They walked along in silence for several minutes, and then Cole said,
"At least we know the bag was left during the day of the robbery.
MacCorkle was a real sweetheart, wasn't he? " "You mean holding back
their wages if they didn't do a thorough job? " "Exactly, " Cole
said.
"Why would a woman leave her purse behind? " "She must have been in a
panic."
"If she was hiding in the kneehole, she saw the whole thing.
" "Maybe she saw the whole thing, " Ryan said. "We should talk to the
man who sits at the desk." He handed Cole the key to the front door of
the bank while he dug his notepad out again. After Cole had gone
inside and turned up the gas lamp, Ryan found what he was looking
for.
"His name's Lemont Morganstaff. We'll talk to him in the morning, " he
said. "He might know something about the bag."
"What's he gonna know? " Cole asked.
Ryan shrugged. "Probably nothing, but we have to ask him anyway. "
"And then what? " "If he doesn't know where the bag came from, we
still can't assume a woman was hiding in the kneehole. It could have
ended up there a hundred different ways. One of the three women could
have sat down at the desk to go through some papers. She might have
dropped it when she got up. Damn, I wish it wasn't so late."
"You're right. There could be a hundred different explanations. A
woman could have left it during the morning. She could have come
inside with a friend and been sitting at the desk while he did his
banking."
"Why would a woman carry around an empty purse? " "I don't know why
they carry them in the first place. Pockets are more efficient."
"We shouldn't get our hopes up. A woman might have dropped it, then
kicked it into the corner of the kneehole when she stood up. Does that
make sense to you? " Cole shook his head. "The women I know keep
track of their things."
"God, I hope she saw it."
"Now who's being ruthless?
If she did see the murders, she has to be scared out of her mind. The
last thing she's going to want to do is come forward."
"We'll protect her."
"She won't believe that, not if she heard what happened to Luke
MacFarland." Ryan began to pace around the lobby. In the shadows of
the gas lamps, the bloodstains resembled ghoulish outlines.
"We're going to try to follow procedure on this one. I don't want to
leave any stone unturned.
Exasperated, Cole said, "I've been a marshal one day. I don't know
what the procedures are."
"We interview the three women first, but we also question every man who
came in here yesterday."
"It seems like a waste of time to me, " Cole said.
"It's procedure." Cole leaned back against a desk and took another
bite of his apple.