Finger
The remains came in a small cardboard box, far smaller than the box of Milk Duds he was munching on.
"Is that. . . ?"
"Yes," she confirmed. "The distal, intermediate, proximal, metacarpal. . . ."
"It's a finger," he said. "All we've got is a finger."
"Yes."
"And you can identify a whole person just from this?"
The affirmative came out breathy as if she were exasperated at his question.
"I. . . I believe you," he said by way of apology.
She continued to work examining the bone every which way but Sunday and he continued chewing on the brilliance of the woman in the same way he was chewing on the Milk Dud.
Miss Warren, have. . .?"
He could barely get the question out—partly because of the caramelly goodness sticking to his teeth—when she surprised him.
"The finger belonged to someone who was most certainly a pianist or typist, although I would. . . ," she paused looking up at him for the briefest moment before veering into the world of English he understood, "say that he is more than likely a pianist."
"More than likely," he repeated.
"Based on the size of the, uh, finger, there is a high likelihood that the victim was male."
He found the certainty amusing and couldn't help but pose a question.
"Can you possibly tell me the height and weight of the male pianist?"
Yeah, he was being a smart ass, but he couldn't help it with the way she was picking details out of those 4 small bones.
"I cannot give you an accurate estimation of his weight, but I would say that his height would range from 5'10" to 6'4".
Special Agent Aubrey gave a low whistle.
"I'm sorry I couldn't be more accurate."
Author's Note: This will be one of those long, long stories that I never seem to finish (yet I will), but thankfully, with much shorter chapters. Because short, unconnected stories don't appeal to me as a writer (and they can be hard to do well), I am going to make this into one big, happy (angsty, dramatic, funny) story, much in the same vein as Songs in the Key of Life. At some point, soon, I hope, the gambling story will be finished, I'll figure out where to take the shadow government story and this will be one of those free-flowing stories that isn't connected to anything in the show except for the characters being in character as best as one can do in 300-words. Enjoy!