them aboard my houseboat, and we can't come up with anything. Maybe five-ten-and-a-half or -eleven. Close to two hundred. But pretty good shape. Brown hair, receding a little. Green eyes, I think. Nose a little crooked. Plenty of tan. Good teeth."
"Big hands on him," Dexter said. "Real big. Thick wrists. Big bone structure. Spoke some Mexican."
"We know how they met," I said. "If he swindled her out of her money and killed her, he'll make himself hard to find. We want to go down his back trail and see if we can turn up anything. We need a good picture of him. We thought maybe somebody at the wedding took some."
He called a plump woman in from the outer office and asked her.
She remembered that one of the women in the office had taken a lot of pictures of the ceremony. Her name was Marlane Hoffer, and she lived with a friend in a little apartment in the Post Oak area. She went out and typed the name, address, and phone number and brought it in and gave it to Meyer.
Marlane was on the third floor of a new nondescript apartment building a block off Westheimer Road, behind the Galleria development area. Marlane's friend checked us through the peephole lens and rattled the lock chain. He was a big man with long hairy legs. He wore short running pants and an unbuttoned yellow shirt. A slab of brown belly bulged over the top of the running pants. He had a big head and a lot of brown hair and blond beard.
As soon as he let us in he turned and bawled, "Marl! It's the guys about the pictures. Marl!"
"Okay, okay," yelled a voice from behind a closed door.
She came out in a few minutes in a floor-length white terry beach robe, her hair turbaned in a blue terry towel. She was a small woman with a pert, friendly face. The friend had gone over to an alcove off the living room and was stretched out watching automobiles racing somewhere, noisily.
She spoke over the roar of engines. "I want to go down to the pool, but he says it's too hot. Here's the pictures I took. I didn't do so great with them. What I got, it's this Pentax he used to use until he got a Nikon, and he never explained all the buttons so I could understand."
We stood and looked at the pictures together. There was one where she had evidently tried to get them both in a closeup. It was an outdoor shot, under some trees. In that picture Evan was looking directly into the camera, with a slightly startled expression. Norma was beyond him, out of focus.
"It was in this sort of garden out behind a restaurant, a really great place to get married. The food was absolutely delicious, and I kind of busted loose on the wine. They said it was Spanish champagne, but what do I know? Look, take the whole thing. She was my friend and now she's dead and I don't want her picture around, okay?"
"If you're really sure you don't…" Meyer said.
"You can bet your ass I'm sure. You, being her uncle, I can understand how you'd want pictures. But she wasn't one of my best friends, you understand? It's a hell of a thing, dying on a honeymoon. But there you are." She whirled and yelled, "Can't you turn that shitty noise down?"
"You don't like it, go out in the hall!" he yelled. We thanked her and left. Through the closed doors, as we walked toward the stairs, we could hear her squalling at him and him roaring back. I made sure we had the negatives, including the one of Evan. "Now we find a good lab," I said.
On Monday morning we brought the four color prints back to the condo at Piney Village. The professional lab had done good work on the eight-byten enlargement. The Pentax lens had done the original good work. It was unmistakably Evan Lawrence, every pore, blemish, and laugh line. He was half smiling, startled, one eyebrow raised. The lab had put them in gray portrait folders.
Meyer sat at Norma's desk in the little office she had fixed up. The file cabinets had been taken away.
Outside, the rain fell in silver-gray sheets out of a gun-metal sky. A tropical disturbance had moved in off
"Big hands on him," Dexter said. "Real big. Thick wrists. Big bone structure. Spoke some Mexican."
"We know how they met," I said. "If he swindled her out of her money and killed her, he'll make himself hard to find. We want to go down his back trail and see if we can turn up anything. We need a good picture of him. We thought maybe somebody at the wedding took some."
He called a plump woman in from the outer office and asked her.
She remembered that one of the women in the office had taken a lot of pictures of the ceremony. Her name was Marlane Hoffer, and she lived with a friend in a little apartment in the Post Oak area. She went out and typed the name, address, and phone number and brought it in and gave it to Meyer.
Marlane was on the third floor of a new nondescript apartment building a block off Westheimer Road, behind the Galleria development area. Marlane's friend checked us through the peephole lens and rattled the lock chain. He was a big man with long hairy legs. He wore short running pants and an unbuttoned yellow shirt. A slab of brown belly bulged over the top of the running pants. He had a big head and a lot of brown hair and blond beard.
As soon as he let us in he turned and bawled, "Marl! It's the guys about the pictures. Marl!"
"Okay, okay," yelled a voice from behind a closed door.
She came out in a few minutes in a floor-length white terry beach robe, her hair turbaned in a blue terry towel. She was a small woman with a pert, friendly face. The friend had gone over to an alcove off the living room and was stretched out watching automobiles racing somewhere, noisily.
She spoke over the roar of engines. "I want to go down to the pool, but he says it's too hot. Here's the pictures I took. I didn't do so great with them. What I got, it's this Pentax he used to use until he got a Nikon, and he never explained all the buttons so I could understand."
We stood and looked at the pictures together. There was one where she had evidently tried to get them both in a closeup. It was an outdoor shot, under some trees. In that picture Evan was looking directly into the camera, with a slightly startled expression. Norma was beyond him, out of focus.
"It was in this sort of garden out behind a restaurant, a really great place to get married. The food was absolutely delicious, and I kind of busted loose on the wine. They said it was Spanish champagne, but what do I know? Look, take the whole thing. She was my friend and now she's dead and I don't want her picture around, okay?"
"If you're really sure you don't…" Meyer said.
"You can bet your ass I'm sure. You, being her uncle, I can understand how you'd want pictures. But she wasn't one of my best friends, you understand? It's a hell of a thing, dying on a honeymoon. But there you are." She whirled and yelled, "Can't you turn that shitty noise down?"
"You don't like it, go out in the hall!" he yelled. We thanked her and left. Through the closed doors, as we walked toward the stairs, we could hear her squalling at him and him roaring back. I made sure we had the negatives, including the one of Evan. "Now we find a good lab," I said.
On Monday morning we brought the four color prints back to the condo at Piney Village. The professional lab had done good work on the eight-byten enlargement. The Pentax lens had done the original good work. It was unmistakably Evan Lawrence, every pore, blemish, and laugh line. He was half smiling, startled, one eyebrow raised. The lab had put them in gray portrait folders.
Meyer sat at Norma's desk in the little office she had fixed up. The file cabinets had been taken away.
Outside, the rain fell in silver-gray sheets out of a gun-metal sky. A tropical disturbance had moved in off
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