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Authors: Jeffery Deaver
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over the array of equipment he knew so well.
Two Leitz binocular stereo microscopes with a Volpi Intralux fiber optic light source, an old Foster + Freeman VSC4 video spectral comparator and the latest of their video spectral comparators—the VSC 2000,equipped with a Rofin PoliLight and running QDOS software through Windows NT. Also, sitting well-used in the corner were a Foster + Freeman ESDA—an electrostatic detection apparatus—and a thin-layer gas chromatograph for ink and trace analysis.
He noticed the glass windows the tourists paraded past every day, nine to four, as part of the FBI headquarters tour. The corridor was now dark and ominous.
Parker watched the other members of the team find seats at desks and lab tables. The room was cluttered, smelly and uncomfortable, the way real working laboratories were. But he preferred to be here—rather than in the glitzy Crisis Center—because he firmly believed in something he’d learned from his father, a historian who specialized in the Revolutionary War. “Always fight your battles on familiar ground,” the professor had told his boy. He’d chosen not to give this answer to Lukas; another thing William Kincaid had told his son was “You don’t have to share everything with your allies.”
He glanced into Stan Lewis’s office again. Saw the books that he himself had used when this had been his department: Harrison’s Suspect Documents, Housely and Farmer’s An Introduction to Handwriting Identification and Scientific Examination of Questioned Documents by Hilton. And the Bible of the profession: Questioned Documents by Albert S. Osborn. He looked at the credenza behind the office chair and recognized the four bonsai trees he’d cultivated then left for Lewis.
“Where’s the note?” he asked Cage impatiently.
“On its way. On its way.”
Parker turned on several of the instruments. Some hummed, some clicked. And some were silent, their dim indicator lights glowing like cautious eyes.
Waiting, waiting . . .
And trying not to think about his talk with the children an hour before—when he’d told them that their holiday plans were changing.
Both of the Whos had been in Robby’s room, the floor still awash with Legos and Micro Machines.
“Hey, Whos.”
“I got to the third level,” Stephie’d said, nodding at the Nintendo. “Then I got bomped.”
Robby’d had a full-scale invasion of his bed underway—with helicopters and landing craft.
Parker had sat on the bed. “You know those people who were here before?”
“The pretty lady you kept looking at,” his son had said coyly.
(“They’re sharper than you’ll ever guess,” reports the Handbook.)
“Well, they told me that a friend of mine is sick and I have to go visit him for a little while. Who do you want to baby-sit?”
In addition to the standard cast of high-school and college sitters, Parker had a number of friends in the neighborhood—parents he socialized with—who’d gladly take the children for the evening. There was also his friend Lynne, who lived in the District. She would have driven to Fairfax to help him out but he was sure she’d have a date tonight (it was impossible to imagine Lynne without a date on New Year’s Eve) and their relationship was no longer at the level where he could ask for a sacrifice like that.
“You have to go?” Robby’d asked. “Tonight?”
When he was disappointed, the boy would become very still, his expression remaining unchanged. He neverpouted, never grumbled—which Parker would have preferred. He just froze, as if sadness threatened to overwhelm him. As Robby had looked up at him, unmoving, holding a tiny toy helicopter, Parker’d felt his son’s disappointment in his own heart.
Stephie was less emotional and wore those emotions less visibly; her only response had been to toss her hair from her face and give him a frown, asking, “Is he going to be all right? Your friend?”
“I’m sure he’ll be okay. But it
Two Leitz binocular stereo microscopes with a Volpi Intralux fiber optic light source, an old Foster + Freeman VSC4 video spectral comparator and the latest of their video spectral comparators—the VSC 2000,equipped with a Rofin PoliLight and running QDOS software through Windows NT. Also, sitting well-used in the corner were a Foster + Freeman ESDA—an electrostatic detection apparatus—and a thin-layer gas chromatograph for ink and trace analysis.
He noticed the glass windows the tourists paraded past every day, nine to four, as part of the FBI headquarters tour. The corridor was now dark and ominous.
Parker watched the other members of the team find seats at desks and lab tables. The room was cluttered, smelly and uncomfortable, the way real working laboratories were. But he preferred to be here—rather than in the glitzy Crisis Center—because he firmly believed in something he’d learned from his father, a historian who specialized in the Revolutionary War. “Always fight your battles on familiar ground,” the professor had told his boy. He’d chosen not to give this answer to Lukas; another thing William Kincaid had told his son was “You don’t have to share everything with your allies.”
He glanced into Stan Lewis’s office again. Saw the books that he himself had used when this had been his department: Harrison’s Suspect Documents, Housely and Farmer’s An Introduction to Handwriting Identification and Scientific Examination of Questioned Documents by Hilton. And the Bible of the profession: Questioned Documents by Albert S. Osborn. He looked at the credenza behind the office chair and recognized the four bonsai trees he’d cultivated then left for Lewis.
“Where’s the note?” he asked Cage impatiently.
“On its way. On its way.”
Parker turned on several of the instruments. Some hummed, some clicked. And some were silent, their dim indicator lights glowing like cautious eyes.
Waiting, waiting . . .
And trying not to think about his talk with the children an hour before—when he’d told them that their holiday plans were changing.
Both of the Whos had been in Robby’s room, the floor still awash with Legos and Micro Machines.
“Hey, Whos.”
“I got to the third level,” Stephie’d said, nodding at the Nintendo. “Then I got bomped.”
Robby’d had a full-scale invasion of his bed underway—with helicopters and landing craft.
Parker had sat on the bed. “You know those people who were here before?”
“The pretty lady you kept looking at,” his son had said coyly.
(“They’re sharper than you’ll ever guess,” reports the Handbook.)
“Well, they told me that a friend of mine is sick and I have to go visit him for a little while. Who do you want to baby-sit?”
In addition to the standard cast of high-school and college sitters, Parker had a number of friends in the neighborhood—parents he socialized with—who’d gladly take the children for the evening. There was also his friend Lynne, who lived in the District. She would have driven to Fairfax to help him out but he was sure she’d have a date tonight (it was impossible to imagine Lynne without a date on New Year’s Eve) and their relationship was no longer at the level where he could ask for a sacrifice like that.
“You have to go?” Robby’d asked. “Tonight?”
When he was disappointed, the boy would become very still, his expression remaining unchanged. He neverpouted, never grumbled—which Parker would have preferred. He just froze, as if sadness threatened to overwhelm him. As Robby had looked up at him, unmoving, holding a tiny toy helicopter, Parker’d felt his son’s disappointment in his own heart.
Stephie was less emotional and wore those emotions less visibly; her only response had been to toss her hair from her face and give him a frown, asking, “Is he going to be all right? Your friend?”
“I’m sure he’ll be okay. But it
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