He called them later that morning and was told by the Forensic Toxicology Lab that it might be sometime next week before the actual autopsy would take place. Av asked why so long. The secretary asked if Av’s case was an active and urgent homicide investigation. Av said not yet, but that of course would depend on the results of the autopsy, wouldn’t it? She told him to go get a book called Catch-22 and then invited him to get in line. Av went to Precious to bitch and moan. She promptly showed him the door. This is the Briar Patch. Move the tarbaby, Detective. He went to complain to Howie Wallace, who offered slightly more sympathy and said, since he didn’t have anything special to do, why didn’t they go out to that French restaurant and do some interviews. Av couldn’t really see the point of that, the EMS reports being fairly complete. Howie said he wanted something different for lunch. Av hadn’t told Howie about the four runners or the little memento he’d found on his front-yard fence.
