Winston looked over at McCaleb. He had nothing to add or ask in the line of questioning she was pursuing. He simply nodded at her and she turned back to Riddell.

“Okay, then, I think we want to see if there is a method of tracing this owl from this point to its eventual owner.”

Riddell looked at the owl for a long moment as if it might be able to answer the question itself.

“Well, that could be difficult. It’s a commodity item. We sell several thousand a year. We ship to retail outlets as well as sell through mail order catalogs and an Internet Web site.”

He snapped his fingers.

“There is one thing that will cut it down some, though.”

“What’s that?”

“They changed the mold last year. In China. They did some research and decided the horned owl was considered a higher threat to other birds than the round head. They changed to the horns.”

“I’m not quite following you, Mr. Riddell.”

He held up a finger as if to tell her wait a moment. He then opened a desk drawer and dug through some paperwork. He came out with a catalog and quickly started turning pages. McCaleb saw that Bird Barrier’s primary business was not plastic owls, but large-scale bird deterrent systems that encompassed netting and wire coils and spikes. Riddell found the page showing the plastic owls and turned the catalog so that Winston and McCaleb could view it.

“This is last year’s catalog,” he said. “You see the owl has the round head. The manufacturer changed last June, about seven months ago. Now we have these guys.”

He pointed to the two owls on the table.

“The feathering turns up into the two points, or ears, on the top of the head. The sales rep said these are called horns and that these types of owls are sometimes called devil owls.”

Winston glanced at McCaleb, who raised his eyebrows momentarily.

“So you’re saying this owl we have was ordered or bought since June,” she said to Riddell.

“More like since August or maybe September. They changed in June but we probably didn’t start receiving the new mold until late July. We also would have sold off our existing supplies of the round head first.”

Winston then questioned Riddell about sales records and determined that information from mail order and Web site purchases was kept complete and current on the company’s computer files. But point-of-purchase sales from shipments to major hardware and home and marine products retailers would obviously not be recorded. He turned to the computer on his desk and typed in a few commands. He then pointed to the screen, though McCaleb and Winston were not at angles where they could see it.

“All right, I asked for sales of those part numbers since August one,” he said.

“Part numbers?”

“Yes, for the standard and deluxe models and then the replacement molds. We show we self-shipped four hundred and fourteen total. We also shipped six hundred even to retailers.”

“And what you’re telling us is that we can only trace, through you at least, the four hundred fourteen.”

“Correct.”

“You have the names of buyers and the addresses the owls were shipped to there?”

“Yes, we do.”

“And are you willing to share this information with us without need of a court order?”

Riddell frowned as if the question was absurd.

“You said you’re working on a murder, right?”

“Right.”

“We don’t require a court order. If we can help, we want to help.”

“That’s very refreshing, Mr. Riddell.”

They sat in Winston’s car and reviewed the computer printouts Riddell had given them. The evidence box containing the owl was between them on the seat. There were three printouts, divided by orders for the deluxe, standard or replacement owls. McCaleb asked to see the replacement list because his instincts told him the owl in Edward Gunn’s apartment had been bought for the express purpose of playing a part in the murder scene and therefore no attachment mechanisms were needed. Additionally, the replacement owl was the least expensive.

“We better find something here,” Winston said as her eyes scanned the list of purchasers of the standard owl model. “Because chasing down buyers through the Home Depots and other retailers is going to mean court orders and lawyers and – hey, the Getty’s on here. They ordered four.”

McCaleb looked over at her and thought about that. Finally, he shook his shoulders and went back to his list. Winston moved on as well, continuing her listing of the difficulties they would face if they had to go to the retail outlets where the horned owl was sold. McCaleb tuned her out when he got to the third-to-the-last name on his list. He traced his finger from a name he recognized along a line on the printout detailing the address the owl was shipped to, method of payment, origin of purchase order and the name of the person receiving it if different from purchaser. His breath must have caught, because Winston picked up on his vibe.

“What?”

“I got something here.”

He held the printout across the seat to her and pointed to the line.

“This buyer. Jerome Van Aiken. He had one shipped the day before Christmas to Gunn’s address and apartment number. The order was paid for by a money order.”

She took the printout from him and started reading the information.

“Shipped to the Sweetzer address but to a Lubbert Das care of Edward Gunn. Lubbert Das. Nobody named Lubbert Das came up in the investigation. I don’t remember that name on the residents list of that building, either. I’ll call Rohrshak to see if Gunn ever had a roommate with that name.”

“Don’t bother. Lubbert Das never lived there.”

She looked up from the pages and over at him.

“You know who Lubbert Das is?”

“Sort of.”

Her brow creased deeply.

“Sort of? Sort of? What about Jerome Van Aiken?”

He nodded. Winston dropped the pages on the box between them. She looked at him with an expression that imparted both curiosity and annoyance.

“Well, Terry, I think it’s about time you started telling me what you know.”

McCaleb nodded again and put his hand on the door handle.

“Why don’t we go over to my boat? We can talk there.”

“Why don’t we talk right here, right fucking now?”

McCaleb tried a small smile on her.

“Because it’s what you’d call an audiovisual demonstration.”

He opened the door and got out, then looked back in at her.

“I’ll see you over there, okay?”

She shook her head.

“You better have one hell of a profile worked out for me.”

Then he shook his head.

“I don’t have a profile ready for you yet, Jaye.”

“Then what do you have?”

“A suspect.”

He closed the door then and he could hear her muffled curses as he walked to his car. As he crossed the parking lot a shadow fell over him and everything else. He looked up to see the Goodyear blimp cross overhead, totally eclipsing the sun.