The following day Scully was sitting behind a two-way mirror in theBaltimore Police headquarters. Mulder and Colton were with her. A womanwith short blonde hair was getting ready to give a lie-detector test to thesuspect.
The suspect wore fluorescent orange prison overalls . He was sitting ina chair, facing the two-way mirror. Scully knew that though they could seehim, he couldn't see them.
One of the suspect's arms was tied with a blood-pressure cuff . Wiresconnected the machine to sensors on his fingertips.
Scully knew that his blood pressure, heart rate, and breathing-rate weregoing to be measured. A change In anyone of them might testify that he waslying.
The woman calibrated the machine so that the ink ran through thestylus and the graph paper moved, then she started the test.
"Is your full name Eugene Victor Tooms?" she asked.
"Yes," the suspect answered. "Do you live in the state of Maryland?”
"Yes," Tooms said.
"Are you employed by Baltimore Municipal Animal Control?""Yes," he answered again.
The examiner observed the graph paper and marked "7+" next to theresponse. So far, Scully knew, the suspect was telling the truth.
"Eugene, is it your intention to lie to me about anything here today?" thewoman asked.
"No," Tooms answered. He spoke in a monotone, and his eyes seemedglazed, as if he were in a trance ."Were you ever enrolled in college?""Yes.""Were you ever enrolled in medical school?""No.""Have you ever removed a liver from a human being?""No," rooms answered. "Have you ever killed a living creature?""Yes."Like his voice, rooms's face was absolutely neutral, empty of all emotion.
"Have you ever killed a human being?""No," he replied.
"Have you ever been in George Usher's office?""No," rooms answered.
"Did you kill George Usher?" "No," he replied again.
"Are you over one hundred years old?"Tooms hesitated, looking astonished by the question. Then he answered,"No.""Have you ever been to Powhatan Mill?" asked the examiner .
"Yes," answered Tooms.
"In 1933?"Again the suspect hesitated before saying, "No."Some time later the examiner reached Scully and Mulder and said: "As faras I'm concerned, the subject did not kill those people. ""Tooms lied on questions twelve and fourteen," said Mulder pointing tothe graph paper. "He's our guy."Colt on stood up and went to the door. Scully could see that he didn'tbelieve Mlilder. "Well, even if he is, I'm letting him go!” The door slammedbehind him.
The next day Scully sat with Mulder at a computer puter in the Baltimorepolice station. Mulder had called up Eugene rooms's arrest report.
"Here," Mulder said, "are Tooms's fingerprints. And here is an elongatedprint taken from Usher's office. It matches the old ones from the X-files.
This print is from the 1933 murder at Powhatan Mill"Scully looked at Mulder and shrugged , "There's no match.""No," admitted Mulder, "but what if..."He punched in a command and the computer stretched Tooms'sfingerprint until it was as long and narrow as the one taken from Usher'soffice. "Just look," Mulder said while running the mouse across its pad. Thetwo images moved towards the centre of the screen until they overlappedand the computer beeped.
"Match 100%," it read.
Scully asked: "How could Tooms's print be exactly the same as a printtaken from a murder committed over sixty years ago?""The only thing I know for sure," said Mulder, "is that they let him go."
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