What was gained by having Tolliver in jail? That was the crucial question. What was the result of his incarceration?

Well, the first thing to pop up in my mind was that we’d have to stay in Sarne longer now. But I couldn’t understand why that would be to anyone’s advantage. A wild thought crossed my mind, and I made myself consider it. Could Hollis have become so nuts about me in such a short time that he was willing to frame Tolliver to keep me here? I just couldn’t swallow that. Actually, it was somewhat easier to believe a scenario in which Mary Nell sprung the same trap on Tolliver, because the phony warrant and the broken taillight seemed like such desperate and amateurish steps. But it seemed very unlikely that Mary Nell would even know we’d been in trouble in Montana once upon a time, and even if she’d learned about the episode somehow, she wouldn’t be able to go on the police computer network and somehow enter a false incident.

I tried to imagine a credible progression of cause and effect, opportunity and motive, sitting in my lonely hotel room. When my mind remained persistently blank, I opened the door to Tolliver’s room and went and sat there. The maid had done the beds and put fresh towels out, so there wasn’t even a trace of Tolliver in his room, at least to my eyes. For a little while, though, being there made me feel a tad better; but after a bit, I felt foolish, and then I felt like an intruder, so I went back.

There was a knock at the door, and I nearly jumped out of my skin. I glanced down at my watch. I’d been sitting there, with my thoughts scurrying around like hamsters in an exercise wheel, for over an hour.

At the door, Hollis said, “I’m sorry.”

“Did you . . . you didn’t have anything to do with this, right?”

“No,” he said, not sounding offended. He sounded almost too gentle, the way you sound when you’re afraid a dog might turn on you. “Marv Bledsoe and Jay Hopkins, they used to drink together.”

I remembered the smug look on Jay Hopkins’ face, and I felt sure he’d called Marv and told him where to catch hold of us. No wonder he hadn’t minded us getting the hair samples. He hadn’t believed we’d have time to get them in the mail.

“I’ve never trusted Jay, or Marv for that matter. Unfortunately, Harvey does, or at least he acts like he does. And the state guys are gone. They went off to check out another teen date murder they think might be related to Teenie’s and Dell’s. So there’s no brakes on Marv, like there ought to be.”

“So, have you seen this warrant?”