“Not yet.”

“Let me know what you find, will you?”

“Of course.”

My shoe covers and gown crinkle as I cross to the gurney containing the bones. Oblivious to my trepidation, Harris has already peeled back the paper covering. He’s picked up an iPad and makes a note with a stylus, deep in thought, his brows knitting.

“We have the remains of a Caucasian male between the ages of eighteen and thirty-five,” he begins. “From all indications he was healthy. Teeth are intact and present.” He looks at me over his glasses. “So we should be able to get DNA.” Then he goes back to his iPad. “This individual has had no dental work done. Not even a filling. There’s no indication of disease or malnutrition. There is evidence of a completely healed fracture of both the ulna and the radius of the right arm. There’s evidence that both bones underwent open reduction and internal fixation with plates and screws.”

“Is there a serial number?” I ask.

He looks at Doc Coblentz. “Ludwig?”

Doc Coblentz hands me an index card. “We had to magnify it, but we got it.” I put a call in to the manufacturer.

I take the card, drop it into my pocket. “Thank you.”

Harris continues. “Interestingly, only one of the plates was recovered at the scene.”

“There were two plates surgically implanted?” I say. “One of them is missing?”

“That’s correct.”

“The missing plate may still be at the scene,” I tell him, feeling slightly alarmed because the scene was left unprotected.

Doc Coblentz shakes his head. “Kate, we discussed this at length with Stevitch. In addition to being a forensic anthropologist, he’s also an expert in forensic geophysics. He went over that scene with a fine-tooth comb. The plate is not there.”

“So if it’s not at the scene, where is it?” I ask.

We fall silent. I’m trying to work through the logistics of the missing plate, when Dr. Harris speaks up. “I have a theory on that.” He looks at me, his brows raised. “If I may continue?”

“Of course,” I tell him.

“Everything’s been photographed and processed,” Doc Coblentz tells me. “Soil samples and those small bits of what appeared to be plastic were sent to the BCI lab in London, Ohio.”

Harris picks it up from there. “Aside from the ring and a few scraps of clothing, there were no other personal effects found on scene.”

“No one crawls around in the crawl space of a barn without clothes or shoes.” I look down at the bones. Most are ivory in color with specks of dirt still clinging in areas. Some are stained brown and pitted. They’ve been arranged loosely in the form of a human skeleton, but even with my unschooled eye, I can see there are many missing. The orthopedic plate lies next to a long, thin bone. It’s about four inches long and half an inch wide with a series of five oval holes evenly spaced along the length. The dirt has been removed, leaving it silver and shiny and looking out of place.