Unnecessary autopsies.
You shoulda been a lawyer, Lucas said.
Not enough money in it. The woman tapped the screen: Heres something else for you. The insurance company called about it. Thats the code for Prudential.
They called?
Yup. Thats what that isthe files were sent out in response to a request from Prudential.
They send them out to Prudential, but theyre gonna make me get a subpoena?
This was a long time ago, the woman said. Things were really different.
The woman went back to the novel while Lucas made notes. When he was finished, he shut down the screen and gave her the fiche. Thank you very much, he said.
She looked up from the desk. Do you think if I, like, xeroxed my breasts and sent a copy to Hiaasen with my phone number, hed call me up?
Certainly worth a try, Lucas said. In fact, Id recommend that you do it. How else will you know? If you dont, you could be like two ships passing in the dark.
Cops are weird, she said. But as Lucas left, she was looking at the copying machine.
LUCAS DROVE TOWARDHOME, THINKING IT ALL OVER: he'd call Prudential in the morning, hoping that theyd still have a record of the call. In any case, they must have paid somebody some money, if they bothered to make the call. Hed bet that Audrey was the recipient.
As he crossed the Mendota Bridge, he noticed, for the second or third time, that there was no noise in the background of his brain: no chattering. Hed caught himself whistling again. In the last twenty-four hours, hed gotten thoroughly laid, hugged by Helen Bell, and double entendred by a nice-looking medical student.
Glaciers breaking up, he said aloud. Ice is going out.
He wasnt sure what it meant, but it felt right.
TWENTY-EIGHT
SHERRILL SAW HIM WALKING IN, CAME DOWN TO meet him, took his hand. Can I take you to dinner tomorrow night?
Sure. But things are starting to cook with Audrey McDonald. Shouldnt mess us up, but if something comes up… He was fumbling with his keys, opened the office door. She stepped in behind him.
Tell me about it, she said. About Audrey. He told her, and she said, Goddamnit. If we werent sleeping together, you could just come down and tell Frank that you need me to work on this, and Id get another neat case to work on. Now, wed sorta have to jump through our asses.
Nothing happening yet, anyway, he said.
Well, if youre going out to shoot somebody, call me, she said, as she went out the door.
Do that.
THREE CALLS: TO PRUDENTIAL, TO THE DOCTOR WHO signed the death certificate, and to the funeral home that handled Amelia Lambs body.
Prudential was cooperative, but the right guy would have to get back.
The doctor was cooperative, but had no memory of theevent at all. I was doing a surgical residency and working part-time as an emergency room doc, he said. I worked emergency rooms for seven years and mustve signed five hundred of those things. Maybe a thousand. Im sorry, but I just dont remember.
The funeral home was confused, but a woman with a quavery, elderly voice finally found the record: Amelia Lamb had been cremated.
Shit, Lucas said aloud.
I beg your pardon?
THE PRUDENTIAL GUY CALLED BACK A HALF HOUR later, as Lucas was pulling together records on the murders proposed by Helen Bell, as well as the two proposed by Annette Ingall.
We paid sixty-four hundred dollars on George Lamb, which was not an inconsiderable sum at the time; and then four and a half years later, we paid fifteen thousand on Amelia Lamb. That insurance policy had been in effect only three years, which was probably why we called the hospital on it, the Prudential man said.
Who was beneficiary on the Amelia Lamb policy?
Uh, lets see… this is an older form… Um, an Audrey Lamb. Apparently her daughter.
Not Audrey and Helen?
No, just an Audrey.
How about on George Lamb?
That was… Amelia.
Huh. Did Amelia Lamb have to take a physical?
Um… yup. Passed okay.
Anything about high blood pressure?
Nope. But this form isnt specificyoud have to see the original doctors report, and that was so long ago…
Do you have the docs name?
Yup.
But the doctor was dead. His son, a dentist, said his fathers records had been transferred to other doctors whenhe gave up his practice, and records not transferred had been stored for ten years, then destroyed.
Shit.
I beg your pardon?
LUCAS WENT BACK TO THE RECORDS FOR AN HOUR, and finally came to a push-comes-to-shove point. If Audrey was guilty of all of this, then she must have killed ODell. But according to the investigative records, signed off by Franklin and Sloan, she left the building before ODell was killed. That was confirmed: she logged out of the building at 10:53. Two people visiting their son in the building, who had logged out after her, confirmed that they had left just as aRoseannererun was ending. Nightlineended a couple of minutes before eleven, and they were shown as logging out at eleven, while ODell was confirmed killed at 11:02.
It was possible, of course, that Audrey was a master burglar and that she had some way of getting into a building with a security desk in the lobby. Or that she had somehow obtained a key card for the elevator. But the first of those possibilities seemed laughable, while the second was only barely reasonableshe wouldnt have had much time to plan the killing of ODell, unless the killing was part of a long-range plan.
He thought about that for a moment. Maybe she did have a long-range plan. Maybe she had access to everybody she might ever need to kill. Then he shook his head. Couldnt think that way. If she was working off a long-range plan, which had somehow involved getting home keys for all her possible victims, then she was a perfect killer and they were out of luck.
He glanced at his watch, punched up his computer, and wrote a memo, with copies to Frank Lester, head of the investigative division, and Rose Marie Roux.
Halfway through, a sheriffs deputy called from Itasca County. You called yesterday about the Baird case?
Yeah, thanks for calling back, Lucas said. How well do you know the case?
I was lead investigator, the deputy said. I pretty much know it all.
I understand it was a firebombing, Lucas said. A Molotov cocktail.
Yeah, thats right. A mix of gas and oil in a gallon jug, the deputy said.
Was there anything weird about the bottle? Lucas asked.
After a moment of pregnant silence, the deputy said, Like what?
Like scoring? Like with a glass cutter?
Another beat. Then, Hown the hell did you know about that? We never put it in the report…
WHEN HE WAS DONE WITH THE MEMOS, LUCAS printed them and walked them down to Rouxs office and left them with the secretary. Homicide was just down the hall, so he stopped by.
Sherrill was at her desk: Lunch?
She was sitting next to Sloan, who was eating a corned beef sandwich. If you dont think peoplell think youre fucking me, she said, just loud enough for Sloan to hear.
