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Benji was organizing the manga section when we walked in. He smiled and nodded to me and then he acknowledged Ranger. The acknowledgment had a tinge of panic.
Morelli and Ranger are very different people. They have different body types and different personalities. They dress differently, walk differently, talk differently. The one thing they have in common is instant recognition that they’re the alpha dog.
“Are you shopping?” Benji asked.
“No,” I said. “Not today. I’m still looking for the Knights Templar coin.”
“Did you talk to Melvin Sparks?”
“Yes. I looked at his coin collection. He had six coins but none of them were the one I’m looking for.”
Benji put a stack of manga down on a round table. “That’s a bummer. I guess the coin I got from Carpenter wasn’t the one you want.”
“Do you know where Carpenter got his coin?”
“No,” Benji said. “He didn’t say.”
“Is he a regular customer?”
“Not really. He panhandles on the corner sometimes and comes in to pass the time between rush hours. He’s more a D&D gamer. He bought some rad dice from me a while back.”
“He knew the coin had some value to it,” I said.
Benji shrugged. “Every thirty-year-old geek played that game in middle school and knows about the coin. It’s not worth serious money, but a collector like Sparks would be willing to put out twenty or thirty bucks for it, depending on the condition.”
“What was the condition of the coin he bought from you?”
“It was good. It had some signs of wear but nothing serious.”
“Did it have a notch in the edge?”
“Not that I can remember.”
Five minutes later we were back in Ranger’s Porsche.
“Next up,” Ranger said.
“Carpenter Beedle. He lives with his parents on Maymount Street.”
“This is the guy who shot himself in the foot?”
“Yep.”
“And he’s a professional panhandler.”
“Yep. And apparently a halfway-decent pickpocket.”
Ranger cut over to Chambers and turned onto Maymount.
“It’s the yellow house with the red door,” I said.
And it’s the house with the empty driveway, I thought. No rusted Sentra. I hoped that wasn’t a bad sign. The rest of the neighborhood was business as usual. In other words, no business at all. No activity.
I rang the bell and Mrs. Beedle answered.
“Oh dear,” she said when she saw me.
This wasn’t the greeting I wanted to hear. “I’d like to speak with Carpenter,” I said to her.
