12th of Never

turn his face,” Conklin said. “I’ve got to see if this man is the professor.”
    “You’ll get your chance later. I’m gonna process this body by the book, and that means back at the office.”
    “I’ll come with you.”
    “If you must. So the blond-haired streetcar driver was murdered like the professor dreamed?”
    “Well, that’s the weird thing. The victim was a streetcar driver. She did take a shot right between the eyes, but she wasn’t blond. She was a black woman, had black hair.”
    “So he got it wrong, but at the same time not that wrong,” Claire said.
    “Correct,” said Conklin. “Then he came in yesterday with another dream; this time his dream takes place right here. He’s moving along the walkway, then he hears a gunshot. But he tells me he didn’t see anyone get hit. So I say, ‘This isn’t a murder case.’ And he said that if I wasn’t going to help him, he was going to come to the aquarium and see if he could pick the shooter out of the crowd before he pulled the trigger.”
    “Maybe he did see the shooter, huh? And that’s why he got shot.”
    “From behind?”
    “Well, maybe the killer recognized
him
.”
    Clapper trudged through the water, past the guys on a tall ladder and under the divers who were inside the tank, pressing something that looked like a piece of neoprene against the hole in the glass.
    Charlie held the butt of a gun with his gloved fingertips.
    He said, “Inspector, look at this. We found it at the far end of the walkway. It’s drenched, but I can still smell that it’s been fired. This is going to be our murder weapon.”
    “Excellent,” said Richie. “Good job.”
    “Unless, of course,” Clapper said with a wink, “I’m dreaming.”

Chapter 79
    CONKLIN SPOKE TO Sheila, who was answering phones at the front desk at the medical examiner’s office.
    “I’m expecting Mackie Morales from Homicide. You can send her in when she gets here.”
    “If Dr. Washburn says okay.”
    “She already did.”
    And then Morales appeared at the glass door.
    “And here she is,” Conklin said.
    He opened the door for Morales, who was looking terrific in tight jeans, a man-tailored shirt, and a fitted camel-hair jacket. Her dark hair was loose and bouncy. She had a very fresh and inviting look about her. An all-American girl by way of Scotland and Mexico. She smelled good, too.
    “Did the victim turn out to be Professor Judd?” Morales asked Conklin. She stood close enough for Conklin to see down into her cleavage.
    “It’s him,” Conklin said. “If you believe this psychic stuff, then Perry Judd dreamed his own death. He didn’t see the shooter in his dream, because he was shot from behind.”
    “I’m on the fence about precognition,” Morales said. “But I believe that Professor Judd believed it.”
    “I’m open to other ideas,” Conklin said.
    He held the door to the autopsy suite for Morales, then followed her in. Claire was weighing Perry Judd’s liver when they got there.
    Once again, Conklin felt the cold shock of guilt. A day ago he had been sitting with Perry Judd upstairs in Interview 2. Now the little guy’s chest was open like a book and his guts were overlapping the rim of a stainless steel bowl.
    Morales said, “Dr. Washburn, I’ll run that bullet out to the lab for you. Save some time.”
    “It’s in the envelope on the table over there,” Claire said. “Thanks for helping out.”
    “Happy to do it,” said Morales. “See you later, Rich.”
    Morales left with the semimangled round Claire had taken out of Perry Judd’s skull. Claire said to Conklin, “The shooter was standing three to five feet behind the victim when he fired. There was no stippling around the wound.”
    “Can you confirm that the cause of death was the gunshot wound to the back of the head?”
    “Yes. I can say that—conditionally,” said Claire. “It’s still off the record until I finish here, in about six hours.”
    Conklin nodded at Claire, then went back upstairs to the squad room. He was transferring his notes to the case file when Charlie Clapper called him on his cell phone.
    “Here’s something that will make your ears stand up,” Clapper said. “The round fired from the gun matches the one Claire took from Perry Judd’s head, so we definitely have the murder weapon. And I’m not done yet.”
    “Go ahead,” Conklin said. Brady appeared out of nowhere and was standing over him, looking frayed and impatient.
    “The murder