“Great. Anything else?”
She heard the hesitation in Sorensen’s voice. “There’s a smudge.”
“How big a smudge? What kind of smudge?”
“It’s a layered mess of more than one print. The original piece of paper is small. If more than one person held it, the likelihood is that their prints overlapped in most places, so it’s already pretty darn lucky we have one for Gilman and one for Gray.”
“Amy, somewhere in that mess could be the fingerprint of the man who copied the yearbook photo for Gilman.”
“You’re asking me to analyze, separate, and match, maybe, four or five overlapping prints on the chance that one of them might belong to someone else?”
“Is that something you can do?”
“No.”
“Oh.” Madison’s heart dropped to the floor.
“I mean, I can’t do it, but there is a particular software that uses a new algorithm to separate overlapped fingerprints, estimating the orientation field of each individual component.”
“Amy, you are the bright center of my universe.”
“Yeah, yeah, that’s what you say now. I’m making no promises, Madison. It’s an experimental technique.”
“If we had anything at all to match to our prime suspects, it would be a huge help.”
“I heard you’ve got one guy in California and one about to fly the coop.”
“Yes, that’s pretty much what we have.”
“I’ll do what I can.”
Locard, Madison said to herself. I believe in Locard. Every contact leaves a trace.
Fynn had rejected her idea of a blank recall of all the yearbooks as impractical, which she disagreed with but could understand. However, it was still a potential avenue to explore once they could narrow the pool of suspects down from the hundreds who had bought the book in the first place.
Madison chugged down some yogurt drink that she had remembered to bring in from home and read Kelly’s report: he had gone through most of Jerome McMullen’s previous associates, and it seemed unlikely that any of them had the contacts or the capital to get Conway on board. Still, where there’s a will, she thought . . . The problem with organizing anything from inside a prison is communication, and the bulk of McMullen’s seemed to be letters to and from volunteer groups and charities.
A television monitor was turned on with the sound muted in a corner of the detectives’ room. The news anchor started his next item, and John Cameron’s arrest picture flashed behind him. Madison read the title line on the bottom of the screen and did not need to hear his commentary. Then they played Nathan Quinn’s appeal to TV viewers from start to finish. One down, three to go. Except that now the count had changed. Madison knew those words well and what evil spirit they had conjured up: two nights ago she had looked straight into his dead eyes.
The sky had rolled out a blanket of heavy rain clouds, and wherever they were coming from, it looked as if they’d never run out. Madison turned up the collar of her jacket and felt fat raindrops splash over her hair before she could make it into her car.
Lieutenant Fynn had given her his blessing, Kelly had given her his customary sour look, and Spencer and Dunne had wished her good luck with it.
The downtown traffic faded around her as she hit I-5 due south and picked up speed toward Seward Park.
Nathan Quinn opened his front door. He was still wearing the suit he’d worn in court, and the result of the hearing seemed to have done little to lighten his mood.
Madison walked in and took stock of the brand-new alarm system that had been installed since she had been there last. She had called him from the precinct parking lot. “Now that Cameron is out, he and I need to talk: no guards, no visiting-room regulations. I have news you want to hear, and I need his help. I’m on my way.”
When she’d arrived, Quinn had his hands full with carrier bags packed with plastic containers that had just been delivered from The Rock.
“Mr. O’Keefe’s good work?” Madison asked.
“Yes. He got food delivered to me in the hospital every day without fail. Would have done the same for Jack in KCJC, but apparently it’s not allowed.”
Donny O’Keefe was the head chef at The Rock; Madison had met him weeks earlier. He was fiercely loyal and had been a player in the regular poker nights at the restaurant. They had played their last game in December, late at night after closing time, and James Sinclair had been there—only days before his murder.
For a moment Madison asked herself what it would be like to play poker with these men who hid so much and risked so much. Probably not very different from what she was about to do.