I spoke to some of the grooms and the other hired help. Everyone liked Tony, no one had a bad word to say about him, and no one was surprised that he had left. Kids were doing that all the time, and even at nineteen or twenty he was still a kid in this industry. I figured the next stop was the local police station. I hate cooling my heels while the cops check my credentials at their usual snail’s pace, so I called ahead, gave them my name, told them to check with Jim Simmons of the Cincinnati police, then went out for lunch (or maybe it was a late breakfast, since I hadn’t eaten since I got up), smoked a cigarette when my conscience wasn’t looking, and finally drove over to the station. I introduced myself to the desk clerk (or maybe she was the desk clerkess, a redhead in her forties), and she led me to the office I wanted. A uniformed cop sat behind a desk, and when I entered he stood up and extended his hand. “Lou Berger,”
