Deep South by Nevada Barr Page B

around some?" The question was an open-ended invitation. Anna accepted it and began listing the observations she had made while waiting. Thigpen stepped forward and in a loud voice began countering her observations with those of his own.
    "The kid was hung. The rope must've broken. This is where she fell." Rather than waste breath arguing the obvious, Anna made an cxccutive decision she knew she'd pay for later but, hell, in for a penny... "Randy," she cut him off. "I need you to go back to the ranger station.
    Get a measuring tape, 35mm camera, pens, paper, envelopes." She went on to list all the things in the evidence collection kit that he hadn't bothered to bring. Its absence didn't make her think worse of him.
    Murder in the parks, any crime that required intricate collection of trace evidence for that matter, was rare. Rangers were trained in it, but without cause to use those skills, most lost them. Anna had. She'd no more faith in herself to lift an important fingerprint or make casting of a boot print than she would to sing an aria. To do these things well required practice.
    What made her already low opinion of her erstwhile subordinate drop another notch was that he'd not had the respect-or the spine-to tell her he had no kit.
    When she finished, Randy pursed his lips, nodded and said, "Barth can get 'em."
    "I'd like you to," Anna said. "You've seen the situation firsthand.
    You might think of something I've forgotten. Also, I need you to be there when the district ranger from Ridgeland arrives. Show him where we are.
    Thigpen spent a moment or two thinking. Anna guessed he was weighing how far be dared to openly flout her orders. Being in on something big in the parks gave a ranger status, bragging rights.
    Whether he wanted to work or not, Randy Thigpen didn't want to miss out.
    A conclusion was reached, and he got in his parting shot. "Good point about Stilwell." He named the district ranger to the north.
    "A good man to have on the job. He knows what he's doing." Anna let it pass. Many years had elapsed since her skin had been so thin a dart as meager as that could penetrate. Davidson was not so well armored. He shot the big ranger a look that was equal parts anger and contempt. Anna allowed herself one small smile as she watched Randy struggle, knowing he couldn't apologize to the sheriff without committing himself to open warfare with his new boss.
    He settled for telling Anna, "There is a better way than you bad us come," and forged off through the woods at an oblique angle to the path they'd followed from the graveyard. According to Anna's brochure map, he was heading toward the fragment of sunken trace that ran just this side of Little Sand Creek. "Where were we?" Davidson asked as the sound of Thigpen's progress faded. Anna finished her litany of suspected evils.
    The sheriff had a camera in an olive-drab sack he carried. After taking photographs of the scene from various angles, he asked Anna to go through her list once more and meticulously photographed each item she mentioned-the shoes and feet, the fungus, the roping, the hands-three shots each to bracket the light.
    That done, they stopped by mutual unspoken accord and stared at the sheeted body "I guess it's time to unwrap her," Anna said at last.
    "I guess." Neither moved to do it. "You do a lot of this?" he asked.
    "No. You?"
    "It seems like a lot to me but I guess it isn't. This is my first kid, believe it or not. You know-that wasn't a car accident or something."
    "Mine too," Anna said, made free by his confession. "It changes it. And I don't even much like kids." She was wishing she hadn't added that last-it sounded so heartless given the circumstances-but Davidson laughed and she was, if not exonerated, then forgiven. "Let's get to it," she said.
    Having donned latex gloves from her first aid kit, she carefully removed the noose from around the sheet-draped neck and slid it over the head.
    As she worked, the sheriff took photographs: the knot,