"You're too much, Weir. Come on."

Rhyme thought of something. "Oh, Lon?" The detective glanced his way. "You have a feeling when he helped us find the pick in his tooth that might've been a little misdirection?"

Kara nodded. "You're right."

Weir looked disgusted as Sellitto searched again. This time the detective checked every tooth. He found a second lock pick in a similar fake tooth on the lower left jaw.

"I'm gonna make sure they put you someplace real special," the detective said ominously. He then called another officer into the room and had him shackle Weir's feet with two sets of cuffs.

"I can't walk this way," Weir complained in a wheeze.

"Baby steps," Sellitto said coldly. "Take baby steps."

Chapter Thirty-three

The man got the message at a diner on Route 244, which because he didn't have a phone in his trailer—didn't want one, didn't trust 'em—is where he took and made all his calls.

Sometimes a few days went by before he picked up the messages but because he was expecting an important call today he'd hurried—to the extent he ever hurried—to Elma's Diner right after Bible school.

Hobbs Wentworth was a bear-sized man with a thin red beard around his face and a fringe of curly hair, lighter than his beard. The word "career" was one that nobody in Canton Falls, New York, had ever associated with Hobbs, which wasn't to say that he didn't work like an ox. He'd give a man his money's worth, as long as the job was out of doors, didn't require too much calculating and his employer was a white Christian.

Hobbs was married to a quiet, dusty woman named Cindy, who spent most of her time homeschooling, cooking, sewing and visiting with women friends who did the same. Hobbs himself spent most of his time working and hunting and spending evenings with men friends, drinking and arguing (though most of these "arguments" should be called "agreements" since he and his buddies were all extremely likeminded).

A lifelong resident of Canton Falls, he liked it here. There was plenty of good hunting land, virtually none of it posted. People were solid and good-natured and knew their heads from their rumps ("likeminded" applied to almost everyone in Canton Falls). Hobbs had lots of opportunities to do the things he enjoyed.

Like teaching Sunday school, of all things. An eighth-grade graduate with a stolen mortarboard but no learning to show for it, Hobbs had never in the Lord's universe thought anybody'd want him to teach.