“How long do you keep the recordings?” asked Chase, not hiding his admiration for the man’s setup.
“Indefinitely,” said Mel proudly. “You never know if at some point in the near or far future a cop will drop by, just like you’re doing now, and ask me if I’ve got the recordings for some date far in the past, like you’re doing now. And then it’s an honor and a privilege for me to be able to tell him, like I’m telling you now: of course I’ve got that footage for you, officer, like I’m about to show you now.”
And he dug into a large metal filing cabinet, where a series of discs were neatly lined up, organized according to date.
“Here we go,” said Mel, as he handed Chase a disk. “This should do the trick.”
“Where can I watch this?” asked Chase.
“Oh, you can take it, if you want. I keep copies of everything you see in here. A physical copy at home, of course, and a digital copy in the cloud. You can never be too prepared or organized, just in case a cop drops by and needs a copy, like you do now.” And he beamed at us with pride writtenall over his features.
On our way out, I noticed Fr?d?rique studying her human carefully, only taking a break from her intense scrutiny to give me a wink.
I gave her two thumbs up. If Mel Corset was involved in the disappearance of Addie Dexter and Ted Machosko, Fr?d?rique would find out and let us know.
Our next port of call was the police precinct, where Chase had the setup needed to study the security footage more closely.
And so the long wait began. I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to find something on CCTV footage before, but it’s more or less the same thing as trying to find your glasses: the thing you want is almost always in the very last place you look. Not that cats wear glasses, of course. Our eyesight is perfect, thank you very much.
And as Chase and Odelia studied the cars as they passed through the gas station, hoping to catch a glimpse of Addie and her boyfriend, Dooley and I wandered through the police precinct, hoping to find a bite to eat. A very nice officer must have understood our predicament, for she very kindly provided us with a plate with some pieces of meatball on it.
“Meatball,” said Dooley after we’d dug in. “Yum.”
“I still wonder why those snails all descended on Tex and Marge’s garden like that,” I said.
“Do you think snail tastes like meatball?” asked Dooley, chewing noisily.
“I have no idea, Dooley, and I don’t intend to find out.”
“I think they taste like snot,” said my friend. “Slimy, you know.”
“Let’s not talk about snot while we’re eating,” I suggested.
“Max, Dooley!” suddenly Odelia said, as she came storming into the small precinct kitchen. “We found her!”
And so they had. On the screen, when we walked back into Chase’s office, a large RV was clearly visible, and as he slowed down the footage, and zoomed in, a blond-haired young woman came into view. She was walking from the RV to the gas station, presumably to pay the bill, and as she did, a second person emerged from the RV. He was dark-haired, lanky, and had sharpish features.
“I don’t like him,” said Dooley immediately. “I think he killed Addie and then took off.”
“I thought you said she became a juggler and he became a clown?” I said.
“Now I’m thinking he probably became a knife thrower, and practiced on his girlfriend and missed.”
We all studied the footage, as Chase ran it a couple of times. Finally Addie got back on board the RV, and the vehicle passed from view, traveling in the direction of Hampton Cove.
“How far did they travel before Addie’s cell phone cut out?” asked Odelia.
“About another ten minutes,” said Chase. “Which puts her exactly…” He’d pulled up a map on his screen, and pointed to a place just outside town. “Here.”
“We better go and have a look,” said Odelia as she got up.
The spot Chase had indicated was located at the foot of a steep hill that gradually turns into a densely wooded area, a place popular with hikers and people looking for some peace and quiet. There are also several log cabins in there, where nature lovers can go and enjoy some time away from civilization. And when you keep traveling like the crow flies, there’s a lake where supposedly the fishing is good. But since it’s hard to find, and even harder to reach—there are no roads that lead up there—fortunately for the fish not many people get that far.
“Let’s hope Addie isn’t buried in those woods,” said Chase as he pulled on his jacket. “Because we might never find her.”
“Let’s think positive,” Odelia suggested. “She might still be alive.”
But her words lacked the ring of conviction.
CHAPTER 24
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I don’t know what Chase had hoped to find, but when we got to the approximate location where Addie’s phone had transmitted its final signal, there wasn’t much of interest to see.
“Mh,” said Chase, as he stood on the side of the road, staring into the woods.
“No RV?” asked Dooley.
“No RV,” I said. Which was probably too much to hope for, after all.
“See? I told you: she joined a traveling…” When I gave him a look of censure, he quickly amended, “… band.”
“Of course she did.”
“I don’t suppose Randal Skip ever searched these woods?” asked Chase.
“No, I don’t suppose he did.”
Chase placed a hand to his eyes to shield them from a sun that was beating down on us.“It would take days to comb this area, even if we had the manpower.” He suddenly crouched down, looking intently at the road. “Look at this.”
“What is it?”
“I’ll bet this is where that RV went off the road.”
There were indeed tire marks that led off the road and onto the shoulder.
“You think Addie and Ted had an accident?” asked Odelia
“Either an accident or they were deliberately run off the road.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Cause this doesn’t look like the tire tracks of an ordinary vehicle. These tracks were made by a much heavier vehicle, like an RV.”
“Could be a truck. Could be anything.”
“Sure. But taken in conjunction with the information we have about that cell phone signal, there’s a good chance their RV met with an accident right here. And if you think about it: why would her phone suddenly die on her like that?”
“Maybe it got damaged in the accident?”
“Or it was smashed up by whoever drove them off the road,” said Chase grimly.
“I don’t like this, Max,” said Dooley. “Chase is making it sound as if something terrible happened to Addie.”
“That’s because he’s a cop, Dooley,” I said. “He’s programmed to think the worst, given his experience.”
“So you think Addie might still be alive?”
“Yes, of course. There could be any number of reasons why that phone died. Like a battery malfunction, or, like Chase said, it got smashed up in an accident.”
“If her phone got smashed up, chances are that Addie got smashed up, too,” Dooley argued. “Kids these days have those phones practically glued to their hands.”
He was right, of course. If Addie’s phone was dead, there was a good chance that so was that phone’s owner. But we owed it to Mr. Dexter to take a positive view of the situation, and until we found a body, we had to work from the assumption that his daughter was still alive somewhere.
But if she was, why hadn’t she been in touch? Why had this accident Chase was referring to not been brought to the attention of the emergency services? And where was that RV now? Big vehicles like that don’t just disappear.
Lots of questions, and no answers. But at least we had a place where we could start looking for the missing couple.
“We’re going to need more people,” said Chase. “Lots and lots more people.”