The Tin Collector

THE MIDNIGHT WEDDING CHAPEL LAS VEGAS, NEVADA

Barbara looked at the picture, and her expression turned dark. "Is this what I think it is?" she asked sharply. "Is this a fucking wedding photo?"

"I don't know." He removed the picture from the frame and put it in his pocket.

They moved through the house. The cottage appeared to be some kind of party pad. Both bedrooms sported huge king-size waterbeds, complete with ceiling mirrors. Shane looked around, opening drawers, searching closets. All were now empty; everything had been removed. When he got to the guest bedroom, he noticed that the closet seemed very shallow, with no hanging rods. He tapped on the back wall. It sounded hollow. He searched around the edges of the closet wall until he found a small kick-plate near the floor. He touched it with his toe, and the back wall of the closet opened on a spring hinge. He pushed "the wall" and found that he was in a small, dark area, about six by ten feet. From where he was standing, he was looking through a glass window, directly into the master bedroom.

"Barbara," he called to her, "go into the master bedroom and stand by the bed."

"Okay," she called from the kitchen, where she had been searching the cupboards. She went into the bedroom, and he could see her clearly through the window in the wall in front of him.

"Go to the mirror over the dresser," he said. She walked to the dresser and was now standing only a few feet away, looking directly at him through a one-way mirror.

"Where are you?" she asked.

"In here, in the guest bedroom."

She moved away from the mirror, exited the master bedroom, and in a minute was pushing the wall open and entering the small back closet he had discovered. Shane found the overhead light and flipped it on. The room was empty except for a vacant bookshelf.

"What is this?" she asked.

"Glory hole," Shane said, using the cop term for any opening used for sexual spying. He began looking around the secret room. Finally he pulled an empty bookshelf away from the wall. He found two videotape boxes that had slipped down behind the shelf and had been missed. He picked them up they were empty. One of the boxes was not labeled, but the other had a name written on the spine: