Chapter 5
Catherine sighed and turned to return into the interrogation room to do what had to be done, when her attention was drawn to somebody jumping along the corridor.
She recognized Greg.
Grissom went to him, frowning, and Greg talked to him animatedly.
"What happened?" Catherine yelled impatiently, Grissom went in the other direction, but Greg approached her, smiling. "New evidence," he said.
Catherine raised her eyebrows and asked: "You're sure you're not making matters worse?"
When Greg entered the interrogation room, Sara was very pale; she pressed her fingernails into her palms and looked downwards, so that her hair fell into her face.
Brass stood, arms crossed, in a corner of the room and waited for them.
Sara looked up and when she saw Greg it seemed as if she was thinking it was a good sign that he was grinning like that.
"So, Greg, can you explain now?" Catherine wanted to know, after she had seated herself opposite of Sara.
"Started with the bottle." Greg began. He was talking very fast. "Sara's DNA on it. And her fingerprints." He glanced at Sara with an indefinable look. "And coffee." Both Sara and Catherine looked puzzled and Greg continued: "Blue Hawaiian."
Sara looked amused and unbelieving at the same time.
"The label of the bottle is polluted with coffee. It's Blue Hawaiian, it's certain. I think the bottle was in the garbage can in our break room together with a rest of my valuable coffee which a worthless person managed to get in there." Greg explained. "Of course it could be coincidence."
Catherine nodded.
Greg moved on. "But I think somebody took Sara's empty bottle with Sara's DNA and fingerprints on it out of the garbage can, bagged it and placed it together with her gun."
"Next: her shoes. The paste on it – the same like on the victim's clothes. But we have to realize not only what was on the shoes but also what was not on the shoes, or better, what was not in the paste: dirt. There was no dirt. If Sara has got the paste on her shoes at the crime scene there also has to be dirt in the paste on her shoes, because it's polluted while you're walking and the dirt sticks in the paste. But there was no dirt. So I guess the paste was put on her shoes by hand and the shoes were not worn after that happened," Greg explained seriously.
Catherine held up her hand. "Okay, let's assume you are right. Who did it?"
Greg smiled. "I also found traces of detergent on the bottle. And on the ID-card. And on Sara's locker and inside her locker. And on the shoes. The detergent that is used to clean all these rooms."
"The detergent could come from Sara," Catherine interrupted him.
"You assume that she had changed her shoes with the paste before you met her in the locker room. Then you went to your office and afterwards to the locker room again.
Nick took samples from her hands. She had neither paste nor detergent on her hands," Greg explained.
Sara looked at him, slightly amused and certainly relieved. "I could have washed my hands after I changed my shoes. In fact I said I had washed them," she said.
"You had no time," declared Greg. "I talked to Nick and asked him, at which time Catherine went to the locker room to search for you. It was only one minute after you entered the lab. You know, the entry time is documented. There was no time to change your shoes and to walk to the bathroom and back until Catherine met you in the locker room."
The car rushed along the road. She saw it only out of the corner of her eyes. She opened the trunk of her car and put her things into it.
Suddenly a woman screamed. She quickly turned around and saw a woman crying next to the street. She made a few steps towards her. "Everything okay with you?" she asked.
"Yes, yes. Everything okay … Car … almost hit me. I'm just a bit shocked." The woman replied and stopped crying. "Should be more careful." she added.
Sara nodded and went back to her car, closing the trunk and making her way home.
"The gun," Sara mumbled hardly audible. "The car. The woman. That's the moment it must have happened."
In this moment Grissom entered the room. "I think we can finish this unfortunate interrogation. Greg told me everything," he said, looking at Catherine.
"But …" Catherine interrupted. "What about the gun?"
Sara smiled. "I think I can explain that now."
"You can explain it later. I'm sure everything will be cleared in the next room. Brass, would you come and help me?" Grissom asked matter-of-factly and added:
"Greg can stay with Sara. And you and Catherine come with me."
Greg smiled at Sara.
In the other room a woman was sitting. An officer was standing next to the door.
Grissom, Catherine and Brass entered the room.
Brass took the task of doing all the formal stuff and finally Catherine asked the woman: "Who are you?"
"Hanna Mill," the woman answered short and perfectly calm.
At Catherine's questioning look Grissom explained: "She's Lizzy Ranger's sister. And she works in the crime lab."
"Cleaning," Hanna Mill added.
Grissom nodded and continued to explain: "Greg came to me and told me he had found traces of the detergent, which is used to clean the rooms in the lab, on the bottle just as on the shoes and on the locker and that the bottle has probably been taken from the garbage can in our break room. So I looked into the files of all employees of the cleaning staff, searching for connections to our case." He made a short break before he added: "And I found Hanna Mill, Lizzy Ranger's sister, the murdered wife of Albert Ranger, our victim."
Hanna Mill's face hardened. "No victim. The bastard murdered my sister," she said.
At this point Catherine spoke again: "We could not prove he had done it."
"He has. He confessed it to me, the bastard, he was even satisfied with himself," Hanna Mill stated.
"And you shot him and revenged your sister?" Catherine asked quietly.
"Yes," answered Hanna calmly.
"And you planted the evidence to incriminate Sara Sidle?" Catherine wanted to know.
"Yes," was again the answer.
"Why?" Catherine asked completely astonished.
"If one of you is affected, you're so busy; you do not see anything what's going on around you. At least I thought so," Hanna Mill explained.
"We should come to the beginning," Grissom finally said, "How did you get Ms. Sidle's gun?"
Hanna Mill leaned back in her chair. "Easy. I have watched her several times. Always the same: open trunk, kit in, gun in, close trunk," she said and continued: "I waited near her car. She opened the trunk, put her stuff in. Then there was the distraction. I grabbed her gun …"
She was interrupted by Catherine: "What distraction?"
At this point Hanna Mill hesitated for the first time.
"She has nothing to do with it. She only did me a favour."
Catherine raised her eyebrows. "Who?"
"My friend. She really has nothing to do with it," Hanna Mill said. "She screamed and distracted her. She went some steps away from her car," she explained without saying Sara's name.
"She only did me a favour. She did not know what I was up to."
Grissom nodded and continued: "Back to the gun…"
Hanna Mill nodded, calming down. "I grabbed the gun and threw Albert's ID-card into the trunk."
"Hold on," Catherine interrupted. "You had the ID-card before the murder?"
Hanna Mill nodded again. "I stole it the day before, when I was meeting him. He didn't realize it."
"Sara could have seen the plastic bag which contained the card in her trunk," Catherine said.
"Maybe, but she didn't," Lizzy Ranger's sister stated, calmly again.
"I'd appreciate it, if you continued with the story," Grissom remarked politely.
"I shot him. I gave him some last kicks. He deserved it," Hanna Mill told them plainly.
"I saw the paste and had a brilliant idea," she continued.
"Not too brilliant though," Grissom commented. "You forgot the dirt."
Hanna Mill shrugged her shoulders. "Bad luck."
"However, I bagged some of the paste which was still leaking out of the garbage can."
"And put it on Ms. Sidle's shoes," Grissom said. Hanna Mill nodded.
"How did you get into her locker?" Catherine asked.
"I work here. Don't you know how easy it is to get into the lockers? Low security."
"But it has definitely been risky, you could have been seen," Catherine stated.
"Whole life's a risk. I did it for Lizzy," Hanna said coolly and continued to explain: "I fished the bottle, which she had thrown into the garbage, out of the can. I planted it together with the gun, not at the crime scene, too obvious, but some houses away, I hoped you'd find it."
Sighing she added: "Bad luck. The detergent." She looked at Grissom. "It was on my hands and on my working gloves. Bad luck." There she finished, folded her arms and waited calmly.
Catherine leaned back in her chair, she was relieved and what she had heard was enough for her, but Grissom was not satisfied: "You definitely set light upon this case, but one thing's left: Why Sara?"
Without any motion Hanna Mill said: "Easiest. Drives home alone every time. So easy to distract her and get the gun."
"So, you didn't do it?" Greg asked half-joking in the next room.
Sara looked at him darkly. "No, I didn't," she said in a definite tone. Then she smiled, but sighed a moment later. "The gun, out of my trunk. I'm sure." She shook her head, unbelieving.
"I was pondering how everything is possible the whole time, but I absolutely couldn't explain it," she told him. "I was getting desperate because I couldn't explain it."
She looked downwards.
"When Catherine first came to me I was only surprised." She shrugged her shoulders. "I had searched for my gun and was late. When she told me it was used to kill the man I couldn't believe it in the first moment and even got angry because Catherine thought it possible that I had shot the man.
But I still didn't think that matters would turn so bad." While Sara was telling this, her look had darkened again. Greg remained silent for once, only listened.
"When I was sent home I was pondering all the time, but I found no solution.
During the interrogation, when Catherine showed me all the evidence against me, I felt helpless, and the only thing I could declare was that I hadn't done it, I could not explain the evidence.
After the news that they found the ID-card in my trunk, I was really absent, I was getting desperate, I tried to recall how in any way somebody could have grabbed my gun and how the card got into my trunk.
I could do nothing. Simply nothing." Sara was pale again. I hate feeling helpless. "When you came, I was really afraid that further evidence against me had been found. But then I saw your face and interpreted your expression as a good sign." Now she smiled.
"Somebody got my gun out of my trunk, while I was distracted by the screaming woman," she said and added after a short silence: "The bottle and the paste: no idea, I cannot tell why this all happened, but I think Grissom will find out, he finds out everything."
"I really should be more careful," she concluded.
"Really," Greg said and laid his hands on her shoulders. Looking into her eyes he said: "I'm so glad, you didn't do it … I knew you didn't do it, I'm glad we can prove now you didn't do it."
Sara smiled at him. "You worked very hard, so that you can prove it," she said and added: "Thank you."
"Rare, but true: you said 'thank you'. Something you didn't often do when you got results from me in the DNA lab," Greg commented, grinning.
The end
