, encircled communities boasted CCM facilities. He
traced the likely route of a cross-country bus. It might veer south toward
Houston, or it might go into Dallas. If it did terminate in Houston, then it
would have to pass through this town, this one, then . . . Fort Stockton, he
decided. A medium-sized city in central Texas where CCM maintained a small
distribution facility. It was just large enough to have the people he d need,
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