Beyond Recognition

LaMoia arrived, clearly worked up.

“Brainstorming,” Boldt said, holding up a hand to prevent LaMoia from interrupting.

The detective nodded. His demeanor was serious and contemplative. “With you,” he said.

The sergeant said, “Me, then Gaynes, then you. Okay?” LaMoia nodded. Boldt retraced their steps, saying, “Fibers found on the windows and by the ladder.”

Gaynes went next. “Window washing. A rag maybe.”

“Cotton fibers,” LaMoia said, a beat behind in the game.

Boldt hoped he wouldn’t hinder them. “A bucket of rags? A rag tucked in a belt?”

“A bucket of soapy water,” said Gaynes.

“Window washing,” LaMoia said, his voice lower and more ominous than usual.

Boldt sensed the detective’s head rise in an attempt to meet eyes, but Boldt wanted this purely stream-of- consciousness communication. His own head slightly bent, Boldt said, “Glass.”

“A squeegee.”

“Sponge. Rag.”

“Ladder,” Boldt said.

“Rooftop.”

“Glass,” LaMoia echoed.

“Windows,” Gaynes offered.

“The cars!” LaMoia said more loudly. “The wheels!”

Inadvertently, Boldt snapped his head up.

“The cars,” LaMoia repeated. “My assignment, remember? Lab report placed cotton fibers inside the cars,” he emphasized, his eyes wide, his mustache caught between his teeth as he gnawed.

Boldt wanted to continue the brainstorming but decided to talk it through. “It’s a natural fiber, John. It’s found everywhere. Every crime scene.”

LaMoia appeared too caught up in his own idea to be of any help. Ignoring LaMoia, Boldt asked Gaynes, “What about the Seahawks front office? If we’re right about the silver and blue being the Seahawks logo, wouldn’t the Seahawks front office license the rights?”

Her eyes brightened. “They’ll have a list of anyone authorized to use the colors and logo.”

“An agent would handle licensing. An attorney probably.”

LaMoia wasn’t paying any attention. His eyes were squinted shut tightly.

“I’ll get a name,” she said. He could see optimism in the brightness of her eyes. He appreciated Gaynes for her can-do attitude. Nothing beat her down.

LaMoia said to no one in particular, “It’s the cars. The lab report mentioned an abundance of cotton fibers.”

Boldt felt a surge of anger. LaMoia wasn’t listening to himself. It was first-year academy stuff. Attempting to follow natural fibers was like trying to use dust as forensic evidence.

“What about T-shirt shops?” Gaynes asked. “They wouldn’t necessarily be listed as printers, yet they might have a screen in the back room. Might sell sweat bands, something with a twisted fiber.”

“Add them to your phone list as well,” Boldt instructed.

LaMoia snapped out of it and said, “The phone deal is on.”

“If Bernie says it’s a towel or a robe, we go with that.”

“Window washing,” LaMoia sputtered, annoying Boldt. “The cars.”

“What about the silver paint?” Gaynes asked. “The Bureau’s crime lab keeps the chemical signature of paints on file. Maybe they could ID the paint manufacturer for us.” She continued. “We might narrow the printer field considerably.”

“That’s good thinking,” Boldt told her. “Check it out with Bernie.”

“Sarge,” LaMoia said, “I need to check something out.”

“Go,” Boldt told him, happy to be rid of him.

LaMoia took off at a hurried clip. That from the man of struts and strides? It caught the attention of Bobbie Gaynes as well. She said, “Well, he’s certainly in a strange place.”

Boldt checked his watch. He was late to an autopsy that he did not want to attend. Dixie was to go over the skeletal remains of the woman found in the crawl space. He would attempt to confirm it was Ben’s mother. If Boldt skipped it, Shoswitz would hear about it; he had no choice but to go.

47

It was not such a long drive, but for Daphne it felt nearly interminable. Boldt had not been told about the meeting. Susan Prescott did not know. It was the bit of conspiracy between Ben and Daphne that had convinced Ben to cooperate with the video lineup and the police artist: the promise of seeing Emily.

The meeting could not take place at Emily’s because Daphne remained concerned about the Scholar’s possible whereabouts and media references to the participation of a local psychic and the existence of a twelve- year-old witness. Even without names being mentioned, Daphne was taking no chances; she would protect Ben at every opportunity.

Both Boldt and Susan would have been highly critical of her for arranging such a meeting, but a promise was a promise. Her fears ran far beyond the tongue-lashing she might suffer from Boldt. More important, she might lose her newly formed bond with Ben to this other woman. She wondered if the transition from a possible future with Owen to a present with this boy had resulted in a transference; if, in fact, she was fooling herself, not being honest, using the boy to soften the landing. She had barely thought about Owen over the past few days. He had been gracious enough to give her the distance she requested, and that distance had ended up an emotional abyss, a black hole across which she had not returned. She had rid herself of him. It felt good on many levels. She missed Corky, especially at dinnertime, but much of what she gained from Corky had been easily replaced by her time with Ben. At that point it hit her hard: If she lost Ben the world was going to seem incredibly empty for a time. For the past week, the kid had done more good for her than he would ever know.

She did not trust Emily. The woman was a proven con artist. She played on a person’s superstitions, fears, and aspirations. She tricked people. She used the stars and a tarot deck to feed people what they wanted to hear. Worst of all, she owned Ben’s heart free and clear; in the eyes of the youngster this woman could do no wrong. If she told Ben to stop talking to Daphne, he would; if she told him to run for her car and lock the doors, he would do this as well. Just the mention of her name drove the boy’s eyes wide. Daphne realized that she was in many ways jealous of Emily, just as she was jealous of Liz-envy was too light a word. She didn’t like herself much, and that discovery made her wonder if her impending breakup with Owen was a product of his failures, their combined failures, or her own internal dissatisfaction with herself.

Martin Luther King Boulevard was a four-lane road through several miles of an economically patchy black neighborhood kept separate from Lake Washington’s upscale white enclaves by a geological formation, a high spine of hill running as a steep ridge, north to south. Daphne marveled how Seattle, like so many U.S. cities, was segregated into dozens of small ethnic and microeconomic communities, villages, and neighborhoods. People moved freely and, for the most part safely, one community to the next, but park a car of blacks in a gated community and a cop or security person would arrive within minutes. A car of whites would not draw the same response. Seattle’s various communities consisted of African Americans, Hispanics, Vietnamese, Caucasians, Jews, Scandinavians, yuppies, yaughties, and computer nerds.

Ben pointed out the park before they arrived. A row of cement obelisks loomed in the distance, looking like support piers for a highway overpass. Daphne didn’t know this area well and was unfamiliar with the park itself. She followed Ben’s directions and pulled over to stop where he indicated.

Ben could not remember feeling this happy, this excited. Emily. He had missed her to the point that he felt his heart might rip from his chest. He had dreamed about her, written in his journal about her, lay awake thinking about