Deadline(130)

            “I’ve got some supporting documents for that stuff. They were uncovered by the reporter who got murdered, and he put a bunch of notes in a flash drive file, explaining what it all was . . . and naming a suspect in his own murder.”

            Virgil dug the flash drive out of his pocket and slid it across to Dave. “I’m gonna want a receipt for that, you know, chain of evidence and so on.”

            “Who was the reporter’s suspect?” Dave asked.

            “A guy named Randolph Kerns, who was murdered night before last.”

            “Ain’t that a pisser,” Dave said.

            “For Randy, anyway. He’s the guy who tried to shoot me up at the high school, and frankly, I wasn’t all that sad to see him go. I mean, if the bell’s gotta toll, might as well be for an asshole.”

            “Who killed Randy?”

            “You got the list—one of the school board members, one of the others,” Virgil said. “I’ve got my eye on the newspaper editor, there. He has a nice sociopathic edge on him.”

            “Any possible way of getting the killer out in the open? Or do we just start busting people?”

            “What I’d do, if I were you, is start taking the school board members aside,” Virgil said. “Be a jerk—I know you can do that. One of them will crack. You only need one, with Masilla already on your side, and those photos.”

            “If we go to court, we like to have things pretty well wrapped up.”

            “Dave, I’ve been doing this for quite a while,” Virgil said. “You don’t want them wrapped up, you want a goddamned gold-plated guarantee, because otherwise you’re afraid you’ll screw up your conviction stats. Well, by the time you get finished fucking with them all, it oughta be at least silver-plated. Dopey, Sneezy, and Grumpy could get a conviction.”

            “Unfortunately, Dopey, Sneezy, and Grumpy aren’t licensed to practice law in Minnesota,” Dave said. “The boss is thinking of handling the prosecution himself.”

            “Ah, Jesus, why do I even bother to arrest people?”

            If the AG had been a lightbulb instead of a lawyer, he would have been about a twenty-watt.

            “He’ll have good advisers,” Dave said. “Like me. But any other little bits and pieces you can find would be welcome.”

            —

            VIRGIL WALKED HIM through the records, pointing out the prices for fuel as shown in the fake books, and the discrepancies reported by the garage manager and the bus driver. “Dick, the garage guy, thinks he can walk away, because he got a legal salary, though the salary is way out of line. I told him he ought to call you, and come up and see you—”

            “He didn’t.”

            “Probably talking to his lawyer. But if you want to give him a little consideration, he’s another straw on the camel’s back.”

            “Another log on the fire.”

            “Another piss into the wind.”

            Dave frowned at his second Bloody Mary and said, “This tastes kinda strange. Wonder what kind of vodka they use?”

            Virgil was impatient: “Dave, you’re eating at Ma & Pa’s Kettle in Trippton. Pa probably made it himself, out of possum squeezin’s.”

            —

            IN THE END, Dave was satisfied that the investigation warranted a call for legal assistance. “I’ll have a couple more guys down here tomorrow, and we’ll go see the county attorney about it—courtesy call. You don’t have any reason to think that he might . . . mmm . . . have an interest? I mean, this has gone on under his nose for years.”