The Face Read Online Free PDF

falling only hard enough to make [24] an umbrella more trouble than it was worth, he got out of the SUV and dashed across the street.
        In southern California during the late autumn and early winter, Mother Nature suffered unpredictable mood swings. From one year to the next, and even from day to day in the same year, the week before Christmas could vary from balmy to bone-chilling. This air was cool, the rain colder than the air, and the sky as dead gray as it might have been in any truly wintry clime much farther north.
        The main door of the building featured no buzz-through security lock. The neighborhood remained safe enough that apartment lobbies did not absolutely require fortification.
        Dripping, he entered a small space, less a lobby than a foyer, with a Mexican-tile floor. An elevator and a set of stairs served the upper stories.
        The foyer air curdled with the lingering meaty scent of Canadian bacon, cooked hours ago, and the musty smell of stale pot smoke. Weed had a singular aroma. Someone had stood here this morning, finishing a joint, before stepping out to meet the dreary day.
        From the bank of mailboxes, Ethan counted four apartments on the ground floor, six on the second, and six on the third. Reynerd lived in the middle of the building, in 2B.
        Only the last names of the current tenants were printed on the mailboxes. Ethan needed more information than these stick-on labels provided.
        An open communal receptacle, recessed in the wall, had been provided for magazines and other publications on those occasions when the volume of other mail didn’t permit the postman to put all items in the boxes.
        Two magazines lay in the tray. Both were for George Keesner in Apartment 2E.
        Ethan rapped a knuckle against the aluminum doors on several of the mailboxes for the apartments in which he had no interest. The [25] hollow sound suggested they were empty. Most likely the daily mail had not yet been delivered.
        When he rapped on Keesner’s box, it sounded as though it was packed full of mail. Evidently the man had been away from home for at least a couple days.
        Ethan climbed the stairs to the second floor. One long hall, three doors on each side. At 2E, he rang the bell and waited.
        Reynerd’s unit, 2B, lay directly across from 2E.
        When no one answered the bell at Keesner’s apartment, Ethan rang it again, twice. After a pause, he knocked loudly.
        Each door had been fitted with a fisheye lens to allow the resident to examine a caller before deciding whether or not to admit him. Perhaps from across the hall, Reynerd was watching the back of Ethan’s head right now.
        Receiving no response to his knock, Ethan turned away from Keesner’s door and made a show of frustration. He wiped his rain-wet face with one hand. He pushed that hand through his damp hair. He shook his head. He looked up and down the hall.
        When Ethan rang the bell at 2B, the apple man answered almost at once, without the protection of a security chain.
        Although an unmistakable match for the image captured by the security camera, he proved to be more handsome than he’d been in the rain the previous night. He resembled Ben Affleck, the actor.
        In addition to the Affleck aspect, however, he had a welcome-to-the-Bates-Motel edge to him that any fan of Anthony Perkins would have recognized. The tightness at the corners of his mouth, the rapid pulse visible in his right temple, and especially the hard shine in his eyes suggested that he might be on methamphetamine, not fully amped but clipping along at high altitude.
        “Sir,” Ethan said even as the door was still opening, “I’m sorry to bother you, but I’m sort of desperate to get in touch with George Keesner over there in 2E. Do you know George?”
        [26] Reynerd shook his head. He had a bull’s neck. Lots of time spent on weight machines at the