“Roque? Oh. The pathologist who died while he was doing Doris’s autopsy. I didn’t know Doris well, but I could make a few calls.”

I started to ask her to keep my query to herself but realized it was hopeless—everyone talked to everyone here, and I was a high-profile stranger. Of course she wouldn’t keep it to herself. I gave Barbara the number of one of the burner phones and used another to call Dr. Roque’s office in Kansas City. He’d written McKinnon from his home address, not the KBI, so I was guessing his KC staff would be more likely than the state people to know why he’d written her.

Although it was Saturday, Roque’s secretary was in the office. Her voice was thick with weeping.

Dr. Roque had been a great man, a great doctor, charitable, witty but never cruel. She didn’t know how they would go on without him. She recognized McKinnon’s name—Dr. Roque had been about to start the autopsy when he was suddenly taken sick—but she didn’t remember handling any correspondence with McKinnon. When I said all I had was an envelope addressed to McKinnon with his home address on it, she couldn’t help me, but she was struck by the coincidence.

“That’s so strange, him writing to her and then getting her body to work on. That’s just bizarre, but he didn’t say word one to me. Talk to his lab tech—if it was some weird question, he might have mentioned it to Aanya when they were in the lab together.”

Like the secretary, Aanya Malik was grief-stricken. “I owe everything to Dr. Roque. He helped me get my green card, my education, everything. When my sister ran away from a forced marriage, he helped me bring her to Kansas City so she would not be shot by my uncles. I know we will go on, but I don’t know how.” Malik spoke idiomatic English, overlaid with a South Asian accent that was sometimes hard to understand.

I murmured those phrases we always use, even though they seem empty in the face of great loss. After a few minutes, Malik tried to pull herself together.

“You said you were a detective. I know the police have come from Lawrence and gone through Dr. Roque’s files. Even someone from the army has come. Is that why you are calling? If you think he did anything wrong, I will tell you personally that—”

“No, no. I’m not with the police, I’m private.” I repeated my story, which seemed to be getting as long as the Odyssey. I tried to keep it concise but included my conflicts with the sheriff and my fears about the colonel in the hopes that would make her feel she could trust me.