Jeffery Deaver - The Stone Monkey

"Yessir," Deng said.

Dellray had gone downtown to arrange for the extra agents from the two relevant federal jurisdictions in New York – the Southern and Eastern, which covered Manhattan and Long Island. He was also wielding his influence to get the SPEC-TAC team on site, which Washington was reluctant to do; the special unit was generally reserved for major hostage standoffs and embassy takeovers, not for manhunts. Still, Rhyme knew, Dellray was a tough man to say no to and if anybody could get the much-needed tactical force up here it'd be the lanky agent.

Rhyme maneuvered the chair back to the evidence and the whiteboards.

Nothing, nothing, nothing…

What else can we do? he wondered. What haven't we exhausted? Scanning the board… Finally he said, "Let's look at the blood some more." He looked over the samples that Sachs had found: that from the injured immigrant, the woman with the broken or gashed arm, hand or shoulder.

Lincoln Rhyme loved blood as a forensic tool. It was easy to spot, it stuck like glue to all kinds of surfaces, it retained its important forensic information for years.

The history of blood in criminal investigation, in fact, largely reflects the history of forensic science itself.

The earliest effort – in the mid-1800s – to use blood as evidence focused simply on classifying it, that is, determining if an unknown substance was indeed blood and not, say, dried brown paint. Fifty years later the focus was on identifying blood as human, as opposed to animal. Not long after that detectives began looking for a way to differentiate blood – break it down into a limited number of categories – and scientists responded by creating the process of blood typing (the A, B, O system as well as the MN and the Rh systems), which narrows down the number of sources. In the sixties and seventies forensic scientists sought to go one step further – to individuate the blood, that is, trace it back to a single individual, like a fingerprint. Early efforts at doing this biochemically – identifying enzymes and proteins – could eliminate many individuals as the source, but not all. It wasn't until DNA typing that true individuation was achieved.

Classification, identification, differentiation, individuation… that's criminalistics in a nutshell.

But there was more to blood than linking it to an individual. The way it fell on surfaces at crime scenes – spatter, it was called – provided great information about the nature of the attack. And Lincoln Rhyme often examined the content of blood to determine what it could tell about the individual who'd shed it.

"Let's see if our injured woman's got a drug habit or's taking some rare medicine. Call the M.E.'s office and have them do a complete workup. I want to know everything that's in her bloodstream."

As Cooper was talking to the office Sellitto's phone rang and he took the call.

Rhyme could see in the detective's face that he was receiving some bad news.

"Oh, Jesus… oh, no…"

The criminalist sensed an odd fibrillation in the core of his body – an area where he could by rights feel nothing at all. People who are paralyzed often feel phantom pain from limbs and parts of their body that cannot have any sensation. Rhyme not only had experienced this feeling but he'd felt shock and adrenaline rushes too, when his logical mind knew that this was impossible.

"What, Lon?" Sachs asked.

"Fifth Precinct again. Chinatown," he said, wincing. "Another killing. This time it's definitely the Ghost." He glanced at Rhyme and shook his head. "Man, it's not good."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, they're saying it's fucking unpleasant, Linc."

Unpleasant was not a word that one heard often from an NYPD homicide detective, especially Lon Sellitto, as hardened a cop as you'd ever find.

He wrote down some information then hung up the phone and glanced at Sachs. "Suit up, Officer, you've got a scene to run."

GHOSTKILL

Easton , Long Island,

Crime Scene

• Two immigrants killed on beach; shot in back.

• One immigrant wounded – Dr. John Sung.

• "Bangshou" (assistant) on board; identity unknown.

• Ten immigrants escape: seven adults (one elderly, one injured woman), two children, one infant. Steal church van.

• Blood samples sent to lab for typing.

• Injured woman is AB negative. Requesting more information about her blood.

• Vehicle awaiting Ghost on beach left without him. One shot believed fired by Ghost at vehicle. Request for vehicle make and model sent out, based on tread marks and wheelbase.

• Vehicle is a BMW X5. Checking registered owners.

• No vehicles to pick up immigrants located.

• Cell phone, presumably Ghost's, sent for analysis to FBI.

• Untraceable satellite secure phone. Hacked Chinese gov't system to use it.

• Ghost's weapon is 7.62mm pistol. Unusual casing.

• Model 51 Chinese automatic pistol.

• Ghost is reported to have gov't people on payroll.

• Ghost stole red Honda sedan to escape. Vehicle locator request sent out.

• Three bodies recovered at sea – two shot, one drowned. Photos and prints to Rhyme and Chinese police.

• Fingerprints sent to AFIS.

• No matches on any prints but unusual markings on Sam Chang's fingers and thumbs (injury, rope burn?).

• Profile of immigrants: Sam Chang and Wu Qichen and their families, John Sung, baby of woman who drowned, unidentified man and woman (killed on beach).

Stolen Van,

Chinatown

• Camouflaged by immigrants with "The Home Store" logo.

• Blood spatter suggests injured woman has hand, arm or shoulder injury.

• Blood samples sent to lab for typing.

• Injured woman is AB negative. Requesting more information about her blood.

• Fingerprints sent to AFIS.

• No matches.

Amelia Sachs had left the Camaro on the street near Rhyme's town house and was driving a crime scene bus downtown on the FDR Drive.

The vehicle was functional city property – a Ford station wagon – but she drove it pretty much the same as if she'd been behind the wheel of her gaudy yellow sports car. The time was 2:45 P.M., before rush hour, but the roads were still crowded and maneuvering through traffic took all her skill.

"Hey, Hongse," Sonny Li began nervously as she skidded around a taxi at 70 m.p.h. But he apparently preferred she keep her attention on the road and fell silent.

In the backseat were Eddie Deng, who wasn't concerned about her driving, and agent Alan Coe, who, like the Chinese cop, clearly was. He gripped the chest strap of his seat belt as if he were holding the rip cord of a parachute during a skydive.

"Did you see that?" Sachs asked casually as a cab ignored the siren and light on the CS bus and pulled out directly in front of her to make the exit at Houston Street.

"We moving real fast," Li said then seemed to remember that he didn't want to distract her and he stopped talking again.

"Which way, Eddie?" Sachs asked.

"The Bowery, turn left, two more blocks then a right."

She pulled off onto a rain-slick Canal Street at fifty, controlled the skid before they went into a garbage truck and accelerated into Chinatown, the tires, goosed by the big cop engine, steaming up the wheel wells.

Li muttered something in Chinese.

"What?"

"Ten judges of hell," he translated his own words.

Sachs recalled – the ten judges of hell, who kept the book called The Register of the Living and the Dead, containing the name of everybody in the world. The balance sheet of life and death.