"They don't count heads at this place," Fred answered glumly. "And before you ask, the license plate wasn't the same. It was a regular one-from Ohio."
"Ohio! What makes you think it was the same guy?"
"He was the only person who stayed there on the night of the May sixteenth and he had a Pace Arrow camper! You don't get coincidences like that!"
They were both quiet for a long time. Fred sulked while Dean felt guilty for treating the old man's efforts so cavalierly but was too pissed in general to jump up and apologize. Instead, he polished off another beer or two. After he finally got around to apologizing, the two men opened more beer and began to discuss matters more rationally.
"You're right about one thing, Fred," Dean said. "If this is Byrne we're chasing, he's cautious as a clam. He didn't have the foggiest idea anyone was looking until after he spoke with Mrs. Glass-around Rollins, Kansas, and yet he keeps changing names, not leaving his signature and not even being seen unless he can't help it. Now that he's aware someone is looking, we'll be lucky to get a sniff of where he is."
"Yeah, I thought about that. We don't even know the Ohio license plate is right. He might have just put that on the registration card when he signed in. You can bet the numbers are wrong. He was on to that trick back at the Whitney Motel, remember?" Dean didn't comment on Fred's unproved assumption. "So, what's next?" the old man asked.
Dean smiled. "You're the detective. So far, you're the only one making any progress. I'm listening."
Fred beamed. "Well, the way I see it, he's gotta figure the motor home is hot."
"Why? He doesn't know we know about it."
"He doesn't how we know about nothing, much less how we know. It must be driving him loony. So maybe he assumes we know more than we do. He'll ditch the motor home and change his plans, if he has any."
Dean thought a moment. "How do you ditch a motor home in the middle of Kansas?"
He answered his own question as he sipped on his beer. "You sell it for a song. Money is no problem."
"Where do you ditch it?"
"The next largest town," Dean answered. Fred grabbed for the map and began searching. Dean scratched his head, irritated at himself for getting so caught up in Fred's continuing scenario, a scenario totally baseless in proven fact. He went to the kitchen for two more beers.
"Figure he's going west," Fred called. "That was the direction he was headed. Hays is the only place in Kansas west of Rollins worth a snot. Sixteen thousand people. That's big enough. He buys something different under another name. 'Course we don't know which of the names he used in the first place to register the motor home when he bought it." Mrs. Lincoln sauntered into the room, blinking her eyes at the late hour, and Fred reached down and picked her up with one arm, taking a beer from Dean with the other.