The zoologist nodded, pulled on his latex gloves once more--without Rhyme's having to instruct him to do so, the criminalist observed.
Rhyme asked about the food and water found at the mill. Ben held them up. The criminalist observed, "No individual store labels. Like the others. Won't do us any good. See if there's anything adhering to the sticky sides of the duct tape."
Sachs and Ben bent over the roll and spent ten minutes examining it with a hand glass. She pulled fragments of wood from the side and Ben once again held the instrument so Rhyme could peer into the eyepieces. But under the microscope it was clear that they matched the wood in the mill. "Nothing," she said.
Ben then picked up the map that showed Paquenoke County. It was marked with X's and arrows, indicated Garrett's path to the mill from Blackwater Landing. There was no price sticker on this either. And it gave no indication of where the boy had been headed once he'd left the mill.
Rhyme said to Bell, "You have an ESDA?"
"A what?"
"Electrostatic Detection Apparatus."
"Don't even know what that is."
"Picks up indented writing on paper. If Garrett had written something on top of the map, a town or address, we could see it."
"Well, we don't have one. Should I call the state police?"
"No. Ben, just shine a flashlight on the map at a low angle. See if there're any indentations."
Ben did this and though they searched every inch of the map they could see no evidence of writing or other marking.
Rhyme ordered Ben to examine the second map, the one Lucy had found in the gristmill. "Let's see if there's any trace in the folds. It's too big for magazine subscription cards. Open it over a newspaper."
More sand poured out. Rhyme noticed immediately that it was in fact ocean sand, the sort that would be found on the Outer Banks--the grains were clear, not opaque, as would have been the case with inland sand.
"Run a sample through the chromatograph. Let's see if there's any other trace that'll be helpful."
Ben started the noisy machine.
As they waited for the results he spread the map out on the table. Bell, Ben and Rhyme examined it carefully. It depicted the eastern shore of the U.S. from Norfolk, Virginia, and
the Hampton Roads shipping lanes all the way down to South Carolina. They looked over every inch but Garrett hadn't circled or marked any location.
Of course not, Rhyme thought; it's never that easy. They used the flashlight on this map too. But found no indented writing.
The chromatograph results flashed up onto the screen. Rhyme glanced at it quickly. "Not much help. Sodium chloride--salt--along with iodine, organic material.... All consistent with seawater. But there's hardly any other trace. Doesn't do us much good for tying the sand to a specific location." Rhyme nodded at the shoes that had been in the box with the map. He asked Ben, "Any other trace in those?"
The young man examined them carefully, even unlacing them--just as Rhyme was about to ask him to do. This boy has good criminalist potential, Rhyme thought. He shouldn't be wasting his talent on neurotic fish.
The shoes were old Nikes--so common that tracing them to a particular store where Garrett might have bought them was impossible.
"Flecks of dried leaves, looks like. Maple and oak. If I had to guess."
Rhyme nodded. "Nothing else in the box?"
"Nothing."
Rhyme looked up at the other evidence charts. His eye paused at the references to camphene.
"Sachs, in the mill, were there old-fashioned lamps on the walls? Or lanterns?"
"No," Sachs answered. "None."
"Are you sure," he persisted gruffly, "or did you just not notice?"
She crossed her arms and said evenly, "The floors were ten-inch-wide chestnut, the walls plaster and lath. There was graffiti on one of the walls in blue spray paint. It said, 'Josh and Brittany, luv always,' love spelled L-U-V. There was one Shaker-style table, cracked down the middle and painted black, three bottles of Deer Park water, a pack of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, five bags of Doritos, two bags of Cape Cod potato chips, six cans of Pepsi, four cans of Coke, eight packets of Planters peanut butter and cheese crackers. There were two windows in the room. One was boarded over. In the unboarded window there was only one pane that was unbroken--the others had been smashed--and every doorknob and window latch in the place was stolen. There were old-fashioned raised electric switches on the walls. And, yes, I'm sure there were no old-fashioned lamps."