Muir pondered the skull. “For the sake of public consumption, all we have is a deserter who ran up into the mountains and hid for thirty years until he died. An interesting two-day story if the media did obtain the facts from us and then decided to print a story on them, but not exactly a modern-day Benedict Arnold. We are looking at a lost soul who eluded American and Vietnamese authorities in order to live out the remainder of his life up in the mountains. That’s it. Unless some famous producer wanted to turn him into a hero and make a movie about him. You know, sacrificing his country to be with the woman he loved.”

“Don’t say that too loud, Professor. The thought scares me.”

Muir shrugged, touching the skull. “He lost five teeth. I almost feel sorry for the fellow.”

“I’m not exactly shedding any tears here. You didn’t see him when he was busy shooting my Marines.”

“Well, now you’re the one who’s right.” Muir let out a breath. “I’m sorry I said that, Brandon. I must have sounded like one of those whiners who gather outside the courtroom when a hardened criminal is being tried for murder. Consider the poor man’s deprived childhood, and that he fell in with the wrong crowd, and got involved with a woman, and was scarred by the cruel military process when they made him do a little time for insubordination. Poor fellow. He was entitled to a few ambushes to help balance out his psyche, wasn’t he?”

“So we’re both right, Professor. How comforting to our fucking egos. And we haven’t solved a thing.”

The remains from Ninh Phuoc rested on another gurney thirty feet away from where they stood. Muir nodded toward them. “Don’t be so pessimistic, Brandon. We’ve solved a lot, no matter that none of it does us any good just yet. We do know who Salt is, even if we can’t find him anywhere in the known universe. We don’t know who the poor fellow is that he murdered, but we have his remains, and sooner or later science will prevail. And we have Pepper, or at least we have his head, with a positive identification from the dental records. So there may come a time—perhaps when we find Salt—that we can obtain a confession and implicate this man as well.”

“What are the odds on that?” Condley glared malevolently at Pepper’s skull. “That fucking head cost me five thousand dollars too.”

“I’ve filed a request for reimbursement. I’m sure they’ll pay you back. It was a judgment call and you certainly were within the regulations.”

“I’ll tell you what, Professor. If they don’t reimburse me for that skull it’s mine. I’m taking it home and turning it into an ashtray.” He paused. “Maybe a urinal.”