ratio. A dream for orga nized crime.’’
‘‘This is what they got into?’’ asked Diane.
‘‘I’m not sure. It wouldn’t surprise me. Like I said, I thought the big trouble two years ago was tobacco. What I do know is that something happened and they got in way over their heads. They may have tried to strike out on their own and crossed the wrong people. That’s where Alice Littleton comes into the picture. She was a freshman at Penn—from Georgia. That’s probably the connection their father made when you called him. From what I can tell, Alice was a little southern girl who was really impressed with the bigcity sophisticates from New York, although Buffalo isn’t exactly Manhattan. No offense.’’
‘‘None taken.’’
‘‘Like I said, I’ve had to piece together what hap pened. Alice wanted to fit in. Followed Ashlyn and her crowd around like a puppy. When Ashlyn, Justin and Cathy got into trouble, they sent little Alice in their place for some kind of delivery, and she got killed. Ashlyn and her friends got religion after that. They went to classes and played good. I thought maybe they had learned their lesson. It looks like they got themselves into deeper trouble. Diamonds. Jeez.’’
A thought struck Diane. ‘‘Did Alice Littleton have a brother?’’
‘‘Is he in this too? You bet she did. Everett Littleton. That’s why I know so much about it. The poor guy traveled back and forth from Pennsylvania to here, to Ontario and back, trying to find out what happened. Hounded us to death about the Hootens. But there was nothing we could do. Nothing that happened was in our jurisdiction. There’s times I’d like to arrest people on general principles, but—how do you folks say it?—we didn’t have a dog in that fight. Everett was several years older than Alice. Raised her after their parents died.’’
‘‘Can you tell me what Everett looks like?’’
‘‘Sure. About six feet. Brown hair and eyes. About thirty-two. Drives a truck, as I recall—had his own private one-truck business.’’
‘‘I think he was the one who killed Ashlyn and Jus tin Hooten, and Cathy Chu.’’
‘‘You don’t say? Took the law into his own hands. This thing was tragic all the way around.’’
‘‘If I send you a picture, can you identify him?’’
‘‘Sure thing. Just JPEG it on up here.’’ He gave her his E-mail address.
‘‘Was there another person involved with them?’’ asked Diane.
‘‘Besides the Hooten cousins and Cathy Chu? I don’t know of any. Could’ve been, though. Why?’’
‘‘There was a fourth, unused noose where we found the bodies.’’
‘‘A noose?’’
‘‘They were hanged.’’
‘‘Jesus. Did it up right, did he? There might have been some known associates. You got a description?’’
Diane almost said no, but she remembered her at tacker. The right age, and identity unknown. ‘‘He might be about the same age. Roughly six feet. Dark hair. Muscular. Prone to violence. But could be some one different.’’
‘‘I can ask around. I’m going to have to talk to the parents anyway. Give me your address and I’ll send you X-rays, dental charts, whatever we can get.’’
Diane gave him her address at the crime lab. She also gave him contact information for Chief Detective Garnett and Sheriff Braden, as well as the plastic sur geon’s name and address in Buffalo.
‘‘He has X-rays of both Ashlyn and Justin. Thanks for talking to me. You’ve made a lot of things fall into place.’’
‘‘Glad to do it. I’m just sorry this turned out so badly for everyone. Have you caught Everett?’’
‘‘Yes, it appears that we did. But he’s been mur dered also.’’
‘‘I’ll be damned. You do have yourselves a situation down there.’’
‘‘That’s a bit of an understatement.’’
‘‘I’ll contact the Canadians. Like I said, they want to keep crime out of their diamond field—and they’ll want their diamonds back if they turn out to be stolen.’’
‘‘Sure. Just have them call me or Chief Garnett. Thanks again.’’
Diane sent a JPEG photo of John Doe to Detective LaSalle, then called the tech school and left a message asking for an appointment to talk with Joseph Isaac son. On her way home, she called Garnett and re peated everything LaSalle had told her.
‘‘So we know who they are and why they were killed. You were right. Our John Doe was angry. This was about revenge—or maybe justice, as he saw it. I’ll call Braden and the profiler. He’ll have to revise his profile again.’’
Diane heard him laughing as he hung up his phone. * * *
Joseph Isaacson was a small man with short white hair and salt-and-pepper eyebrows and moustache. He walked with a slight stoop. Diane wondered if it was from years of bending over his work. He reminded her of their mummy—they called him a scribe, but he could have been an artisan like Joseph Isaacson. He spoke with a slight accent.
Isaacson closed the door to cut out the sound from the adjacent polishing and cutting equipment of the classroom, moved a stack of papers and invited her to sit.
His office was cluttered with books and papers. He had an old rolltop desk against the wall and a table in the middle. It was the table he actually used as a desk. Behind him was a photograph of a large spar kling diamond.
