“Thank God there’s no statute of limitations for murder.”
“Well, there shouldn’t be for any major crime, but there’s nothing any of us can do about that, is there?” Beck proposed, and twisted off the top of a bottle of Peach Snapple. “But back to what I was saying. A company called CRP recently used a thermal-fusion technique to combine the three latent ident substances I was telling you about, all three in one is what I’m telling you. It’s great. A low-therm fume application with this stuff, Anthra-Hydrin, will sap an image off of any solid surface, even if the surface was touched by surgical gloves, and the readout will be admissible even without a digitalization. The whole process takes about eighteen hours.”
“Fine,” Helen said, pushing back a headache. “But what about the graphology? The analysis that will prove the letter wasn’t written by Dahmer? You said it only takes eight hours. When will you be able to give me something I can give the papers?”
“I don’t even know what the press is talking about. Where do they get this shit? The peripheries of the P-Street m.o. are so different from Dahmer’s, it’s ridiculous.”
“That’s what I told them.”
“And I gotta tell you, we found two cooking utensils in the motel room.”
“Cooking ut—”
“A paring knife and an aluminum spatula, and, yes, they each contained traces of human muscle tissue.”
Helen thought back. “There was a cooking odor in the room, but no kitchen appliances.”
Beck shrugged. “So the perp brought in a hotplate or a Hibachi or something? Big deal.”
Big deal? “Jan, are you telling me that the perp ate pieces of the victim?”
“It’s impossible to say for sure since I don’t have the perp’s stomach contents to read. But, under the circumstances, I’d say that it’s a very good possibility. Part of Arlinger’s left bicep was cut out of his arm. Dahmer did the same thing to one of his victims. But it’s just more copycat stuff.”
Helen considered this, then agreed. “Okay, okay, you’re right. I wasn’t thinking.”
“So there’s nothing to worry about with the press, is there?”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.” Helen stalled. Her mind kept flicking back to Tom. Stop it! You’ve got a job to do! Forget about Tom! “So you were saying. How long before you can give me positive proof that the note wasn’t written by Dahmer?”
Beck’s dark eyes mused back in a quick mathematical surmise. “Well, the trace plate’s cooking now for, I guess, five hours. A trace plate is a computer enhanced photographic negative—real size—of the original letter. Once I get the plate out of the processor, I’ll put it in there.” Beck pointed to another anonymous machine on the other side of the narrow room. “That’s an A/N spectrophotometer. The A stands for assay. Want to guess what the N stands for?”
Helen’s eyes squinted down on a yellow-and-scarlet label stuck to the machine’s baseplate. WARNING, THIS DEVICE CONTAINS RADIOACTIVE ISOTOPES. STAND CLEAR.
“You’re kidding me? You’ve got a nuclear reactor sitting in here?”
“Not precisely,” Beck replied with a smile. “A beryllium shroud covers the active pit, so you’re not going to melt. The pit, a pellet of plutonium 235, activates any amino-acid residuum on the note. Then I’ll take the note and compare it to samples of Dahmer’s handwriting that Columbus County Detent has already couriered over. I’ll feed the works into a comparison computer index which files, in duplicate, line-quality, letter formation, letter- and word-spacing—in microns, mind you—clockwise, counter-clockwise, straight-line, and curvature motion, terminal strokes, and relative position, the entire graphological ball of wax. We don’t do it the old way anymore. A felt-tip pen won’t leave any measurable impactations—we don’t need any of that in this day and age. My computer analysis of the P-Street letter will give you what you need. And I can hand it to you in—” Beck looked a her watch. “Say, three and a half hours from now.”
Helen, however weary from all the forensic word salad, was impressed.
“That would be great, Jan. Thanks for hustling.”
“That’s my job.” Beck sipped more Snapple. “How’s Tom, by the way?”
The question wiped the slate of Helen’s mind clean. And without even a perfunctory thought, she blurted an answer:
“We broke up.”
The remark weighed Beck’s face down like a high g-force. “You—you’re kidding.”
“I mean, I think we broke up,” more bad water spilled out of Helen’s mouth.
Beck’s voice softened, and she leaned forward as if she were in a college dorm asking her roommate a sensitive question. “Why?” she asked.
I caught him cheating on m— Helen’s thoughts began. Gritting her teeth forced it back, to wordlessness.
But then a tear formed in her eye and she got up and turned very quickly. Her self-esteem, whatever remained of it, could not allow the chief of the technical services division see her cry.
“It just wasn’t working out,” she said and left.
««—»»
Two voices.
Two men in the dark.
“I feel so—”
“Shut up. Stop being such a pussy.”
Silence, for a moment.
“You’re gonna make me sick of you.”
“Please.” A gasp, a sob. “I can’t help how I feel. I would do anything for you.”
One shadow shape turned to the other.
“I know. And you already have.” A lean to the side. A kiss on the cheek and a crude caress. “And I thank you for that.”
Sobbing, in response.
“And you’ll do more from me, won’t you?”
A heated rustle beneath damp covers. An arm shot around the other’s shoulder. “Yes, oh yes! Anything!”
“Good.”
The one shadow stood up, wended through silken dark, through blackness like a sweet song. Metal clicked. Then the shadow returned.
In his hands dangled another shadow: handcuffs.
“You love me, don’t you?”
“Yes! Yes!”
“Do you really?”
“Christ—yes!”
“It’s an easy thing to say. But are you willing to prove it?”
A whisper more fierce than the hardest shout:
“YES!”
“Good, that’s good.” Then more silence, and then: “Turn over and put your hands behind your back.” The ratcheted cusp of the handcuffs clicked open. “Just like last night and the night before that and the week before that and the month before that.” The cuffs snapped closed. “Just like every night from now on,” said the man who was once the boy from Bath, Ohio.
— | — | —
CHAPTER SEVEN
Helen didn’t leave her office.
Perhaps she should have.
She wanted to wait, for the verification of what she already knew. But why? To feel safe? And going home would only force her to face things she didn’t want to face. Easier to just sit here and act like I’m doing something, she supposed.
Headquarters quieted down after the 4 p.m. shift-change, the roar descending to a clatter. Cigar fumes left no doubt that Olsher hadn’t left either. What would he do when the state passed new legislation banning smoking in all workplaces? Probably retire. She’d passed his office a few times and seen him in there, fidgeting. He’s waiting too, she knew. Waiting for Beck…