Deep Freeze (Virgil Flowers #10)(86)

“Could have gone all day without asking that,” Shrake said.

—

The Barbies were housed in a variety of plain brown moving cartons, had been purchased individually in retail stores, and packed in the boxes for transport to the barn-factory. An assembly line had been set up on a rough plywood table, with four or five stools on each side of it, littered with batteries, tools, and surgically violated Barbies. A plastic bin of replacement parts was sitting in the middle of the table.

Virgil took it all in and thought about how sad it all was. “You guys going to arrest the women?”

Shrake shook his head. “Nah. Griffin says there’s no point. She wants to stop the manufacturing, and this ought to do it. She’s given everybody the cease-and-desist orders, so . . . I guess the Barbies go away, and that’s the end of it.”

“No sign of a rifle?”

“Really couldn’t look,” Shrake said. “Wasn’t on the warrant.”

—

There was an uncomfortable wait until the sheriff’s truck showed up, which turned out to be a city public works department utility truck. Shrake said he’d stay inside with the women until the boxes were all loaded, to keep them out of trouble, and Griffin went out with Jenkins to supervise the seizure of the dolls and the replacement parts.

When Griffin was gone, Virgil said to the women, “We’re not arresting you—but please, please don’t go back to manufacturing the dolls. I don’t want to come back to bust anyone, and I’ll have to if you violate the court orders.”

One of the women said, “You’re Virgil.” She was wearing a thin nylon babushka and looked like what Virgil thought a Syrian refugee might look like.

Virgil nodded.

“How in the hell are we going to eat, Virgil?”

“Don’t ask me that,” Virgil said. “Let me see what I can fix up with the town. Talk to the sheriff and see what can be done. I don’t like this, and Jenkins and Shrake don’t like it, but what you’re doing is illegal, and with the court orders . . . I mean, we got no choice.”

“You’re just following orders,” another woman said.

“C’mon,” Virgil said. But, he thought, he was. “Listen, I know you don’t owe me, but somebody tried to kill me last night. I need to know if it was somebody involved with you guys or if it came from whoever killed Gina Hemming and Margot Moore.”

The third woman said, “Like you said, we don’t owe you.”

“You don’t, but I’m going after the guy who did that . . . but maybe less hard if it was somebody trying to set me back a little, get me off your back. If it was the murderer, well, I’m going to be pulling up trees by the roots to find him. It’d help if I knew which was which.”

After some sideways glances, one of the women said, “You know what? If I thought it would slow you down going after our people, I’d tell you. But I can’t because we really don’t know. Heard about it this morning down at Dunkin’ Donuts, and we were talkin’ about it on the way out here to work . . . But . . . don’t know.”

“All right,” Virgil said. “You’ve got your legal papers there, don’t violate them. When we’re out of here, if one of you knows how to get in touch with Jesse, tell her to call me. She knows the number.”





TWENTY-SIX Virgil left the farmhouse to Jenkins, Shrake, and Griffin and drove into town, straight on through, and down Highway 26 to Lansing, Iowa, where he crossed the river and continued down Highway 35 to Prairie du Chien. Snowpacked spots on the highway, and the unfamiliarity of the new truck, slowed him down, and he was driving for two hours. On the way, he called the duty officer at the BCA and asked him to tell the Prairie du Chien cops that he was going to stop by and why.

He figured out the truck’s navigation system as he drove, and the truck steered him right into the police department, which was housed in a white stone building next to what looked like, under the snow cover, a city park. The chief, he was told, was vacationing in Pensacola Beach, Florida, but Lieutenant Anderson Blaine was waiting and had been briefed on Virgil’s problem.

Blaine turned out to be a tall, mild-mannered man, with black hair, black-rimmed glasses, and a black uniform. “Call me Andy. I understand you’re looking for William Gurney, Mark Pendleton, and Son Davis,” he said.

“Need to chat, unless one of them suddenly confesses to murder.”

“Don’t see that happening,” Blaine said. “Let me get my coat. I’ll walk you over to Le Café—it’s a couple of blocks—you can talk to William and Mark.”

Outside, Virgil asked, “This is a French restaurant?”

“Bastard French,” Blaine said. “Started out with crêpes, steak-frites, baguettes, and cheese plates, ended up with really good coffee and banana muffins in the morning, chicken-fried steak, fries, and baguettes at night. The cheese plates stayed, of course, this being Wisconsin.”

“Of course,” Virgil said.

“I might mention to you, William and Mark are gay,” Blaine said. “Not that there’s anything wrong with that. They’re a little flamboyant about it, but they’re good guys, on the whole.”

“Good information,” Virgil said. “The guys I’m looking at up in Trippton are gay, too. Or something like that.”