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Coming back around, Petey asked in a hushed voice, “What about him?”
“When The Major came to the door, why didn’t Jenks blast him with the shotgun?”
“Shocked him to see The Major with a rifle.”
“Hmm. That concerns me. If Jenks is so easily rattled, he’s unreliable.”
“No, sir. Nerves of steel. He’s as solid as the day is long. I’d swear to that.”
“Your loyalty to him is admirable, Petey. But what about his loyalty to you? Are you willing to bet your life on it? This Bailey woman might not have seen you fire a bullet into an American hero’s chest. But Jenks did.”
Petey’s eyes darted out and back, then up and down. He licked his lips again. He was thinking it over. “He’s solid,” he repeated, but with noticeably less conviction.
“In order to protect yourself, me, all of us, you know what you have to do.”
Petey swallowed noisily. “Not sure what you’re getting at.”
“Yes you are.” He let that rest for a second or two, then said, “Make sure you bury his body deep enough so scavengers can’t get to it, or sink it in The Pit with enough weight that it’ll never surface. Do you understand?”
Petey understood, all right. His forehead was beaded with sweat. He looked miserable. “When?”
“Now.”
“It’s coming up on daylight.”
“Then you’ve got no time to waste, do you?”
Petey blinked several times. “Me and him have come to be good friends.”
“I know. I also know you understand the gravity of your situation. You said The Major didn’t see you. Either of you.”
“No. Jenks clouted him before he could.”
“And Kerra Bailey didn’t.”
Petey shook his head.
“Leaving only one person who remains a threat to you. To us. Harvey Jenks. Right?”
Petey nodded but looked on the verge of tears.
The other man reached across the table and gripped Petey’s hand hard, like a general commending a volunteer, then motioned him up. “Ask him to come in now.”
“How come?”
“It would look fishy if I didn’t talk to him, too.”
Petey shuffled to the door, opened it, and in a jocular voice that sounded close to normal, said, “Your turn.”
For the next twenty minutes, Harvey Jenks was put through the same drill. His account was almost word for word identical to Petey’s. “When we ran out of time to take care of her, I thought to grab her bag,” he said of the disemboweled Louis Vuitton. “Too bad the fall didn’t kill her.”
“That is too bad. It’s also too bad that The Major’s heart is still beating.”
Jenks reacted with a start, then rubbed the bridge of his nose as he processed it. “Petey shouldn’t have got so trigger happy. Or he should’ve shot him twice. At least.”
“Why didn’t you shoot him as soon as he came to the door?”
“He had a rifle.”
