The Burning Wire

trillion.”
    “That’s a lot of—”
    “And do you know how many are needed for a successful DNA sample?”
    He said, “According to your book, Lincoln, about a hundred.”
    Rhyme lifted an eyebrow. “Impressive.” Then he added, “You think you have a hundred cells there in that massive smear?”
    “Probably, I would think.”
    “You sure do. Sachs, looks like your swimming expedition wasn’t in vain. If the battery had blown, it would have destroyed the sample. Okay, Mel, show him how to collect it.”
    Pulaski ceded the tricky task to Cooper.
    The tech collected the DNA and called the lab for pickup. “I know—ASAP,” he told Rhyme just as the criminalist had been about to crack the whip.
    “And spare no expense.”
    “That coming out of your fee, Linc?” Sellitto grumbled.
    “I give you my best customer discount, Lon. And a good find, Pulaski.”
    “Thanks, I—”
    Having delivered enough compliments for the time being, Rhyme moved on, “What about the trace from the inside of the door, Mel? You know, we’re not moving very quickly here.”
    Cooper took the samples and looked them over on the examining sheet or under the microscope. “Nothing that doesn’t match the samplars and substrata . . . except this.” It was a tiny pink dot.
    “GC it,” Rhyme ordered.
    A short time later Mel was reading results from the gas chromatograph, the mass spectrometer and several other analyses. “We’ve got an acidic pH—abouttwo—and citric acid and sucrose. Then . . . well, I’ll put it up on the screen.”
    The words appeared: Quercetin 3-O-rutinoside-7-O-glucoside and chrysoeriol 6,8-di-C-glucoside (stellarin-2) .
    “Fine,” Rhyme said impatiently. “Fruit juice. With that pH, it’s probably lemon.”
    Pulaski couldn’t help but laugh. “How did you know that? I’m sorry, how did you know?”
    “You only get out of a task what you bring to it, Rookie. Do your homework! Remember that.” He turned back to Cooper.
    “Then vegetable oil of some sort, lots of salt and some compound that eludes me completely.”
    “Made up of what?”
    “It’s protein rich. The amino acids are arginine, histidine, isoleucine, lysine and methionine. Also, plenty of lipids, mostly cholesterol and lecithin, then vitamin A, vitamins B2, B6, B12, niacin, pantothenic acid and folic acid. Large amounts of calcium, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium.”
    “Tasty,” Rhyme said.
    Cooper was nodding. “It’s food, sure. But what?”
    Though his sensations of taste hadn’t changed after the accident, food was to Lincoln Rhyme essentially fuel and he didn’t get much pleasure out of it, unlike, of course, whisky.
    “Thom?” There was no response so he took a deep breath. Before he could call again, the aide stuck his head in the door.
    “Everything okay?”
    “Why do you keep asking that?”
    “What do you want?”
    “Lemon juice, vegetable oil and egg.”
    “You’re hungry?”
    “No, no, no. What would those ingredients be found in?”
    “Mayonnaise.”
    Rhyme lifted an eye to Cooper, who shook his head. “Lumpy and kind of pinkish.”
    The aide reconsidered. “Then I’d go with taramasalata.”
    “What? Is that a restaurant?”
    Thom laughed. “It’s a Greek appetizer. A spread.”
    “Caviar, right? You eat it with bread.”
    Thom replied to Sachs, “Well, it is fish eggs, but cod, not sturgeon. So it’s not technically caviar.”
    Rhyme was giving a nod. “Ah, the elevated saline. Fish. Sure. Is it common?”
    “In Greek restaurants and grocery stores and delis.”
    “Is there anyplace more common than others? A Greek area of the city?”
    “Queens,” Pulaski said, who lived in the borough. “Astoria. Lots of Greek restaurants there.”
    “Can I get back now?” Thom asked.
    “Yes, yes, yes . . .”
    “Thanks,” Sachs called.
    The aide waved a gloved hand, Playtex yellow, and disappeared.
    Sellitto asked, “Maybe he’s been staking out someplace in Queens for the next attack.”
    Rhyme shrugged, one of the few gestures he could still perform. He reflected: The perp would have to prepare the location, that was true. Still, he was leaning in a different direction.
    Sachs caught his eye. “You’re thinking, Algonquin’s headquarters’re in Astoria, right?”
    “Exactly. And everything’s pointing to it being an inside job.” He asked, “Who’s in charge of the company?”
    Ron Pulaski said he’d had a conversation with the workers outside the substation. “They