Free The Ten-Mile Trials by Elizabeth Gunn Page B

house?’
    â€˜No,’ Ray said. ‘What does surprise me is that the gun is a Smith & Wesson .38 special – the Victory model.’ He recrossed his legs, looking discontented.
    â€˜Oh, yeah? I don’t know that gun. I’ve had the Model Fourteen for years, I used to use it for competition shoots . . .’
    â€˜Well sure, most of us did. But that was the Masterpiece.’ He sighed, remembering. ‘What a great weapon!’
    â€˜I had mine rigged out with a six-inch barrel and custom-fitted handgrips . . . it was almost guaranteed to raise your score.’
    â€˜Right. But those old Victory models, you say you never fired one?’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜They’d compare to the Model Fourteen like a Ford Falcon to a Cadillac. World War Two, they made about a million of them for the army, rough-finish cheapos. I see them sometimes in old movies. Some phoney like Dick Powell playing an asshole private eye sneaking down dark alleys alone at night.’
    â€˜You’re saying it’s not a very practical—’
    â€˜I’m saying it’s been discontinued since about 1982 and no bad guy’s going to walk into a dealer’s shop this year and buy one for protection.’
    â€˜Somebody’s collector’s item, then. A stolen gun.’
    â€˜But not from here. Saturday afternoon, I remembered how Property Crimes guys been yelling about so many break-ins, and I decided to look brilliant and solve this case all by myself. So I searched their last two weeks’ reports, thinking I’d come up with the .38 right away, but I got zilch. This morning I got LeeAnn to do a bigger search. She found no match in the last two years.’ He rubbed his face. ‘That gun wasn’t stolen here. We’re searching the five-state area now.’
    â€˜OK, pros from out of town. The victim wasn’t wearing a holster, was he? It’s not his own gun?’
    â€˜Don’t think so. Far as I could see, his only weapon was an ordinary boot knife in a holster on his right leg.’
    â€˜A boot knife. Not likely we could trace that if it was stolen.’
    â€˜Which may have been the point.’
    â€˜Huh. So what’s this Mass card you’re both so hot about?’
    Rosie said, ‘Ray found the card buttoned into an inside pocket of that jacket when they took it off him. You heard how all the labels had been cut out of his clothes? He was trying to be a nonperson – but he was carrying this card. Soon as Ray showed it to me, I said it looks like the Mass card you get at a funeral. It’s got a cross at the top, has a name and a date and a prayer – I think it’s a prayer. But it’s printed in some foreign language. Weird, strange lettering.’
    Ray said, ‘I showed it to Pokey – he got pretty interested, said he recognized the odd-shaped alphabet, he’s pretty sure it’s Ukrainian. He got a steno in the lab to come get it and make a copy for him.’
    â€˜But Pokey is Ukrainian. Wouldn’t he know if it was his own language?’
    â€˜You’d think so.’
    â€˜Anyway, you’ve got to admit it’s kind of interesting.’ Rosie’s eyes held a little sheen of excitement. ‘Isn’t it? A doper hoodlum who’s stripped himself of all identity but carries one keepsake. Maybe something he couldn’t bear to part with?’
    â€˜Or maybe it was left in the jacket by its previous owner, whose house he robbed?’
    I saw her face set in stubborn lines that said she liked her own story better.
    â€˜Well, BCA will sort it out, I guess. Now, who’s going to court with the prisoners?’
    Ray said, ‘Andy Pitman will take the tat freak – what’s his name?’
    â€˜Hogarth Peter Weber.’
    â€˜Oh, right, how could I forget that? He’s a real hard case, isn’t he?’
    â€˜Yes. I’m hoping I’ve got the County