“Over seventeen thousand people a year in the U.S. are seriously injured in incidents involving elevators and escalators,” Susan said.
Henry did not look remotely amused. His mouth was drawn tight and there were no laugh lines around his eyes. In the elevator light, Susan could see tiny spider veins blooming along his jaw-line.
“So we finished interviewing the psych-ward inmates this afternoon,” he said.
“Patients,” Susan corrected him.
He ignored her. “You ever meet Archie’s roommate?” Henry said. “Name’s Frank.Depressive. A little slow. Gets a lot of calls from his sister, talks about her constantly. Only it turns out he doesn’t have a sister.”
It wasn’t making very much sense to Susan. But then she was so tired, she wasn’t sure that simple arithmetic would make much sense. “So he lied about having a sister,” she said.
Henry hit the elevator emergency stop button. The elevator ground to a halt.
Susan looked up at the floor lights above the doors. Both the two and the three were lit up. They were stuck between floors. She was suddenly feeling more awake.
“You can’t do that,” Derek said, his voice rising. “There are only two working elevators. What if there’s a fire?”
Henry took a step right up against Derek. “If there’s a fire,” he said between gritted teeth, “you’re supposed to take the stairs.”
Derek backed against the wall. “Okay, sir,” he said.
Susan’s mind was clearing.
Henry leaned back on the elevator wall next to Derek. “I’ll tell you what I think,” he said to Derek, giving him a tap on the upper arm. “I think that Gretchen pretended to be Frank’s sister. I think that she was keeping tabs on Archie through Frank. Frank won’t admit to any of this.” He waved a hand in the air. “Swears on the Bible that he has a sister, who loves him very much.” He held up a single finger. “But he did tell me about a phone,” Henry said. “A cell phone. Frank took it out of Archie’s dresser drawer and Archie got mad. What do you think, Susan?”
Susan was having trouble breathing.
“You know anything about a cell phone?” Henry asked.
“No,” Susan said.
“I’ll tell you what I think,” Henry said. “I think Gretchen is in town.” He shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe she never left. So this Beauty Killer fan club, or cult, or whatever the fuck, may be responsible for much of our city’s recent mayhem. But I can’t find any evidence that our homicidal orderly ever used an Internet dating service. We’ve searched his computer at home. We’ve searched the computers he had access to at work. We’ve even searched the computers at his local library branch, which I can assure you is not easy. Nothing. Jeremy Reynolds didn’t manipulate our orderly into killing Courtenay Taggart. Gretchen Lowell did. I think she used the orderly to get Archie a phone. And then I think she had him kill a patient on the ward because she knew it would get Archie out of there. And if I find out that you knew about this phone, I will rain holy hell on you.”
“I think I found Pearl Clinton,” Derek said. “I got a call from a woman who runs a store on Hawthorne: From the Earth to the Moon. She said that Pearl used to work for her. I’m supposed to meet her there. You can check it out. If you want.”
No one said anything for a moment.
Finally, Susan broke the silence. “Pearl could lead us to Archie,” she said to Henry.
Henry hit the emergency button with the heel of his fist and the elevator strained for a moment and then started to move.
C H A P T E R 54
From the Earth to the Moon was on Hawthorne Boulevard in between a coffee shop and a free-trade store. Susan knew the place. It had been there about a year, replacing a Goth store, which had replaced a head shop.
If you had a subculture, Portland had a store for you.
“Here,” Susan said.
Henry pulled over in a loading zone directly in front of the store. Sometimes Susan wished she were a cop. Or at least had a car with cop plates.
“What is with this place?” Henry asked.
“It’s steampunk.”
“Steampunk?”
“It’s a subculture,” Susan said. “Sort of Victorian.Sort of sci-fi. The world as imagined by Jules Verne.”
Henry looked at her blankly.
“Have you ever read The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen?”
“Is it a baseball book?” Henry said.
“Never mind,” Susan said. “Pearl was wearing a corset and a
pair of goggles. This place sells that kind of thing. It makes sense that she worked here.”
They got out of the car and went inside the store.