While he spoke his fingers danced over the keyboard, and with every keystroke the image changed, flickering from green-eyed with a pointy chin and a Roman nose, to blue-eyed with a dimpled chin and a pert nose. It was amazing how different the face looked in its various permutations. “She could have had freckles, a mole, a dimple, heavy eyebrows, narrow eyebrows, no eyebrows…”

“ Wayne said this was unreliable,” I said sympathetically. Josh blew out an exasperated breath.

“He wasn’t kidding. I don’t even know how old she was, and let’s face it: There’s a big difference between what someone looks like at eighteen and twenty-eight. So what can I do for you two? You coming to check progress?”

I shrugged. “It’s something to do. I can’t go back to work at the house on Becklea, and although there are still things I need to do to Aunt Inga’s house-I want to paint the porch ceiling blue, and attach some stars, and I found a great porch swing at a flea market a couple of weeks ago, but that needs painting, too-anyway, I can’t seem to concentrate on it. I want to know who this woman is. Was.”

“Maybe some food’ll make you feel better,” Josh said, getting up. “ Shannon ’s at the cafeteria, working on her history project, and I’m not making much progress here. Let’s go.”

He headed for the door, with Kate and me trailing behind. I glanced over my shoulder once and met the brown eyes of the girl on the screen. It was probably just me, but they looked compelling.

We found Shannon sucking down a cup of bad coffee and working. I was relieved to see that what she was doing had nothing to do with the skeleton in the crawlspace or the murder of Venetia Rudolph; she was simply working on her history report about the settling of Maine in 1607. It was a nice change.

“Popham was the first American settlement,” she explained without looking up.

“I thought Jamestown, Virginia, was the first,” I answered. I don’t know much about history, except as it relates to textiles, but a few of the better-known facts have stayed with me.

Shannon shook her head. “ Popham, Maine, was earlier. But the colony didn’t survive the winter. So Jamestown became the first permanent settlement.”

“Interesting,” I said, taking a seat across the table from her. “It gets pretty cold here in the winter, doesn’t it?”

“Depends on what you mean by cold,” Josh said with a shrug. He had grown up here, so the cold obviously didn’t worry him. Kate grinned.

“You’ve heard what they say, haven’t you, Avery? There are only two seasons in Maine: winter and the fourth of July.”

“I hadn’t heard that, actually. And it’s not true, either. It’s pretty nice out there right now.” I glanced out the window at the yellowing birch trees and bright, blue sky. The temperature hovered in the midsixties, so it was nice and crisp, just the way a fall day ought to be.

“Wait a couple of months,” Kate said, as Josh grinned. “And lay in a supply of long-johns. Not to mention fire-wood. How’s the house?”

“Aunt Inga’s house? Fine.”

“Have Derek look it over,” Kate advised. Josh nodded. “Make sure it’s well insulated. Have him put weather-stripping around the doors and caulk around the windows to keep the wind out. Put storm windows and storm doors everywhere if you don’t have them already. Insulate your pipes so they don’t freeze. And buy an electric blanket.”

I felt myself pale. “It’s going to be that cold?”

Shannon was still bent over her work, but Kate and Josh exchanged a glance. “It gets pretty cold here, yes.”

“Colder than in New York?”

Kate shrugged. “The average lows are in the low teens. And then there are the ocean breezes.”

“It can get windy in New York, too,” I said, desperately trying to get them to tell me that it wouldn’t be much worse than what I was used to. Temperatures in New York City rarely dip into the teens, though. “When the cold air goes screaming down the streets, between the buildings…”

“I’m sure it can get freezing in New York,” Kate said kindly. “It’s colder here, though. And a lot more snow, too. You’d better prepare yourself.”

I shivered miserably, just thinking about it.

“So what are you guys doing here?” Shannon wanted to know, finally looking up. Josh explained that Kate and I had come to see what progress he’d made with his forensic facial approximation software.

“And?”

Josh’s voice turned frustrated. “And nothing. Dad’s right, a lot of it is guesswork, and the results are often less than accurate. Still, both Avery and I thought we had something there for a second.” He glanced at me. I nodded.

“How could you have something?” Shannon wanted to know, with the same logic her mother had displayed earlier. “Avery’s only been in town for a few months. The skeleton’s been in the ground for years. Avery can’t possibly have seen her before she died.”

“That’s true,” I admitted. “But maybe I’ve seen a picture of her? In the newspaper or on TV? Or even on the back of a milk carton? It could be a long time ago. She could have been a runaway, maybe. A teenager. The TV stations in New York could have shown her photo when she disappeared, and it’s still stuck in the back of my head somewhere. Or she could have been featured on one of those Unsolved Mysteries programs. I watch them once in a while.”

“That’s not a bad idea,” Josh said. “You should suggest it to my dad. If the dental records don’t help, maybe he can have someone look through databases of runaways and missing teens. I’ll volunteer.”

“That’s very nice of you,” Kate said, “but I don’t think your dad would want you to take time away from your school work to work on his case.”

“So I’ll do it on my own time,” Josh said with a shrug. “Or maybe I can spin it into an extra credit assignment of some kind. Like this reconstruction thing. Professor Alexander is good that way.” He grinned.

We ended up staying in the cafeteria and eating lunch before heading back to the lab. On our way across the quad, we ran into Brandon Thomas on the same errand.

“What’s going on?” Josh wanted to know. Brandon ’s usually pristine uniform was wrinkled and dirty, and his usually open and friendly face wore a frown. If I sniffed deeply, I thought I detected the pungent odor of garbage. Or rubbish, as they say in Maine.

Brandon shrugged helplessly. “What isn’t? Skeletons, murder victims, car accidents… and now I’ve just had to crawl all over the dump looking for Avery’s old kitchen appliances!”

“How’s Wayne holding up?” Kate wanted to know. If Brandon was overwhelmed, Wayne must be equally so. Except Wayne Rasmussen never seemed overwhelmed.

Brandon seemed to agree with me. “He’s OK, I guess. Seems OK. But then he always seems OK, doesn’t he?”

“Haven’t you seen him?” I asked Kate. She shook her head.

“Not for a couple of days. These murders have really kept him hopping.”

“I’ve seen him,” Josh said, “and if it makes you feel any better, he’s worried, too. But he’s been through a lot more. After processing the Murphy crime scene all those years ago, I guess not much could be worse.”

“He wasn’t chief of police back then, was he?” I asked.

Josh shook his head. “Just an officer. But pretty much the whole force was involved in that case, from what he’s told me. It was a big mess.”

In more ways than one, I reflected.

“But at least they knew who did it!” Brandon said. “This could be anybody!”

“Not quite anybody,” Shannon said, flipping her mahogany red mane over her shoulder. Josh sent her an appreciative glance. “If the same person killed both people-Miss Rudolph and the dead woman in the crawlspace-then it’s someone who was here two, or four, or six, or eight years ago, whenever the skeleton was buried there, and who’s still here now.”

“But that’s most of Waterfield. People don’t leave here that often.”