“Not fully identified?” Jessica shot back.
“It's base is black India ink, possibly purchased at a specialty shop in the vicinity of the murders.”
“Specialty shop?” asked Kim.
“Nestled amid our target area, along Second Street, there's a bookstore called Darkest Expectations that sells it, as well as a stationery store named Ink, Line amp; Sinker. Upscale, hip shops. Only blocks from where we found the last victim.”
“No hemlock, no arsenic, no strychnine traces?” asked Jessica.
Sturtevante shook her head. “Whatever he's using, it isn't your run-of-the-mill poison.”
“I'll want to talk to your toxicology guys. What about you, Jim? Have you got a team of toxicologists working on identifying the poison?”
“We do, but it's the same with our lab. They don't know what they're looking for. It's been one hell of a problem.”
“If we can ID the poison, it might say something about the poisoner,” said Kim. “Behaviorally speaking, that is.”
“It might well be a hybrid poison, some sort of designer drug,” Jessica suggested.
“Chief Parry holds the same belief. Meantime, our people are thinking it's something new, like you say, possibly a hybrid.”
“Have they ruled out coldfire, then?” Jessica thought of her young victim in a morgue drawer back in Quantico.
“Tryptootilin? Yes, we've had our share of cases involving coldfire, and yes, they have ruled it out,” replied Sturtevante.
“Spanish fly? Azaleas? Rhododendrons? Other plants and flowers? I mean, doesn't this guy come with flowers and candy in hand?” Jessica asked.
“They have looked at all the usual suspects. You know how many poisons exist in the world?” Sturtevante asked in a strained voice.
Jessica realized only now that the detective had been offended by her tone. The two stood in the glow of light filtering through a glass door on which was lettered dr. Leonard w. shockley, me. The two women sized each other up, their eyes locked.
Jessica said evenly, “I have a dictionary-sized book on the subject of poisons.”
“That you've no doubt read, so you have some idea what our lab people are faced with… and how do you test for what you don't suspect? There's no way to test for everything, and everything on earth, if-”
“If used in excess, kills, I know,” finished Jessica.
Kim, sensing the hostility between the other two women, jumped in. “It would appear no one's seen the like of it before, whatever this poisoned ink is. They're sure to have tested for mercury, right?”
“Right,” Sturtevante echoed.
“Let's have a look at the victims,” Jessica suggested.
“Step inside.” Sturtevante opened the door. “You're expected; all has been arranged.”
“We aim to please,” added Parry. “I knew you'd want to take a hands-on approach, both of you. And it's as good a place to start as any.”
His deep-set blue eyes reminded Jessica of the Hawaiian nights they'd spent together, and a sudden weakness in her knees made her wonder if she could handle this. She wondered as well if she could work alongside this man as if nothing had ever happened between them. His eyes seemed to mutely ask her the same question. Jessica wanted both to be alone at this moment and to be alone with him; they had so much to say to each other, so much clearing of the air to do.
Jessica again heard her father's voice from deep within telling her to be strong as she unconsciously clutched at the heavy steel scalpel in her breast pocket. Somehow her father's gift gave her the strength and resolve she needed.
On entering the morgue's outer corridor, she saw a white-haired Dr. Leonard Walter Shockley through what seemed a series of prisms-glass office windows, rows of them. He looked to be conducting some test on a gas chromotographer no doubt, attempting to separate out various chemical substances in order to make some scientific determination about some evidence. He looked like a ghost, a very busy and preoccupied ghost. As they came toward him, he didn't show the least interest in them and didn't even look up from his work.
Jessica wondered how Shockley might react to her and how she should treat him-professional to professional or as the daughter of an old friend. Shockley had known and worked with her father many years before, and had in fact attended Jessica's graduation from medical school. Jessica rarely saw him anymore, since the death of her father. She already felt surrounded by people she must prove something to, and now she feared another was about to be added to the list.
FIVE
Unfathomable to mere mortals is the lore of fiends.
As Jessica stared at her surroundings-the Philadelphia PD's Crime Lab Unit and adjacent medical examiner's office-a feeling of deja vu swept over her, and for a moment, she thought she might be returned to a time when she was chief medical examiner for the District of Columbia. The place could not be more identical. Perhaps designed by the same architect in the mid-fifties? Like hundreds of other such places, Philadelphia's crime lab appeared as busy as any in the nation, and just as understaffed.
As they entered the main lab, Lieutenant Sturtevante said to the coroner for the city of Philadelphia, “Shocky, it's time for the show.”
A stoop-shouldered gnome of a man with a greenish tinge to his skin turned from the cadaver he was scrutinizing with forceps, probe, overhanging magnifying glass, and the intensity of a medieval alchemist or some aged wizard in a fairy tale. Dr. Shockley stood, feet planted, rubber-gloved hands on hips, staring as if he were stumped by a complex mathematical problem, his eyes wide behind bottle-bottom glasses. Suddenly allowing a smile to spread across his wizened features, he said in a delighted tone, “Well, if it isn't the last of the female studs, Stud-e-vant! Have you caught yourself a man yet? Can't catch a man, how're you supposed to catch a murderer?” He laughed at his own jokes, and it was clear that the two were following a familiar routine.
“I've got you, Shocky. All the man I can handle at one time.”
“If there was ever a woman I couldn't satisfy, I suspect it'd be you, dear.”
“That's enough of that, Shocky. Let me introduce-”
He waved Sturtevante off, going directly to Jessica, peeling away his rubber gloves, fluids and pieces of tissue flying as he grasped her hands in his, eyes twinkling as he heartily pumped her arm as if hoping for water to spout from her mouth. His grip felt like steel, stronger than she had imagined, as he nearly shouted, “So, Sturtevante, our two famous detectives have arrived, Dr. Coran and Dr. Desinor. Been so looking forward to it, ladies. Around here, the more the merrier. As for you, Jessica, I feel a hug coming on.”
“Really? And it's wonderful to see you, too, Uncle Leonard.”
“Uncle?” asked Sturtevante. “Not by blood but by affection,” said Jessica. “One of my father's best friends.”
“One of? I was your father's best friend, sweetheart,” he countered.
“Sorry, Doctor. I meant-”
“Never you mind. It's just wonderful to have you here and on the case with me.”
“Do you really mean that, or are you just being polite?” she challenged the old man.
“Unlike many of my associates here in Philly, I'm not afraid to say it. I need all the help I can get!” He took Kim's hand next and shook it as heartily as he had Jessica's.
Shocky, as Sturtevante had called the ME, had gotten their names and faces right, explaining, “I recognize
