“Just plain, thanks.” He sipped, closed his eyes. “Ah, better! What are you after, Carmine?”
“The answer to a question. Did you do histology on John Hall’s neck puncture?”
“Sure.”
“What did it show? I must have skimmed over it.”
The file was on his desk; Gus opened it. “A definite invasion of tissue, but very shallow. In fact, epithelium only.” He reached for his half glasses and read, frowning. “I see why you don’t remember. Whoever did the actual histology made a botch of it. I guess the lab was in a panic over this new and undetectable poison, and Paul had his best guy on that as well as himself. They pinch-hit, which is why they’re so good — no matter what the forensic task is, one of them can do the analysis or histology or ballistics or — or — it’s a long list. We don’t have the money or the work for separate technicians. But I remember this because he was a new guy — Brad. Turns out his skills are in ballistics, guns, that kind of thing.”
“So we don’t know?” Carmine asked.
“About the depth of the penetration, no.”
“Could you possibly look at the slides, Gus? I’ll buy you lunch at Malvolio’s any day you like if you do,” Carmine wheedled.
“Lucky for you all the tetrodotoxin cases are still in the lab,” said Gus, intrigued by now. He found John Hall’s box of specimen histology, and the dozen slides on the neck wound.
“Actually they’re okay,” he said, surprised, looking up from his microscope with raccoon’s eyes from pressing too hard. “I’d say the deeper layers of cells weren’t penetrated at all. I think your guy received a subcutaneous injection, not an intramuscular one.”
“What exactly does that mean in terms of symptoms, Gus?”
“Slower onset. This is very precise, if Brad the technician didn’t botch his sections. I must tell Paul to erase any black marks on Brad’s record. The needle lifted the skin and slid just under it, which you could do if the substance were concentrated and all you had to inject was a drop or two, rather than a full cc. Also, it couldn’t have been done at all with that gizmo you showed me — not nearly precise enough.” Gus heaved a sigh of satisfaction. “I must rewrite this.”
“How much of a delay would subcutaneous injection cause?”
The pathologist thought about it. “Depends on how rich the subcutaneous tissue was in blood vessels, but the slides say it wasn’t fatty — the deceased kept himself fit, I’d say. So taking all that into account, anything from an extra ten to an extra twenty minutes.”
“Gus, my man, you are a pearl beyond price, and lunch at Malvolio’s just became lunch at the Lobster Pot.”
From the M.E.’s domain Carmine went to the Commissioner’s.
“Did you know that human fat or adipose tissue is rich in blood vessels?” Carmine demanded as he walked in.
“Well, bless my Aunt Annunziata’s arm flaps! To what is this germane, O honored Captain of Detectives?”
Silvestri in skittish mood meant his day was going well; Carmine stifled a sigh. “John Hall’s neck is germane, O great and wise Commissioner of Police. It had no fatty tissue worth a dime, therefore no wealth of subcutaneous blood vessels, and no needle punctured his muscle tissue. In other words, he had a lightly built man’s scraggy neck. Our poisoner was very crafty indeed, John. He administered a highly concentrated injection of tetrodotoxin just under John Hall’s epithelium — no more than a drop or two, Gus thinks.”
“So the time window has opened up,” Silvestri said softly.
“The deed was done before they went into the study.”
“How did we miss it, Carmine?”
“Human error, oversight, false premise, take your pick. No one’s fault, really, except they put a new technician on taking the histology sections, and, expecting a needle track, blamed the technician when it wasn’t there. The kid was right, Gus wrong.”
“What made you wonder about it now, Carmine?”
“I don’t honestly know, except that something Dean Wainfleet said on an unrelated subject caused a weird shift in my mind, and I suddenly wondered if a subcutaneous injection would slow the reaction time down enough to enable the deed to be done before the men went into the study. Once the symptoms appeared, Hall died quickly — eleven minutes. That says the stuff was concentrated. It was worth a visit to Gus Fennell, I thought.”
“Well worth it. Not that it advances proof of guilt.”
“Exactly.” Carmine sighed. “You know, I could really do with a decent bank robbery or a shoot-out in the Chubb Bowl just for sheer recreation.”