L is for Lawless (Kinsey Millhone 12)

"How'd you do?" Ray asked blandly.

"I left a message for Henry. I'm hoping he'll call back in the next hour or so."

"Too bad you didn't get through to him. I guess there's no point in going out to the airport until you talk to him."

I sat down at the table, ignoring his commiseration, which was patently insincere. I said, "Let's start with the keys."

Ray made a note on the pad. The note said "keys." He drew a circle around it, squinting thoughtfully. "What difference does it make about the keys as long as Gilbert's got 'em?"

"Because they're just about the only tangible clue we have. Let's just write down what we remember."

"Which is what? I don't remember nothing."

"Well, one was iron. About six inches long, an old-fashioned skeleton key, a Lawless. The other was a Master…"

"Wait a minute. How'd you know that?"

"Because I looked," I said. I turned to Helen. "You have a telephone book? I didn't see one in there, and we're probably going to need one."

"It's in the dresser drawer. Hold on a second. I'll get it," Ray said, and got up. He disappeared into the bedroom.

I called after him, "Have you ever heard of Lawless? I thought it might be local." I looked over at Helen. "Does that ring a bell with you?" She shook her head. "Never heard of it." Ray came back with two books in hand, the Louisville residential listings and the Yellow Pages. "What makes you think it's local?"

I took the Yellow Pages. "I'm an optimist," I said. "In my business, I always start with the obvious." He put the residential listings on an empty chair seat. I leafed through the pages until I found the listings for locksmiths. There was no "Lawless" in evidence, but Louisville Locksmith Company looked like a promising possibility. The big display ad indicated they'd been in business since 1910. "We might want to try the public library, too. The phone books from the early forties might be informative."

"She's a private investigator," Ray said to his mother. "That's how she got into this."

"Well, I wondered who she was."

I set the phone book on the table, open to the pages where all the locksmiths were listed. I tapped the Louisville Locksmith display ad. "We'll give this place a call in a minute," I said. "Now where were we?" I glanced at his notes. "Oh yeah, the other key was a Master. I think they only make padlocks, but again, we can ask when we talk to the guy. So here's the question. Are we looking for a big door and then a smaller one? Or a door and then a cabinet or storage unit, something like that?"

Ray shrugged. "Probably the first. Back in the forties, they didn't have those self-storage places like the ones they have now. Wherever Johnny put the money, he had to be sure it wasn't going to be disturbed. Couldn't be a safe-deposit box because the key didn't look right to me. And besides, the guy hated banks. That's what got him into trouble in the first place. He's hardly going to walk into a bank with the proceeds from a bank heist, right?"

"Yeah, right. Plus, banks get torn down or remodeled or turned into other businesses. What about some other kind of public building? City Hall or the courthouse? The Board of Education, a museum?"

Ray wagged his head, not liking the idea much. "Same thing, don't you think? Some developer comes along and sees it as a prime piece of real estate. Doesn't matter what's on it."

"What about some other places around town? Historical landmarks. Wouldn't they be protected?"

"Let me think about that."

"A church," Helen said suddenly.

"That's possible," Ray said.

She pointed to the pad. "Write it down."

Ray made a note about churches. "There's the water works by the river. School buildings. Churchill Downs. They're not going to tear that place down."

"What about a big estate somewhere?"

"That's an idea. There used to be plenty around. I been gone for years, though, so I don't know what's left."

"If he was running from the cops, he had to have a place that was easily accessible," I said. "And it had to be relatively free from intrusion."

Ray wrinkled his forehead. "How could he guarantee nobody else would find it? That's a hell of a risk. Leave big canvas bags of money somewhere. How do you know a kid won't stumble across it playing stickball?"