54

Jack started his morning with calling the Lanius gallery and asking about how to reach the mushroom artist, Greg Shatzkin. The guy had been all around the mushroom houses. He could have been the one to track those spores onto the last Blackwell crime scene. He could be Blackwell.

But it didn’t turn out that way. Shatzkin, when finally reached, claimed a solid alibi, teaching at a local college, which was confirmed by the admin office. Another dead lead.

After Jack finished grousing over that, he spent the morning online, checking eBay and Craigslist, checking local listings against the roster of stolen items he had from the burglaries. The work was tedious and not the case he wanted to work, but if this was the price he had to pay for being back on active duty, then so be it.

His hand paused over the mouse as a listing for a laptop came up, same model as on his stolen items list. The hard drive would be wiped clean by now, the laptop pretty much unidentifiable, but he made note of the