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belonging to Stephen Stanko, including the college-ruled notebook in which Stanko had written his “comedy routine.” (During the course of the investigation, several cops would read the so-called comedic material. None laughed.)
    There was also a black folder, manila folders, a cup, bag, and receipt from a Bojangles’ fast-food restaurant, a gray vehicle floor mat, and two blood swabs taken from the steering wheel and the gear shift.
    The warrant ordered, as they all do, that a complete inventory of items gathered at the scene be made and presented back to the court. That list was compiled by Bogart and Pitts and returned to the court by the middle of the afternoon of April 9.

    On Saturday morning, April 9, Laura Ling’s remains were autopsied at the Medical University of South Carolina. Dr. Kim A. Collins, out of the Wake Forest University School of Medicine, Department of Pathology, noted aloud that the deceased had suffered a puncture wound to the throat. She had been severely beaten about the face and strangled.
    There was one bruise on Ling’s face that was of particular evidentiary value. It had a well-defined and unusual shape, and appeared to have been made by a ring, which, if located, might help link the killer and his victim.
    During the autopsy, Dr. Collins located and described every wound on Ling’s body. It was a lengthy process. The killer had been prolific with his punishment, and there were many wounds to chart.

    That same morning, Henry Lee Turner’s remains were autopsied, in the same hospital as Ling’s. Dr. Kim Collins was in attendance for both postmortem procedures.
    Before the surgery, X-rays were taken of his upper body. These pictures would prove to be vivid evidence of the lead slugs inside Henry Lee Turner’s chest.
    It turned out that under his blue jeans, purple polo shirt, and black athletic shoes, Turner had been wearing what the coroner referred to as “patriotic boxers” and white socks. Full dentures were still in the victim’s mouth, and a bloody white handkerchief was found in one of his pants pockets.
    There was an old adage about crime scenes: A killer always takes away part of his victim, and the victim always takes part of his killer. The search for trace and biological evidence linking killer with victim was exhaustive. Fingernail clippings were taken from each hand. The bloodstained bullets were removed.
    Dr. Collins believed Turner had been shot first in the chest, then in the back.
    Following the autopsy, the victim’s clothes and dentures were bagged as evidence, items to be scrutinized further by county and state forensic scientists. That evidence—plus the bullets, and a gun residue kit—was officially passed from the Medical University of South Carolina to the Horry County Police Department, at 8:40 P.M . on Saturday. The receiving officer was Detective Neil B. Livingston.

    Back in Murrells Inlet, law enforcement was going over Laura Ling’s home carefully, looking for useful information. Police discovered a file cabinet filled with the killer’s paperwork. In the cabinet were his files on serial killers, the product of his hours of real research in the Socastee library. Every file was carefully examined.
    In addition to his writings, they found hundreds of clipped magazine and newspaper articles about notorious killers, a scrapbook of deviant violence.
    The two largest files were on two killers Stanko obviously found special: Gary Ridgway, the Green River Killer, and Jeffrey Dahmer, the notorious cannibal.
    Sheriff Cribb examined the clippings and read Stanko’s copious notes. Cribb was the first to wonder if what Stanko was really doing in the Socastee library was learning how to become a serial killer.
    “We found a lot of information about serial killers,” Cribb said. “He just seems real interested in serial killers, and now he’s starting out, heading that way.”

THE MASTERS
    Viewing the world through the windshield of a pickup truck, Stephen