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Writer's pictureMark Sanders

Chapter 11: Desperate

Blogtober 2023

Murphy escorted Carl to the sheriff's office first-aid station to clean up the cut on his head. The offices sat on the ground floor, while the jail was located above it. Carl would stay in a holding cell on the ground floor where they did suspect interviews. He seemed lucid and relaxed when Murphy locked him inside.


Clarkton, meanwhile, found his desk to use the phone. He was rarely at this desk, preferring to spend his time at the crime lab on the other side of the courthouse. He hated cell phones and used a land line whenever he could despite their increasing rarity.


“Coroner’s office, this is Nicole.”


“This is Clarkton,” he said. “What have you got?”


“Nothing you’re going to believe,” she said. “I put the black substance under the microscope, but it’s not organic.”


“Explain.”


“There are no biological cells visible,” she said.


“That’s what it isn’t,” he said. “Can you tell what it is?”


“Not with anything we have,” she said. “We need to run it through a mass spectrometer, which we don’t have.”


“Get a sample ready,” Clarkton said. “I’ll send a deputy to collect it and drive it to Cape. I’ve got friends in the SEMO Crime Lab who’ll move it to the front of the line.”


“You must be desperate to call in that kind of favor,” she said.


“Not desperate yet,” he said, “but curious enough to cash in these chips.”


“I’ll have it ready,” she said, and he hung up.


Photo credit Adobe Stock #126988894

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