Hal and Orin on the phone: JOI's suicide (p. 253)
‘The B.P.D. field pathologist who drew the chalk lines around Himself’s shoes on the floor said maybe ten seconds tops. He said the pressure buildup would have been almost instantaneous. Then he gestured at the kitchen walls. Then he threw up. The field pathologist.’
Context
Hal giving Orin the forensics of the suicide scene, deadpan. Carlisle's reading, recorded not adopted: chalk lines around the shoes rather than a body-outline, plus the gesture at the walls, assimilate JOI's death to the death of Hamlet's father-ghost — poison coursing from head through body (Hamlet I.v) — before JOI ever walks as a wraith. The scene's whole Hamlet frame (unmourned father, uncle newly installed upstairs), condensed into one forensic detail.