Unless, of course, I caught an earlier flight because an old FBI pal called me late last night….”
“Thank you.”
“Yeah, yeah. Don't get all mushy on me.” She knuckle-punches Ceepak in the arm. “So, find anything interesting in the garbage this morning?”
“Yes, ma'am.”
Ceepak pulls out two evidence envelopes.
“This was swept off the beach Saturday morning.”
McDaniels looks at the clove cigarette butt.
“Ah, Djarum Black Kretek,” she says. “An Indonesian import. It is widely believed that the name Kretek derives from the crackling sound that cloves make when burned-‘keretek-keretek.’ As you see, I share Sherlock Holmes's fascination with tobacco products.”
“Indeed,” Ceepak says.
Man, I can so see these two nerding out in front of the TV with milk and cookies, thrilling to
“This,” he tells her, holding up the second evidence bag, “comes from the suspect's home.”
McDaniels peeks in the bag.
“Looks like a perfect match. We'll run it through the lab. How'd you secure it?”
“I asked politely.”
“Oh. You're a sneaky one, hunh?”
“Yes, ma'am.”
McDaniels puts the envelopes in her cargo pockets. I guess that explains the shorts: lots of pockets. Not as many as Ceepak, but almost.
“Can I borrow your magnifying glass?” she asks him, just assuming the big guy lugs one around with him at all times-which, of course, he does.
“Thanks.”
She grunts as she bends down to study the twisted tips at the bottom of the fence.
“Oh, yeah. This fence is like a cat brush.”
She pulls out her own tweezers and a stack of evidence bags and starts plucking fibers I can't see.
“So,” she says, “this is where it all went down?”
“Yes, ma'am. That car there….”
Ceepak points to the Tilt-A-Whirl.
“Second turtle from the left,” she says without looking. “I know. Morgan E-mailed me the whole file. Of course, the skinny guy? This homeless bum with the goatee? You know he didn't do the kidnap.”
“Yes, ma'am. I know.”
“You do?” I'm sort of startled here.
Dr. McDaniels chuckles.
“Officer Ceepak-please explain to the class how you know what you know.” She looks up at me. “I love to torture my students.”
“We know Squeegee was not the kidnapper,” Ceepak says, “from examining the boot impressions left in the sand behind the Hart beach house.”
“Go on.”
“The tread marks matched those we found on the Tilt-A-Whirl…”
“But?” Dr. McDaniels arches an eyebrow.
“But the boot prints on the beach were deeper.”
“Ergo?”
Now she's using Latin like Batman sometimes did on that old TV show.
“Therefore,” Ceepak says, “the kidnapper weighed more than the man who walked across the Tilt-A-Whirl platform.”
“How much?”
“Excuse me?”
“How much did the kidnapper weigh?”
Ceepak drops his eyes like he forgot to study that chapter.
“Sorry. I didn't calculate the exact weight.”
“273 pounds,” she says. “Big guy. A big galoot of a guy.”
“How can you be certain?” I ask, impressed.
“Hey-I wrote the book. Besides, my guys took your plaster cast back to the lab and made some measurements.”
“So it was kind of a trick question?” I ask.
“Yeah. That's my favorite kind. So, you know-watch your back, kid.” This time, she knuckle-punches my shoulder. It stings.
My partner's smiling. He likes this feisty lady.
“I need another number,” he says.
“Shoot.”
“More precise time of death.”
Dr. McDaniels shakes her head and sighs.
“I'll re-check his eye jelly numbers, but you know we can't be precise. There is no way to nail it … not with one hundred percent certainty.”
Okay-I have to ask.
“Eye jelly?”
“Officer Ceepak?” the professor once again calls on the smartest kid in the class to explain.
“The vitreous humor is a transparent jelly that fills the eyeball,” he says. “Potassium levels are low in the vitreous humor of a living eye, but rise at a known rate after death. If we measure that potassium level, we can calibrate a more exact T.O.D.”
“It's the best I can do,” Dr. McDaniels says, staring up into the crime scene, slowing turning her head, scanning it all in like she's one of those disposable cameras that gives you the panoramic view. “We can't pinpoint a precise time, but I'll give you my tightest interval of confidence.”
“Appreciate that.”
“Okay,” she says. “I always like to see the crime scene. Photographs only tell you so much. Now that I've seen it, I need to leave. Even though I was never actually here.”
“Roger that.”
“If you need me? I won't be in my office.”
I think that means she will be. She walks up the beach toward the access road, stopping once to lean against the fence and shake more sand out of her shoe.
“Oh, Ceepak?” she hollers back.
“Yes, ma'am?”
“You need more evidence to nail these bastards.”
“I know.”
“So solve the first crime to solve the second.”
“Solve the murder to solve the kidnapping?”
“No, dummy-the
Ceepak gets it. I don't know what
“Will do. Thanks for the tip.”
“What tip?” she says over her shoulder as she walks away. “I wasn't even here, remember?”
He smiles like he's just met his favorite movie star.
“Come on, Danny,” he says when she's gone.
“Where to?”
“Boardwalk Books. I promised Squeegee I'd pick him up a compilation of Ginsberg poems. I believe the bookstore also has a fax machine.”
“So I've heard.”
