Chapter 4

Brian woke up to see the sight and sound of his cell phone flashing, ringing, vibrating and doing everything but singing and dancing on his night stand. It started the way the end of the world will start, he thought, with a phone ringing at 3:00 in the morning. It was a line from some book he'd read. He was still half asleep.

He caught the phone just as it skittled off the table, and answered it.

"Reder here." He already knew who it was, and what it was about. A phone call at this hour only meant one thing.

"Lieutenant Reder. Brian? Sorry to wake you." That was Lynn, the police dispatcher, a kindly, middle-aged bleached blond. She was always a mixture of professionalism and motherliness. "We've got a body out in Mary district. The patrol guys thought you should come out."

Not every dead body found in the area warranted calling a homocide detective. Sometimes people died, and it was murder. But when in doubt, homocide was called in. As a detective, Reder normally worked a 9-to-5 day shift, but he was on call 24 hours a day for circumstances like this.

"Okay. What's the location?"

"No address. It's out in the desert. Maybe you should come to the station and a unit can drive you out, or can follow it. That would be easiest for you."

"Okay, thanks. Good idea."

"It's rough terrain out there, too. Better wear boots." That was the motherliness coming in. Brian often got teased about his dapper manner of dress. He was the only homocide detective he knew that actually wore the occassional trench coat.

"Thank you, Lynne."

"Oh more thing, Brian." Lynne's voice sounded a little flat. "The guys asked me...what's the name of that stuff you have, that scrambles your nose or whatever?"

"Odorscreen, Lynne." Odorscreen is a relatively new Israeli product that reduces nauseating odors by 'filling up' the receptors in the human nose that perceives them. In particular, it masks the instinctively revolting smell of bodily decay. Its manufacturer markets it as being particularly useful in the event of widespread disaster with many deaths. Mitigating awful stenches improves relief worker efficiency and reduces psychological trauma. Movies sometimes portray cops as putting mentholatum on their upper lips to hide the scent of death, but they don't. It doesn't work, and it's usually not necessary. Brian had also been teased a couple times for discreetly using Odorscreen.

"The guys were wondering if you could bring some for them."