She shrugged.
"Foreign," she said. "Some kind of a Latino. Maybe from Cuba? Little dark guy, slender, nice smile. Very polite sort of a guy, as I recall."
"You got a list of the stuff?" I said.
She slid the stubby finger further along the line. There was a small column filled with tight handwriting. It listed a garment bag, eight articles of clothing, a toilet bag, four shoes. The last item listed was: one briefcase.
We just walked away from her and found the stairs back to the lobby. Walked out into the morning sun. It didn't feel like such a great day anymore.
We reached the car. Leaned side by side on the front fender. I was weighing up in my mind whether Joe would have been smart enough and careful enough to do what I would have done. I figured maybe he would have been. He'd spent a long time around smart and careful people.
"Roscoe?" I said. "If you were the guy walking out of here with Joe's stuff, what would you do?"
She stopped with the car door half open. Thought about it. "I'd keep the briefcase," she said. "Take it wherever I was supposed to take it. The rest of the stuff, I'd get rid of it."
"That's what I would do as well," I said. "Where would you get rid of it?"
"First place I saw, I guess," she said.
There was a service road running between the hotel and the next one in line. It looped behind the hotels and then out onto the perimeter road. There was a line of Dumpsters along a twenty-yard stretch of it. I pointed.
"Suppose he drove out that way?" I said. "Suppose he stopped and lobbed the garment bag straight into one of those Dumpsters?"
"But he'd have kept the briefcase, right?" Roscoe said.
"Maybe we aren't looking for the briefcase," I said. "Yesterday, I drove miles and miles out to that stand of trees, but I hid in the field. A diversion, right? It's a habit. Maybe Joe had the same habit. Maybe he carried a briefcase but kept his important stuff in the garment bag."
Roscoe shrugged. Wasn't convinced. We started walking down the service road. Up close, the Dumpsters were huge. I had to lever myself up on the edge of each one and peer in. The first one was empty. Nothing in it at all, except the baked-on kitchen dirt from years of use. The second one was full. I found a length of studding from some demolished drywall and poked around with it. Couldn't see anything. I heaved myself down and walked to the next one.
There was a garment bag in it. Lying right on top of some old cartons. I fished for it with the length of wood. Hauled it out. Tossed it onto the ground at Roscoe's feet. Jumped down next to it. It was a battered, well-traveled bag. Scuffed and scratched. Lots of airline tags all over it. There was a little nameplate in the shape of a miniature gold credit card fastened to the handle. It said: Reacher.
"OK, Joe," I said to myself. "Let's see if you were a smart guy."
I was looking for the shoes. They were in the outside pocket of the bag. Two pairs. Four shoes, just like it said on the housekeeper's list. I pulled the inner soles out of each one in turn. Under the third one, I found a tiny Ziploc bag. With a sheet of computer paper folded up inside it.
"Smart as a whip, Joe," I said to myself, and laughed.
Chapter Twenty
ROSCOE AND I DANCED AROUND THE SERVICE ALLEY TOGETHER like players in the dugout watching the winning run soar out of sight. Then we hustled over to the Chevy and raced the mile back to our hotel. Ran into the lobby, into the elevator. Unlocked our room and fell in. The telephone was ringing. It was Finlay, on the line from Margrave again. He sounded as excited as we were.
"Molly Beth Gordon just called," he said. "She did it. She's got the files we need. She's flying down here, right now. She told me it was amazing stuff. Sounded high as a kite. Atlanta arrivals, two o'clock. I'll meet you there. Delta, from Washington. Picard give you anything?"
"Sure did," I said. "He's quite a guy. I got the rest of the printout, I think."
"You think?" Finlay said. "You don't know?"
"Only just got back," I said. "Haven't looked at it yet."
"So look at it, for Christ's sake," he said. "It's important, right?"
"See you later, Harvard guy," I said.
We sat down at the table over by the window. Unzipped the little plastic bag and pulled out the paper. Unfolded it carefully. It was a sheet of computer paper. The top inch had been torn off the right-hand corner. Half the heading had been left behind. It said: Operation E Unum.
"Operation E Unum Pluribus," Roscoe said.
Underneath was a triple-spaced list of initials with telephone numbers opposite. The first set of initials was P.H. The phone number was torn off.
"Paul Hubble," Roscoe said. "His number and the other half of the heading was what Finlay found."
I nodded. Then there were four more sets of initials. The first two were W.B. and K.K. They had phone numbers alongside. I recognized a New York area code against K.K. The W.B. area code I figured I'd have to look up. The third set of initials was J.S. The code was 504. New Orleans area. I'd been there less than a month ago. The fourth set of initials was M.B.G. There was a phone number with a 202 area code. I pointed to it, so Roscoe could see it.
"Molly Beth Gordon," she said. "Washington, D.C."
I nodded again. It wasn't the number I had called from the rosewood office. Maybe her home number. The final two items on the torn paper were not initials, and there were no corresponding phone numbers. The second-to-last item was just two words: Stollers' Garage. The last item was three words: Gray's Kliner File. I looked at the careful capital letters and I could just about feel my dead brother's neat, pedantic personality bursting off the page.