In July of 2015, 32-year-old architect Ellis Webb left her home in San Francisco and set out on a lonely hike in California’s Sequoia National Forest.

She was to return in 2 days.

3 years later in August of 2018, a group of biology students came across human remains deep in the forest.

The skull was covered by a white, perfectly smooth porcelain mask with no holes for eyes or mouth.

The mask was fused to the bone so tightly that it could not be removed without destroying the skull.

For the first time in many years, the Seoia Forest became a place where silence looked more terrifying than screaming.

On July 24, 2015 at 20 minutes in the morning, a parking lot camera on Folsam Street in San Francisco captured a gray Toyota 4RE SUV slowly pulling out of an underground exit.

Behind the wheel is Ellis Webb, a 32-year-old architect known around the Finchin Partners office for her cool professionalism and her habit of escaping for lonely hikes after completing major projects.

She loved these escapes from the city, saying that only among the trees did she feel real.

This time the goal was the Sequoia National Forest, the John Mir Trail.

Two days of silence, a few miles of solitude is a common way for her to clear her head before a new assignment.

Before leaving, Ellis left a message for her sister, Ava.

I’m leaving in the morning.

I’ll be back on Sunday.

Don’t worry, there’s always a connection there.

That was the last we heard from her.

The drive to the forest takes about 5 hours.

at a gas station near the town of Visalia.

The cameras recorded her at .

She bought a bottle of water, two energy bars, a map of the route, and calmly paid in cash.

The saleswoman would later tell the police that the young woman looked confident, took her time, smiled.

Then, at , 9 minutes later, her car was recognized on the cameras at the entrance to the John Mure Trail section.

After that, there was no trace of her.

The parking lot where Ellis left her car is a small one with a few spaces surrounded by pine trees.

When the rangers arrived 3 days later, the SUV was standing upright, locked and unscathed.

Inside, there was a wallet, a laptop, a camera, and a few drawings in a tube.

On the seat was a completed travel receipt.

name Ellis Web route John Mure return Sunday July 26th she had done everything right she had reported the route time and point of return and still she disappeared when she didn’t show up for work on Monday her co-worker Jonathan first thought Ellis had simply decided to extend her weekend but by the evening her phone rema ined off at 900 p.m.

Ava Webb filed a missing person’s report.

The next morning, July 28th, an official search operation began.

It involved rangers, local volunteers, and dog handlers.

The weather was hot, the temperature was over 30°, and the air was shivering above the ground.

A helicopter with a thermal imager flew around the area several times a day, but there were no results.

On the third day of the search, one of the dog teams picked up the faint smell of human sweat along a narrow path that led down to a stream.

Half a mile from the main route, among the thickets of oaks and pine needles, the rescuers came across an abandoned camp.

The tent was set up and intact.

Inside were a backpack with food, a sleeping bag, a bottle of water, and a journal with sketches and notes.

It seemed that the woman had just left for a few minutes and did not return.

The only thing missing was a phone and a small handheld flashlight.

The things were lying neatly as a person who plans to return would leave them.

There were no signs of struggle, blood, or wild animals.

The dog picked up the trail again, but it broke off at a rocky stream bank where the water flowed shallow and quiet.

The rescuers later said that this place was like swallowing a smell.

For several days in a row, they combed the area around them.

50 volunteers, dozens of miles of trails.

At night, search lights broke the darkness, but no new clues emerged.

The report stated, “The trail is lost at a distance of approximately 300 yd from the camp.

It is likely that the subject entered the water.” However, the bottom of the creek was clean.

No fragments of fabric.

No shoes, nothing.

Meanwhile, Ava stayed in the park.

She spent the night in a motel near the entrance to Sequoia, came to the search headquarters every day, asking them not to stop the work.

Witnesses recall that she looked exhausted but stubborn.

One of the rangers who coordinated the operation told reporters she didn’t believe her sister could just walk away and get lost.

She said something had happened and we were missing it.

A week later, the search was officially called off.

The protocol stated, “The active phase is over.

The probable cause of disappearance is unknown.” The file with her name was included in the section missing person under undetermined circumstances.

For the Web family, this record was a verdict without explanation.

Ava returned to San Francisco with a suitcase containing her sister’s belongings, which the Rangers had packed in paper bags with evidence tags.

Inside was a note from the Tampa page from Ellis’s diary, where she had scribbled a short phrase in pencil.

The silence here is not at all like in the city.

3 years of silence followed.

3 years without an answer when every phone call seemed like a chance and every news from the forest was another deception of hope.

The Seoia stood as it always did, calm, majestic, and seemed indifferent to the fact that someone had stayed in it forever.

3 years have passed.

The summer of 2018 brought heat and dust to the Sequoia National Forest.

The pine stood still, the air shivered above the ground, and the trails were overgrown with moss and dry grass.

Ellis Webb’s disappearance had long since ceased to be news.

The photos of her smiling face, once hung at the park’s entrances, faded, turned pale gray, and then disappeared altogether.

For most, it was just another story swallowed up by the forest.

For her sister, it was an unfinished part of her life.

Ava Webb never gave up searching.

She returned to the Seoia every month, each time, to the same spot where Ellis’s camp had once stood.

The rangers recognized her from afar, a woman in a hat carrying a thermos of coffee and a folder full of clippings, maps, and old postcards with the words missing on them.

She talked to foresters, tourists, even local farmers who traveled near the park.

According to them, her eyes had the same empty glint that people get when they have been searching for too long.

In the police archives, case number M4157, labeled disappearance under unexplained circumstances, was on the bottom shelf among dozens of other similar files.

No one had looked at it since it was closed in September 2015.

Until August of 2018, there was nothing to indicate that the forest would ever remember Ellis Webb’s name again.

On August 30th, a group of biology students from Santa Clara University arrived in the northern sector of the Sequoia to conduct field research.

Their leader, Professor Howard Milton, chose a remote area that was rarely visited even by rangers.

The area was marked on maps as level 9, a part of the protected area where only scientific observation of the flora was allowed.

At in the evening, they set up camp near the dried up bed of an old stream.

As the sun began to sink, one of the students, David Lucas, went deep into the forest in search of lyken samples.

After half an hour, he came across something he first thought was a piece of white stone among the pine needles.

When he leaned closer, he saw that it was a human skull.

It was wearing a perfectly smooth white mask.

There were no holes for eyes or mouth.

The mask fit snugly to the bones, gleaming through the dust as if it had just been polished.

The group’s first testimony recorded by the rangers is preserved in the official case file.

The body was lying on a slope partially covered with sand and dry leaves.

The clothes were female tourist clothes.

The upper part of the skeleton was covered with a mask of white porcelainike material.

David said that he could not immediately realize that he was looking at a person.

The mask was strangely shaped without a single crack and a dusk resembled a marble slab.

Tular County police arrived at the scene on the morning of August 31st.

The area was declared a crime scene.

According to the report, the remains were located about 3 mi from the John Mure Trail in a deep depression between rocks where no official route led.

Only a part of the skeleton was found, the skull, upper torso, and several limb bones.

The shoes and part of the clothes were preserved, but the fabric crumbled when touched.

Investigators immediately noticed the main detail, the mask.

Its surface was so smooth that even after 3 years in the ground, it had no scratches.

It had no cuts or locks and did not look like an ordinary decorative item.

Its edges ran exactly along the jawline and the remains of a thin glue were fixed inside.

Experts assumed that the mask had been glued on after death, but so thoroughly that it was impossible to remove it without damaging the bones.

A forensic team was working at the scene.

Professor Milton and his students left signed statements and were released from the area.

Local journalists learned about the discovery 2 days later.

A short article in the Visalia Times Delta newspaper was headlined, “Unknown remains deep in Sequoia.” But a few hours after the article was published, the police received a call from Ava Webb.

She demanded to know the coordinates of the find.

The examination lasted 2 weeks.

DNA analysis confirmed that the remains belonged to Ellis Web.

Her sister also recognized a fine silver ring found next to the body and an old bandana that Ellis always wore when hiking.

The pathologist’s report states, “There were no signs of violence characteristic of blows or fractures.

The cause of death has not been determined.” But later in the notes, there was an entry.

The mask is handmade, made of fine porcelain with impurities of kyolin and quartz.

Traces of glue indicate professional attachment.

This detail was crucial.

The mask had nothing to do with factory products.

It was created by someone who had the skills of a sculptor or restorer.

At the time of the autopsy, it remained on the skull so firmly that experts had to saw it off at the edges to get to the bone tissue.

On the inner surface, they found microscopic remnants of a pigment commonly used in artistic ceramics.

After that, Web’s case officially changed status.

Instead of disappearance under unclear circumstances, a new line appeared in the documents.

Murder by an unidentified person.

The area where the body was found was closed to visitors.

For several weeks, experts from the FBI worked using ground penetrating radar and metal detectors looking for possible other traces, fragments, weapons, prints.

But the forest was silent.

Even the soil taken at the burial site yielded nothing useful.

No fibers, no DNA from unauthorized persons.

Among the police, this case was unofficially called white mask.

The report stated the crime was committed with a high level of planning and attention to detail.

The lack of signs of a struggle indicates that the victim was probably unconscious or already dead at the time the mask was applied.

This was no relief for Ava.

She arrived at the morg in Bakersfield to pick up the remains and according to the staff stood in front of a metal table for several minutes without moving.

She asked to see the mask which had already been seized as evidence.

One of the forensic experts recalled that the woman only said she couldn’t have worn it herself.

After 3 years of silence, the forest finally returned Ellis’s body.

But along with it, it also gave away a mystery that could not be explained.

The mask that was supposed to hide her face has now become the only face of this story.

The investigation into Ellis Webb’s death officially began on September 3rd, 2018.

The case was handled by a task force headed by Detective Glenn Mercer of the Tari County Crimes Against the Person Unit.

He had 20 years of experience and a reputation for keeping up with even the oldest cases.

He was the first to suggest that the story of the porcelain mask might be just part of something bigger.

The first weeks after the body was identified followed the usual rhythm for such cases.

Protocols, witness interviews, checking recent calls and financial transactions.

But each document ended with the same phrase.

No new information.

Then Mercer requested archival access to missing person’s cases in California’s national parks over the past two decades.

He was not looking for coincidences, but for patterns.

After a week of reviewing the reports, he noticed two cases.

The first was the disappearance of 30-year-old artist Julia Clark in King’s Canyon National Park in 2007.

The second was that of tourist Amelia Duran, who disappeared in Mariposa County in the summer of 2011.

In both cases, the women had gone on a short hike, were experienced travelers, and left no trace behind.

Their cars were found in parking lots, their belongings were intact, and their root notes were filled out in neat handwriting.

And as in Ellis’s case, no witnesses, no explanations.

Mercer called in forensic pathologist Allison Gray, who had performed the autopsy on Web’s body.

It was she who first noticed the material of the mask.

When she re-examined the samples, she found traces of a substance on the inner surface of the porcelain that she could not immediately identify.

After chemical analysis, it became clear that it was a special restoration adhesive based on epoxy resin with titanium impurities.

This composition is used in art workshops to fix cracks in ancient ceramics.

It is practically not available on the market, only through professional channels or special deliveries for museums.

The experts report states, “The nature of the glue distribution on the inner surface indicates that it was applied with a thin tool, probably a brush or spatula.

The perpetrator was experienced in working with fragile materials.

This was the first concrete lead for the detectives.

Mercer sent official inquiries to several art institutes and restoration centers in the state, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Sacramento.

The answers began to come in a few days later.

Glue similar to the one found on the mask was supplied to only four studios located within a 100 miles of the site where the body was found.

Two of them taught students, the third made souvenirs for tourist shops, and the fourth was a small private porcelain studio in the city of Visalia, opened in the ’90s.

Its owner is a former museum restorer who has been working independently since retiring.

While the analysts were checking the glue supply, the detectives were looking into old disappearances.

They traveled to King’s Canyon, where Julia Clark disappeared 11 years ago.

The former ranger who had led the search was still working in the park.

He recalled details that had been preserved only in his memory.

Her camp was intact with only sketches scattered on the ground.

One of them had a face without features.

It didn’t seem strange at the time.

Mercer wrote down every word.

He saw a recurring pattern in these details.

the disappearance of women involved in art, the silence at the scene, and the absence of signs of struggle.

When the lab results confirmed the glue’s uniqueness, Mercer ordered a complete list of people connected to art studios in Tular, Kings, and Fresno counties.

According to experts, the material found was used only by a small group of professionals, restorers, and ceramists.

This limited the number of suspects to a few dozen people.

Among the documents seized during the procurement audit was an invoice dated June 2015.

The customer was a private studio called Grey Crafts in Viselia.

The order included exactly the type of glue that was identified on the mask.

This date coincided with the month when Ellis Webb went on her last hike.

Detectives went to the city to check out the studio.

The report on the visit stated that the premises looked neat.

The facade was decorated with handmade porcelain, masks, vases, small figures.

The workshop was working officially, had a license, but there was no information about the owner in the register, only an old phone number.

Calls went unanswered.

Mercer instructed forensic scientists to conduct a comparative analysis of the clay samples found in the studio with the dust left in the pores of the mask.

The results were due in a few weeks.

At the same time, police began to investigate other similar cases across the state.

A report dated September 19th stated, “The similarities between the Clark, Duran, and Web cases are the age of the victims, their occupations, and the fact that they all disappeared near national parks.

It is likely that the offender is operating within a familiar area, has survival skills and artistic abilities.” For the sheriff’s office, this no longer looked like an isolated murder.

When the photographs of the three women, Julia, Amelia, and Ellis, appeared on the detective’s desk, Mercer looked at them for a long time.

All of them had calm, confident faces, the type of women who don’t look for danger, and each had an art related profession.

That same week, a new paragraph was added to the forensic report on the glue.

It said that the substance contained micica particles with a characteristic golden hue, a rare component used only in decorative coatings for high-end porcelain.

This fact finally confirmed that the mask was created not by an amateur but by an experienced craftsman.

This is how the version of the artist performer emerged, a person who not only kills but turns his victims into an element of his own work.

The internal report signed by Detective Mercer ended with a short phrase.

We are not looking for a hunter.

We are looking for an artist.

On October 5th, 2018, Detective Glenn Mercer and his team obtained a search warrant for a private porcelain studio in the Visalia that appeared on a purchase list for a rare restoration glue.

The name on the facade is Greycraft Studio.

The small sign above the old wooden door was barely visible through the dust.

The premises were located on the outskirts of the city next to a car repair shop and a furniture warehouse.

The place looked remote from everything and that’s what immediately attracted the investigators attention.

The owner of the studio was Jonathan Gray, a man of about 65, a former museum restorer.

He had worked in Los Angeles until the mid90s, then left the service due to health problems, and settled in Visalia.

According to his neighbors, he lived alone, did his own artistic things, and rarely left the neighborhood.

One of them, a pensioner from a neighboring building, recalled, “He hardly ever socialized.

In the morning, he would go out into the yard, grind something, or carry large white molds in his hands.

In the evening, the light in the workshop was on until midnight.

When the detectives arrived at the address, Gray met them calmly.

He did not object to the search, read the warrant carefully, opened the door, and said he had nothing to hide.

The police report states, “The suspect’s behavior was calm with no signs of panic or resistance.

The interior of the room was sterile.

Along the walls, there were shelves with porcelain vasses, masks, and small figurines.

Everything was done in a uniform manner, smooth lines, cold whiteness, and the absence of any facial features.

Forensic experts noted that some of the works are extremely similar in technique and proportions to the mask found on Ellis Webb’s skull, especially the way the glaze was applied and the microscopic grooves along the inner edge, which served to make it fit the surface more closely.

In one of the cabinets, investigators found several jars of the same brand of restoration glue that appeared in the forensic report.

When asked about this, Gray explained that he procured the materials through museum suppliers where he still had friends and that such glue was part of normal restoration practice.

He did not seem embarrassed.

According to Detective Mercer, he answered calmly, did not avoid eye contact, and willingly explained the process of porcelain making.

When asked about Ellis Web, he answered briefly, “I don’t know who that is.

I rarely read the news.” The search yielded several porcelain molds, a photo archive on an old hard drive, and a workbook with notes on firing and kiln temperatures.

No obvious evidence linking Gray to the crime was found.

But the detectives did notice one detail.

A table covered with a cloth at the far end of the workshop.

Under it, they found a half-completed work, a smooth mask without cuts with pencil marks along the inner edge.

It clearly showed fingerprints in a layer of clay that had not yet dried.

Experts made an impression to compare it with Gray’s own prints.

After the search, he was invited for questioning.

The protocol recorded that he arrived voluntarily without a lawyer.

When asked where he was in July 2015 when Ellis Webb disappeared, Gray replied that he was in Sacramento at an antique table wear show.

He even gave the name of the hotel, but the police found out that the booking records for those dates had not been preserved.

The alibi turned out to be unverifiable.

According to a former colleague who worked with him at the museum, Gray had a reputation as a meticulous but reserved professional.

She recalled that he was painfully sensitive to carelessness, especially when it came to antiquities.

Sometimes he would say that true beauty is in the perfection of form, not in faces, because faces always spoil an idea.

This phrase was later quoted in an official dossier as characteristic.

Mercer carefully studied Gray’s past.

In the museum’s archives, he found several complaints about his behavior.

He allegedly clashed with visitors and once threw away a broken sculpture, saying that such things have no right to exist.

After that he was fired by agreement.

10 years later he registered a studio in the Visalia officially to hold workshops and sell porcelain products.

In reality, according to neighbors, no one ever saw any students or clients.

After inspecting the workshop, the forensic experts made a report.

The materials found at the site confirm the presence of technical skills necessary to manufacture items similar to the mask from the crime scene.

No direct evidence of the owner’s participation in the murder was found.

However, the detectives came to a consensus that there were too many coincidences to be coincidental.

A new section appeared in the unofficial police records.

Suspect number one, Jonathan Gray.

After that, he was placed under surveillance.

Two plain clothes operatives were on duty near his house, and two more checked his movements around the city.

During the first weeks, nothing suspicious happened.

Grace spent most of his time in the studio, sometimes traveling to the city center to buy materials at an art supply store.

His roots were repeated.

His behavior remained familiar.

However, Mercer had the feeling that there was something hidden behind this calmness.

He looked at the photos from the studio again and again.

The smooth, faceless masks on the shelves looked at nothing, and each had the same proportions.

Like a cast from an unknown template created for someone specific.

Formally, the case remained open, but without sufficient evidence, the arrest warrant was rejected.

Jonathan Gray continued to live his usual life, returning everyday to his white, silent studio, where even the dust seemed to fly carefully so as not to spoil the perfect silence.

November 2018.

The Ellis Web case had been in the archival status of in progress for several months when detective Glenn Mercer ordered analysts to return to the smallest details of Jonathan Gay’s biography.

It seemed that all the facts were already known.

A recluse, an artist, a former restorer.

But experienced investigators knew that the most important thing is not in the actions, but in the traces of them.

They started with tax reports and public records.

The state registry records that between 2007 and 2011, Gray regularly participated in art fairs and decorative arts exhibitions throughout California.

This is a common activity for the artist, but two of the locations coincided with the geography of the disappearances of women who appeared in previous archival cases.

In June of 2007, Gray participated in a fair in Fresno, 50 mi from King’s Canyon Park, where the artist Julia Clark disappeared.

And in July of 2011, in the city of Mariposa, the closest to the place where tourist Amelia Duran disappeared.

At both events, he exhibited masks and decorative porcelain pieces.

Archival photos found in a local newspaper confirmed his presence.

One photo shows his booth with several white masks displayed on black velvet.

This was the year Amelia disappeared on her way to Yoseite.

Mercer noted the coincidence in the report.

Suspect Gray was in close proximity to the locations where both victims disappeared.

There is no direct evidence, but his presence at the events on the dates in question coincides with the time frame of the disappearances.

These facts did not guarantee a conviction, but they began to form the missing piece of the puzzle.

Gray became a figure that moved in the shadows of the artistic community.

Always there, but never visible.

Next, investigators turned to his digital past.

Experts from the cyber unit obtained a court order to examine old electronic devices seized during the search.

A computer, two external drives, and several flash drives.

Most of the files were destroyed or encrypted, but experts recovered a part of the online journal from search queries.

Among them are dozens of pages related to tourism, topographic maps, forest trails, and orientering.

The activity was recorded in June 2015, about a month before Ellis Web disappeared.

Key queries: John Mure trail schedule, Sequoia restricted areas, maps of streams in the northern area, how to find secluded places to take pictures.

Experts noted that the search was conducted consistently with precise specifications as if someone was planning a route to a specific area.

The internal report of the cyber unit reads, “The motive of the research is unknown, but the activity has the character of preparation for a trip to the forest.

” This was the first evidence that directly linked Gray to the area where Ellis’s body was found.

However, prosecutors demanded something more tangible than coincidence.

Without physical evidence or a confession, the case could have fallen apart in court.

The detectives decided to proceed cautiously.

After several meetings, Mercer filed a request with the court for permission to wiretap Gay’s studio.

The argument was possible involvement in a series of murders with an artistic motive.

The judge agreed, subject to the strict confidentiality of the operation.

On November 15th, at in the morning, a technical team quietly entered Greycraft studio.

All actions were recorded on cameras.

The microphones were placed in three locations.

Under the modeling table, near the firing kiln, and in a small storage room where the paint cans were kept.

The system worked autonomously and transmitted the signal to the server of the county police department.

The next morning, Gray returned to the studio as usual at 8.

The audio recordings show that he worked in silence for the first few hours with only the sound of water.

the grinding of metal tools and the distant rustling of the stove.

Then he turned on an old record player and listened to classical music.

The operatives analyzed hundreds of hours of recordings.

At first, they heard nothing suspicious.

Expert conversations about materials, temperature, glaze.

But a technician’s note appeared in a report dated November 23rd.

At and 16 minutes in the morning, the suspect is talking to himself, mentioning the phrase, “Everything has a face, even silence.” The phrase turned out to be literally the same as in Ellis Web’s notes found in her camp 3 years ago.

For Mercer, this was a signal.

He realized that there was no direct proof, but the match sounded too accurate.

A profiler psychologist was brought in to investigate.

He suggested that Gray felt the need to materialize control to recreate faces devoid of emotion in order to stop the randomness of human life.

At the same time, the team of archavists retrieved another interesting detail from the old databases.

In the catalog of the exhibition of contemporary ceramic art in Santa Clara in 2009, the author was listed as J.

Gray.

The title of the work, Silence Portrait number three.

The description in the catalog is short, a white form without details, created to explore the boundaries between body and image.

The experts, having looked at the photograph of the exhibit, noted the complete similarity with the mask found on Ellis Webb’s skull.

This confirmed that the motif could not have been accidental, but part of a long concept that the artist himself had been implementing for years.

Despite all the weight of the evidence, the prosecutor again refused to issue an arrest warrant.

There was not enough evidence.

All the police had were past exhibitions, search queries, and recordings from a hidden microphone where the old master spoke to silence.

Detective Mercer realized that to break this cycle, he had to catch him in the act.

The surveillance continued around the clock.

Gray remained in his studio, precise as a machine.

But for Mercer, the silence around this man already sounded suspiciously loud.

The audition in the studio had been going on for over a month.

The recordings contain only the sounds of a potter’s wheel turning, the noise of a fan, and short notes on a dictaphone where Jonathan Gray commented on technical processes.

There was no direct evidence until one day a phrase was heard that changed everything.

The audio dated December 27, 2018 captures Gray’s conversation with a visitor, a man who came to order a set of decorative masks.

The analyst’s report states, “At the ninth minute, the suspect mentions a place where he gets inspiration, and he quotes, “True form is born only where silence has weight.

Deep in the Seoia is my place, where it all begins.” Detective Glenn Mercer immediately ordered a check of all of Gray’s known travels over the past 3 years.

Using bank statements and surveillance footage, they were able to trace his movements.

Although most of his transactions were in cash, one transaction stood out.

A rent payment for a small warehouse in the town of Trilling Pines, 40 mi from Sequoia National Park.

The payment was made in cash, but the lease bore Gray’s signature.

Trilling Pines is a small community of less than 2,000 people, a former logging town.

The warehouse was located on the outskirts among old hangers that had once been used to store wood.

The owner, a 60-year-old farmer named John Kelly, told investigators that the tenant was a quiet older man with a neat beard who came every few months in a dark gray pickup truck.

According to him, he never stayed for long.

He just came in, checked the lock, sometimes took out some boxes.

I thought they were old materials for his shop.

Mercer decided to act immediately.

On December 28th, a district judge issued a secret search warrant for the warehouse.

The operation was scheduled for the morning of the 29th to reduce the risk of attracting attention.

When the police team arrived, everything looked abandoned.

Rusted doors, dust on the steps, cobwebs in the windows.

It was quiet and cool inside.

The investigators turned on the spotlights, and a scene that looked more like a laboratory than a warehouse gradually opened up before them.

Along the walls were wooden tables covered with a thin layer of gypsum dust.

On the shelves were jars of enamels, rolls of transparent film, and bags of white clay.

In the center is a workt with dried casts of masks, some of which were cut in half as if they were used as molds.

Forensic experts began to record everything on video.

There were old newspapers and sketch sheets on the floor.

One of the detectives noticed a series of photographs attached to the boardw but buttons.

They were crumpled and faded, but several of them showed Ellis Webb in hiking clothes by the river with pine trees in the background.

Further examination revealed that these photos were taken a few days before her disappearance.

In some of the shots, she didn’t even look at the camera.

It looked like she was being filmed from a distance.

The inspection report states, “A series of 19 photographs of one woman was found.

Visual identification is consistent with Ellis Web.

The images were taken in a wooded area, presumably in the vicinity of the John Mure Trail.

The source of origin is unknown.

Next to the photographs on the table was a hardcover notebook destroyed by the humidity.

It contained dozens of sketches of human faces without eyes or mouths.

Some pages are covered with strange symbols, lines that look like coordinate grids with notes in the form of triangles and numbers replaced by letters.

Forensic analysts have suggested that these could be cryptographic records or geographical markings.

On the last page is an inscription in black pencil.

When clay is silent, it tells the truth.

In the far corner of the warehouse, they found a box with small tools, spatulas, sanding heads, engraving knives, spatulas with the remains of hardened glue.

All the items were thoroughly cleaned, but experts were still able to detect microparticles of the same epoxy composition used to make the mask.

On another table was a small firing kiln, the same model as the one seen in the workshop of Visalia, only much newer.

Its body was warm, indicating recent use.

Inside were three porcelain pieces, all of the same shape, without holes, covered with white glaze.

One of them had the remains of human hair fused into the glaze on the inside.

After several hours of work, the site was declared an area of special interest.

Everything was seized for laboratory analysis.

The most disturbing discovery was a small metal box with papers.

It contained several unsigned envelopes, old checks, fragments of maps with markings, and small bags of clay of various colors.

On the back of one sheet was written in neat handwriting, SM level 9.

When the police checked the fingerprints on the found objects, some of them matched Jonathan Gay’s prints taken during the previous interrogation.

This was the most serious evidence of his direct presence in the warehouse.

But Gray himself was not there at the time of the search.

According to the owner of the premises, the last time he appeared was about 2 weeks ago when he brought several boxes and drove a pickup truck toward a national park.

A report from the Tular County Police Department noted, “The facility exhibits the hallmarks of a systematic activity aimed at manufacturing porcelain molds.

There is direct evidence of a connection between the subject and suspect, Jonathan Gray.

The next step is to identify possible off-site storage or manufacturing locations.” Detective Mercer spent a long time reviewing the recovered photographs of Ellis Web.

Each of them was taken from the same distance, as if someone had been watching her for days, waiting for the right moment.

Among the fragments of plaster and dust, they found the shadow of her last hours and a hint that Gray had not stopped.

Then, in the summer of 2015, for each mask on the shelves had a new unfinished outline.

In January of 2019, the police department’s cryptographers completed the decryption of the diary entries found in Jonathan Gay’s warehouse.

The symbols, which at first glance resembled messy lines, turned out to be a set of coordinates.

Each letter did not represent a number, but a direction, north, west, up, down.

With the help of a special program, we were able to recreate a map of the area leading to the southern border of the Seoia National Forest.

There, among the steep hills and old cedars, a place with a short note was marked SM level 9.

Detective Glenn Mercer requested a geological map of the region.

In the area where the coordinates converged, there was indeed an abandoned mine that had been closed at the beginning of the 20th century.

In the archives, it was listed under the code name Santa Maria.

It was separated from the road by about 6 mi of thicket and steep gorges.

According to local rangers, even hunters rarely went there because of the unstable soil and dangerous landslides.

On January 25th, the police launched an expedition together with a group of forensic experts.

Specialists from the search and rescue service equipped with drones and portable gueorar went out.

The weather conditions were difficult, cold, fog, and ice on the trails.

The team leader report stated, “The area is inaccessible, located at an altitude of over 4,000 ft.

the feeling of complete isolation.

After three hours of searching, the drone spotted a suspicious rectangular shape among the trees that looked like the entrance to an attic.

The group moved there on foot.

Where the main entrance used to be, there was now a half-filled archway covered with stones.

Inside was a narrow passageway that stretched about 20 yard into the depths.

The air was cold with a pungent smell of damp earth and metal.

Under one of the side slopes, the experts came across signs of fresh intervention.

The ground had been dug up recently, the top layer still retaining moisture.

When they carefully removed several boards, they found a wooden hatch.

Underneath it was a staircase that went down into a narrow underground space.

The flashlight snatched out of the darkness flat plywood walls and a small room about 10x 10 ft.

What they saw inside resembled a museum archive but with a sinister twist.

On the shelves were dozens of boxes labeled in neat handwriting.

Clark Durand Web.

Each one contained personal items, jewelry, watches, scraps of fabric, burnt fragments of photographic film.

On the floor were two wooden boxes containing unfinished porcelain masks.

They were thin, translucent with pencil marks along the edges.

Everything indicated that work was continuing on the project that Gray once called portraits of silence.

On one of the walls hung a board with photos pinned to it.

They were of the same women who were listed in the archives as missing.

Julia Clark in a colored coat standing by a rock.

Amelia Durand with a backpack at the edge of the forest.

Ellis Web in a tent reading a map.

All of the photos were taken from a distance from different angles but in the same manner.

Ominous detachment as if the subjects had been observed for a long time and methodically.

In some of the shots, the silhouette of a man can be seen in the background, blurry, but similar to gray.

Forensic scientists worked carefully, taking prints from each object.

They found several DNA fragments that matched the profiles of two women who had disappeared many years ago.

This became the decisive evidence.

The case was now classified as a series of premeditated murders.

One detail was particularly alarming.

On the floor near the desk was a large sheet of paper with marked circles and a signature at the top.

Unfinished sketch.

The drawing resembled a map of the area with marked points forming a kind of spiral.

In the center was the letter S and next to it was the word silence.

Experts later suggested that it could be a map of the places where he planned to create his next works.

A metal container with substances similar to glue and paint was found in a small cabinet-like box.

Gray’s fingerprints were found on the jars.

Next to it were several bottles labeled pure Kyolin, dating from the same year Ellis disappeared.

All of the items were carefully packed and sent to the lab.

An oppressive silence reigned underground.

One of the experts later wrote in a report, “The impression is that we are in a place created not for storage, but for contemplation.

Everything is on display as part of an exhibition.” At the exit of the mind, the group came across another strange detail, a small wooden stand with a clay tablet with a woman’s palm print on it.

Next to it was a sign that read level 9.

No one could explain what it meant.

After the examination, the area was closed.

The entrance to the mine was sealed and surveillance cameras were installed above it.

The detectives realized that they were dealing with a wellplanned system.

Everything indicated that Gray had used the mine as a private hideout, a place where he kept not only the materials, but also the very history of his crimes.

Mercer stood at the entrance for a long time, staring at the darkness that swallowed the light of the lanterns.

A short note remained in his notebook.

When art becomes silence, it demands a voice.

Find it before it speaks.

After that, the headquarters began preparing the operation.

Jonathan Gray was no longer just a suspect.

He was the target of a major investigation that was to end in the very forests where it all began.

In early February of 2019, surveillance of Jonathan Gray went into a roundthe-clock mode.

The operation was cenamed silence.

Detective Glenn Mercer coordinated a group of 12 agents who were on duty near his home in Viselia and monitored his every move.

After the discovery of the mine, no one doubted that Gray knew the circle was closing, but he acted as if nothing had happened.

He left the house to get materials, returned at a certain time, and continued to work in the studio.

His outward calmness only increased his anxiety.

On February 17th, at 24 hours 43 minutes, a surveillance camera recorded Gray leaving the house without turning off the light in the studio.

He was carrying a backpack and a small case that looked like a toolbox.

Instead of his usual pickup truck, he got into a rented dark-colored SUV and drove off toward the mountains.

The agents following him had to drive without headlights to avoid giving away their pursuit.

His route was through a highway that led directly to the northern entrance of the Sequoia National Forest.

Around midnight, the car turned off the main road onto an old dirt road where the asphalt turned to gravel and then disappeared among the pines.

The place was marked on the maps as a restricted area, an area that had not yet been cleared after a fire several years earlier.

Gray turned off the engine and got out.

Agents recorded him taking out a flashlight and walking deep into the forest, not using the trail.

The team followed him at a distance.

Each step echoed in silence.

The ice cracked underfoot and the light of the flashlight wandered between the trees, cutting through the darkness.

After 40 minutes of walking, Gray stopped at a rocky slope.

The cameras showed nothing further.

The signal had disappeared.

The thermal imager showed him bending down and opening something.

Then his silhouette disappeared into a black hole between the boulders.

Detective Mercer ordered a perimeter to be set up.

The SWAT team split into two groups.

One remained outside while the other, equipped with flashlights and body armor, cautiously moved toward the entrance.

What looked like a crevice from afar turned out to be a narrow cave covered with branches and stones.

Around the first bend, a small room opened up, looking like an underground closet.

The air was thick with the smell of dust and burnt clay.

When the light hit the walls, everyone realized where they were.

Inside was a table filled with tools, jars of paint, pieces of porcelain, and clay casts.

On the central surface was a fresh, still wet mask covered with a towel.

Next to it was a bowl of water, a sponge, and perfectly arranged spatulas.

Everything showed that the work had been going on before they arrived, but the worst was waiting on the back wall.

There was a large map of the West Coast from Washington to California.

There were dozens of red marks on it.

Each one was accompanied by a small sheet of paper with an inscription, name, date, place.

Among them are familiar names to the detectives.

Clark, King’s Canyon Park, July 2007.

Duran, Mariposa County, August 2011.

Web Seoia, July 2015.

Next to other marks are names that the police had never seen before.

These could be unknown victims who have not yet been reported.

In the right corner of the cave was an old camera on a tripod pointed directly at the desktop.

In the container under it were several flash cards, film, and some of the pictures had already been developed.

On them are masks suspended on thin ropes with captions under each.

Stage one.

Stage two before the silence.

Forensic experts later found that some of the photos were taken inside the same mine that was found a month ago.

While the team was recording the find, they heard a rustling from the depths of the cave.

One of the agents shown a flashlight and saw Gray.

He was standing against the wall holding a small cutter covered in white clay.

His clothes were dusty and his eyes were calm.

According to the participants of the operation, he did not try to escape and did not say a word.

He just quietly put the tool on the table and raised his hands.

The detention took place without resistance.

The report states, “Suspect Gray Jonathan was brought in at 15 minutes in the morning with no signs of alcohol or drug intoxication.

He was calm and did not make any objections.

He was taken to the office in the city of Visalia where detectives and a prosecutor were already waiting.

During the initial inspection of the cave, more than 40 items were seized.

maps, photos, tools, molds for casting, and notebooks with notes.

One of the notebooks contained a table with names and marks opposite each name.

Short phrases like completed, work in progress, source found.

Several pages contained fingerprints that matched his previous samples.

After the suspect was transported to the department, he was placed in a separate room for interrogation.

The cameras recorded him sitting motionless, hands folded in his lap, face expressionless.

He did not answer the detective’s questions about his motives, only nodded briefly, as if listening to music that no one could hear.

A doctor present during the interrogation described his condition as emotionally stable but distant.

After a day of silence, Grace signed a report of familiarization with the evidence.

The signature was neat without any wobble in his hand.

He was charged with three counts of premeditated murder with extreme cruelty, unlawful detention of persons, and destruction of evidence.

The prosecutor’s office immediately filed a motion for life imprisonment.

When forensic experts examined the mask found in the cave, it turned out that it had not yet been fired.

On the inner surface, there were traces of the same glue that Gray used in his previous works mixed with particles of human epidermis.

All the materials were transferred to the FBI where they confirmed the full correspondence to the criminals handwriting.

In an internal report, Detective Mercer wrote, “The subject acted with cold methodicality, motives unknown, probably viewed his actions as a process of creation.

Each victim is part of a larger plan.

After his arrest, Jonathan Gray did not say a word.

His silence was the final touch in a case that newspapers would later call silence under porcelain.

All the evidence pointed to him, but none revealed why.

In the photos from his arrest, he sits in a police car, looking straight into the lens.

His face is frozen like a mask white expressionless like a man who has finally become part of his own work.