info, it’s interesting, no?”
“Somebody casing the park? Hell, yeah.”
The egg bagel disappeared down his gullet. He washed it down with cold coffee from the big detective room. We were in his office, the tiny space humid from poor ventilation and discouragement. I’d arrived just before noon, honoring his early-morning request for a “sit-down.” He’d sounded anxious. I’d been there for a quarter hour, still had no idea exactly what he wanted.
He brushed crumbs into his wastebasket. “One pass by the SUV might not mean much but coming back a second time’s a bit more ominous. But ominous doesn’t mean it’s connected to my murders, there are all kinds of night-crawlers out at that hour. And showing himself that openly doesn’t fit an offender who picks up his casings, leaves nothing serious behind.”
“Or he used a revolver and got lucky.”
“Hey,” he said, “you’re supposed to see the good in everyone. Yeah, that’s possible but the overall picture’s organized, you said so yourself. Someone like that’s planning a shoot-and-dump, he’s gonna advertise his presence the night before to a coupla jumpy girls?”
“True,” I said.
“Don’t do that.”
“What?”
“Agree so readily. It scares me.”
“Keep living, you’ll have plenty of opportunity for terror.”
He grinned, stretched, pushed lank black hair off his mottled forehead,sank as low as the chair would allow. “This guy’s an exhibitionist, right? Showing off his work, look how clever I am. Having a grand old time.”
“He could be bragging,” I said. “Or his message is something not so obvious. Specific to his mode of thinking.”
“He’s crazy?”
“Not to the point where he can’t function, but his mind’s probably a scary place. Whatever his motive, it’s personal.”
“Woman and child, a family thing? Yeah, I know we talked about that but I’m having my doubts, Alex. I just can’t see a father processing his own kid’s bones then strewing them like garbage. Speaking of which, Liz Wilkinson called me just before you got here, totally beating herself up. Apparently, there’s a technique for cleaning bones that she missed.”
He pulled two sheets of paper out of his printer. One contained a pair of split-frame photos: on the left, half a dozen small, glossy, hard-shelled brown insects, to the right a single, spiky, caterpillar-type creature.
The second sheet was an order blank for “high-grade, mite-free dermestid beetles” from a lab supply company in Chicago.
I said, “Flesh-eating bugs?”
“Flesh, hair, wool carpeting, any sort of animal matter, wet, dry, or in between. Not bone and teeth, because the little buggers’ jaws can’t handle anything that hard, but anything short of that. The adults like to snack, but it’s the larvae—the ones with the whiskers—that are the serious gourmets. Set ’em loose and they can munch a bear skull sparkling clean within twenty-four hours, inflict no damage on the skeleton. Which is exactly why taxidermists and museums and scientists use ’em to spruce up specimens. Liz called it anthro for dummies, said two babies in a row probably clouded her judgment.”
He swung his feet onto the desk. “Does the use of creepy-crawlies spark any ideas?”
I said, “Set the beetles, then wax and buff? It’s starting to sound ritualistic.”
“Beetles and
bees
wax,” he said. “Maybe I should be looking for a deranged entomologist.”
“Or one of those guys who like to mount heads over the mantel. Her I.D. was missing, same for jewelry, if she was wearing any.”
“Trophy-taking.”
“Maybe not in the sense of a sexual sadist evoking a memory,” I said. “If that was his aim, he’d have held on to at least some of the bones. Family or not, this one’s rooted in intimacy and specific to these victims. Can purchasers of the beetles be traced?”
“If only,” he said. “They’re legal and not protected like toxic chemicals so anyone can
“Somebody casing the park? Hell, yeah.”
The egg bagel disappeared down his gullet. He washed it down with cold coffee from the big detective room. We were in his office, the tiny space humid from poor ventilation and discouragement. I’d arrived just before noon, honoring his early-morning request for a “sit-down.” He’d sounded anxious. I’d been there for a quarter hour, still had no idea exactly what he wanted.
He brushed crumbs into his wastebasket. “One pass by the SUV might not mean much but coming back a second time’s a bit more ominous. But ominous doesn’t mean it’s connected to my murders, there are all kinds of night-crawlers out at that hour. And showing himself that openly doesn’t fit an offender who picks up his casings, leaves nothing serious behind.”
“Or he used a revolver and got lucky.”
“Hey,” he said, “you’re supposed to see the good in everyone. Yeah, that’s possible but the overall picture’s organized, you said so yourself. Someone like that’s planning a shoot-and-dump, he’s gonna advertise his presence the night before to a coupla jumpy girls?”
“True,” I said.
“Don’t do that.”
“What?”
“Agree so readily. It scares me.”
“Keep living, you’ll have plenty of opportunity for terror.”
He grinned, stretched, pushed lank black hair off his mottled forehead,sank as low as the chair would allow. “This guy’s an exhibitionist, right? Showing off his work, look how clever I am. Having a grand old time.”
“He could be bragging,” I said. “Or his message is something not so obvious. Specific to his mode of thinking.”
“He’s crazy?”
“Not to the point where he can’t function, but his mind’s probably a scary place. Whatever his motive, it’s personal.”
“Woman and child, a family thing? Yeah, I know we talked about that but I’m having my doubts, Alex. I just can’t see a father processing his own kid’s bones then strewing them like garbage. Speaking of which, Liz Wilkinson called me just before you got here, totally beating herself up. Apparently, there’s a technique for cleaning bones that she missed.”
He pulled two sheets of paper out of his printer. One contained a pair of split-frame photos: on the left, half a dozen small, glossy, hard-shelled brown insects, to the right a single, spiky, caterpillar-type creature.
The second sheet was an order blank for “high-grade, mite-free dermestid beetles” from a lab supply company in Chicago.
I said, “Flesh-eating bugs?”
“Flesh, hair, wool carpeting, any sort of animal matter, wet, dry, or in between. Not bone and teeth, because the little buggers’ jaws can’t handle anything that hard, but anything short of that. The adults like to snack, but it’s the larvae—the ones with the whiskers—that are the serious gourmets. Set ’em loose and they can munch a bear skull sparkling clean within twenty-four hours, inflict no damage on the skeleton. Which is exactly why taxidermists and museums and scientists use ’em to spruce up specimens. Liz called it anthro for dummies, said two babies in a row probably clouded her judgment.”
He swung his feet onto the desk. “Does the use of creepy-crawlies spark any ideas?”
I said, “Set the beetles, then wax and buff? It’s starting to sound ritualistic.”
“Beetles and
bees
wax,” he said. “Maybe I should be looking for a deranged entomologist.”
“Or one of those guys who like to mount heads over the mantel. Her I.D. was missing, same for jewelry, if she was wearing any.”
“Trophy-taking.”
“Maybe not in the sense of a sexual sadist evoking a memory,” I said. “If that was his aim, he’d have held on to at least some of the bones. Family or not, this one’s rooted in intimacy and specific to these victims. Can purchasers of the beetles be traced?”
“If only,” he said. “They’re legal and not protected like toxic chemicals so anyone can
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