“You’re already beyond me,” Kim admitted. “I’ve heard those terms, but I don’t really know what the processes are.”
“They’re not that complicated,” Edward said. He stood up. “The basic concepts are not difficult to comprehend. It’s the results that can be difficult to analyze. Come on, I’ll show you the machines.” He took Kim’s hand and pulled her to her feet.
Edward enthusiastically dragged a reluctant Kim around his lab, showing her the mass spectrometer, the high-performance liquid chromatography unit, and the capillary electrophoresis equipment. The whole time he lectured about how they were used for fragment separation and identification. The only thing Kim understood completely was Edward’s obvious bent for teaching.
Opening up a side door, Edward gestured inside. Kim glanced within. In the center of the room was a large cylinder about four feet high and two feet wide. Cables and wires emerged from it like snakes from Medusa’s head.
“That’s our nuclear magnetic resonance machine,” Edward said proudly. “It’s a crucial tool with a project like this. It’s not enough to know how many carbon atoms, hydrogen atoms, oxygen atoms, and nitrogen atoms there are in a compound. We have to know the three-dimensional orientation. That’s what this machine can do.”
“I’m impressed,” Kim said, not knowing what else to say.
“Let me show you one other machine,” Edward said, oblivious to Kim’s state of mind. He led her to yet another door. Opening it, he again gestured inside.
Kim looked in. It was a hopeless tangle of electronic equipment, wires, and cathode ray tubes. “Interesting,” she said.
“You know what it is?” Edward asked.
“I don’t think so,” Kim said. She was reluctant to let Edward know how little she knew about what he did.
“It’s an X-ray diffraction unit,” Edward said with the same degree of pride he’d evinced with the NMR unit. “It complements what we do with the NMR. We’ll be using it with the new alkaloid because the alkaloid readily crystallizes as a salt.”
“Well, you do have your work cut out for you,” Kim said.
“It’s work but it’s also extraordinarily stimulating,” Edward said. “Right now we’re using everything in our investigative arsenal, and the data is pouring in. We’ll have the structure in record time, especially with the new software that is available with all these instruments.”
“Good luck,” Kim said. She’d derived only a sketchy idea of what Edward had explained, but she had certainly gotten a taste of his enthusiasm.
“So what else happened up in Salem?” Edward asked suddenly. “How’s the renovation going?”
Kim was momentarily nonplussed by Edward’s question. With his preoccupation involving his own work, she didn’t think he was currently interested in her puny project. She’d been just about to excuse herself.
“The renovation is going well,” she said. “The house is going to be darling.”
“You were gone quite a while,” Edward said. “Did you delve back into the Stewart family papers?”
“I spent a couple of hours,” Kim admitted.
“Find anything more about Elizabeth?” he asked. “I’m getting more and more interested in her myself. I feel as if I owe her an enormous debt. If it hadn’t been for her, I never would have come across this alkaloid.”
“I did learn some things,” Kim said. She told Edward about going to the statehouse prior to driving to Salem and that there was no follow-up petition concerning the mysterious evidence. She then told him about the Northfields deed with Elizabeth’s signature, and how it had angered Thomas Putnam.
“That might be the most significant piece of information you’ve learned so far,” Edward said. “From the little reading I’ve done, I don’t think Thomas Putnam was the right person to irritate.”
“I had the same thought,” Kim said. “His daughter, Ann, was one of the first of the girls to be afflicted, and she accused many people of witchcraft. The problem is, I can’t relate a feud with Thomas Putnam with the conclusive evidence.”
“Maybe these Putnam people were malicious enough to plant something,” Edward suggested.
“That’s a thought,” Kim said. “But it doesn’t answer what it could have been. Also, if something were planted, does it make sense that it was conclusive? I still think it had to be something Elizabeth made herself.”