Violets are Blue

I noted that a businessman near the gate was reading the Examiner. I could see the bold headline on the front page: HORROR IN GOLDEN GATE PARK, TWO MURDERED.

I didn't see anyone waiting, so I began to look for signs directing me to public transportation. I only had a carry-on bag; I had promised to be home by Saturday for Damon's concert. I had my marching orders, and I planned to keep all my promises from now on. Cross my heart.

A woman walked up to me as I started away from the gate. 'Excuse me, are you Detective Cross?'

I had noticed her just before she spoke to me. She was wearing jeans and a black leather car coat over a powder blue T-shirt. Then I spotted the telltale holster under her coat. She was probably in her mid-thirties, nice looking, down-to-earth, pleasant for a homicide detective, who often come on a little gruff.

'Inspector Hughes?' I asked.

'Jamilla.' She extended her hand and smiled as I took it. Nice smile too. 'It's good to meet you, Detective. Ordinarily I'd resist any idea that originated with the FBI, but your reputation precedes you. Also, the murder in D.C. was awfully similar, wasn't it? So — welcome to San Francisco.'

'Good to be here.' I returned the smile and shook her hand. Her grip was strong but not overly so. 'I was just thinking about the murder in D.C.,' I told her. 'Your crime-scene notes brought it all back to me. We never got anywhere with the murder of Patricia Cameron. You can add that to the file on my so-called reputation, the one that preceded me.'

Jamilla Hughes smiled again. Sincere. Nothing overdone about it; nothing overdone about her either. She didn't particularly look like a homicide detective, and that was probably good. She seemed a little too normal to be a cop.

'Well, we'd better hurry. I've contacted a veterinary dental specialist, and he's meeting us at the city morgue. He's a good friend of the medical examiner. How's that for showing you the sights of San Francisco?'

I shook my head and grinned. 'Actually, it's exactly what I came out here to see. I think I read about it in one of the tour books. When you're in San Francisco, don't pass up a chance to see the morgue.'

'It's not in the tour books,' Jamilla said, 'but it should be. It's a whole lot more interesting than any trolley car ride.'

Chapter 9

Less than fifty minutes later, Jamilla Hughes and I were inside the morgue at San Francisco's famed Hall of Justice. We had joined the chief medical examiner, Walter Lee, and the dental expert, Dr. Pang.

Dr. Allen Pang took his time examining both bodies before he said anything to us. He had already studied photographs of the bite areas that had been taken at the crime scene. He was a small man, completely bald, with very thick black-rimmed glasses. At one point during his examination, I noticed Inspector Hughes give a wink to the M.E. I think they found Dr. Pang just a little strange. So did I, but he was very thorough, and obviously serious about the job he had taken on.

'Okay, okay. I'm ready to talk about the nature of the bites now.' He finally turned to us as he made this pronouncement. 'I understand you're making casts of the bite marks, Walter?'

'Yes, we lifted the marks with fingerprint powder. The casts should be ready in a day or two. We swabbed to gather saliva, of course.'

'Well, good. That's the right approach, I think. I'm ready to state my piece, my educated guess.'

'That's excellent, Allen,' Lee said in a soft, very dignified voice. He wore a white coat with the nickname Dragon stitched on one pocket. He was a tall man, probably six-two, and weighed at least two fifty. He carried himself with confidence. 'Dr. Pang is a friend I have used before,' Lee told me. 'He's a veterinary dental expert from the Animal Medical Center in Berkeley. Allen is one of the best in the world, and we're lucky to get him on this case.'

'Thank you for your time, Dr. Pang,' Inspector Hughes said. 'This is terrific of you to help.'

'Thank you.' I joined in with the hallelujah chorus of gratitude.

'It's perfectly all right,' he said. 'I'm not exactly sure where to start, other than to say that these two homicides are most interesting to me. The male was severely bitten, and I'm relatively sure the attacker was, well, it was a tiger. The bites on the female were inflicted by two humans. It's as if the humans and the large cat were running together. Like they were a pack. Extraordinary. And bizarre, to say the least.'

'A tiger?' Jamilla was the one to express the disbelief we were all feeling. 'Are you sure? That doesn't seem possible, Dr. Pang.'

'Allen,' Walter Lee said, 'explain, please.'

'Well, as you know, humans are heterodonts; that is, they have teeth of different sizes and shapes, which serve different functions. Most important would be our canines, which are situated between the lateral incisor and the first premolar on each side of each jaw. The canines are used to tear food.'

Walter Lee nodded, and Dr. Pang continued. He was speaking solely to the M.E. at this point. I caught Jamilla's eye, and she gave me a wink. I liked that she had a sense of humor.

Dr. Pang seemed to be in his own world. 'In contrast to humans, some animals are homodents. Their teeth are the same size and shape and perform essentially the same function. This is nottrue of large cats, however, especially tigers. The teeth of tigers have been adapted for their feeding habits. Each jaw contains six pointed cutting teeth, two very sharp, recurved canines, and molars that have evolved into cutting blades.'

'Is that important in terms of these murders?' Jamilla Hughes asked Dr. Pang. I had a version of the same question.

The smallish man nodded enthusiastically. 'Oh, of course. Certainly. The jaw of a tiger is extremely strong, able to clamp down hard enough to crush bone. The jaw can only move up and down, not side to side. This means the tiger can only tear and crush food, not chew or gnaw.' He demonstrated with his own teeth and jaw.

I swallowed hard, and found my head shaking back and forth. A tiger was involved in these murders? How could that possibly be?

Dr. Pang stopped talking. He reached up and scratched his bald pate rather vigorously. Then he said, 'What completely baffles me is that someone commanded the tiger away from its prey after it struck — and the tiger obeyed. If that hadn't happened, the prey would have been eaten.'

'Absolutely amazing,' the medical examiner said, and gave Dr. Pang a pat on the back. Then he looked at Jamilla and me. 'What's the saying — 'Catch a tiger, if you can?' A tiger shouldn't be all that hard to find in San Francisco.'

Chapter 10

The large white male tiger was making a chuffing sound, a muted, backward whistle. The sucking noise came from deep inside its wide throat. The sound was almost unearthly. Birds took flight from a nearby cypress. Small animals scampered away as fast as they could.

The tiger was eight feet long, muscular, and weighed just over five hundred and eighty pounds. Under ordinary circumstances its prey would have been pigs and piglets, deer, antelope, water buffalo. There were no ordinary circumstances in California. There were lots of humans, though.

The cat pounced quickly, its lithe, powerful body moving effortlessly. The young blond man didn't even try to resist.

The tiger's massive jaws opened wide, then clamped down onto the man's head. The cat's jaws were strong enough to pulverize bone.

The man screamed, 'Stop! Stop! Stop!'

Amazingly, the tiger stopped.

Just like that. On verbal command.