CHAPTER FOURTEEN
James appeared in her doorway, and from the tension in his shoulders, Isla knew he'd found something.
"Dr. Samuel Pritchard," he said, moving to her desk and setting down his laptop so she could see the screen.
"Age fifty-eight, research scientist. He's been consulting with various city departments for the past six years on psychological screening protocols—specifically, developing assessment tools to evaluate personnel fitness for high-stress positions in emergency services and public safety roles. "
Isla straightened in her chair, her exhaustion momentarily forgotten. "Psychological screening. So he would have had contact with—"
"City employees across multiple departments," James finished.
"Police, fire, EMS, public works. According to his consulting contract, he's conducted personality assessments and stress response evaluations for hundreds of municipal workers over the years.
He's built up quite a database of psychological profiles on people working for the city. "
Isla pulled up Pritchard's profile on her own computer, scanning the details James had compiled.
Born in Duluth, educated at the University of Minnesota with a PhD in biomedical engineering, thirty-two years of research experience spanning multiple institutions.
His LinkedIn profile showed a career focused on developing diagnostic technologies, with particular emphasis on non-invasive measurement systems.
But it was his publication history that made Isla's pulse quicken.
"Look at this," she said, clicking through to a research paper Pritchard had published three years ago in a journal of experimental psychology.
The title alone made her stomach tighten: "Physiological Markers of Moral Deviation: Detecting Antisocial Personality Traits Through Autonomic Response Patterns. "
James leaned closer, reading over her shoulder. "Jesus. He's trying to measure people's character."
Not quite, but close enough to be deeply troubling.
Isla skimmed through the abstract, her investigator's mind cataloging the implications.
Pritchard's research focused on developing technology that could allegedly identify psychological and moral deficiencies through physiological measurements—heart rate variability, skin conductance, pupil dilation, dozens of subtle biological markers that supposedly revealed a person's true character beneath whatever social mask they wore.
"It's pseudoscience," Isla said, though her voice carried doubt. "You can't measure morality with sensors."
"But if someone believed you could?" James pulled up another article, this one from a fringe psychology journal that Isla had never heard of.
"Here's a paper from five years ago where Pritchard argues that certain people are fundamentally 'defective'—his word—at a neurological level.
Says their brain architecture produces what he calls 'empathy deficits' that make them incapable of genuine prosocial behavior. "
Isla read through the paper, her unease growing with each paragraph.
Pritchard's writing was dense with technical jargon, but the core argument was disturbingly clear: he believed some people were biologically predisposed to cruelty and selfishness, that their capacity for empathy was structurally compromised in ways that made them dangers to society.
And more troubling still, he believed his diagnostic technology could identify these people before they acted on their worst impulses.
"This is dangerous thinking," Isla said quietly. "Deciding that some people are fundamentally broken, that you can detect and categorize them based on physiological measurements—that's eugenics dressed up in modern technology."
"It's also exactly the kind of worldview that could justify murder," James said. "If you genuinely believe you can identify people who are neurologically incapable of basic human decency, then removing them starts to look like a public service rather than a crime."
Isla pulled up Pritchard's consulting records, tracking his assessments and evaluations over the past six years.
The logs showed regular sessions with city employees—sometimes weekly, sometimes monthly—all properly authorized and documented.
He'd conducted an evaluation as recently as last week, according to his notes describing "personality assessment for fire department promotion candidate. "
"We need to know if he ever crossed paths with our victims," Isla said, already pulling up David Langford's work history. "If the city required psychological evaluations for maintenance workers—"
"Found it," James interrupted, pointing to an entry in Langford's employment file from fourteen months ago.
"Langford was required to undergo a psychological fitness evaluation after multiple workplace complaints.
The evaluator was Dr. Samuel Pritchard. According to Pritchard's notes, Langford was 'hostile and defensive throughout the assessment,' refused to engage meaningfully with the testing protocols, and made 'dismissive comments about the legitimacy of psychological evaluation. '"
Isla's heart rate picked up. "That's a direct interaction. And given what we know about Langford's interpersonal skills, I'm guessing that evaluation didn't go well."
"Definitely not," James agreed. "Pritchard's final assessment recommended that Langford undergo anger management training and suggested he showed 'concerning patterns of antagonistic behavior and lack of interpersonal cooperation.
' The union fought it, and ultimately nothing came of the recommendation.
Langford kept his job, and Pritchard's evaluation was filed away. "
A personality conflict. A confrontation in an evaluation room between a pipe fitter with a reputation for rudeness and a research scientist who believed he could identify defective people through biological measurements.
The kind of encounter that might stick in someone's mind, especially if they were already cataloging people whose behavior suggested moral corruption.
"What about Linda Graves?" Isla asked, though she suspected she already knew the answer.
James pulled up another file, and Isla saw the connection immediately.
Seven years ago, Dr. Samuel Pritchard had applied to become a foster parent through Duluth County Family Services.
Linda Graves had been assigned to evaluate his application, conducting home visits and psychological assessments to determine his fitness to care for children.
The application had been rejected.
"Graves's notes are in the file," James said, scrolling through the documentation.
"She recommended against approval, citing 'concerning ideological rigidity' and 'an unusually clinical approach to human relationships that raises questions about emotional availability.
' She also noted that Pritchard seemed more interested in studying child development than in actually nurturing children. "
Isla read through the assessment, recognizing Linda Graves's clinical efficiency in every line.
The evaluation was thorough but cold, detailing Pritchard's shortcomings with the kind of dispassionate precision that would have felt like judgment to anyone on the receiving end.
Graves had essentially declared him unfit to care for children, and she'd done it with the same bureaucratic efficiency that had earned her complaints throughout her career.
"Two victims, two documented negative encounters with Dr. Samuel Pritchard," Isla said, standing and reaching for her coat.
The pieces were clicking into place with uncomfortable clarity.
"A research scientist who believes he can identify morally defective people through physiological measurements, who's had professional contact with city employees for years, who personally encountered both victims in situations where their worst qualities were on display. "
"That's motive and opportunity," James said, already grabbing his own jacket.
"But it's all circumstantial. We don't have anything that directly connects him to the murders.
And we still don't know how he'd even know about the tunnel system, let alone be able to navigate it well enough to commit these crimes. "
"Then we need to talk to him. See how he reacts when we bring up Langford and Graves.
See if he knows they're dead." Isla checked her weapon, making sure the magazine was fully loaded.
She was probably being paranoid—they were going to interview a research scientist at his home, not apprehend an armed fugitive—but after two murders in the steam tunnels, she wasn't taking chances.
James paused at the door. "You think he'll run?"
"I think if he's our killer, he's been planning this for a long time.
He'll be prepared for questions. Prepared for suspicion.
" Isla met his eyes. "But he won't be expecting us to understand his ideology.
That's our advantage—we can see the worldview that justifies the murders, and he'll think we're just looking for conventional motives. "
***
They drove through Duluth's late-morning traffic in focused silence, Isla's mind running through interview strategies while James navigated toward the address they'd found in Pritchard's consulting records.
The scientist lived in a renovated Victorian in the Congdon Park neighborhood, an area of elegant older homes occupied mostly by professionals and academics.
The kind of place where neighbors minded their own business and nobody would notice if someone kept unusual hours or made regular trips to the industrial district at night.