"Yeah. I've heard that."
" Si," Rodriguez said. "I found a stiff dead two weeks, you could tell the nails had grown an inch."
" Deceptio visus," Charlie said. "The tips of the fingers and toes shrink, so the nails appear longer. Nothing more."
"You mean appearances are deceiving, don't you, Charlie?" I asked hopefully. With Doc Riggs, you have to read between the lines.
He smiled back at me.
I kept going. "You're saying Prince didn't do it."
Charlie shrugged. "What do we have so far? Circumstantial evidence. Prince appears to have chatted with three women shortly before each was killed. He admits speaking to two of them, denies the first, which is curious but not conclusive of anything. We have no matching latent prints at any of the scenes. The autopsy of Miss Diamond reveals rather modest bruising over the thyroid and a partially fractured hyoid bone, which is consistent with strangulation by moderate force."
"A limp-wristed English professor," Fox said, making his point with a dainty wave of the arm, "a wacko drunk pervert. What more you want, Jake?"
"On the other hand," Charlie said, "Ms. Rosedahl and Mrs. Fox suffered somewhat greater damage. Larynx snapped in two. Fractured hyoid, thyroid, and cricoid, the whole shebang."
Fox shrugged. "He got better at it, maybe sobered up. Doc, don't forget the blood typing."
"Prince tests for blood type A, as do the semen specimens from Miss Rosedahl and Mrs. Fox. Have you done the DNA testing?"
"It's at the lab," Rodriguez said. He put down the newspaper, glommed a chocolate Kiss from Charlie, unwrapped the foil, and popped it into his mouth.
"Well," Charlie said. "No use speculating now. When they line up the alleles for each polymorphic locus, there'll be no mistaking it. Either it's Prince's semen or not."
"So what if it matches," I jumped in. "That doesn't exclude the possibility that he had sex with each woman, then after he left, the killer arrived."
Fox laughed. "Oh, gimme a break, Jake! What is this guy to you, some Mr. Chips character?"
I didn't answer, but Charlie did. "If there's a DNA match, it means Prince is lying. He says he never met any of the women, much less…"
"And if he's lying," Nick said, scooping up the ball and heading for the end zone, "he's the killer. Admit it, Jake."
"It'd be enough to sustain an indictment," I conceded glumly.
"Enough to pull the switch at Raiford," Nick Fox concluded.
I looked at Pam Maxson. She placidly watched them take shots at me. Maybe she liked it. I'd been surprised when she told me to book three seats to Miami. Wanted to fulfill some speaking engagements, she said, help with my investigation, too. Surprised me again when she accepted my invitation for room, board, and affection at the little coral-rock house between Kumquat and Poinciana, rather than a fancy, oceanfront, phone-in-the-bathroom, twenty-four-hour-room-service hotel. We had shared my bed under the paddle fan on the second floor, the pungent aroma of neighborhood mango trees wafting through the open windows on the sticky nighttime breeze. We had listened to distant police sirens and each other's heartbeats. We had curled around each other, and I said sweet things into her neck, all of which I meant at the time.
I always think there's a band, kid. Professor Gerald Prince, master plagiarist, said that. So did Professor Harold Hill, knavish music man. And Jacob Lassiter, bloomin' pettifogger. Fakers all.
Rodriguez had given me the manila folder with the printout from Priscilla Fox's computer. I looked at it for the third time.
DO YOU LIKE TO PAMPER A WOMAN, PASSION KING? PRINCE. JUST A PRINCE, LIKE YOUNG HAMLET. PAMPERING? IS THAT WHAT YOU NEED? DON'T KNOW. NEVER HAD IT. MIGHT BE NICE FOR A CHANGE. IF YOU CAN'T STAND THE COLDNESS OF MY SORT OF LIFE, GO BACK TO THE GUTTER. THE GUTTER! LISTEN HERE, PASSION PRICK. I'VE BEEN A WIFE AND A MOTHER AND HAD DINNER WITH THE GOVERNOR AND DROVE CAR POOL, AND I'M A LADY ALL DAY, AND AT NIGHT, I DO WHAT THE HELL I WANT. NO. NO. NO. TRY THIS. "I'M A GOOD GIRL, I AM" WHAT? TRY IT. "I'M A GOOD GIRL, I AM. AND I KNOW THE LIKES OF YOU, I DO." WAIT!!! THATS FROM A PLAY. BY JOVE, SHE'S GOT IT. I THINK SHE'S GOT IT. SURE. MY FAIR LADY. YOU WERE DOING THE REX HARRISON PART, RIGHT? I PREFER TO THINK OF THE PLAY AS PYGMALION, AND I WAS DOING HENRY HIGGINS AS WRITTEN BY SHAW. I THOUGHT YOU MIGHT TRY A FEW OF ELIZA'S LINES. OH PRINCE. YOU'RE VERY LITERARY. I LIKE THAT. MY HUSBAND NEVER HAD ANY TIME FOR PLAYS. FOOTBALL, BUT NOT PLAYS. AND TRY TO GET HIM TO THE BALLET. HE CALLED IT FAIRIES' BASEBALL. WELL THEN, PERHAPS WE COULD GET TOGETHER. LOVE TO. CALL ME AGAIN. BUT GOT TO GET CLEANED UP, CHANGE CLOTHES NOW. HEY. I MEAN IT. CALL ME TOMORROW.
I put the file down and thought about it. Charlie went back to his maggots, Rod to his paper, and Nick Fox sat down at his desk beneath the wall of commendations and merit badges. Pam Maxson studied me from across the office. It was the professor, all right, sliding in and out of an old role. According to the printout, they signed off at 10:05 P.M. Priscilla said she had to get cleaned up, change clothes. Not get cleaned up, go to bed. She was going out. Or someone was coming over. Late. And not the Passion Prince. Someone she already knew. But who?
Nick Fox, maybe.
Or Alex Rodriguez, her pal.
Now, those were thoughts best kept to yourself. I opened the file again. When they found Priscilla Fox, wearing a silk negligee, strangled in the foyer near the front door, there was a faint light from the corner of what had been Nick's study. A steady hum came from the IBM compatible on the desk. On the screen, white on black, a message from hell.
MAN IS THE HUNTER; WOMAN IS HIS GAME; THE SLEEK AND SHINING CREATURES OF THE CHASE, WE HUNT THEM FOR THE BEAUTY OF THEIR SKINS.
Tennyson again, they told me. I didn't know the poem, but I can read English. Regardless of the poet's meaning, there was no mistaking the intent here. Someone was collecting the sleek, shiny pelts of the female of the species and bragging about it.
Got to get cleaned up, change clothes now. Who was it? Some sick creature out of the swamps who looks just like you or me? Or Nick Fox or Alex Rodriguez? There it was again, the thought hanging on like a summer cold.
I told everybody I was going to put the top down and take a little ride just to clear my head. No one seemed to care. As I stood up, Nick Fox said, "Jake, let me give you some advice. You've got to look out for your reputation. This case could make you look like a bozo."
"Meaning what?"
"Don't get defensive. I'm trying to help you out. Look, I know stories about you when you just started practicing. A lot of people thought you played ball too long without a helmet."
"I made some mistakes," I admitted.
Nick turned toward Rodriguez, his one-man fan club. "One day when Jake was just out of the PD's office, he went to federal court. Remember, Jakie, the story was all over town. The judge had assigned the motion to a magistrate. Jakie had never appeared before a magistrate before and didn't know how to address him. So when he's asked whether the plaintiff is ready, Jakie here says-"
"Yes, Your Majesty."
Rodriguez snickered. Pam smiled politely. Charlie kept reading.
"It seemed right at the time," I said.
"I checked up on you, Jakie," Fox said. "At Harman and Fox, your first deposition in a big civil case, one of the senior partners tells you it's a formal proceeding. So you show up-"
"In a tuxedo," I said.
Even Charlie laughed at that, and he's my best friend.
"So the point is, Jakie, like I told you before, keep your ass down, it won't get shot off."
I took the expressway west past the Orange Bowl, pale and faded now that the Dolphins had moved uptown to a new amphitheater with massive replay screens and sky boxes for the heavy hitters. I turned south on the Palmetto, past Flagler Street and Calle Ocho, past Coral Way, and exited at Bird Road. I was sandwiched between two semis, and I inhaled equal portions of carbon monoxide and diesel fuel. I headed west again, past the same car dealers and gas stations, gun shops and XXX videos, beauty parlors and rental furniture stores. Plastic signs proclaimed the lowest prices, the largest selections, the newest models, and the biggest, bestest, beautifulest products money can buy.