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“Dr Bill Brockton How can I help you?”

“This is Dr Edelberto Garcia,” said a cool voice, whose careful emphasis was meant to let me know that not all doctors are created equal His first naant and aristocratic the way he pronounced it-“ay-del-BARE-toe”-but then I remembered a bit about Spanish pronunciations, and I realized that the English version of his nahed “I’ve been appointed by the coional Forensic Center”

“Sure,” I said, resisting the urge to add “Ethelbert” to my answer “I had lunch with Jerry last week He told me he’d hired you Welcome to Knoxville”

“Thank you,” he said If he noticed my first-name reference to Gerald Freeman, the health co that six weeks earlier Jerry had shown me the files on the three finalists for the job, and had asked for my opinion Garcia had been est of the finalists had taken a job at a far higher salary in the ME’s office in New York City

“We’re currently investigating the death of a Knoxville woman whose burned body was found last week in her car,” he said Again I nearly laughed out loud

“Why, yes,” I said, “I believe I heard so about that Can I be of some assistance?”

“I’eant Evers, that you’ve done soht be relevant”

“Ah, Sergeant Evers,” I said “Good ator” I didn’t add that Evers had fearsoated me only a few months before and had arrested me on suspicion of homicide, in the death of Jess Carter, who had served a brief stint as acting ME here in Knoxville Maybe Garcia already knew that; if he didn’t, he was the only person in a hundred-eant Evers thinks ree” I could hear hi my words and my tone for the sarcasm I’d added to the evenmatch with the new ME, I decided “Actually, Dr Garcia, that research is pretty interesting What we’ve done is coreen bone-fleshed bone-with fractures in dry bone We burned two cars containing cadavers and limbs from the immediate postmortem interval, as well as fro past teeks in the summer-by then you’re down to bare, dry bone already”

He mulled this over briefly “And have you docu you could er over?”

“Nothing in writing,” I said “Got soer over”

“Thank you, but without soical context, I’m not sure-”

“Hell, I’ll be theover that direction anyhow I’ll bring a few of the bones and show you what it is I’ll be writing up, soon as I get around to it You can ask questions, and I can try to answer thereat If it’s not, neither one of us has lost more than a few minutes You want to take a look?”

“Very well,” he said

Very well? I thought Who says “Very well” any brooht, Who the hell says “Swell” anyht, Apparently I do “I’ll be over there in about tenyou”

“I’ll see you then,” was all he said before hanging up

I selected half a dozen bones frohttime experiment, then wrapped the boxes we used to store the specimens in the skeletal collection As I headed down the hall that traced the curve of the stadiue Jiy fro but aristocratic, I realized, since the first syllable was pronounced like “whore” I tapped on Jorge’s door with one knuckle “Co up fro what appeared to be the tango, but suddenly they spun apart and began break-dancing

“That’s an interesting dance,” I said “I don’t believe I know that one”

“Ah, Dr Brockton,” he said, looking up “Sorry to be rude This is actually research Did you know that in Buenos Aires, where this dance video was shot, one out of every twenty teenagers has posted a video on YouTube?”

“I didn’t,” I said “What’s U-2?” It didn’t sound like he was talking about a Cold War spy plane or a rock band

“Not U-2 YouTube” He scrawled it on a piece of paper for me “An Internet site where people post videos they’vepeople Like MySpace”

“Your space? You have a Web site that’s popular with kids?”

He laughed, then typed an address into his co ads and thumbnail pictures of faces and pets “Not my space,” he said “MySpacecom”

After a few seconds, he clicked it back to the tango break dancing “At first all the videos on YouTube were very clumsy and silly,” he said, “but a lot of theht out of Hollywood” He studied ain “But I think you didn’t stop to talk about cinema or the Internet”

“No, I stopped for advice,” I said “Do you have any tips on dealing with a Latino physician who seems to have a chip on his shoulder?”