The Julian secret

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

Lake Red Cloud, Minnesota

Mugwanee County Courthouse

The next morning

Charlie Clough used a wrinkled handkerchief to wipe the sweat from his face. Only fifty-five degrees outside, but the effort of hauling his three hundred pounds-plus across the square was real effort. So far, though, things were working out better than he had anticipated. First-class ticket to… where? Sioux City, South Dakota. Or was it North Dakota? Charlie was fairly certain he didn't really believe North, Dakota existed anyplace but on maps, so it must have been South Dakota. He had gotten a real rental car, not one of those fuckin' compacts he could hardly get into. The drive had taken about three hours, including one stop for gas and two more for snacks.

He'd been lucky, arriving at the Holiday Inn, the town's only accommodation, just before the dining room closed for dinner. According to the desk clerk, he'd gotten the very last super-king-sized bed. Good thing. A queen simply wasn't big enough. His arms draped over the side. Charlie figured the world was configured to fit the little people, folks who barely tipped the scales at two fifty. Some even less. It was tough making your way in a universe where you were already super-sized.

This morning, he had pretty well decimated the breakfast buffet before driving the mile or so into town. Town was too big; village was a better word. All tricked up like some fuckin' Alpine hamlet, even though the highest ground he'd seen so far was a speed bump across from the school.

He slapped at an insistent buzzing. Fuckin' mosquitoes! He'd suffered from gnats in South Georgia, every kind of biting insect in Florida, but he'd never known mosquitoes grew this large. These babies could stand flatfooted in the road and fuck a turkey!

The inside of the courthouse looked like something out of an installment of In the Heat of the Night. Only thing missing was that actor, Carroll O'Connor, same one who played Archie Bunker. He took the stairs down to where a sign indicated he would find records.

After an hour, he hadn't even come close to what he was looking for. Puffing with exertion, he climbed back up the stairs to the clerk's office and went in.

A red-cheeked young woman put down her copy of People magazine and came up to the desk-where Charlie stood, again mopping his face.

"The records," he said in response to her polite inquiry. "I can't seem to find any records, births, deaths, before 1950."

She looked at him quizzically. "Those are on computers, the ones in the record room." He shook his head. "I know, but I want to see the actual records, the physical pieces of paper."

She looked at him again, this time as though he wasn't quite right in the head, potentially dangerous. "Those are archived, sir. They're not here."

Charlie looked around, found a secretary's chair, and eased his bulk onto it gingerly. He had been standing for an hour down in the fuckin' record room, and now he was standing here, jawing with this nitwit who seemed not to understand the difference between electronic copies and the real thing. His feet hurt. They weren't made to hold up as much weight as he put on them.

"Where are they?"

She pointed as though the documents were just across the room. "Follow Main Street to the city-limit sign, take your first left. There's a warehouse where we keep the archives."

He stood, turning to go. "Thanks."

"Sir! Wait a minute. That warehouse isn't open all the time. I'll call to see when you can get in."

Swell.

Well, at least he could take time for an early lunch at the cafe he had seen across the square. "Thanks. I'll be back in a few minutes." Forty minutes later, Charlie paid the tab and walked out onto the sidewalk. He'd had better chow, but he'd had worse, too. A lot worse. At the corner, he looked both ways before stepping into the street toward the square. He was no more than a few paces from the curb when he heard the growl of a large engine. He looked up straight into the grille of the biggest fuckin' truck he had ever seen.

His last thought was that there wasn't going to be time to stop.