XO

“Oh, sure.”

The man had a tech wheel over two heavy compound microscopes-one a biological, which illuminated translucent samples from beneath, and a metallurgic model, which shone light down on opaque samples. Shean was setting it up when Rhyme shooed him away. Using his right hand he prepared several slides from the trace and examined them one by one, using both of the scopes.

“And good job with the analysis of the trace, Charlie. Let me see the original printouts.”

Shean called them up and Rhyme studied the screen and then some of the samples visually. Peering through the eyepieces, he was muttering to himself. Dance couldn’t hear everything he said but caught an occasional, “Good, good… What the hell is that? Oh, bullshit… Hm, interesting… Good.”

Rhyme set slides out and pointed. “Fungi database on that one and I need a fast reagent test on those.”

A tech ran the reagent tests. But Charlie Shean said, “We don’t exactly have a fungus database.”

“Really?” Rhyme said. And gave the man a website, user name and pass code. In five minutes Shean was browsing through Rhyme’s own database on molds and fungi, jotting notes.

Eyes on the chart, Rhyme said, “‘Harutyun.’ Armenian.”

The detective nodded. “Big community here in Fresno.”

“I know.”

And how did Rhyme know that? Dance wondered. But speculating about the criminalist’s encyclopedic mind was useless. Some facts that even children knew he was completely ignorant of. Others, far more esoteric, were stored front and center. The key, she knew, was whether they had helped him analyze evidence or might help him do so in the future. She wouldn’t have been surprised to learn that he didn’t know the earth revolved around the sun.

Finally the results from the new tests were compiled and Rhyme reviewed them, as well as the results from the earlier analysis that Shean’s techs had run. It was raw data only but no one was better at turning raw data into something useful than Lincoln Rhyme. “Now, outside Edwin’s house. The fungus is often used in place of traditional toxic chemical pesticides and the mineral oil is also found in alternative pesticides.

“Also, at his house and at the convention center, the triglycerides… With that color temperature and melting point, I’d say it’s neatsfoot oil. That’s used for treating baseball gloves and leather sports equipment, equestrian tack and gunslings. Snipers buy a lot of it. Used to be made from cattle bones-‘neat’ is an old word for oxen or cow-but now it’s made mostly from lard. Hence the triglycerides.” He consulted the chart, frowning. “I don’t know about the ammonium oxalate. That’s going to take more digging. But the limonite, goethite and calcite? It’s gangue.”

“What’s that, ‘gangue’?” O’Neil asked.

“It’s by-product-generally unused materials produced in industrial operations. Those particular substances are often found in ore collection and processing. I also found the same materials in the trace at the public phone at Fresno College, where he called Kayleigh to announce one of the attacks.

“And something else here,” Rhyme said with some excitement in his voice. He glanced at the evidence bags. “From the PA system control room, the phone and from behind Edwin’s house: calcium powder? But it’s not what you suggested, Charlie-medical or dietary supplement. It’s bone dust.”

“Well, couldn’t people still take it like a supplement?”

Rhyme frowned. “Don’t think they’d want to. I forgot to mention: it’s human.”

Chapter 54

THE BONE MATERIAL was quite minimal and to confirm the source would require a confocal laser scanning microscope, Rhyme explained, looking around the room as if one of these magical devices were nearby in the lab.

Charlie Shean said that while he was aware of the machine and had wanted to acquire one, the FMCSO could not, in fact, afford it.

“Well, I’m ninety-nine percent sure. The morphology of the particles and the geometry of the dust almost guarantee it’s human. I’d be very surprised if it wasn’t.”

What they could do with that information, though, Rhyme wasn’t positive. “Can’t quite see how it fits into the big picture,” he admitted. “Anybody among the cast of characters here have a job that might involve bone? Surgeon, dentist?”

“No.”

“Undertaker?” Harutyun suggested.

“They don’t do much bone work. I could see medical examiners, pathologists. Wait, Fresno College-where he made the call-does it have a medical school?”

“Yes,” Harutyun reported.

“Ah, that could be it. Human skeletons in the classrooms and then procedures too, involving bone saws. Until we get more information, I think we’ll go on the assumption that he picked up the bone dust at the school and then continued his surveillance at Edwin’s.”

O’Neil said, “At least we know that the person who was behind Edwin’s house was the perp.”

“So, that means it isn’t him,” Harutyun said.

“Unless,” Dance pointed out, “Edwin himself was the source of the bone dust and he left the trace when he walked back to see who’d been spying on him.”

“Exactly, Kathryn,” Rhyme said.

Harutyun muttered, “That’s the way this case’s been going all along-he’s guilty, he’s innocent, guilty, innocent.”

Rhyme wheeled back to the microscope. “Hm, still a few things I want to look at. Ammonium oxalate… Scotch?”

Crystal Stanning broke her vow of silence. “You… you found some traces of liquor?”

“No, no, I want some scotch.”

“Oh, well, we don’t actually have any in the sheriff’s office.”

“Really?” Rhyme sounded surprised.

“Lincoln,” Thom said.

“I was simply asking.” He returned to the microscope.

Dance and O’Neil looked over the chart, on which Sachs had highlighted Rhyme’s deductions.

• Sunday. Robert Prescott homicide, convention center stage/orchestra pit/scaffolding

– strip lamp

– no matching friction ridge prints

– no matching tool marks (unit removed by wing nuts)

– fifty-foot power cord

– no matching fingerprints

– smoke detectors in pit, disabled

– no matching fingerprints

– smudges determined to be produced by latex gloves, brand unknown, not associated with gloves in Edwin Sharp’s possession

– cardboard cartons moved from projected path of victim

– no matching fingerprints

– smudges determined to be produced by latex gloves, brand unknown, not associated with gloves in Edwin Sharp’s possession

– unique trace from stage/orchestra pit/scaffolding

– triglyceride fat (lard)

– 2700K color temperature (yellowish)

– melting point: 40-55 degrees F

– specific gravity: 0.91 at 40.0 C

– Determined likely to be neatsfoot oil, treatment for leather sports equipment, tack and gun