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“Which one?”
“Shlomo couldn’t recall.”
Monck glanced at his watch.
“You have boots at the courthouse as we speak?” I asked.
“Either there or out dogging his honor’s whereabouts.”
“Will a judge give a cold crap about Joe’s boyhood woes?”
“Uncertain. But the next little goody should grab his attention.”
I refolded my hands in my lap and leaned back. The chair didn’t like it.
“Joe told us he had a night gig answering phones.”
“To pay the bills.”
“Phones at night. I kept weighing that, ran a check of the obvious. He’s not a nine-one-one operator or one of our dispatchers. Didn’t work for the fire service or an ER. But further expert sleuthing uncovered a tantalizing service in Provo.VVV. Vannie’s Virtual Voices.”
“Nice alliteration.”
“You ever call an office or a business and get corkscrewed through a mind-bogglingly irritating maze of choices?”
“All the time.”
“Or call after closing and get a recorded voice that cares nothing about your problem?”
I nodded.
“The experience can make you furious, yes?”
“To say the least.”
“Vannie’s schtick is that a real live human answers every call coming into her clients’ switchboards. Twenty-four/seven.”
“Remotely.”
“Yes. Her employees act like front-office receptionists, greeting those who phone, patching callers through when they’re available, taking messages when they’re not. They’re friendly as shit and live only to solve your problem.”
“Let me guess. Joe works for Vannie.”
“He does.”
I waited for the judge-grabber.
“Persuaded by a casual allusion to a potential audit, Vannie produced a list of clients going back five years. I ran the name of every outfit on the list against calls made from Palke’s room at the Royal West Indies Resort and Bonner’s room at the Sibonné Beach Hotel.”
“Why would they use the room phones?”
“Depending on their cellular plans, tourists often use landlines for local calls to avoid international charges.”
That made sense.
“Musgrove had the phone dumps in her file?” I asked.
“She did. Unfortunately, there were no cell phone records for Palke and Bonner. And no records of any kind for Bobby Galloway, mobile or landline.”
