with the families?”
“One in a million can walk away from the remains of a loved one. Forget about it. Still, just look at this Adonis. Hardly looks dead, does he? Am I right? What a specimen of Homo sapiens.”
“Fact is he looks like that statue of David,” Jessica observed.
“Michelangelo's David?” Kim asked. “I don't see the resem-”
“No, no, not Michelangelo. The infamous one that looks like the boy David most likely looked like, the one by the sculptor Donatello.”
“Oh, yes, I know the piece you mean. A portrayal of David at the time of his slaying of Goliath, presented as the pubescent child he had to have been at the time rather than a muscular Hercules.”
“Donatello, living in the mid-fifteenth century, defied conventional wisdom. He believed in being true to nature and history. I've always admired his perfectly horrifying rendition of the street prostitute Mary Magdalen as well.”
They had come back fresh to examine Anton Pierre's body, and Jessica, staring hard at the handsome face through a high-intensity magnifying glass, noticed an unusual pattern. “I see a blemish or the faint remains of a rash, I believe, on his forehead.”
They had found small areas of patchy redness on all the victims caused, Jessica believed, by the toxin.
“Just another rust-colored rash?” asked Shockley, coming closer to have a look.
“No, no discoloration. Rather a faint shadow under the scope. Take a look.”
'Teardrops,” said Shockley.
'Teardrops? No way. Teardrops form a line as they drop down the face. These are polka-dot fashion. Besides, they're above the eyes.”
“Let me put some infrared light on the subject,” Shockley suggested. “Hit the light switch on the wall beside you, Dr. Desinor.”
Kim did so, and except for the red glow of the infrared light Shockley held over the dead man's striking features, pitch darkness surrounded them. Their white lab coats turned a Day-Glo purple.
Studying the supposed rash more closely now, Jessica could clearly see a pattern of small circles with rivulets running away from each, all under the red glow, all about the young man's forehead.
'Teardrops,” Shockley again said.
“But the splatter pattern is… all wrong, as if…”
“Yes, I agree. Jessica, dear, we finally have something the killer left behind.”
“Then the tears are his; the killer's left his secretions on the victim?” asked Kim.
“We'll have to lift his DNA with great care. I have just the fixative and gel for the job,” Shockley assured her.
“Are you sure? We damage it, it's gone. Are you sure we shouldn't simply do an electron bombardment photo?”
“And destroy the only evidence we have?”
“We'd have the photos.”
“Photos will tell us nothing. We can't test the photos for human DNA properties. These teardrops, if we can lift and fix them, can tell us if our killer is male or female, his approximate age, skin color, what kind of secretor he is, possible blood type. Of course, this will take some time.”
“The green,” said Kim, taking Jessica's arm. “It was green tears that I saw. The green reflecting pool. He cries in the color green.”
“Green tears?” asked Jessica, her voice giving way to confusion.
“I didn't recognize it before, but the green pool I saw- he cries in green for all the lost hopes, dreams, intentions of this world that have never come to fruition. He cries for the loss of angelic aspirations.”
An attendant in blue surgical garb stuck her short-cropped head through the door and said, “Pardon, Dr. Shockley, but the red light is spinning again, and there's a call for Dr. Coran and Dr. Desinor. The caller says it's urgent.”
“I'll take it,” said Jessica.
Kim followed Jessica back toward her temporary office to take the call, but Kim said she had to find some caffeine and sugar quickly or she would keel over, so they parted near the elevators. Jessica took the call alone.
Detective Sturtevante's voice rang out. “Sorry to disturb you there, but this is about the case Jessica thought she detected a tinge of sarcasm. “Go ahead.”
“Then you haven't heard? I thought Parry and you were tight.”
“Heard what? I haven't seen or heard from Parry since you left together, yesterday.”
“Unfortunately, we think we may have victim number five already. If it's true, this guy's really stepped up his timetable in a big way.”
“Can you send a squad car for Dr. Desinor and me?”
“It's waiting for you outside the lab, east exit of the building.”
“Thanks. See you when we arrive and we're all sorry about the confusion of the other-”
“And Dr. Coran…”
“Yes?”
“Good to have you on the case. Don't think I had the opportunity to say so before.”
“ 'Predate it, Lieutenant.”
“I know we need all the support we can muster on this one.” Leave it to Sturtevante to call me support staff, Jessica thought. “Right. Male or female?” she asked.
“Come again?”
“The victim, male or female?”
“Male, but he pretends otherwise.”
“Come again?”
“Likes dressing up in women's clothes. He's something of a… let's say an androgynous sort.”
“I see.”
“Might have something to do with all this, you think? This look of the victims? To me, they all appear to be rather difficult to pinpoint as to sex. The men are as pretty as the women.”
“Perhaps, could be. We've been remarking on the same thing here. I mean to say that their lifestyles, all of the victims, were…” She hesitated. “In one fashion or another, they were atypical, sexually speaking.”
“Agreed. And they dressed the part, playing down which sex they belonged to, playing down their sexual characteristics. Add to that the thin, lithe bodies, none of them dating in the normal sense, all looking for some spiritual answer to the sexual dilemma.”
“You've given this some thought.”
“I have, yes.”
“I did notice the asexual nature of the bodies, both the two females and the feminine males. Long, slender, no telling them apart from the back, even difficult from the front, such small breasts on the women.”
“Yes, the killer's body type of choice.”
“Could have a great deal to do with what's going on inside his head.”
“We'll never know if he decides one of these days to take his own medicine.”
“You think he may be suicidal?”
“His poetry leads me to think so, yes.”
“We've duplicated the poems and have had them forwarded to every teacher and professor in the area and beyond, to see if anyone recognizes the handiwork,” Jessica told her.
“Good thinking. As you know, I'd already started down that road with the local professors at the university. Listen, I must rush off. I'm glad we've had this chat.” The detective abruptly cut the connection, and Jessica wondered for a moment if the androgynous nature of all the victims had spoken more to Lieutenant Leanne Sturtevante than to others working the case. She wondered momentarily about Sturtevante's sexual orientation. Then she admonished herself for the thought.
“Kim!” she called out to Desinor as her Mend passed by the office, a cup of steaming coffee in one hand, a half-eaten Snickers bar in the other. Kim poked her head inside, asking between chews, “What was the call about? Who was it, Parry?”
