adipocere, a soaplike substance that preserved her features remarkably well over the decades. Midway through the investigation into Leena’s murder, someone had broken into my office and stolen the box. That someone had been Garland Hamilton.
I motioned toward my desktop, and Morgan set the box down. I raised the lid, which was hinged along one of the three-foot sides. Inside, I saw the bones of a young white female, each bone bearing the case number in my writing. Two parts of the skeleton were missing, as I knew they would be: the skull and the hyoid, both of which I had taken to show my anthropology class the day the box was stolen. The woman’s skull-Leena’s skull-and the fractured hyoid bone from her throat had been buried eight months ago up in Cooke County by Jim O’Conner. O’Conner was now the county’s sheriff, but thirty years earlier he’d been simply a young man who loved Leena, when she was still an innocent girl. Before her uncle had molested her and her aunt had strangled her.
The bones took me back in time, the way the smell of baking bread or fresh-mown grass can take you back to your childhood. For me, seeing a skeleton was like reading a diary-a diary recording injuries, illnesses, handedness, and a host of other parts of life that remained written in the bones long after death. In the room that adjoined my office, I had a library full of such diaries-diaries of life and death. Every one was uniquely fascinating, and I always remembered its details. Every one was uniquely sad, too-Leena’s doubly so. I shook myself free of the memory and looked up at Morgan.
“Sorry,” I said. “I was just taking a quick trip down a dark stretch of memory lane.”
He nodded. “I understand,” he said. “Take your time.”
“I’m done,” I said. “You mentioned you were looking at Garland Hamilton’s credit-card receipts. Anything that points to where he is now?”
“No,” he said. “The storage-unit rental was about six months ago, and he paid for a whole year up front. Latest activity”-he hesitated-“was a couple hours after he escaped. A security camera at a SunTrust ATM on Hill Avenue shows him using the cash machine. He got a four-hundred-dollar cash advance and four hundred dollars out of checking. The most the machine would let him get.”
“Where’d he get the cards?”
“I don’t know,” said Morgan. “He didn’t have them in jail, so he must have had them stashed someplace safe and easy to get to. Maybe the storage unit.”
“Weren’t his accounts frozen?”
Morgan shook his head. “If he were bankrolling international terrorism or embezzling millions, the feds would freeze his accounts. Otherwise there’s no legal basis for it. He won’t get real far on eight hundred bucks, but it lets him drop off the radar at least for a while.”
“Any idea where he might be? You think he’s staying put, or do you think he’s on the run?”
Morgan frowned. “Hard to tell. Typically, escaped murderers run, but he’s not typical. He’s smarter than most, and he knows how cops think.”
“So he might run after all,” I said. “Figuring that you guys would expect him not to.”
“Hell, you can chase your tail in circles second-and third-guessing that way. Doesn’t get you anything except dizzy, though. His picture’s all over the media, and we’ve sent an APB to every law-enforcement agency in the country. We’ll get him.”
“I hope sooner rather than later,” I said.
“It’ll be sooner,” he said. “Meantime, though, I was wondering-have you thought about carrying a gun?”
“Me? A gun? When I’m out in the field, I’m generally on all fours, with my butt sticking up in the air.” The description got a laugh from Morgan. “What good would a gun do me?”
“I meant for when you’re not in the field,” he said. “When you’re in the office, or at home. I know you’re not a gun-totin’ kind of guy. But maybe for now, till we catch him.”
In fact, I had already considered it. “You think I’m in danger?” I asked.
He considered that. “Depends on which matters more to Hamilton,” he said, “getting away or getting even. He already tried to kill you once. He might consider that unfinished business-a score he’s got another chance to settle, now that he’s on the loose.”
“Gee, this is making me feel better,” I said.
“I’m not trying to scare you,” he said. “I’m just being realistic. Get a weapon. Hell, you’re a TBI consultant; I’m sure we can get you a permit. We’d just need to take you out to the firing range and get you qualified.”
“Damn,” I said. “I hate this. But if you can make it happen, I’ll do it.”
“Good,” he said. “I’ll see what hoops we need to jump through. And I’ll let you know as soon as we find anything on Hamilton.” He shook my hand and turned to go. “Be careful,” he said.
“Sure.”
After Morgan left, I picked up the phone and dialed.
“Cooke County Sheriff,” said a brisk voice in an East Tennessee twang. “Kin I hep you’uns?”
“Yes, ma’am. I’m wondering if the sheriff’s in.”
“Kin I tell him who’s calling?”
“It’s Dr. Bill Brockton from UT.”
“I’ll tell him, hon,” she said. I felt like I was in a truck-stop cafe rather than on the phone with a law- enforcement agency.
“Hang on, if you don’t care to.” The expression-which actually meant “if you don’t mind”-made me smile.
Ten seconds later, I heard Jim O’Conner’s voice. “Doc, you all right? I hear things have gotten exciting down there.”
“I’ve had better times, but I’m okay,” I said.
“I’m sorry he’s loose.”
“Not half as sorry as I am,” I said. “Listen, you gonna be around late this afternoon?”
“Should be,” he said. “Unless somebody does some spectacular lawbreaking up here in Cooke County. Which,” he added, “is always a distinct possibility.”
“Mind if I come see you?”
“Come on up. Any particular occasion?”
“Got something to show you,” I said.
“I’ll be here. You remember how to find us?”
“Sure,” I said. “Drive east till civilization ends, then follow the sound of the gunfire.”
He laughed. “Yup, you remember. If something comes up and I can’t be here, I’ll give you a call.”
“Same here,” I said. “It’ll be good to see you, Jim.”
“Be good to see you, too, Doc.”
TWO HOURS later and fifty miles to the east, I took the I-40 exit for River Road, the winding, two-lane blacktop that snaked along a tumbling mountain river and into Jonesport, the county seat of Cooke County.
The sheriff’s office was tucked into a granite courthouse that looked more like a small fortress than a seat of county government. As I parked, I noticed a couple of stoop-shouldered whittlers occupying a bench on the courthouse lawn. Shavings were heaped almost knee-high between the feet of each man. I had seen these same whittlers on that same bench in the exact same postures some nine months earlier when I’d been up in Cooke County. I wondered if they had even left their post, or were they permanent fixtures, like the Civil War cannon and the statue of Obadiah Jones, the town’s founder and namesake? I tucked the box of Leena’s bones under one arm. As I passed the bench, I lifted my other hand in greeting. Neither man spoke or waved, but there was a flicker of eye contact and the barest hint of a nod from each aged head, and both pairs of eyes swiveled to the box under my arm.
“That’s a mighty good pile of shavings you-all got there,” I said. “Just be careful you don’t drop a lit match. I’d hate to have to come identify your burned bones.”
“Is them bones you got in that box?” one of the men asked.
“From that Kitchings girl?” asked the other.
“She weren’t a Kitchings,” corrected the first one. “She were a Bonds.”
“Bonds. I knowed that,” said his friend. “I just disremembered.”
“Are them bones? That Bonds girl’s bones?” persisted the first one.
“You’d need to ask the sheriff about that,” I said.
