“It’s a gamble.” Wesley leaned back in his chair. “Jeez.”
Shaking his head. “If the smell Petersen mentioned was something he imagined or something he confused with another odor maybe a cologne the killer was wearing-we’re going to look like fools. The squirrel’s going to be all the more certain we don’t know what the hell we’re doing.”
“I don’t think Petersen imagined the smell,” I said with conviction. “As shocked as he was when he found his wife’s body, the smell had to be unusual and potent for Petersen to notice and remember it. I can’t think of a single cologne that would smell like sweaty maple syrup. I’m speculating the killer was sweating profusely, that he’d left the bedroom maybe minutes before Petersen walked in.”
“The disease causes retardation . . .” Abby was flipping through the book.
“If it’s not treated immediately after birth,” I repeated.
“Well, this bastard isn’t retarded.” She looked up at me, her eyes hard.
“Of course he isn’t,” Wesley agreed. “Psychopaths are anything but stupid. What we want to do is make the guy think we think he’s stupid. Hit him where it hurts-his goddam pride, which is hooked up with his grandiose notions of his off-the-charts IQ.”
“This disease,” I told them, “could do that. If he has it, he’s going to know it. Possibly it runs in his family. He’s going to be hyper-sensitive, not only about his body odor, but also about the mental deficiencies the defect is known to cause.”
Abby was making notes to herself. Wesley was staring off at the wall, his face tense. He didn’t look happy.
Blowing in frustration, he said, “I just don’t know, Kay. If the guy doesn’t have this maple syrup whatever . . .”
He shook his head. “He’ll be on to us in a flash. It could set the investigation back.”
“You can’t set back something that is already backed into a corner,” I said evenly. “I have no intention of naming the disease in the article.”
I turned to Abby. “We’ll refer to it as a metabolic disorder. This could be a number of things. He’s going to worry. Maybe it’s something he doesn’t know he has. He thinks he’s in perfect health? How can he be sure? He’s never had a team of genetic engineers studying his body fluids before. Even if the guy’s a physician, he can’t rule out the possibility he has an abnormality that’s been latent most of his life, sitting there like a bomb waiting to go off. We’ll plant the anxiety in his head. Let him stew over it. Hell, let him think he’s got something fatal.
Maybe it will send him to the nearest clinic for a physical. Maybe it will send him to the nearest medical library. The police can make a check, see who seeks out a local doctor or frantically begins riffling through medical reference books at one of the libraries. If he’s the one who’s been breaking into the computer here, he’ll probably do it again. Whatever happens, my gut tells me something will happen. It’s going to rattle his cage.”
The three of us spent the next hour drafting the language in Abby’s article.
“We can’t have attribution,” she insisted. “No way. If these quotes are attributed to the chief medical examiner, it will sound fishy because you’ve refused to talk in the past. And you’ve been ordered not to talk now. It’s got to look like the information was leaked.”
“Well,” I commented dryly, “I suppose you can pull your famous ‘medical source’ out of your hat.”
Abby read the draft aloud. It didn’t set well with me. It was too vague. “Alleged” this and “possible” that.
If only we had his blood. The enzyme defect, if it existed, could be assayed in his leukocytes, his white blood cells. If only we had something.
As if on cue my telephone buzzed. It was Rose. “Dr. Scarpetta, Sergeant Marino’s here. He says it’s urgent.”
I met him in the lobby. He was carrying a bag, the familiar gray plastic bag used to hold clothing connected to criminal cases.
“You ain’t gonna believe this.” He was grinning, his face flushed. “You know Magpie?”