A sharpie marker labeled each sheet: Shirt-front. Shirt-back. Pants-front. ‘What is that?’ he asked.‘The tapings from Diana’s clothing. I never looked at them.’He slumped into a task chair, scooted it up to the counter. He looked as tired as she felt … and probably looked, she thought with discomfort. When had she last combed her hair?‘And what can they tell you?’ he asked with a sigh, as if he didn’t really care about the answer, only that someone else do the talking for a while.So she started from the beginning. ‘We press adhesive tape to the surface of the clothing or bedding or upholstery, and it picks up loose hairs and fibers and other trace evidence, like paint flakes. With luck, the hair will belong to the suspect and the fibers to the clothes he wore.’‘Really.’ He seemed a bit perplexed, no doubt wondering why he didn’t hear more about hairs and fibers.So she added the qualifiers. ‘I can screen the hair for similarities microscopically, but can’t individualize it to the person – that would be sent for DNA.
