Face of Murder

Whether it actually did or not, she had no way of knowing, but it was as good a guess as any.

***

Zoe had been worried for a brief moment that she might be waking Dr. Applewhite up, but being held by the FBI for the first time in your life was not a soothing experience. She had been sitting awake, staring at the walls, with nothing else to do to pass the time.

“I am sorry for all of this,” Zoe said quietly, sitting opposite her mentor with a steaming cup of coffee in front of both of them. The staff on duty had insisted that if she wanted to talk to someone being held overnight, it had to be in a proper interrogation room. It had to be recorded.

It wasn’t the way she would have preferred to do things, but it would have to do.

“The wheels of justice have to keep on turning.” Dr. Applewhite smiled, tucking her hair behind her ear. She didn’t sound particularly happy, even if her lips were curved up into the right shape.

“Is that a quotation?”

“At this stage, I don’t even know.” Dr. Applewhite sipped at her coffee. “I’m tired, Zoe. It’s been a long day.”

The guilt hit her even harder. What more could she do? It wasn’t as if Zoe had been sitting around at home, or had resolved just to leave Dr. Applewhite in a cell all night. She had been out there, trying to find a solution for this thing. It just hadn’t happened.

“I am sorry,” Zoe murmured again, wondering if at this point it even made any difference. She continued louder, wanting to take action now more than ever. “I have been working on a theory. I thought you might be able to help me figure out who the culprit could be.”

“Anything to get me out of here quicker.” Dr. Applewhite sighed. “Let’s hear it, then.”

Zoe nodded. “I think the killer has recently suffered some kind of neurological change. One side effect of this would be something like aphasia, dyslexia, dyscalculia. Something that prevents him from being able to write things out properly. That is why the equations do not make sense, and also why the violence has started happening now. I am willing to bet that before this traumatic event, whatever it was, the killer has no history of violent behavior.”

“But?”

“But we went to the hospital where Dr. North worked, and there was nothing in the records. We cannot find anyone who fits the criteria of this kind of recent development alongside the appropriate height, weight, and age.”

“Hmm.” Dr. Applewhite took another sip of her coffee. “Well, the theory works. It doesn’t sound like it should be wrong.”

“That is why I thought you might be of some help. I need you to think back, wrack your brains. Is there anyone, either in the academic world or in mathematical circles? Anyone who was rumored to be a bit strange, or stories that sound a bit off? Glaring mistakes, problems with speech, anything like that?”

Dr. Applewhite sat back in her chair, her eyes roving across pictures that Zoe could not see as she thought. “Mistakes, yes. But those are just part of mathematics. That’s what happens when you try to work on something difficult, something theoretical. My own formula was flawed, after all.”

“Not something like that—not a missed calculation or a failure to carry the one. More like things being written down in the wrong way. Numbers reversed, or put out of order, for example. The way that the equations on the bodies were unbalanced.”

“I work too much to stay up to date with all of the national journals, to read something as embarrassing as that,” Dr. Applewhite protested. “I suppose it would have made a scandal, but I haven’t heard about anyone messing up that badly.”

“It does not need to have been published. It could have been coursework—something a professor at the college noticed and mentioned to you. Someone brilliant that suddenly made mistakes. It has to be a big fall from grace for him to be this angry. If I suddenly lost the ability to draw, given my already limited art skills, I do not think that I would be upset.”

“That’s very insightful. You’ve been working on your empathetic understanding of others, haven’t you?”

Zoe couldn’t say that she had, but maybe just being around someone like Shelley was enough to help her understand more about human nature, in herself and others. “That is not the point. Think back. Stories, rumors. Hints. Anything you heard in passing. It does not even have to be concrete.”

“Look, I just can’t think of anyone,” Dr. Applewhite said. “Maybe it would be better to ask the professors. Or another neurologist.”