“How who did what?”
I laughed. “Sorry. It’s Dr. Brockton from UT. I think I know how Stuart Latham set the car on fire while he was in Vegas.”
“Do tell,” said Cash.
“I’m not sure you’d believe me if I told you,” I said. “I’d rather show you. Any chance you’ve got some free time late this afternoon or tomorrow?”
“Since you ask so nice,” he said, “and since you’re about to help me blast a killer’s alibi out of the water, I’ll make time. I’ve got some folks to interview this morning and after lunch, but I should be through by four o’clock or so.”
I checked my watch. It read 8:37.
“Can you meet me at the Anthropology Department around four-thirty? We’ll take a little field trip from there.”
“You’re being mighty cryptic,” he said, “but you’ve got me hooked.”
I told him how to find my office, and then I called Jason Story, one of my master’s-level graduate students. Jason sounded sleepy when he answered the phone, which wasn’t surprising considering he’d sent me an e-mail in the middle of the night describing the experiment he’d just finished.
“Sorry if I woke you up, Jason,” I said. “We need to do another run today.”
He yawned. “So soon? I’ve already done six in the past two days.”
“’Fraid so,” I said. “The stakes are higher on this one, though. This one’s the dog and pony show for the D.A.’s investigator.”
Suddenly he sounded much more alert. “Okay, no problem,” he said.
“Can you get it started by ten?”
“A.M. or P.M.?”
“A.M.”
“Wow,” he said. “That’s cutting it close. But okay, yeah. You might want to stay upwind of me, though—it’s been pretty hot out there, and I won’t have time to take a shower.”
“No matter how bad you smell, Jason? I’ve smelled worse things.”
“I guess so.” He laughed. “What time are you bringing the guy from the D.A.’s office out?”
“Around five, five-thirty. That should be about right, shouldn’t it?”
“Should be. Gotta go. See you then.”
Jason was getting ready to enter his second year in the graduate program. Like countless other high-school and college kids who’d gotten hooked on CSI, Jason aspired to be a forensic scientist. Unlike most, though, Jason had gone out and gotten real-world experience. He’d spent three years as a volunteer with a Knox County Rescue Squad. The rescue squad didn’t handle criminal cases, but Jason had worked enough death scenes—car crashes and drownings, even a plane crash—to get past the jitters, and as soon as he took osteology, I was sure he’d be a valuable addition to my Forensic Response Team. He was good with gadgetry, too—Jason felt as comfortable with a GPS or with a topographic map and a compass as I felt with a mandible or a femur. And if I ever needed to tie somebody up and be sure they couldn’t get loose, Jason would be the one whose knotcraft I would call on. He was steady and reliable, and, maybe more to the point, he was in the market for a thesis topic, so he’d jumped at the chance to help with some research.
At 4:20, Cash knocked on my door. “You’re early,” I said. “Good man.”
“I finished up a little sooner than I expected,” he said, “and I didn’t see much point in just killing time. If you’ve got things to do, though, tell me, and I’ll make some phone calls till you’re ready.”
‘No, this is fine,” I said. “Let’s go. Do you want to ride with me or follow me?”
“Let me follow you, so I can just head home when we’re done. You ready to tell me where we’re going?”
“One of the Ag farms,” I said. “By way of Burger King, if you don’t mind?”
“I never got lunch,” he said. “Burger King sounds great. At this point Purina Dog Chow would probably sound pretty good.”
“Let’s say Burger King.”
“WELC…BRRGRR…KI…” crackled the voice through the loudspeaker. I couldn’t even tell if the person was male or female. I hoped they’d be able to hear me better than I could hear them. “W…LIKE…TRY OUR zzttzztt COMBO…DAY?”
I didn’t know what I’d just been offered, but I did know that I didn’t want a combo. “I’d like a Whopper and a sweet tea, please,” I said. I spoke up, because the sound system didn’t seem to be working well.
“zzttzztt TEA?”
“Sweet tea,” I said loudly. “Do you have sweet tea?”
“zzttzztt TEA?”
“Sweet tea!” I shouted. “Sweet tea! If you don’t have sweet tea, regular tea’s okay!”
“zzttzztt TEA…ELSE?”
“That’s it!” I yelled. “Just the Whopper and the tea!”
A young man walking into the restaurant, a backpack slung over one shoulder, looked at me oddly and gave me a wide berth.