We walked up the two ruts that constituted Theo Stamos’s driveway. It was about a hundred feet up to the trailer, a fifty- or sixty-foot rust-streaked mobile home that had probably been manufactured in the seventies. It was set on an angle, the side with the two doors-one forward and one aft-facing northwest. There were lights on inside, providing enough illumination so we could see where we were walking.
“How long’s he lived here?” I asked.
“Long as I’ve known him,” Sally said. “That’s a couple of years. I don’t get where he would be. I talked to him on the phone a couple of hours ago.”
“At one in the morning?”
“Around then.”
“Kind of late for a phone call?”
“Okay, so, we kind of had a fight, you know?” She sighed. “Because of you.”
I didn’t say anything.
“I mean, Theo was pretty pissed at you, and he was going on about it to me, like it’s my fault or something because I work for you.”
“I’m sorry, Sally,” I said. I meant it.
“And then I find out that something has happened since then, with Doug.” Even in the darkness, I could make out her accusing look. “Something that might get Theo off the hook.”
I hadn’t gotten around to telling her about finding the bogus electrical parts in Doug’s truck. “I was going to fill you in on that,” I said.
“Doug had those fake parts? Boxes of them?”
“That’s right,” I said.
“Did it occur to you then that maybe it wasn’t Theo’s fault? I mean, if Doug had those parts now, couldn’t he have had them when the Wilson house burned down?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “But regardless, Theo installed them, and he should have been able to spot the difference.”
“You’re impossible.”
“How did you hear about Doug?” I asked.
“He called me. He was so upset. Especially after you’ve been friends for so long, how he saved your life and everything.”
I winced mentally.
“And I told Theo,” Sally continued. “And he was super mad, he kept calling me about it, the last time around one, I guess. So I thought, I better come over here and try to calm him down.”
“And he wasn’t home?”
We’d arrived at the steps that led up to the trailer door.
“No,” Sally said. “But if he’s not here, why’s his truck here?”
“You’ve been inside?”
She nodded.
“You’ve got a key?”
Another nod. “But it was open when I got here.”
“He’s not in there passed out or anything?” She shook her head. “Let’s have a look just the same.”
I swung open the metal door and stepped inside the trailer. It was pretty spacious, as trailers go. I stepped into a living room, about ten by twelve. There was a couch and a couple of cushy chairs, a big-screen TV sitting atop a stereo unit, a scattering of DVDs and video games. There were half a dozen empty beer bottles around the room, but it wasn’t quite a frat house in here.
The kitchen, to the left of the partition as you walked in, was another story. The sink was overflowing with dirty dishes. There were several empty takeout containers littering the countertop, a couple of empty pizza boxes. Theo’s truck keys were on the kitchen table, next to a stack of invoices and other work-related papers. While the place was a mess, nothing looked particularly out of order. It wasn’t like there were upturned chairs and blood on the walls.
I picked up the keys and jangled them. “Wouldn’t think he’d go far without these,” I said, as though they were some sort of clue.
On the far side of the kitchen was a narrow hallway that led down the left side of the trailer. There were four doors off it-two small bedrooms, a bathroom, and a larger bedroom at the tail end. The smaller bedrooms had been turned into storage rooms. Empty stereo boxes, clothes, tools, stacks of Penthouse and Playboy magazines, and others raunchier than those, filled each of them.
I didn’t, at a glance, see any boxes of counterfeit electrical equipment.
The bathroom was about what you’d expect of a single guy. Just one step above an interstate highway gas station restroom. And the large bedroom was an explosion of work clothes and boots and tossed covers.
“You ever stay here?” I asked Sally. It wasn’t a question about her sex life. I just couldn’t picture her tolerating this mess.
She shuddered. “No, God. Theo’d sleep over at my place.”
“When you guys get married, you moving in to your house?” I almost called it her father’s place.
“Yeah,” she said.
“Anything look funny here to you?” I asked.
“Just the usual horror show,” she said. “Where would he go?”
“Would he have gone out with a friend? Maybe someone came over and they went out for a drink or something.”
Sally pondered a moment. “Then why didn’t he take his keys and lock up when he left? He’s not going to want someone to steal his truck.”
“Did you try his cell?” I asked.
She nodded. “Before I came over. And his phone here. Both went to message.”
I thought. “We should give it another try.” I walked back up the narrow hallway and picked up the phone on the kitchen counter. “Hang on,” I said. “Let’s check the history. If somebody called him on his landline, invited him out, we’ll see who it is.”
