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“Where is he now?”
“Don’t know. And his papers don’t say. That’s a puzzler because they would normally list what his next deployment was. The files I looked at for other personnel all did.”
Decker picked up the phone off the nightstand and opened the email. He took a minute to scan down the pages that Robie had photographed.
“How’d you get these?”
Robie just looked at him.
“Do they know someone was there tonight?” asked Decker.
This comment drew a look of respect from Robie.
“Or was it clean?” added Decker.
“My exit was not as clean as I would have liked. But they won’t know what my area of interest was, that I can guarantee.”
“That’s good to know.”
“What are you going to do now?”
“Show the picture to someone to make sure it’s the right guy.”
“We don’t need you showing this picture all around.”
“I’m only going to show it to one guy. A person I trust implicitly.”
“I hope your trust is well placed.”
“It is. That I can guarantee you.”
“And if it is the right guy?” asked Robie.
“Then we need to track down this Ben Purdy.”
“And if you can’t?”
Decker looked at him. “Why would that be a problem? Even if his current assignment wasn’t in the file. He’s in the Air Force, not in hiding.”
“Hewasin the Air Force. We don’t know if he still is. Andifyou find him he may not talk. For a number of reasons,” he added grimly.
“You think it goes that deep?”
Robie ran his fingers along the chair’s armrest. “FYI, I wouldn’t be here otherwise.”
“That’s also good to know.”
“Anything else?”
“When I asked you about Irene Cramer, you hung up on me. Why?”
“I had nothing to contribute to that discussion.”
“You have a funny way of not answering questions.”
“Goes with the territory I call home.”
“I can deal with half-assed answers and even outright lies, because pretty much everybody lies to me at some point. But to solve the case, I have to get to the truth. AndFYI,I will.”
