Fifteen minutes after leaving the MCME, Slidell and I were crossing into South Carolina. To either side of I-77 lay a border sprawl of low-end shops, restaurants, and entertainment emporia, a Carolina version of Nogales or Tijuana.

Paramount's Carowinds. Outlet Market Place. Frugal MacDougal's Discount Liquors. Heritage USA, abandoned now, but once a mecca for Jim and Tammy Faye's PTL faithful intent on God, vacation, and bargain basement clothes. Opinions varied as to whether PTL had stood for Praise the Lord or Pass the Loot.

Rinaldi had opted for a trip to Sneedville, Tennessee, to do some digging on Ricky Don Dorton and Jason Jack Wyatt. Rinaldi also planned to run a background check on the pilot, Harvey Pearce, and was intent on a meaningful conversation with Sonny Pounder.

Jansen had headed back to Miami.

Slidell had spoken little since picking me up, preferring the sputter of his radio to the sound of my voice. I suspected his coolness derived from my homophobia crack.

OK by me, Skinny.

We were soon rolling between heavily wooded, kudzu-draped hills. Slidell alternated between drumming the steering wheel and patting his shirt pocket. I knew he needed nicotine, but I needed 02. Through a lot of sighing and throat clearing and drumming and patting, I refused to give the go-ahead to light up.

We passed the exits for Fort Mill and Rock Hill, later Highway 9 cutting east to Lancaster. I thought of Cagle's headless skeleton, wondered what we would find at his lab.

I also thought of Andrew Ryan, of times we'd been rolling toward a crime scene or body dump together. Slidell or Ryan? Who would I rather be with? No contest there.

The University of South Carolina system has eight campuses, with the mothership parked squarely in the heart of the state capital. Perhaps the Palmetto State founders were xenophobic. Perhaps funds were limited. Perhaps they simply preferred to have their offspring educated in their own backyard.

Or perhaps they foresaw the bacchanalian rite of spring break at Myrtle Beach, and tried reaching across the centuries to discourage a very different type of hajj.

In Columbia, Slidell took Bull Street and turned left at the edge of campus. Failing to locate a spot in the visitor-metered parking area, he pulled into a faculty lot and cut the engine.

'Some egghead gets me ticketed, I'll tell him to stick it up his PHD.' Slidell pocketed the keys. 'You know what those letters stand for, don't you, Doc?'

Though I indicated no interest, Slidell provided his definition.

'Piled higher and deeper.'

Exiting the Taurus was brutal. The sun was white-hot, the pavement rippling as we crossed Pendelton Street. Overhead, leaves hung motionless, like damp nappies on clotheslines on a windless day.

The USC anthropology facilities were located in a dishwater-blond building named Hamilton College. Built in 1943 to spur the war effort, Hamilton now looked like it could use some spurring of its own.

Slidell and I located the departmental office and presented ourselves to the secretary/receptionist. Dragging her eyes from a computer screen, the woman regarded us through Dame Edna glasses. She was in her fifties, with a mulberry mushroom on her forehead and hair piled higher than a Texas deb's.

Slidell asked for Cagle.

The deb informed him that the professor was not in.

When had she last seen him?

A week ago Friday.

Had Cagle been on campus since?

Possible, though their paths hadn't crossed. Cagle's mailbox had been emptied the immediate past Friday. She hadn't seen him then or since.

Slidell asked the location of Cagle's office.

Third floor. Entrance was impossible without written permission.

Slidell asked the location of Cagle's lab.

Second floor. The deb reiterated the point about written permission.

Slidell flashed his badge.

The deb studied Slidell's shield, lipstick crawling into the wrinkles radiating from her tightly clamped lips. If she noticed the words 'Charlotte-Mecklenburg,' she didn't let on. She turned a shoulder, dialed a number, waited, disconnected, dialed again, waited again, hung up. Sighing theatrically, she rose, walked to a filing cabinet, opened the top drawer, unhooked one of several dozen keys, and checked its tag.

Keeping several steps ahead to minimize opportunity for conversation, our reluctant hostess led us to the second floor, down a tiled corridor, and around a corner to a wooden door with a frosted-glass window. The words HUMAN IDENTIFICATION LABORATORY were stenciled on the glass in bold, black letters.

'What exactly is it you need?' The deb ran a thumb back and forth across the small round key tag.

'Last Thursday Dr. Cagle promised he'd send me a case report and photos,' I said. 'I haven't received them. I can't reach him by phone and it's quite urgent.'

'Dr. Cagle's been in the field all summer, only comes in on weekends. Y'all sure he intended to do it right away?'

'Absolutely.'

Two creases puckered the mulberry mushroom. 'Man's usually very predictable and very reliable.'

The deb hunched her whole body when she turned the key, as though revelation of the wrist movement might constitute a security breach. Straightening, she swung the door inward, and pointed a lacquered nail at me.

'Don't disturb any of Dr. Cagle's things.' It came out 'thangs.' 'Some are official police evidence.' It came out 'poe-lice.'

'We'll be very careful,' I said.

'Check with me on your way out.'

Drilling us each with a look, the deb marched off down the corridor.

'Broad missed her calling in the SS,' Slidell said, moving past me through the open door.

Cagle's lab was an earlier-era version of mine at UNCC. More solid, outfitted with oak and marble, not molded plastic and painted metal.

I did a quick scan.

Worktables. Sinks. Microscopes. Light boxes. Copy stand. Ventilator hood. Hanging skeleton. Refrigerator. Computer.

Slidell tipped his head toward a wall of floor-to-ceiling storage cabinets.

'What do you suppose that meatball keeps locked up in there?'

'Bones.'

'Jay-zus Kee-rist.'

While Slidell went through the unlocked cupboards above the work counters, I checked the room's single desk. Its top was bare save for a blotter.

A file drawer on the left held forms of various types. Archaeological survey sheets. Burial inventories. Blank bone quizzes. Audiovisual requisitions.

The long middle drawer contained the usual assortment of pens, plastic-headed tacks, paper clips, rubber bands, stamps, and coins.

Nothing extraordinary.

Except that everything was organized into separate boxes, slots, and niches, each labeled and spotlessly clean. Inside the compartments, every item was aligned with geometric precision.

'Fastidious little wanker.' Slidell had come up behind me.

I checked the right two drawers. Stationery. Envelopes. Printer paper. Labels. Post-its.

Same ordinary supplies. Same anal tidiness.

'Your desk look like that?' Slidell asked.

'No.' I'd once found a dead goldfish in my desk drawer. Solved the mystery of its disappearance the previous spring.

'Mine sure don't.'

Being familiar with Slidell's car, I didn't want to imagine the state of his desk.

'Any sign of the report?'

I shook my head.

Slidell moved on to the lower-counter drawers, and I began on the file cabinets to the left of the desk. One held class materials. The other was filled with forensic case reports.

Bingo!

Across the room, Slidell banged a drawer home.

'I've gotta get some air.'

'Fine.'

I said nothing about the files. Better to have Slidell outside smoking than breathing down my neck.

The dossiers were organized chronologically. Twenty-three dated to the year Cagle had examined the Lancaster skeleton. I found two for the proper month, but none for a headless body.

I checked the preceding and following years, then scanned the tab on every folder.

The report wasn't there.

Slidell returned after ten minutes, smelling of Camels, armpits, and sweaty hair cream.

'I found Cagle's case files.'

'Oh, yeah?'

Slidell leaned over me, breathing cigarette breath.

'The Lancaster report isn't with the others.'

'Suppose Wally-boy misplaced it?' Slidell asked.

'Doesn't seem likely, but keep looking.'

Slidell went back to banging drawers.

I returned to the desk and surveyed the bulletin board. Like Mrs. Flowers, Wally Cagle insisted on equidistant spacing and ninety-degree angles.

A postcard sent by someone named Gene. Polaroids taken at an archaeological dig. Three pictures of a cat. A printout of names followed by four-digit university extensions.

The center of the board held a handwritten list of tasks followed by a column of dates. Those up through Thursday had been crossed out.

'Look at this,' I said.

Slidell joined me at the desk.

I pointed to an item among Cagle's uncompleted tasks: Pull photos and report for Brennan.

'He uses a ruler to cross things out? Jesus, this guy's one tight spitter.'

'That's not the point. Even though the secretary didn't see him, Cagle's been here as recently as last Thursday. Does the fact the item is not crossed off mean he never pulled the file? Or did he pull it, then forget?'

'Looks like Wally-boy never took a dump without itemizing and crossing it off.'

'Maybe he was interrupted.'

'Maybe.'

'Maybe someone else took the file.'

'Who?' Slidell's voice dripped skepticism.

'I don't know.'

'Who even knew the damn thing existed?'

'Cagle's graduate student,' I snapped. Slidell's attitude was making me churlish. 'He read parts to Cagle over the phone.'

'Maybe Cagle took the stuff to a home computer.'

'Maybe.'

'But he never sent you the report.'

Good, Skinny. State the obvious.

'Or the photos.'

'Nothing.'

Slidell hitched his belt. It slid back into the groove below his spare tire.

'So where the hell are they?'

'An astute question.'

'And where the hell is the good professor?'

'And another.'

I was starting to get a bad feeling about Cagle's safety.

My gaze fell on the computer and its flatbed scanner. The setup looked like it might have been purchased when the Monkees were big.

Slidell watched me walk over and press the 'on' button. As the CPU dragged through a boot, the Texas deb receptionist appeared in the doorway.

'What is it you think you're doing?'

'I located Dr. Cagle's case files, but the one in question is missing.'

'So you think you're going to use his computer?'

'It might tell us if the photos were ever scanned.'

As if on cue, the CPU beeped and the monitor flashed a password request.

'Do you have it?' I asked the deb.

'I could never give out a password.' She sounded as though I'd asked for her bank card PIN. 'Besides, I don't know it.'

'Does anyone else use this computer?'

'Gene Rudin.'

'Dr. Cagle's graduate student?'

The deb nodded. Not a hair moved.

'Gene's off to Florida until the start of fall term. Left Friday.'

A long, lacquered finger pointed at the computer.

'But that scanner won't run. I've had a work order in to computer services for at least two weeks now.'

Slidell and I exchanged glances. Now what?

'Did Dr. Cagle ask you to send any faxes last week?' I asked.

The lacquered hands vanished in an arm fold across her chest, a hip shifted, and one sandaled foot came forward. The toes were the same brilliant red as the fingers.

'I've already told you, I didn't see Dr. Cagle last week. And besides, do you know how many faculty I'm responsible for? Or how many grads and undergrads and booksellers and visitors and whatever trail through my office?' I guessed Slidell and I fell under the 'whatever' heading. 'Hells bells, I do half the student advising around here.'

'That can't be easy,' I said.

'Faculty faxing is not in my job description.'

'You must get a lot of visitors.'

'We get our share.'

'Did Dr. Cagle have any unusual callers last week?'

'That would not be for me to say.'

What the hell did that mean?

'Did Dr. Cagle have any visitors last week?'

There was a long pause as she chose her words. 'I may not agree with Dr. Cagle's alternative lifestyle' — she pronounced it as two words: 'alter native' — 'but he's a fine man, and I don't question his associations.'

'Someone came to see Cagle?' Slidell asked gruffly.

One deb eyebrow shot up. 'There's no need to be a grumpy pants, Detective.'

Slidell opened his mouth. I cut him off.

'You were unfamiliar with Dr. Cagle's visitor?'

The deb nodded.

'What did he want?'

'The man asked for Dr. Cagle. I informed him the professor was out of town.' The deb shrugged one freckled shoulder. 'He left.'

'Can you describe the guy?' Slidell.

'Short. Had black hair. Lots of it. Real shiny and thick.'

'Age?'

'Wasn't no spring chicken, I'll tell you that.'

'Glasses? Facial hair?' Slidell's tone was sharp.

'Don't get snippy with me, Detective.'

The deb unfolded her arms and flicked at a nonexistent speck on her skirt, her way of allowing Slidell to cool his interrogatory heels.

'No mustache or beard, nothing like that.'

'Can you remember anything else about the man?' I asked.

'He wore funny sunglasses, so I couldn't see his eyes.'

'What did you see when you looked at his face?' Slidell glared at her.

'Myself.' The deb slapped a key on the desktop. 'That's for the wall cupboards. Check with me when you leave the building.'

Slidell and I spent the next forty minutes searching every remaining cabinet, drawer, and shelf in the place. We found nothing related to the Lancaster case, and nothing to indicate where Cagle had gone.

Frustrated, I returned to the desk and idly ran my fingertips under the blotter's plastic edging.

Nothing.

I lifted a corner and peeked underneath.

A single card lay on the desktop under the blotter. I picked it up.

The logo resembled a police badge. I was about to read the printed information when the deb receptionist reappeared in the door, breathless from running up the stairs.

'I just talked with Dr. Cagle's housemate.'

An agitated hand fanned the air in front of her face.

'Dr. Cagle's in intensive care on life support.'

Laying both hands on her chest, the deb looked from me to Slidell and back, mascara-rimmed eyes wide with alarm.

'Sweet Lord Jesus. The doctors don't think he'll last out the day.'