I took Buster for a walk on the beach with my cell phone clutched in my hand. I was tired and my head hurt, and I put both of those things out of my mind.
The motorcycle cop stayed ten yards behind me. He’d put his helmet on his bike, and walked while talking into a cell phone. I caught snippets of conversation, and heard him talking to his wife about an upcoming vacation to the Keys. It was obvious he wasn’t taking his assignment too seriously.
On my way back, I retrieved Chuck Cobb’s homicide report from my car. I needed something to do while waiting for Burrell to call me, and reviewing Cobb’s report was a good way to pass the time.
I went inside. It was Happy Hour, and the Dwarfs noisily lined the bar. I took my usual table by the window, put my cell phone in front of me, and started to read.
“You want a beer?” Sonny called to me.
“Another pot of coffee,” I replied.
“Boo,” the Dwarfs said.
The report was fifteen pages long. A lot had happened the day I’d discovered Piper Stone’s body in the Dumpster, and I found myself stopping every few paragraphs to dredge my memory. Sonny served me a fresh pot along with a frosty mug of beer.
“What’s this?” I asked.
“They made me,” he said.
I glanced at the bar, and saw the Dwarfs raise their glasses.
By the time I had finished the report, it was pitch black outside. I sipped my coffee, which had gotten cold but still tasted good. On the cover page of the report was Cobb’s work number and cell number. I tried both, and Cobb answered his work line.
“This is Jack Carpenter,” I said. “I just finished reading your report on Piper Stone’s murder. There’s an error in it.”
Cobb groaned. “Damn, I’m never going home tonight.”
“Sorry. It’s nothing huge.”
“Lay it on me.”
“On page five, you say that Vorbe, the grocery store manager, told me he saw Jed Grimes hanging around the Dumpsters, and called the police. That wasn’t what Vorbe told me. He said an employee had seen Jed, and alerted him.”
“You know, I saw that discrepancy as well,” Cobb said.
“You did?”
“Yeah. The store manager’s version of who saw Jed differed from yours. I called him, and we talked about it.”
“What did he say?”
“He said you must have heard him wrong.”
The coffee was a few inches from my lips. I put it back down on the table.
“Is that what he told you?”
“Yes.”
“Were there any other discrepancies in our stories?”
“No, just that one. I didn’t think it was a big deal. Do you?”
I stared out the window at the ocean, and thought about it. Most police reports contained errors, or what cops liked to call misstated facts. But this wasn’t an error. Vorbe had told me one thing, and he’d told Cobb another.
“He changed his story,” I said.
“If it makes you feel any better, I talked to the employees at the store, and the manager’s version checked out,” Cobb said. “None of the employees saw Jed hanging around the Dumpsters. It was the manager, and he called the police.”
“So why did Vorbe change his story?”
“He didn’t, Jack. You heard him wrong. Everything else he said checks out with what you said. Haven’t you ever heard someone wrong before?”
I started to reply, then shut my mouth. There was no use arguing with Cobb. He’d already talked to the store manager, and the manager had convinced him that I was wrong. That bothered me even more than the lie he’d told.
“There’s my other line,” Cobb said. “I’ll call you back when I’m done, and we can talk about this some more.”
I folded my phone. Jed had told me that Heather had gone to get food, and was going to surprise him. I’d assumed that meant she was going to a restaurant, but it could have been the local grocery store. I went to the bar. The Dwarfs were slugging whiskey and feeling no pain. I pulled out a twenty-dollar bill, and waved it in their faces.
“Who’s up for a game of chicken?” I asked.
“I am,” a Dwarf named Shorty said. Shorty stood six-feet-four and got his nickname because he was always short on cash.
“How fast are you?” I asked.
“Depends who’s chasing me,” Shorty said.
I gave Shorty the money and told him the rules.
“Piece of cake,” he said.
Shorty walked outside the bar. I went to the window, and watched him approach the motorcycle cop. Shorty was acting drunker than he was, his body swaying from side to side. The cop ignored him, and continued to talk on his cell phone.
Shorty lifted the cop’s helmet off the motorcycle’s bars, and went running down the beach as fast as his legs would carry him. The cop jumped off his bike and gave chase.
I headed for the door, and felt something by my leg. It was Buster, and his tail was wagging.
“You’re on,” I told him.