8 Josh on TV
Although she was not an official member of the Residue Class, Cosette was a sort of candidate-in-waiting. That meant she participated in virtually all the group activities, including the contentment of sitting together around the Rosemont’s large screen TV. We enjoyed watching our favorite programs, all the while discussing our favorite crime cases. Still, we weren’t living in Utopia. Life was not all mountain strawberries and whipped cream.
After solving two huge murder mysteries, some of the Residue Class were in danger of growing cocky. Seeing ourselves mentioned in the news every day didn’t exactly foster humility. Every time the police solved a crime within a hundred miles of Hurlsburg, which included New York City, some reporter interviewed Josh or Carmela, asking them about how they contributed to putting away the perpetrator. Each would protest they had nothing whatsoever to do with solving the case.
Still, no matter how hard they tried to credit the real detectives who cracked the case, the reporter would always switch to a different question. Viewers seem to have no interest in having their myths debunked or their heroes scaled down to human proportions. (At six-foot-nine, Josh is rather hard to scale down to human proportions.)
Fortunately for us younger Residue members, our professor/mentor protected the team from all the snoopy reporters. Personally, I had no idea how I could answer, “How would your Residue Class have solved this?”
How could I answer without sounding like I was criticizing the police?
Surprisingly, the police all over the state didn’t seem to resent our team of eggheads. Quite the contrary. If a case involved any math more complex than the square root of four, they called in their “math team.” That was us (almost including Cosette), Rosy’s Residue Class. (Rosy is one of Josh’s nicknames, for Rosemont. So is Josh, for Joshua.)
Lately, the reporters were calling on us even when there wasn’t even a case. Last week, they invited Josh to participate in TV’s “Citizen Crimefighters” show. The entire Residue Class (plus Cosette)–Libby, Raj, Sonia, Helen, Carmela, and me–assembled in Carmela’s living room to watch the show live, at least Josh’s parts in it. Naturally, I’m biased, but I think he did a great job of explaining difficult mathematical concepts in simple terms.
Of course, I don’t mean “difficult” for us. We may not be all-around smart, but in math, we don’t find much of anything to be difficult. That’s why Josh chose his team in the first place. Not that some of us don’t have other talents, but in math, we sparkle. Like Cosette. She knew nothing about sports, or first aid, or English literature, but she’s brilliant when it comes to anything statistical. That’s why she was Josh’s principal collaborator for the design of this week’s lecture.
Josh won’t be happy when he sees I called it a lecture. He’d prefer “demonstration.” He prides himself on making abstract concepts clear through vivid examples.
(And because, truly, he does tend to “lecture” a bit more than he likes to admit. Note to Josh: I personally love your lectures. I could listen to you all day, but you must know that some non-mathematicians have, let’s say, “difficulties” with them.)
Anyhow, Cosette helped him prepare some red-hot examples of statistical concepts for this interview. That’s not easy. Stats are not one of the public’s favorite subjects–somewhere down the list near infomercials about euthanizing puppies. So why did the network let him choose that subject?
First of all, nobody “lets” Josh choose his subjects. He talks about what he wants to talk about, otherwise he doesn’t talk at all. So he’s always excited about his subjects, and it shows. Like the way he showed how we used statistics to help solve grisly crimes. That interests the public.
One particular segment really hit home. West Staunton Evans, the host, asked, “Can you show us how mathematics helps you solve random murders?”
In less than a microsecond, Josh shot back. “No, I can’t show you that.”
“Really?” West looked truly taken aback for a moment, then recovered by tossing a follow-on question: “Why can’t you? Do you think I’m not smart enough?”
I was so proud of the way Josh sidestepped the trap. “On the contrary, West. You’re too smart.”
For a moment, Evans looked shyly down to one side, but I could tell he liked to hear that. “Thanks, Josh, but I’m not really that smart.”
“Don’t disrespect yourself.” Josh always said that to us, and I guess we always need to hear it. Sometimes, anyway, or, for instance, Cosette never would have walked into that mess with Philippe and his friends. Most of the time, though, I need to hear the opposite. (Whoops, I think I just belittled myself.)
Evans then called a commercial break. When Volvo, Rinso, and Bud Light finished their pitches (which I couldn’t hear because of the loud flushing sounds), West resumed, speaking to the audience. “During that break, Josh explained that he knew I was smart enough to realize there was no such thing as random murders. So I asked him to explain it to all of you out there watching the show. Josh?”
The camera turned to a head-shot of Josh’s long, thin visage. “There’s no such thing as random murders because every serial killer has a pattern.”
Evans said, from off camera, “Can you give some examples?”
“Sure. Jeffrey Dahmer picked up young men in Milwaukee bars. He offered money to pose for his photographs. He drugged them in drinks, then strangled them. That’s not everything in his pattern, but it’s a lot for the police to work with: Location, Milwaukee. Setting, bars. Victims: young men. Pitch: “I’m a photographer.” Lure: cash. Method: drugs and strangulation.”
Evans shuddered, almost convincingly, then asked for a few more examples of patterns, which Josh gave. No need to repeat them here, because they make me really shudder, but his closing was definitely worth repeating. “You see, West, mathematics is, at its core, the study of patterns, and every serial killer has his own pattern, sometimes called his signature.”
“Or hers?” West asked. When Josh looked puzzled, Evans elaborated. “Do female serial killers have signatures, too?”
“Well, we don’t have sufficient examples of female serial killers to speak authoritatively. As an educated guess, though, I’d venture to say they do. I’ve studied about a dozen examples, from Lavinia Fisher when our country was young, through Aileen Wuornos, to Dorothea Puente in our own time. As far as I could tell, each of them had a pattern.” He stared off into space, and I thought he was finished. But he dropped his gaze to the camera lens and said, emphatically, “And stuck with it.”
“I can understand that,” said West, “because I, too, have a pattern I stick with.” Though there was a huge digital clock on the set, he raised his arm and conspicuously studied the dial on his blue and platinum De Bethune DB28. Cosette, like many Swiss, instantly recognized this winner of the Geneva Watchmaking Grand Prix. Most Americans wouldn’t, but I suppose West was hoping reporters would mention it in their morning stories.
“At this point in our interviews,” West announced, “We have to pause for a word from our wonderful sponsors. When we return, we’ll have a surprise mystery guest.”
He turned from Josh and faced the camera head-on. He seemed to be speaking directly to me. “So stay tuned!”