The First Victim

CHAPTER 70

"I gotta tell ya,’’ LaMoia said to Boldt as both men hurried down the fire stairs at Public Safety two at a time, ‘‘I’m a little pissed at Lofgrin for taking so long with that chain. Seems to me he coulda had something for us this afternoon.’’

‘‘The chain takes a backseat to these fish scales,’’ a winded Boldt said, carrying the evidence bag containing the gang kid’s shoe in his left hand, while guiding himself with the banister in his right. LaMoia was suddenly leaping three stairs at a time. Youth! ‘‘Bernie’s a perfectionist. He isn’t going to speculate. It’s not in his nature. If he’s taking more time with the chain, then maybe that’s in our favor. Maybe he’s got something.’’

‘‘Wouldn’t count on it.’’

In a perfect choreography, LaMoia beat Boldt to the landing and held the door open. Boldt ran through without missing a step.

‘‘Gentlemen!’’ Bernie Lofgrin said, looking up from the middle of his two-million-dollar playground. Two assistants worked at a bench nearby. Lofgrin’s thick glasses leant him the nickname Magoo. He looked extraterrestrial with those eyes and the white lab jacket.

Boldt passed him the evidence bag. ‘‘Need to know if we’re talking the same fish scales, Bernie. We’ve got a live one up in the Box.’’

‘‘A match,’’ LaMoia advised, ‘‘would put him with Jill and Jane Doe.’’

‘‘I get the idea, Sergeant,’’ Lofgrin replied. Detectives tried to influence the lab’s findings by guiding and indicating where they wanted

the evidence to lead. Lofgrin rarely played that game, though detectives never stopped trying.

They gave him the room to work and they kept their mouths shut, with Boldt twice reaching out to stop LaMoia from making any comment. Lofgrin always took his sweet time about it. To rush him was to get him talking; to get him talking was to suffer exasperatingly long explanations on a variety of subjects.

He prepared two fish scales onto a glass slide-one from the earlier evidence, and one from the shoe just delivered. He began speaking before the slide was fully inserted into the microscope. ‘‘Was just about to return your call, Sergeant,’’ he said to LaMoia, though his attention remained on his equipment. ‘‘The reason we took so long on that chain that Dixie sent over was that we lifted a substance from a full third of the links. Ran a gas chromatograph on it-petroleum base-but couldn’t establish a product identification for you. Knew you’d want it.’’

‘‘Oil?’’ LaMoia asked.

‘‘It has the viscosity of old oil, to be sure. Nothing automotive. The graph was a mess of chemicals. Couldn’t get a clean enough sample for a good read. Because of its age maybe. We must have tried a dozen times or more, which accounted for the extra man-hours.’’ He leaned his head into the microscope and made adjustments on the focus. ‘‘Bingo!’’ he said, stepping aside. ‘‘Have a look.’’

LaMoia moved to the microscope. He worked the focus. Nobody’s eyes focused the same as Lofgrin’s. ‘‘That’s a match!’’ he said excitedly. The fish scales tied their suspect to the Hilltop homicides.

‘‘I concur,’’ Lofgrin said.

‘‘The oil,’’ Boldt encouraged. He knew the man well enough to know the importance of this evidence-Bernie Lofgrin always dragged out the really good stuff.

Lofgrin smiled at his old friend, letting Boldt know he was on the right track. ‘‘Grease, actually. Extremely heavy grease, used in winches, lifts. The substance that threw us off was nothing more than sea salt. Contaminated the hell out of our graphs.’’

‘‘Sea salt,’’ Boldt repeated. ‘‘Grease. .’’ he mumbled. ‘‘And the only place we can confirm the use of those chains was in the sweatshop.’’

‘‘Ergo,’’ Lofgrin said in his usual contemptuous tone, ‘‘that sweatshop isn’t in any cannery. It’s on some ship.’’

‘‘A trawler!’’ Boldt exclaimed.

‘‘An old trawler,’’ Lofgrin added. ‘‘If we’re going to explain these fish scales, it had to be in operation over twenty-five years ago.’’

Boldt turned quickly on his heels and faced LaMoia. ‘‘Call in for backup. Two cars. Four uniforms. Have ’em waiting for us in the garage.’’

‘‘Where we going?’’ LaMoia asked, the two men already on their way out of the lab.

‘‘You’re welcome!’’ shouted an annoyed Lofgrin. He lived for compliments.

Out in the hallway, at a full run, Boldt informed his sergeant, ‘‘We’re going to do the one thing we should have done a long time ago: We’re going to bluff.’’