‘How does the neomycin fit into this?’

‘It helps to minimize the fish odour with some people. In order for the antibiotic to work effectively, you’ve got to modify your diet. People who suffer from TMAU, though – no matter what meds they’re taking, no matter how much they’ve modified their diet, you put them into a stressful situation, they start to sweat even more, and the fish odour goes into overdrive.’

‘The bedroom window at the Downes house,’ Hoder said. ‘It was open.’

‘And the windows in the other house were open, too. I looked through the photos taken of the bedrooms. At each crime scene the Red Hill Ripper opened all the bedroom windows. If our guy has this TMAU disorder, I bet he opens all the windows to clear out that fishy odour.’

Hoder made a fist and rubbed it across his bottom lip, thinking.

‘Look, this was just a quick Google search,’ Darby said. ‘It could be some sort of other metabolic disorder, maybe a skin condition, like Rita Tuttle said, maybe something else entirely. But two separate people who said something about a guy with a particular fishy and garbage-like body odour? That’s something we can’t ignore.’

‘Agreed. Where’s the Tuttle woman now?’

‘Interview room. Griffin’s going to take her statement. I think we should get a sketch artist, preferably one of yours. We can take Tuttle to the MoFo and have her talk to this guy over Skype.’

Hoder nodded and removed a satellite phone from his jacket pocket.

‘Where’d you get that?’

‘Coop,’ he said. ‘He brought them from Denver, one for each of us.’

‘Where is he?’

‘At the hotel with Hayes, sweeping our rooms for bugs. Otto’s inside our rolling lab, working his way through the blood samples.’ Hoder sighed. ‘It’s not looking good. In addition to using bleach, our guy used hydrogen peroxide on the floor. He knows forensics.’

‘If this Timmy guy signed up for a class and dropped it, the college will have his name and address on file.’

‘We’ll need a court order before we go fishing.’

‘I know. I say we skip the local route and go federal. People get real co-operative when they see a federal warrant. We can also use it to target local pharmacies, see who’s getting neomycin prescriptions filled. We should also start asking around, see if anyone knows anything about a guy named Timmy who has a permanent BO problem. What’s the status of the video interview?’

‘The RCFL guys have it,’ said Hoder. ‘They’re installing that hidden tracking program. It’ll go live in about twenty minutes or so.’

‘What do you think about putting out the information on the knots?’

‘I think it’s too early. If we go out with the knots and the sketch tonight or tomorrow, he might get spooked and decide to leave town for a while. Let him keep thinking he’s got the upper hand. We’ll give it a day or two to see what the trace comes up with.’

‘You look like you could use some sleep,’ said Darby.

‘Couldn’t we all. I’ll meet you in the interview room.’

Darby returned to Williams’s office and used his computer to get a list of local pharmacies.

There were two in Red Hill; Brewster had four. She could sit around and wait for a court order that, most likely, wouldn’t come through until sometime tomorrow, or she could try to do something now.

Five minutes later, she was behind the wheel of her rental, with the case file and the pharmacies’ addresses lying on the passenger’s seat.

44

Baylor Apothecary was the closest, located inside the ground floor of a small brick-faced building right around the corner from Cindy’s Diner. The windows were dark, but the pharmacy was still in business. Darby pressed her face against the glass and in the gloom she could make out fully stocked aisles. Baylor’s opened every morning at eight. She’d have to wait until tomorrow.

She had better luck at the Rite Aid on the other side of town, off the main highway, Route 6. It was in a strip mall that at one point in time had included a Blockbuster video store and a discount lumber liquidator. The snow had picked up, growing in intensity. A white blanket covered the two cars in the lot.

The inside of the pharmacy was brightly lit and eerily quiet, as though it had suddenly been abandoned. It was also uncomfortably warm. Darby unzipped her jacket as she made her way to the back with the case file for the Connelly family pinched between the fingers of her left hand.

The pharmacist was a thickset middle-aged woman with a button nose and brittle black hair that had thinned to the point that her scalp was visible. Her nametag read BARBARA.

‘Evening,’ Darby said pleasantly. ‘I need your help with a medication called neomycin – the oral antibiotic and not the topical treatment.’

Barbara smiled as she turned to the computer. ‘Your name?’

‘Not me. One of your male customers.’ Darby showed her federal ID, and the woman’s smile collapsed. ‘His first name is Tim or Timothy.’

‘Do you have a court order?’ The woman’s attention was glued to the butt-end of the 9-millimetre tucked inside Darby’s shoulder holster. ‘I can’t help you without a court order.’

‘The FBI are getting it together. All I need to know is whether or not you have a man named Tim or Timothy in your system who gets his neomycin prescription filled here. If he is, great, I’ll come back with the court order. If he isn’t, then I’ll get out of your hair.’

Barbara was shaking her head the entire time. ‘I can’t tell you anything unless you have a court order,’ she said. ‘HIPAA and the state’s Medical Information Act prevent me from sharing any information regarding a person’s –’

‘I understand.’ Darby had expected to encounter this reaction. During the drive, she had come up with a way around it – provided she could get Barbara the Pharmacist to agree to play along. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t explain myself correctly. My fault. You live here in Red Hill?’

‘Why?’

‘Are you familiar with the Red Hill Ripper?’

Barbara didn’t answer. Didn’t have to. The skin of the woman’s face flexed and tightened against the bone.

‘You can see why I’m anxious to see if this man is in your system,’ Darby said patiently. ‘I’m not asking you to do anything illegal. I just need to know whether or not this man is one of your customers.’

‘I’m just … I should really talk to my supervisor.’

‘I understand. But while you’re on the phone – while you and I are standing here, talking about rules and procedures, the Red Hill Ripper is planning on doing this to another family.’

Darby brought out her folder, her finger marking the spot she needed. She opened it and showed the woman a close-up of the noose wrapped around Linda Connelly’s neck, the skin swollen, bloated and purple.

The photo had the desired effect. Barbara the Pharmacist’s breath caught in her throat and she backed up slightly, wincing. Her attention swung to the pharmacy computer.

‘Just tell me if he’s in there,’ Darby said. ‘There’s no law against that, right?’

‘I … Well, no, I don’t think so.’ Barbara looked around uneasily, to see if anyone was nearby.

‘I really appreciate you helping the Bureau out on this,’ Darby said. ‘Thank you.’

The phone behind the counter rang.

Barbara looked relieved. ‘Excuse me for a moment,’ she said.

As the woman hustled away, Darby stared at the computer on the counter. The Red Hill Ripper’s name and address could be just a few mouse clicks away. She wanted to jump over the counter.

Then the pharmacist’s head snapped to Darby. The woman’s features had gone slack, and the blood drained from her face. The person on the other end of the line said something that made her flinch. A low, guttural moan escaped her lips and she yanked the phone away from her ear.

‘He knows where I live,’ the pharmacist said, her voice stripped of colour.

‘Who?’

‘The man on the phone. At least I think it’s a man. His voice sounds … He sounds like he’s speaking through a computer.’