Kathy Reichs - Spider Bones

“That’s a traditional shark tooth pattern.” Gearhart’s voice came from somewhere to my left.

“You sure?” Perry asked. “We haven’t got much here.”

“Absolutely. I collect shark images. Paintings. Prints. Tattoos. I’ve seen dozens of variations on this theme.”

Perry made a grunting noise in her throat.

“Must be part of a tapuvae, ” Gearhart said. “An ankle band. The only unusual elements are these three loopy things.”

Gearhart indicated two backward C’s with a U between them sticking up from the filigreed strip.

A full minute passed, then the lights came on.

Without asking if we’d seen enough, Perry peeled the specimen free and dropped it into a jar of formalin. The tissue looked ghostly pale floating in the clear liquid.

“There we have it, sports fans.” Perry was marking the case number on the jar lid with a Sharpie. “Looks like Señor Shark ate a tattooee with a gimpy left leg.”

Cold, I thought.

“The cops can work the hospitals and tat parlors while I query the MP families.”

“You might try computer image enhancement,” I said. “To tease more detail out of the design.”

“Or high-contrast or infrared photography,” Ryan added.

“Will do.” Perry stripped off her gloves. “So. Not a bad morning’s work. Given our vic is the size of a pork roast.”

Toeing the lever on a bio-waste can, Perry tossed her gloves.

“ Mahalo, Dr. Gearhart. I get you a set of photos, you’ll write up your thoughts?”

“No problem.”

Perry turned to me.

“You going to spend some time with the first kid?”

“Yes, I—”

To Ryan. “Come with me, champ. I’ll buy you a Danish while I ponder whether to close that beach.”

As the trio filed out, two Viking blues slid my way. Words snapped from my tongue before I could stop them.

“Think shark attack. Champ.”

My testiness surprised me. Was I really feeling threatened by Hadley Perry?

It amused Ryan. The smile that whispered in his eyes only goosed my resentment.

A reexamination of the cleaned bones turned up nothing new.

Thirty minutes later, Ryan and I took our leave. I didn’t bother to monitor his or Perry’s face for hidden meaning.

We were on Iwilei Road when my BlackBerry buzzed.

Danny.

“You coming in today?”

“Just leaving the ME’s office.”

“Was Perry her usual delightful self?”

Feeling a reply was pointless, I offered none.

“Got some info on 1968-979.”

“Good news or bad?”

“Yes.”

I could sense Ryan listening.

“Katy has my car. Detective Ryan was kind enough to give me a ride.”

I’d cleared with Danny that it was OK for Ryan to bunk at the Lanikai house. Knowing our history, he’d responded with a few lines of “Let’s Get It On.” Marvin Gaye he’s not.

“The girls are over the cat phase?” Danny asked.

I’d also told Danny about the friction between Lily and Katy. At that moment, I didn’t want to discuss it.

“Will Ryan have a problem getting past the gate?” I asked.

“Has monsieur le détective got plans for the day?”

“Why?”

“I’ll sponsor him. He can hang here if he wants. We can bounce ideas off him. Fresh perspective, you know.”

“Hold on.”

Pressing the device to my chest, I queried Ryan’s interest in visiting the CIL. To my surprise he gave an enthusiastic thumbs-up.

Good thing.

The idea-bouncing proved very useful.

OVERNIGHT, DANNY HAD HAD AN IDEA. THAT MORNING HE’D been busy in the J-2 shop.

“Circle search.” He smiled and leaned back, fingers laced on his chest.

Ryan and I regarded him blankly.

“Civilians.” Danny’s head wagged in mock disgust.

“You’re a civilian,” I pointed out.

“OK.” His palms came up. “Slow and simple. First, I got a topo map and located the grid coordinates for Lowery’s Huey crash. We all good so far?”

Ryan and I nodded.

“Then I had a J-2 analyst search to see how many troops went MIA within a fifteen-kilometer radius of those grid coordinates—air, ground, overwater, whatever. Next I had him narrow to losses occurring January twenty-third, nineteen sixty-seven, through August seventeenth, nineteen sixty-eight.

“From one year prior to the Huey crash up to the date 1968-979 was found,” I said, for Ryan’s benefit.

“Bingo.” Danny arced an arm at folders stacked on the love seat. “Those are the people who remain KIA/BNR.”

Ryan looked to me for translation.

“Killed in action, body not recovered. How many?” I asked.

“Eighteen,” Danny said. “I just signed the files out.”

“On the phone you said you had new info on 1968-979.”

“When the decomposed remains now designated 1968-979 went to Tan Son Nhut in sixty-eight, mortuary personnel found John Lowery’s dog tag inside the body bag. But Lowery had already been identified months earlier and sent stateside.”

“The burned body that ended up buried in North Carolina,” Ryan said.

“Yes,” I said. “Now exhumed and reaccessioned as 2010-37.”

“Since the decomposed remains, 1968-979, couldn’t, in the thinking of the military personnel, be Lowery, and they matched no one else reported MIA in that sector, they remained at Tan Son Nhut as an unknown until nineteen seventy-three. Then they went to CIL-THAI. In nineteen seventy-six they came to Hawaii. They’ve been on our shelves here ever since.”

A smile crawled Danny’s lips.

“What?” I prompted.

“Except for one brief sabbatical. While at Tan Son Nhut, hair and tissue samples were retained and sealed in jars. In 2001, because of similarities to another file open at the time, those samples were pulled for DNA testing.”

“Nuclear or mitochondrial?” I asked, referring to the two human genomes typically sequenced.

“Good old nuclear.” Danny’s grin spread. “The profile for 1968-937 is on file. We just need a relative for comparison.”

I glanced at the folders. Four decades. Was a family out there somewhere, still hoping? Or had everyone long since given up and moved on with their lives?

“Let’s do it,” I said.

With guidance, Ryan quickly became adept at reading files. He found the perfect candidate two hours after lunch.

Alexander Emanuel Lapasa. Xander to friends and family.

Lapasa’s folder was the slimmest of the lot.

Why? Xander Lapasa never served a day in the military.

But everything fit.

Alexander Emanuel Lapasa was a twenty-nine-year-old white male who stood six foot one and weighed two hundred pounds. Lapasa’s mother reported him missing in March 1968, two months after Xander’s weekly letters stopped arriving from Vietnam.

Ryan passed Danny a photo. He passed it to me.

The snapshot showed a tall young man from the waist up. His curly dark hair was tucked behind prominent ears. A mile-wide smile revealed straight white teeth.

Lapasa wore a striped shirt with the top buttons open, a knapsack over one shoulder. His arms elbowed out from hip-planted hands.

“Looks like he’s got the world by the tail,” Ryan said.

“Or believes he soon will,” Danny said.

I returned the photo. Danny studied it a moment.

“Looks like Joseph Perrino,” he said.

“Who?” Ryan and I asked.

“The actor? Appeared on The Sopranos now and then? Never mind.”

“I didn’t think civilians went to Nam in the sixties,” Ryan said.

“Sure,” Danny said. “Civilian employees of the army’s post exchange system, aid workers, missionaries, journalists. Check the wall. Quite a few nonmilitary personnel are listed.”