Little Girl Gone (An Afton Tangler Thriller #1)(61)

They passed the Basilica, its dark green dome gleaming in the faint sunlight, slid under a bridge, and turned up Hennepin past the sculpture garden. Everywhere they went, traffic was either backed up or crawling at a glacial pace. Thanks to continued cold and two more inches of snow last night, there were also stalled vehicles, fender benders, and abandoned cars.

Afton was pleased that Max had dialed back on his aggressive driving and was exercising a bit more caution today. She could almost relax in the passenger seat and take a deep breath. Almost.

“Where are we going?” she asked, one eye still focused on the speedometer.

“Sampson’s,” Max said. He momentarily swerved into the oncoming lane, dodging a car that was stuck at the bottom of a steep grade. “Gotta look somebody up.”

“Who?”

“A guy.”


*

MAX drove past Sampson’s Bar, made a U-turn, and then pulled in front of the bar, nosing into a no-parking zone. He threw an OFFICIAL POLICE BUSINESS card on the dashboard and said, “C’mon. We’re gonna have us a little confab with The Scrounger.”

Afton gazed at the cheesy red-and-yellow exterior of Sampson’s Bar, which clearly announced, I’m a dive. The hand-lettered sign in the window advertising Dubble Bubble seemed to say, Come on in, the drinkin’s fine.

“How do you even know he’s here?”

“Couple of things tipped me off,” Max said. “First off, there’s his butt-ugly pickup truck held together with Bondo tape parked illegally in a spot marked ‘Handicapped.’”

“Okay.”

“Plus Sampson’s is the crappiest bar in the neighborhood, which makes it his official stomping ground. Everything else around here is your basic fig and fern bar.”

“I think fig and fern bars went out in the early nineties,” Afton said.

“What do they call them now?”

“I don’t know. Maybe craft beer bistros or wine bars. Something like that.”

“Still,” Max said. “It’s the same old bullshit.”

“Of course it is.”

The interior of Sampson’s was darker than pitch. Probably well under the regulation lumens required by the liquor licensing board. That was okay with Afton. This way she wouldn’t have to look at the winos who were already slumped anonymously at the front bar, or the ugly orange carpet, or the studded red plastic lamps that dangled on bare cords.

Max paused to study the inhabitants, didn’t recognize any familiar faces lurking at the bar, and turned his attention to what could loosely be called the dining room. Loosely, because it was basically three Formica tables and an unattended pull-tab booth encased in chicken wire.

Seated at one of the tables, eating peanuts and sipping an amber-colored drink, was a man dressed in coveralls, Red Wing work boots, and a red cap with the earflaps down. His chair was tipped back and he was watching a college hockey game on TV.

“There’s our boy,” Max said.

They strolled across a dark expanse of dance floor that felt sticky underfoot, and headed straight for The Scrounger’s table.

“Whoa,” The Scrounger said when he caught sight of Max. “Look who’s out slumming.”

“How do,” Max said.

“Detective Montgomery,” The Scrounger said. “What an unexpected pleasure.” His eyes flicked over and took in Afton. “And I do believe you’ve made a serious upgrade when it comes to your choice in partners.”

“Thanks,” Afton said. “I think. Although I’m not technically a detective.” The Scrounger had ginger-colored hair pulled back into a ponytail, a scruffy beard, and brown eyes that were pinpricks of intensity. He looked like a cross between a stoner and a University of Minnesota English professor.

“Mmn,” The Scrounger said, smiling at Afton. “You must be a protégée then.”

“Something like that,” Max said. He sat down across from The Scrounger and Afton followed suit. “This is Afton Tangler. She’s been working with me on the Darden kidnapping case.”

“Ah,” The Scrounger said. “Nasty.” He crunched a peanut between his front teeth and smiled again at Afton. “I meant the case, not you.”

“The FBI is working the case pretty hard,” Max said. “Obviously, they would. But MPD is running its own investigation as well.”

“It’s been all over the news,” The Scrounger said. “They think it might have been a woman who stole the kid?”

“It’s possible,” Afton said.

“I know that Kenwood Parkway, where the Dardens live, is one of your routes,” Max said.

“Surely you don’t think that I—”

Max held up a hand. “No, no, nothing like that. But I know you’re familiar with that particular part of the city.”

The Scrounger nodded. “Intimately.”

“And I was wondering if maybe you’d seen or heard anything that was a little off?”

“You mean suspicious,” The Scrounger said.

“Right,” Afton said.

The Scrounger thought for a few moments. “Last week I found an entire set of encyclopedias dumped in a trash can in the alley that runs behind James Avenue. Can you believe that? A compendium of universal knowledge trashed along with the detritus of chicken bones and potato peels. The biography of Cicero, great battles of World War Two, and botanical miracles. What’s the world coming to?”