Janice shakes her head. "I don't think the phone and box were the same thing. And the politician's son was part of the original briefing I gave you; it's the reason why this case got such a comprehensive, high-profile investigation."
"So you don't want to talk to this Mr. Hebert? And what do you think the box is? And I thought we were waiting for the phase of the moon to investigate the were-cat?" Mud asks.
Janice,as she thinks about it, realizes that many phone base units could be 'box like'. And she did remember seeing handsets in the house that were smashed apart...
"Hmm. Could be a base unit without a handset, I guess, if you think it's a phone. Don't know why someone would take something like that—maybe it was stuffed with something. We could ask the boyfriend about it, if we ever get a chance to meet him, but I don't know what else we'd try here."
"So now what, chief?" Mud asks the more mature Janice who he has anointed leader of their team.
"I mean, I was just assuming it was a phone, because you can see something got ripped out of the phone jack in the wall. So, if it turns out those were two different things, my bad."
"Right," Janice replies again. "I think we move on, unless anyone has a problem with that."
"Nope. Move on where?" Mud asks ready to follow.
It occurs to Adam that most of those large base units are for wireless handsets, and often double as an answering machine...
"For what it's worth, I've seen telephone bases that also have voicemail recorders. So, maybe the MIB were there to collect the evidence of a voicemail." Mud shrugs. "Where to now, Janice. Just decide. I'll follow."
"Right," Janice replies. "But that's not something we can track. If I get the chance, I'll see if anyone in the investigation has pulled her phone records."
"Hmm. It will be a while before we can do anything on the cat creature. Guess we go after G-Ray again? Or we can train for a week or two."
"Yes, I can go ask around about G-Ray. We also can find that Mr. Hebert. Maybe a telephone call to the victim?" Mud looks to the mature lady for the decision.
"Yeah, I'll pretty much just let you guys figure out what we should be doing."
Mud heads toward the neighborhood where G-Ray was last seen to ask around.
The next day, Mud heads around to look into the G-Ray thing, he doesn't hear about any sightings of G-Ray specifically since he vanished, but he does hear a tale about G-Ray getting into a car with a white man who was dressed up in a tux, which was an unusual thing, about a week before he went nuts.
Additionally, several other members of his gang have gone missing in the last few days.
Janice finds that the missing girl's phone records were pulled as standard procedure. The only thing that stands out when she looks at it was a call from a pay phone at Hartt's Exxon in Venice, LA. The call was from within a day of her vanishing (her exact time of disappearance isn't exactly known).
Back at the house, Mud reports that he doesn't hear about any sightings of G-Ray specifically since he vanished, but he does hear a tale about G-Ray getting into a car with a white man who was dressed up in a tux, which was an unusual thing, about a week before he went nuts.
Janice reports back to the others that there was a single suspicious phone call on the records—but it came from a pay phone in Venice, not too close by.
She's also mentioned the tuxedo in the G-Ray case before. The fact that other gang members are missing is new, though. "If you're interested," she tells Mud and Pixie, "We could try to pose as members of the gang; I can probably find photos, and disguise as either a missing person or one we take out of the picture temporarily, to see if someone's been knocking them off."
"Okay, just to be sure, that means Venice like here, not, like, real Venice, right?"
"Yeah," Janice replies, a bit annoyed, "Hundred miles or so by road, to the South-East. So, should I pull photos and names of missing gang members?"
"No offense, but I've no interest in posing as a gang member. Unless we have a particular lead on a white guy in a tuxedo picking up black gang-bangers, I think G-Ray is cold. Yes, pull the pictures of the missing bangers, just in case. Maybe we can start a bulletin board with pictures, titles and strings..."
"I suggest we go check out Venice. Maybe the red head Mr. Hebert made the call from the gas station, or the vic. Janice, can you get pictures of him and the vic to show around down there?" Mud says vic, because he's been binge watching CSI shows.
"We can, I guess." Janice is clearly a bit disappointed. "I just meant to gather info. Posing is more my thing than yours. There's just nothing we're specialized for on the kidnapping case, but I'll humor you if you want to continue investigating."
Mud gets the boat ready and pilots the boat to Venice and starts looking for the Hartt's Exxon. He assumes that Janice has the two photos.
After walking for ten minutes, Mud finds Hartt's Exxon. He circles the place at a distance to understand its layout and exits. Then, he leads the girls inside.
The gas station was fairly easy to find with google. There's an old style payphone outside. The listing from the phone company was that the call was made at 1:37AM, per the sign on the door, the station is open from 6AM to Midnight.
Stepping in it looks like a typical little gas station. There's 2-3 people inside, and one person behind the counter. The middle aged woman looks up as the trio walks in. Given the way Mud is looking around, she nods. "Something I can help you with Darlin?"
"Um, maybe. I hope so. My friends are missing. You wouldn't by chance have seen either of these two people?" Mud shows her the photos of the vic and Mr. Hebert.
The woman looks at the pictures briefly, and then shrugs. "Don't recognize 'em hon, sorry. We get quite a few people through here though, lots of 'em going fishin, you might check with the fishin' charters or the the hotel."
"Thanks. Which way to the hotel and these fishin charters? Also, you wouldn't by chance have a video recording of that payphone outside? That was the last time they called me."
"Sorry hon, we don't have no cameras out there. There's fishin' charter companies up and down the canal here hon, start two miles up, every time you see a boat that says 'Charter' on it, that's a charter. Lots 'o people round these parts make extra money doing charters."
"Thanks." Mud replies had heads outside. He looks for any surveillance of the phone booth.
To the others he says, "the attendant didn't recognize them. She suggested that we check the charters along the water. Why don't we split up into two pairs and go ask them? I can go this way."