“Continue to scout around,” said Diane. “See if you can find any tracks. If we could get a line on a vehicle, that would be great. When you finish, help David and Neva. I’m going to hitch a ride back to the lab and work on the bones we found.”
“The rest of the cook?” asked Jin.
“I’m not sure now that the guy I reconstructed was the cook, or was the only cook. There was at least another person in the basement when it exploded.”
“That’s good-I mean the more clues we have, the faster we can solve this thing,” said Jin. “Not that we have another dead body from the explosion.”
“I’m hoping I have enough facial fragments for another reconstruction,” said Diane. “Carry on.”
Diane worked her way down the embankment, slipping a couple of times in the snow. When she got back down she went inside, pulled Garnett away from the media, coaxed him into the van, and told him about the other person in the basement-and about Jin’s find.
“This is good. I can tell the media how valuable information could have been lost if we hadn’t found where McNair hid it.”
Get your mind off payback, thought Diane. “Have you found anyone alive who lived in the apartment house,” she asked. “What about the landlord? Who was renting the basement?”
“No one was renting the basement, according to the landlord,” said Garnett. “I’ve got some men sitting on him. I can’t believe someone could have a lab in his house and not know about it. We’ve pushed him pretty far, but so far he’s not budging.”
“How about residents? One of them could have allowed someone in the basement,” said Diane.
“Most of them were killed in the explosion. There’s a kid who does have an apartment in the house. He went on vacation to Europe with his parents just before this happened. We’re hoping when he returns he’ll have some answers to your questions. I’ve got your drawing out there, no hits. I’ve sent it to the old members of the drug unit. I’m waiting to hear. Now, what do you have on the Stanton kid?”
Diane told him about the museum thefts, his relationship with Darcy, the possibility that they were on a date and neither had any idea that there was a meth lab in the basement.
“I’ll be damned. That puts a new face on it. Why did he try to jack your car?”
Diane shrugged. “He was hurt and dazed after the explosion. He panicked. Maybe he really didn’t know what he was doing. He probably carried a gun as a macho thing. I don’t know and probably never will. But we have found no trace connection with him and McNair. Have you found any links?”
“No,” Garnett confessed. “None whatsoever. They were both shot with Berettas, but not the same one. The two murders are so similar, but at the same time there are some important differences. This museum theft makes me think the similarities are simply coincidences.”
“Look, Garnett, don’t lock me out of this. I need to know what you know. We can help and I’m very motivated.”
“I’m telling you all I know. This find in the warehouse here puts you back in the game. Right now I need to get back to the media. I’m hoping for some press that’ll stop Adler in his tracks. He’s hurt a lot of good men.”
“Would you get one of the patrolmen to give me a ride back to the lab? I’d like to start working on these bones.”
“Sure,” said Garnett. “Izzy’s here; I’ll get him to take you.”
“He’s working? I thought he’d be off mourning his son.”
“He’s due time off, but he wants to find out who did this, and I’m letting him help. I think he needs to be involved.”
“Poor guy,” said Diane. They emerged from the van and Garnett went to get Izzy. Diane got the box of bones and, hoping to look inconspicuous, stood behind the van. She looked up on the ridge and saw a beam of light extending from the ground upward like a small spotlight. She watched it for several moments. It didn’t move. Jin! she thought.
Chapter 35
Diane opened the van, shoved the box of bones in, and raced up the hill. She slipped on the snow and scraped her knees through her pants.
“Damn!” she exclaimed, picking herself up and hurrying up the embankment.
At the top of the ridge she saw the flashlight leaning against a rock. She searched the ground quickly with the beam of her flashlight. Just as her light played on a hiking boot at the bottom of an embankment on the other side of the ridge, she heard a groan.
“Jin!” she shouted.
She ran down the embankment, half sliding on the rocks and snow, fortunately not falling.
She knelt beside him as he struggled to his knees. “Jin, what happened?” she asked. “Did you fall?”
“Fall?” He said confused. “No. I don’t think so.” He sat up. “Damn, my head hurts. He rubbed his hand on the back of his head. “Ouch!” He brought his hand back around. “It’s wet,” he said.
“Let me look.” She aimed her flashlight at the back of his head and parted his hair. “You have a cut and it looks like you’re going to have a sizable bump. You’re sure you didn’t fall? What’s the last thing you remember?”
Jin tried to stand up.
“Just sit there for a moment, and tell me what you remember.”
“I was kneeling down, digging at something I found,” said Jin.
“More evidence?”
Jin shook his head. “An arrowhead.”
“An arrowhead?”
“Yeah, milky quartz, looked like, from what Jonas called the Old Quartz Culture, about eight thousand years ago. There’s a zillion of those kinds of points in Georgia. Don’t you visit your own museum?”
“Yes, I know what the Old Quartz Culture is. That’s the last thing you remember-digging out the arrowhead?”
“Yes.”
“Someone hit you,” she said.
“Hit me?” Jin stood up suddenly and checked his pockets. “The cigarette butts are gone. Someone stole my cigarette butts. It had to be the killer. He was right here with me and I let him get away.”
“We don’t know it was the killer…,” began Diane.
“Who else would give a shit about cigarette butts? Jeez, I don’t believe this.” Jin retrieved his flashlight and began searching the ground.
“You all right up here?”
Diane looked up at the top of the ridge. It was Izzy Wallace. He was followed by Archie, the policeman from the morgue tent, and another patrolman Diane recognized as one of the two who helped her when Blake Stanton was locked in her car. The three of them came down the slope.
“We saw you running like a bat out of hell up the embankment,” said Izzy. “What happened?”
“It looks like someone hit Jin over the head and stole some evidence,” said Diane.
“Here?” said Archie. “While we were all down at the warehouse? Somebody was up here?”
“Looks like it,” said Diane.
Izzy saw Jin searching the ground. “What do we need to be looking for?” he asked.
“An evidence bag with cigarette butts,” said Jin. “Maybe I did fall and it just fell out of my pocket.”
“From the bump on the back of your head, I think you were hit,” said Diane. “You were unconscious for a while. You need to see a doctor.”
“I’m fine.”
“You need to do what she says, son,” said Archie. “We’ll search up here. If there’s anything to be found, we’ll find it.”
“Let them look, Jin.” She saw something on the ground and picked it up. It was the quartz arrowhead. She handed it to Jin.
“I’m sorry, Boss,” he said.
“That’s all right, Jin. None of us expected anyone to be up here, with all the police around.”
“There’s all kinds of roads and paths around here,” said the patrolman.