Then he saw the leather cut spread across Nolan's lap. His stride faltered, almost imperceptibly. His eyes moved from the raven patch to Nolan's face, and the mild expression he had worn at the door sharpened into something alert and wary. He said nothing. He looked at Silas, then at the photograph on the table, and his right hand closed around the edge of his coat. After another second he turned and walked out, his companions following him so quickly they nearly collided at the door.
A black car rolled out of the lot and disappeared down the county road. The waitress finally released the coffee pot she had been gripping so tightly and set it on its warming plate. Nolan watched Silas watch the car.
"Who was that?" he asked.
"Warren Pike."
Nolan felt the room narrow around him. The man who had been part of his father's disappearance had just looked at him in plain sight and decided to leave without explanation. "He recognized it," Nolan said, glancing at the cut.
"Yes. And I believe he recognized you."
"I've never met him."
"That may not matter," Silas answered. "If Pike has kept track of anything connected to Elias, he may have kept track of Carla and you. We shouldn't assume he forgot either of you just because you were allowed to live quietly."
A road captain might have ordered a younger man to pursue the car. Nobody at the table did. Instead Decker moved to the window, memorized the last visible turn, and came back without saying much. The distinction between suspicion and proof was beginning to matter to Nolan in a way he hadn't appreciated before he entered the diner.
The conversation continued for another hour. Elias had disappeared after the fundraising accusation, leaving his motorcycle, his friends, and apparently every trace of the man he had been. Silas had investigated what he could, but the people who might have known more had withdrawn, retired, or claimed they remembered nothing.
An older rider named Reyes contributed short corrections when memory drifted toward legend. Elias had warned them about Pike three days before the accusation, Reyes said, not weeks before. Pike's first direct approach to the club had occurred through another member. There had been a meeting behind a repair shop that summer, and someone had lied afterward about who attended it.
Nolan wrote details on the back of an old garage invoice. He had no other paper, and he didn't trust his memory with a story that contained too many people willing to remember it differently. He also noticed that some riders were watching other riders rather than watching him, as if the old accusation still had the ability to divide them.
At eleven, Silas pushed back his chair. "Come to the clubhouse tomorrow," he said. "It's outside town. Eleven in the morning. Bring the cut, the photograph, and the box."
"You're not afraid it'll make things worse?"
"I'm afraid of having wasted another twenty-two years if we do nothing," Silas replied. He wrote an address on a piece of heavy paper and slid it over. "One other thing, Nolan. Look through that box again when you get home. Your mother went to a lot of trouble to hide it. People who work that carefully usually leave more than one way to be understood."