“I’ve been reading about you and Virgil…I’ve done a couple of sudden death investigations for Virgie down in Nobles County. Suicides, both of them. So…is this related to the Grandfelt thing?”
“We would have liked to get some DNA from the guy,” Virgil said.
“Trying to match up with the Doris Grandfelt rapist DNA?” Trask asked.
“Exactly.”
“If you’ve got good reason, you could have him exhumed…”
“We will probably try to do that,” Lucas said.
“Hang on one minute,” Trask said. “I’ll be right back.”
He put his phone down, and Lucas and Virgil listened to the silence for fifteen seconds, and Virgil said, “I hope he wasn’t cremated.”
“Even if he was, his house has gotta be full—”
Trask came back. “Okay, bad news. His body was picked up by South Minnesota Cremation Services. He’ll be ash, by now.”
Lucas: “Goddamnit.”
“One other thing,” Trask said. “His wife’s name is Amanda Fisk, and she’s an assistant county attorney here in Ramsey County. A prosecutor. Well known in the business. Maybe if she hadn’t been who she was, the ME might have wanted to take a look at him. But the whole cause-and-effect situation with the Chuckit! balls and the fall was so obvious…”
“All right,” Virgil said. “Listen, thanks, Darren. Take a look at your notes, and if anything occurs to you, give us a ring.”
“Will do.”
—
When they’d rungoff, Lucas asked, “Is Trask competent?”
“He’s not the brightest star in the Milky Way. You wouldn’t want him on a really hard call.”
“You’re not filling me with confidence,” Lucas said. “We gotta nail down Carlson. His house has gotta be full of his DNA. Get some of your BCA people over there.”
“We will do that. I worry about the fact that he was killed so soon after the reward was posted,” Virgil said.
“So do I,” Lucas said. “I’m not that impressed by coincidences.”
“His wife was a witness.”
Lucas: “Yup.”
“Let’s talk to her,” Virgil said. “Call the county attorney, get her phone number.”
“I will. If he’s a match for the DNA…”
“What does that even mean?” Virgil asked.
Lucas looked out the passenger window and saw some goats. He said, “Goats.”
“Yeah. We’re in farm country. You can tell by the barns.”
“I don’t know what it means.”
“The barns?”
“No, I don’t know what it’ll mean if there’s a match,” Lucas said. “We’ll have to review the Grandfelt autopsy down to the last atomic particle…not us, but the ME and his pathologists. Was she raped? Give us a percentage call. Seventy-thirty, no rape? Sixty-forty, rape? If she was, then Carlson was the killer and case closed. If she wasn’t…”
