The bullet had been fired straight and level, and part of his right ear, half his brain, and chunks of his skull had produced a sort of Jackson Pollock splatter arrangement on the far, formerly white wall.

No wedding ring-thus Cliff Daniels either was not married or, based on the photographic evidence in his living room, was keeping it a secret.

More interesting, for a man who in so many ways seemed so inconspicuous, in one very notable way Clifford Daniels, at least in his present state, was anything but-I mean, I'm fairly comfortable about my own manhood, but I wouldn't want to have a locker beside Cliff's.

And most interesting of all, his right hand was gripped around his other gun, and at the moment of passing he appeared to have been in a state of sexual arousal. Goodness.

I walked back over to Ms. Tran. She looked at me and asked, "You saw it?"

"It?"

Silence.

Somebody had to say something, and eventually she defined It. "He's so… large."

"Oh… that? I don't call that big."

She smiled.

"Of course, it's not about the size," I told her.

"Wrong."

"Right."

We suddenly found ourselves on thin ice. I mean, here we were, a man and a woman, barely acquainted professionals, sharing a small room with a monster Mr. Johnson flying at full mast.

She suggested, "I suppose we have to address his, well… his state of…"

"His what?"

"You know… his…"

"Spell it out."

She said, sounding annoyed, "That's enough, Drummond. We're both adults."

"Really? You should ask my boss about that."

"Look… the corpse has… had an erection-okay? Let's just keep it clinical. Act like professionals. We can deal with this."

"Good idea. After all, you can't ignore the elephant in the room."