There was an Oregon map in the car.
This car? Just now?
The Sentra.
You think he left it there?
No, how could he? And it wasnt the car I rented, it was the one I switched plates with at the airport. Never mind, its got nothing to do with anything. Its an actual coincidence.
And a real interesting one, too, Keller. Brightens my whole day.
Sorry. Wheres Beaverton? Is it near anything?
Tell you in a second, she said. There you go. Its just outside of Portland.
And just like that they knew his name and where he lived. They were in a Kinkos on Hickman Road, where theyd set her up at a PC for $5 an hour. Hed been watching over her shoulder, so he didnt have to ask how she did it, but that didnt render the performance any less remarkable. Google had led her to a site where all you had to do was enter a phone number and it would see if it could find it; once it determined that it was available, you had the option of buying it for $14.95. After a quick credit-card transaction, it coughed up the data.
I knew the government could find out anything, he said, but what I didnt realize was everybody else can, too. Youd think hed have an unlisted number.
He does. Unpublished, anyway. It said so, right there on the screen, at the same time it was offering to sell it to me for fifteen dollars.
Cant argue with the price, can you?
Theres probably a way to get it for free, she said, if Id wanted to devote the time to it. And no, you really cant argue with the price. I figured the absolute minimum it would cost us was thirty pieces of silver. I wonder who flies to Portland?
Ill go, he said. Theres no reason why you have to.
She gave him a look.
What?
Were both going to Portland, Keller. That goes without saying.
You just said
What airline , Keller. And I dont have to wonder, not since God created Google.
They spent the night at the Laurel Inn after all, but in separate rooms. It was Dots idea, after shed gone to the United website and booked them on a flight the next morning. We have to stay someplace, she said, and weve already got the one room.
His room was on the ground floor in the front. He checked in and had a shower, then went up to 204. She was drinking a bottle of Snapple from the vending machine and making a face every time she took a sip. She asked if he knew a decent place for dinner, and he said the only place he could think of was the Dennys across the street, and he didnt think it would be a good idea to go there.
Its probably not the only Dennys in town, she said, but lets not go to any of the others, either. She found a steakhouse in the Yellow Pages that billed itself as Iowas best, and they agreed it was pretty good.
Back in his room, he watched cop show reruns on A&E. It seemed to him they were episodes hed seen before, but that didnt matter. He watched them anyway.
When he got home, he thought, hed upgrade their TV, spring for a big flat-panel set like the one hed left behind in New York. Get TiVo, too, and a decent DVD player. No reason not to, not if he had all that money in a bank in the Caymans.
He could think of a batch of reasons not to call Julia, but in the end he went ahead and called anyway. She said hello, and he said Its me, and she said Nicholas. Just her voice saying his name, and he felt his chest swell up.
He said, It worked. The thing was there, and it had what it was supposed to have, and she says youre a genius.
All pronouns and nonspecific nouns. Because were on the phone?
The night has a thousand ears.
I thought it was eyes, but I suppose it could be ears, too. A thousand eyes, a thousand ears, and five hundred noses.
Because it worked, he said, Ive got more places to go.
I know.
I wont call until
Until its over. I understand. Youll be careful.
Yes.
I know you will. Give her my best.
I will. She says youre a keeper.
But you knew that.
Yes, he said. I knew that.
In the morning they had breakfast at the airport while they waited for their flight for Denver, where they ate again before the flight to Portland. The rental car there was booked in his name, and he showed his drivers license and paid with his credit card. He didnt have to worry about either of them, or any of the pieces of ID he was carrying, including the passport hed shown at check-in. They were legitimate and authentic, even if the name they carried was not the one hed been born with.
It was easy to locate Belle Mead Lane on the street map Keller bought, but not so easy to find it when you were driving. The development it was in, on the western edge of Beaverton, seemed to specialize in thoroughfares that twisted this way and that, often winding up more or less back where theyd started. Add in a rich complement of dead-end streets, plus some fantasy roads that existed only in the mind of the cartographer, and the whole business got tricky.
Thats supposed to be Frontenac, he said, glowering at a street sign, but it says Shoshone. How do you suppose Taggert finds his way home at night?
He must leave a trail of bread crumbs. Whats that off to the left?