Officer Silas Jaxon on the witness stand laughed, his expression disdainful.
"The head was buried in the soil of the flower bed, sticking to some insect eggs; I don't think it's anything special," he said mockingly. "Miss Lawyer, I don't know if you've ever seen bodies rotten with maggots, or those pulled from the water covered with snails and clams. Are maggots, snails, and clams also key pieces of evidence?"
Muffled laughter came from the gallery.
"..." Purple Summers' expression stiffened.
She wanted to say: Of course, I have seen them.
Purple Summers turned, silently returned to the defense bench, picked up another stack of documents, and redistributed them to the witness, prosecutor, judge, and the twelve jurors.
The first page of the document was a photo of a rotten skull, magnified so that a few egg masses attached to the skull were visible.
The second page was an identification report from the National Entomology Research Institute.
