The Case of the Displaced Detective

by Stephanie Osborn

  “Thank you, Colonel,” Holmes nodded, accepting the first report. “I will study these, and contact you if I have any questions.”

  “Good enough. I’ll be in my office if you need me. If I have to step out, tell Christine you’re looking for me, and she’ll get hold of me right away.”

  “Very good.”

  Jones headed out. Skye stood as well.

  “Holmes, do you need me now?”

  “No, I think not, for the time, Skye,” Holmes said absently, already absorbed in the forensic report.

  “Good. I’m going to head down to the Chamber and start the final analyses before…shutting down for the hiatus.”

  At those words Holmes stopped reading, glancing up at her, having noticed something in her tone, something that disturbed him.

  “Are you all right, Skye?”

  “I’m fine,” she said briskly, but he noticed the tenseness around the azure eyes. “If I don’t come back in time for lunch, close the safe and come get me.”

  Then she, too, was gone.

  * * *

  Skye was welcomed into the Chamber, where Caitlin was already overseeing activation of the device. Upon the arrival of the chief scientist, however, the project manager ceded control. Skye supervised completion of activation and initiated preliminary test sequences, rather than focusing on a given alternate continuum.

  “This is gonna take awhile,” Caitlin noted.

  “Yeah, but it has to be done,” Skye decreed. “That’s why I designed the test plan in modules. We can break for meals and put the test on hold, then resume tomorrow. But I’m hoping we can get done today on this sequence. I really don’t want someone to have to baby-sit the tesseract overnight, or worse, run the team round the clock.”

  “Yeah. Start the detailed testing tomorrow, then?”

  “Yup. Tomorrow’s the detailed. That’ll take about three, four days. After that, if we need to, we can go component by component.”

  “Do you expect to find anything?”

  “Nope. Just making sure everything’s running right before shutting it down,” Skye sighed.

  * * *

  Neither Holmes nor Skye came up for air at lunchtime, as it turned out. Although Skye broke the team for lunch, she stayed and oversaw the tesseract, spending the time tweaking the afternoon test plan. And Holmes lost himself in the forensics reports, studying even the unfamiliar parts—such as the DNA analysis—and mentally annotating them with questions to ask Skye. Then he absorbed them, making them part of his consciousness, so the details would be at hand whether the documents were or not.

  By the end of the day—which was late, but did see the end of preliminary tesseract testing—both were tired, hungry, and bleary-eyed. Skye showed up in their office, and a surprised Holmes glanced up, blinking, as his eyes struggled to shift focus to the longer range after an entire day of reading.

  “I’m pooped,” she announced. “Are you ready to go home?”

  “Actually,” Holmes murmured, loath to admit the lack of knowledge, “I had hoped to ask you a few questions regarding these reports. There are some sections which I find myself at a loss to interpret—most notably, the DNA analysis, and something called the ‘clinical pathology report.’”

  “Oh, okay. That, I can do. Only don’t expect a real technical explanation right now. I’m more than half brain-dead.”

  “I will accept that. Sit, and let me show you.” Holmes chuckled.

  Skye pulled a chair beside him and sat, while Holmes flipped to the first page with a turned-down corner. He handed it to her and she glanced at it.

  “Oh, okay,” she noted, scanning the page. “This is the preliminary report on those threads they found at the tamper site up the road. They got a dye reaction, and they’re still working to identify the specific chemicals used. So far, no indication of any DNA on the sample. Look—here’s how to read it,” she explained, tilting the page so Holmes could see. “This table contains the chromatography results. Substance tested for is in the left column, percentage in the right. There’s probably some substances you won’t recognize on here, because they don’t always use the standard organic chem nomenclature; but if you need to look something up, I’ve got the latest CRC Handbook of Organic Compounds on my shelf, there.” She twisted around and pointed; Holmes took note. “Below that table is the x-ray diffraction spectrum, and the data from the spectrum; they had to destroy part of the sample to get this.”

  “Destroy?” Holmes frowned.

  “Yeah. You burn the sample, then powder the ash and run it through a diffractometer. I’m sure you’ve made similar analyses. Only instead of using visible light, we’re using x-rays, and the x-rays tell about the crystalline structures of the residues in the ash. In this particular case, I think they were looking to pin down what kind of dye was used in the material.”

  “Ah,” Holmes said, the light dawning, “now we are in my bailiwick once more.”

  “Well, there are some modern synthetic dyes you might not be familiar with, but yeah, that should be no problem for you. If we need to, I can get you a reference to modern dye chemicals. Colonel Jones can help with that, or maybe Cait. What else?”

  Holmes grabbed another document and flipped over several pages.

  “Here. The clinical pathology report on Michaels.”

  * * *

  “Mm,” Skye murmured, as her eyes drifted down the page, then she turned to the next page. “Okay, this particular part you have marked is the toxicology section of the report. I assume you caught the rest of it.”

  “Yes, I did. The anatomic pathology was straightforward. What is LD50?” Holmes queried. “I had been trying to ascertain the quantities of substances found in Michaels’ system, but that term seems not to be defined, so it made little sense.”

  “Um, that stands for…” Skye racked her tired brain, “Lethal Dose—50%. It’s the dose required to kill half the members of a test population, like say fifty out of a hundred lab rats. It’s a common forensic term to indicate how toxic something is. I can see why this particular report would be confusing—they’re expressing the quantities as percentages of a percentage. Yuck. Okay, let’s see…” she studied the text. “Yeah, the units are in milligrams of substance per kilogram of body weight. You familiar with metric?”

  “It was not in common use in England, but yes, I have some familiarity with it, from the laboratory,” Holmes averred, looking over her shoulder.

  “Okay, you should be able to interpret this now. You might get thrown by the odd drug name or something, but we can look those up online, if we need to.”

  “Yes, I believe so,” he agreed, standing and stretching before returning the document he held to the safe. “Shall we go?”

  “Oh, we shall, we shall,” Skye said fervently.

  Holmes closed and locked the safe, signing it out for the evening. Skye double-checked the lock, then initialed her confirmation that the safe had, indeed, been locked on the log sheet. Wearily she moved to her desk, checking phone and email before shutting down the unclassified laptop and stowing it in its case.

  * * *

  “Let’s go,” she declared. Holmes took a good look at her and immediately recognized the signs she had been on her feet most of the day.

  “Here,” he said, reaching for the laptop case, “allow me. You look decidedly worn, my dear. I am by no means a gourmet chef, but I have been known to cook the odd basic meal. Would you care to allow me to prepare dinner tonight?” he offered as they headed down the hall.

  “You’re as tired as I am.” Skye gave him a considering glance. “No, I’ve got a better idea.”

  “And what might that be?”

  “A drive-through. We’re getting burgers tonight.”

  Holmes raised an eyebrow. I have no idea what she said…

  * * *

  Holmes was introduced to the all-American fast-food cheeseburger and fries—or chips, as he knew them—for dinner, and found them acceptable and filling. After eati
ng, Skye collapsed in the corner of the sofa with her feet up on the rustic coffee table, while Holmes smoked his pipe and allowed the information he had absorbed earlier in the day to assimilate.

  When he glanced to his side to find Skye nodding off, Holmes leaned over and prodded her gently. She roused with a start, and he very kindly told her, “Go to bed, my dear. I will ensure the house is locked, then retire myself. You look done in.”

  “Oh,” she murmured groggily. “Okay. But there’s one thing I want to do first, before I forget again. I meant to do it all last weekend, but it kept slipping my mind.”

  She got up and staggered down the hall to her study. Curious, Holmes rose and followed, more than half-suspecting she was sleepwalking, and prepared to divert her into her bedroom should that prove to be the case.

  But Skye went to the desk and pulled out a drawer. Extracting a small pencil case from the back, she opened it and fished out a key. Digging in another drawer produced a plain silver key fob. She threaded the key onto the split ring of the keychain before handing it to Holmes.

  “Here. House key. It’s yours. If I have to stay overnight to baby-sit the tesseract this week, get Caitlin or somebody to bring you home.”

  Then she stumbled off to bed, leaving Holmes staring at the passkey to his new domicile.

  * * *

  The next morning the pair stopped off in their joint office for coffee together before Skye headed downstairs to the Chamber.

  Holmes remained in the office, returning to the detailed reports and resuming where he had left off the previous day. He had been quite impressed with them, finding them far more exhaustive than the sources available to him in Victorian London. And now, thanks to Skye’s explanations the night before, they were more intelligible.

  Each aspect of the investigation had its own report: The perimeter fence scene, the crime scene up the road where Michaels was strapped into his tampered vehicle, the vehicle itself, Michaels’ body, Michaels’ personal effects and quarters, Davis’ body, his personal effects. It made for a lot to take in, but Holmes absorbed it at a great rate.

  Each report also had attached a sheaf of photographs, which Holmes perused exhaustively, and images of other crime scene details such as footprints and fingerprints. The information only served to reinforce Holmes’ original conclusion: both men had been murdered.

  Around lunchtime Holmes came up for air, having completed his examination of the reports. The telephone rang, and after a moment of debate, Holmes picked it up.

  “Dr. Chadwick’s office. Commander Holmes speaking,” he barked, in his best impersonation of military manner.

  “Hey, Holmes, it’s Skye,” the familiar voice sounded on the other end of the line. “That was good. Sounded realistic.”

  “Hello, my dear. Are you ready for lunch?”

  “That’s why I called. We’re at a critical stage of the detailed testing, and can’t break to eat. Go ahead without me.”

  “You did not get lunch yesterday, either, my dear. Might I offer to fetch something from the cafeteria for you?”

  “No, that’s okay. Cait went for pizza for the entire team. Don’t worry. I’ll eat, I promise.”

  “Good.”

  “How’s the…” Skye paused, obviously debating phrasing. “How’s your…‘settling in’ coming?”

  “Quite well,” Holmes answered blithely. “I have finished reviewing all the initial documents. I think this afternoon I may visit Colonel Jones with a few requests.”

  “Okay. Hey, if you’re gonna go look at that, um, property down the road from us, you might wanna do it soon. I caught the weather forecast this morning and it’s supposed to rain tonight.”

  “Ah, excellent information, Skye. I think I shall see if the good colonel can arrange for that this afternoon as well, then.”

  “That sounds good. Wups, gotta go, Holmes.” Skye’s voice dropped to a whisper, and she added, “Good hunting. Bye.”

  “Farewell for now, Skye,” Holmes said, smiling at her surreptitious addendum.

  He hung up, then picked up the phone and dialed Colonel Jones.

  * * *

  After lunch, which he shared with the detective in the cafeteria, Jones had a Humvee brought around, and he took Holmes to the site where Lieutenant Michaels’ pickup truck had been meddled-with, then sent on its fatal journey.

  Holmes stood beside the Humvee and turned in a circle, surveying the entire area. In Holmes’ assessment, the road to the site was little more than a farm path: A gravel and dirt track moving through the prairie from the east, then tracing the perimeter of the base.

  “This was a ranch road,” Jones verified Holmes’ suspicions, “until the land was acquired for the military base. We diverted it for patrols of the perimeter and maintenance of the fence.”

  “I see,” Holmes noted, studying the area. “Where does the other end of the road connect?”

  “Couple miles over there,” Jones waved eastward. “It comes out on Peyton Highway.”

  “And is this a large, well traveled road, this Peyton Highway?”

  “Not huge, but reasonably so, I suppose. Enough so maybe the traffic here wouldn’t have been noticed coming and going, you think?”

  “Exactly, Colonel,” Holmes noted, studying the immediate vicinity. He moved to the side of the road, noting the tire tracks in the dried mud. Holmes crouched to study the marks in the dried clots, automatically reached toward a pocket, then frowned. “Oh, but I do miss my lens,” he murmured in mild irritation.

  “I knew it,” Jones grinned triumphantly, fishing in the pocket of his uniform. “Here, Holmes. Consider it a little present from one investigator to another.” To Holmes’ delight, the colonel produced a large, powerful magnifying glass from his pocket.

  “Ah, Colonel! You anticipate my needs! Excellent!” Holmes threw himself down in the grass beside the marks, scrutinizing them through the lens. His long finger pointed to a particular imprint, which showed signs of disturbance. “And this is where the fiber was found?”

  “It was. By the way, the final forensics report came back on it this morning. I’ll forward a copy to you. It was a cotton/synthetic blend, and had been dyed with a known dye in the color called Air Force blue. It was, apparently, an Air Force jumpsuit or coverall.”

  “Of just the sort worn by the base mechanics?” Holmes queried in mock innocence.

  “Just so,” Jones agreed grimly. “So we likely have one or more moles inside the base.”

  “A mole?”

  “A spy, hidden in our network. Burrowed in, invisible to the surface, like a mole.”

  “Yes, well, we shall see if we cannot ferret out this particular rodent,” Holmes said, unconcerned. “As to how our moles arrived and departed, I gathered the print evidence shows two sets of footprints appeared here, then walked back to the highway?”

  “Correct. I’d say they drove here in Michael’s own truck, sabotaged it, set him off in it, then walked back to a waiting car.”

  “And there was no way to trace said car?”

  “No, the highway shoulder is paved, and there weren’t marks.”

  “I see.” Holmes paused, studying the ground. “This soil is unusual, relative to the rest of the area.”

  “Yes. Simply the fact there IS bare soil here is unusual, for uncultivated prairie. This particular location, it turns out, is part of the sandstone uplift that includes the Garden of the Gods. Notice how the soil here is that same peculiar pinkish-orange, and sandy. The sandstone has eroded away here, and left this telltale soil.”

  “I see. Yet there is a greyish clay admixture too, which I take to be an erosional component of perhaps a shale.”

  “Yes. Parts of the formation contain layered shale and sandstone. It made for a nice material to cast the impressions of the tire treads and the mechanic’s back.”

  “Indeed. Why do you suppose they would have chosen here, in the mud, when they could have positioned themselves on the grass and left far fewer traces…?�
��

  “Oh, that’s actually pretty straightforward. There was still snow on the grass. By lifting it up off the ground, the grass insulated it and kept the snow from melting as fast. Our mechanic preferred lying in the mud to lying in the cold snow.”

  “Ah, as you say,” Holmes nodded sagely. “But that must mean our mechanic was quite coated with this rather bright mud. I should think the back of his coveralls and his boots in particular would be fairly plastered with it.” He glanced back down at the indentations in the clotted soil. “By any chance do you have a measuring tape with you, Colonel?”

  “I do, Mr. Holmes,” Jones replied, fishing it out. “I find such things sometimes come in handy.”

  “Then do you please assist me to measure these impressions. I believe we may be able to discover a tidbit or two regarding our mechanic’s build and posture if we do…”

  Jones immediately knelt beside the prone Holmes, and the two men measured the impressions, scribbling notations on a pad Holmes had in his pocket.

  * * *

  When they were done, Holmes suggested they go by the shop where the pickup truck was being held as evidence. Jones grimly agreed. Upon arrival, Holmes made a show of a second inspection of the truck, coming up fruitless; then wandered around the shop area, pretending interest in the work; having “grown up in the city,” he had never had need of an automobile.

  Jones smiled, because he fully realized the detective was, in fact, sizing up the builds of the various mechanics, and trying to get a good look at the soles of their boots. But the colonel played along with the ruse, following Holmes and occasionally introducing the various mechanics, innocuously pointing out this or that feature of the work or equipment. After some half-hour, Holmes turned to Jones.

  “Well, very good, Colonel,” he said with a smile. “Quite a pretty little puzzle, I should say. Good luck with your investigation, and thank you for allowing me to indulge a quaint hobby.”

  “Are you ready to go, Commander Holmes?” Jones queried.

  “Oh, quite.”

  “Right this way.”

  * * *

  Ten minutes later they were back in Jones’ office.