The Colorado Kid   ::   Кинг Стивен

“No lighter?”

“Nolighter.” Both men said it together, then laughed.



11

“Devane waited until Monday,” Dave said, “and when the business about the cigarettes still wouldn’t quit nagging him—wouldn’t quit even though he was almost a year and a half downriver from that part of his life—he called me on the telephone and explained to me that he had an idea that maybe, justmaybe, the pack of cigarettes John Doe had been carrying around hadn’t come from the State of Maine. If not, the stamp on the bottom would show where theyhad come from. He voiced his doubts about whether John Doe was a smoker at all, but said the taxstamp might be a clue even if he wasn’t. I agreed with him, but was curious as to why he’d called me. He said he couldn’t think of anyone else who still might be interested at that late date. He was right, Iwas still interested—Vince, too—and he turned out to be right about the stamp, as well.

“Now, I am not a smoker myself and never have been, which is probably one of the reasons I’ve attained the great age of sixtyfive in such beautiful shape—”

Vince grunted and waved a hand at him. Dave continued, unperturbed.

“—so I made a little trip downstreet to Bayside News and asked if I could examine a package of cigarettes. My request was granted, and I observed that there was indeed anink stamp on the bottom, not a postagetype stamp. I then made a call to the Attorney General’s Office and spoke to a fellow name of Murray in a department called Evidence Storage and filing. I was as diplomatic as I could possibly be, Stephanie, because at that time those two dumbbell detectives would still have been on active duty—”

“And they’d overlooked a potentially valuable clue, hadn’t they?” Steff asked. “One that could have narrowed the search for John Doe down to one single state. And it was practically staring them in the face.”

“Yep,” Vince said, “and no way could they blame their intern, either, because they’d specifically told him to keep his nose out of the evidence bag. Plus, by the time it became clear that he’d disobeyed them—”

“—he was beyond their reach,” she finished.

“You said it,” Dave agreed. “But they wouldn’t have gotten much of a scolding in any case. Remember, they had an actual murder investigation going over in Tinnock—manslaughter, two folks burned to death—and John Doe was just a choking victim.”

“Still…” Stephanie looked doubtful.