On the desk was a photo of Ori in her youth. She really had been beautiful, with large luminous eyes. I searched the desk drawers. Nothing of interest. Checked the closet alcove, which was filled with summer clothing. The bathroom held nothing. The door that connected this room to room 20 was locked. Locked doors are always more interesting than the other kind. This time I got out my set of key picks and set to work. In TV shows, people pick locks with remarkable ease. Not so in real life, where you have to have the patience of a saint. I was working in the dark, clamping the penlight in my mouth like a cigar while I used the rocker pick in my left hand and the wire in my right. Sometimes I do this efficiently, but that's usually when the light is good. This time it took forever, and I was sweating from the tension when the lock finally gave.

Room 20 was a duplicate of the one I'd occupied. This was Ann's bedroom, the one Maxine was not to clean. I could see why. On the closet floor, dead ahead, was a Ponsness-Warren shot shell reloader with a built-in wad guide, an adjustable crimp die, and two powder reservoirs filled with rock salt. I crossed to the closet and hunkered down, inspecting the device, which looks like a cross between a bird feeder and a cappuccino machine, and is designed to pack a shell with anything you like. A blast of rock salt, at close range, usually ends up buried under your skin where it stings like a son of a bitch, but doesn't do much else. Tap had found out just how ineffectual salt can be in staving off the sheriff's deputies.