“Why would a drifter have a photo of my son?” I asked.
“I saw you at town hall,” Walter whispered, his fingers moving quickly as he sorted a stack of envelopes. “The mayor was not happy when he left.”
“I am trying to find where a road leads,” I said. “Do you know an address on Elm Lane? A gray house near the old creek bed?”
Walter stopped tapping his pencil. He kept his eyes on the letters in his hand, his thumb rubbing the corner of an electric bill.
“The county revalued that whole block last month,” Walter said, his voice dropping even lower. “My supervisor, Mrs. Gable, told me to flag any inquiries about it. She said the mayor wanted a personal heads-up if anyone asked about the title.”
“Why would Thomas care about a house on Elm Lane?” I asked.
“His brother used to live there,” Walter said. “The brother who went south after the dairy farm closed down back in 2007.”
He pushed a receipt toward me, though I had not bought any stamps.
“Be careful, Margaret,” Walter whispered. “I cannot lose this job. My daughter’s tuition is due in January.”
At three, the library basement was cold. Evelyn sat before the green screen of the microfilm reader, her cardigan buttoned to the neck.
The machine groaned as she turned the black plastic wheel, sending yellowed pages of the *Oakhaven Ledger* spinning across the glass.
“Here,” Evelyn said, stopping the wheel with her palm. “October fourteenth, 2006. The annual autumn fire department breakfast.”
The black-and-white photograph showed five men standing in front of the old firehouse, holding paper plates of pancakes.
Just behind them, parked parallel to the curb, was the county patrol car.
Evelyn leaned in, her glasses touching the rubber shield of the screen.
“Look at the license plate,” she said.
I read the numbers aloud, my voice sounding thin in the empty basement archive. “SHF-04.”
“And now look at the bumper sticker,” Evelyn said, pointing her pencil at the dark blur on the right side.
It was a small, rectangular decal with a white star inside a black circle, the emblem of the State Police Association.
“That was Thomas’s personal county car,” Evelyn said. “He was the only deputy who used the number four designation.”
