Character Analysis
Mr. Jesse's murderer is Robert Slate, a man who is out to track down all of his former associates and kill them for his share of the loot they took from a bank robbery twelve years ago. He serves as a shadow figure in the novel—he's almost never encountered—but the characters are constantly trying to either track him down or evade him. It turns out that the Colonel once represented Robert Slate as his lawyer and got him a lighter sentence. Slate then killed the Colonel's secretary, leading to the Colonel's undying hatred for lawyers… even after losing his memory.