I said, "He was subtle about it, too. I remember when he mentioned that the body had been wrapped, he was so offhand about it, I thought it was just a minor part of Frankie's jailhouse talk. The same with the fact she'd been stabbed."

"You didn't mention it yourself?"

"Of course not. He was fishing for information, but I never gave him that. No wonder he was so worried about word getting back. Frankie'd go berserk if he thought Pudgie pointed a finger at him. I take it the second set of prints wasn't Frankie's."

"Nah, what a pisser. I felt bad about that."

"Me, too. I just talked to the painting contractor, a guy named ,Lennie Root. He says Frankie and Pudgie both worked for him in early '69. After six months, Frankie quit-this was approximately mid-June. Apparently, after that, he worked in Blythe for three weeks. That's where he met and married Iona Mathis."

"What about Pudgie? Where was he?"

"Don't know, but I can go back and ask. I was focusing on Frankie."

"So Root puts him in Quorum at the same time as Charisse ?"

"Not Quorum, but Blythe, which is close enough," I said. "By the end of July when she disappeared, Frankie'd moved to Venice, a five-hour drive. Here I was, just about to swing over to your view, thinking Frankie's our guy, and now Pudgie surfaces, so there goes that."

"Not necessarily. They could've been in it together. Pudgie told you they didn't know each other, but that was clearly horseshit."

"Yeah, right. Pudgie knew Iona, so why wouldn't he know Frankie? She could have introduced them," I said. "Or maybe it was the other way around and Pudgie was the one who introduced Iona to Frank."

"Well, it doesn't make much difference since the second set of prints wasn't his. Personally, I hate to see him off the hook for this."

"Well, someone was in the Mustang with Pudgie. Iona maybe?"

Stacey frowned, scratching at the underside of his chin. "Well now, wait a minute. Hold on. That's a leap we can't make. We're putting Pudgie in the Mustang when the girl was killed, but the prints might have been sequential instead of simultaneous. Did Pudgie know the McPhees?"

"If he stole the car it wouldn't matter if he knew them or not."

"Problem is, if Pudgie knew Cornell or anyone of them, he might've had legitimate access to the vehicle. The car came back in poor condition. Ruel might have asked him to move it into the shed or hose it down. Or he and Cornell might have gone out to the shed to sneak a smoke. There could be all kinds of explanations for his prints being there."

I said, "Assuming they knew each other."

"Right."

I thought about that briefly. "Pudgie did grow up in Creosote, which is only sixteen miles south. I think it's down below Hazelwood Springs."

"That's my point."