The Fugitive's Trail by J.C. Fields

bedrooms. He now stood in the living room looking around. Kruger was sitting on a worn sofa, he frowned, stood and said, “Did you find something?”
    “No, I didn’t. That’s what’s wrong with this apartment.” He turned to Kruger. “Remember Paul Bishop’s house in St. Louis?”
    Kruger nodded and looked around. “Yeah I do. You’re right, this place is similar. There’s nothing personal here.”
    Alvarez looked at Kruger and then Charlie. “Who’s Paul Bishop?”
    Kruger said, “It was the first time I meet Charlie. Paul Bishop killed himself and left a suicide note confessing to four unsolved murders. The guy lived in a house for twenty years and it looked like this.”
    Alvarez nodded. “The landlord said he moved in a couple of months ago. It’s a furnished apartment. Apparently, all of this was here when he moved in.”
    “Is it possible he was planning his disappearing act for awhile? Maybe that’s why you couldn’t find any records of him.” Kruger stopped. “By the way, how did you find out where he lived?”
    Alvarez was quiet. He shook his head. “The receptionist at P&G Global gave it to one of the first responders.” He looked at Kruger. “Before they got their stories straight.”
    Kruger smiled. “How did they know his address? I thought he just appeared out of the elevator.”
    “Fucker’s keep lying to us, don’t they?”
    Kruger nodded. “Yes they do. I bet no one knew she’d given it to one of your officers.”
    Charlie interrupted, “Where’s the laptop you found?”
    Alvarez said, “Lab.”
    “What did you find on it?”
    “Damn thing would make a great door stop. The hard drive’s been crashed. Our computer guys think it was sabotaged.”
    Charlie nodded. “If this guy’s as good as we’ve heard, he might have had a booby trap on it. I’d like to see it, if possible.”
    “Soon as we’re done here, we can go to the lab.”
    “I’m uncomfortable with the timeline.” Charlie pointed to the bedroom and continued, “His clothes and luggage are still in the closet. We know the cabbie dropped him off at Newark at twelve fifty-five p.m. So he had to get in the cab somewhere around noon, with only a backpack. If he came back to the apartment and cleaned it out, what did he do with his personal effects? Why didn’t he take clothes? Nothing fits.”
    Kruger said, “How long was it before your team searched this apartment?”
    Alvarez pulled out a notebook, flipped a few pages, read for a few moments, and said, “We got the call at nine-thirty a.m. I showed up at ten-oh-three. Let’s see—here it is. We had someone here by three-thirty p.m., why?”
    Kruger was silent for a few moments. He looked at Alvarez. “He didn’t come back here. The cabbie said he picked him up outside the library at Thirty-Fourth and Madison. That’s on the other side of town, closer to P&G Global than here.”
    Charlie grinned. “What’s at a library?”
    Kruger looked at him, thought for few moments, and said, “Books?”
    “Yes, but they also have public computers.” Charlie’s smiled widened. “He didn’t have to come back here to erase his computer. He did it remotely. Bet he had backup off site and was more interested in getting it than the computer. Computers can be replaced—the data and programs, not so much.”
    Alvarez frowned. “Where would he keep back up?”
    Kruger snapped his fingers. “A safe deposit box. A bank.”
    Alvarez took his cell phone out and made a call. When the call was answered, he said, “How many banks are within a half-mile of the library at Thirty-Fourth and Madison?” He paused for a few moments listening and said, “That many? Really? I would never have guessed. Well, start calling them and find out if our fugitive had an account or lockbox. We’ll be back there in about an hour.” He ended the call. “They might have a location for us by the time we get back. Damn, I didn’t realize how many banks are in this