Free The Long Count by JM Gulvin

and a tiny bathroom at the back. The bed was freshly made and the drapes at the window tied back. Yellow flowers had been painted directly onto plain blocks of blue cinder that made up the walls. The carpet was threadbare and patchy and in places he could see a hint of concrete showing through.
    It looked as though everything had been vacuumed thoroughly and he imagined if Grace was sharp enough to spot the barrel of a shotgun by the side of the road then she would be more than fastidious in her work. Standing in the doorway still, he cast an eye across the nightstand, the bedclothes and the little table where theTV was set. Nothing jumped out at him initially; he could see no marks on the table or nightstand to indicate where someone might have taken a saw to a shotgun. But then his gaze fastened on the luggage rack.
    Moving into the room now he shut the door and considered the carpet again. It was clear Grace had worked it hard, but he kept to the edge of the room as he sought the luggage rack. Folding metal legs with canvas bands running in between, taking care to open it up he inspected those bands and could see nothing at first, but then he picked up the tiniest slivers of what looked like shavings of steel. In the bathroom he tore a piece of toilet paper off the roll and gently smoothed the shavings onto it. Folding the paper over, he took a pen and marked it with the room number and name of the motel.
    Back in the parking lot he opened the trunk of his car where his 7mm hunting rifle was clipped to the underside of the lid. Lying on top of a folded sheet of tarpaulin was a briefcase and inside that a stack of evidence envelopes. Carefully he slipped the fold of toilet paper into one of those then sealed it and scribbled a note on the front. Grabbing a roll of police tape from his tool box he sealed the door to the motel room, then went back to reception for the barrel of the gun.
    Back in the little kiosk he called the sheriff’s office and requested that a lab team be sent down to dust the room. He told them he wanted a teletype of any fingerprints they recovered forwarded both to the National Crime Information Center and his captain’s office in Amarillo. Then he went back to his car and drove the short distance into town.
    The mercantile was on the right-hand side and he pulled into the parking lot and went in. A young woman was sitting on a stool at the checkout chewing gum, and he asked her if she remembered anyone coming in to purchase a hacksaw.
    ‘Yes, sir,’ she said. ‘Young guy about my age came in here first thing.’
    ‘What was it he bought exactly?’
    ‘A hacksaw like you said. That and a roll of duct tape.’
    Thanking her, Quarrie went back to the parking lot and was about to get in his car when he noticed the facade of the local bank. He stood there for a second or so chewing his lip and thinking how there’d been no wallet on the dead man in the trunk of the cruiser.
    Inside the bank, he talked to the cashier and she showed him the check she had cashed for sixty dollars. A little red-faced, she admitted she had not asked the young man for any identification.
    Using the manager’s phone Quarrie spoke to Ranger Headquarters in Austin and then he went back to the mercantile to get a cup of coffee while he waited for somebody to call him back. He was sitting in his car outside the bank with his hat over his eyes when the manager came out and Quarrie followed him.
    A dispatcher was on the phone and he took it at the manager’s desk. ‘John Q,’ the woman said, ‘we got the information you wanted. The body you found in the trunk was a salesman called Kelly, working for a farm supplies company out of Little Rock, and it’s the company that owns the vehicle. 1966 Buick sedan, it’s black and the license plate is five, double-three, double-one.’
    ‘All right,’ Quarrie told her. ‘I want an APB out on that car and someone from Arkansas needs to call on Kelly’s next of kin.’

Ten
    Isaac