The Steel Kiss

The tech continued. A number of samples of soft drinks: Sprite, and regular and Diet Coca-Cola, all in various dilutions, which meant they came from different sources—cups that contained ice; the beverage was not drunk directly from can or bottle. White wine, high sugar content. Typical of inexpensive sparkling or still white.

Silence flowed into the parlor, broken only by the tap of the gas chromatograph cooling. The device worked by subjecting its samples to temperatures that were about fifty degrees Celsius higher than the boiling point of the least volatile element of the sample. An inferno, in other words.

Sachs fielded a call. She stepped aside to take it. In a corner of the parlor, she stood with head down. Eventually she nodded and relief was obvious in her face. She disconnected. “The Borough Shooting Team was convened.” Rhyme recalled—the incident review after she parked a slug in the escalator motor to try to save Greg Frommer’s life. “Madino—the captain—says it’s a good panel. Uniforms and shields from the street. I’ll write up the FD/AR and that’ll be it, he said.”

Rhyme was pleased for her. The NYPD had so many regulations and formalities that they could overwhelm an officer just trying to do the job.

Cooper said, “Something else here. Traces of rubber, ammonia and the fiber, probably from paper—a paper towel.” He then ran through a lengthy laundry list of trace chemicals.

“Glazing compound,” Rhyme said absently.

“You knew that?” the intern asked, staring at the mouthful of substances, three lines long.

He explained. There’d been a case years ago in which a wife had slashed her husband’s jugular with the sharp edge of a pane of glass she’d worked out of the rec room window. As he slept she drew the glass over his jugular and he bled out quickly. She’d cleaned the glass and replaced it in the window, glazing the pane back in place. (Her bizarre strategy was that no murder weapon, that is, knife or other blade, could be traced back to her. Not true, of course, since she neglected to clean from her blouse the traces of glazing compound she’d used on the window after the murder. It took officers all of five minutes to find the pane; a luminol test confirmed the presence of blood.)

Sachs took another call. A cryptic reaction. Eyes flitting from window to floor to rococo ceiling. What was this about? he wondered.

She disconnected and grimaced. She walked to Rhyme. “I’m sorry. My mother.”

“She’s all right?”

“Fine. But they moved up a test.” Her face remained troubled. He knew she was torn between the case and her only living family member.

“Sachs, go,” he said.

“I—”

“Go. You have to.”

Without a word, Sachs headed out of the parlor.

Rhyme stared after her then turned slowly, the motor of his chair uttering a soft whine, and gazed at the challenging whiteboards.

CRIME SCENE: 390 E. 35TH STREET,

MANHATTAN (SITE OF ARSON)

-Offense: Arson/homicide.

-Victim: Abraham Benkoff, 58, account director advertising agency, well known.

-COD: Burns/hemorrhaging.

-Means of death:

--Gas leak from CookSmart Deluxe range, equipped with DataWise5000 controller.

--No accelerant.

-Additional elements of profile of suspect:

--Dark clothes, baseball cap.

--Observing scene to make sure only adult victim killed?

--Another message from the People’s Guardian.

---Again playing down intelligence.

CRIME SCENE: 388 E. 35TH STREET,

MANHATTAN (SITE OF UNSUB’S SURVEILLANCE).

-Evidence:

--Shards of glass. Window glass, old.

--Xylene, toluene, iron oxide, amorphous silica, dioctyl phthalate and talc (glazing compound).

---His profession? Probably not.

--Paper towel fibers.

--Ammonia.

--Rubber fragments.

--Diesel fuel.

--Two soil samples, indigenous to shoreline.

---Connecticut or Westchester County.

---New Jersey.

-Soda, differing dilutions, several sources.

-White wine, high sugar content. Typical of inexpensive sparkling white wine.

Archer too was studying the writing carefully. “More questions than answers,” she muttered.