Dead Guilty (15 page)

Diane
called David at the Waller crime scene first
to check up on her team.
‘‘How’s everything going?’’ she asked.
‘‘Going
fine. I
sneaked some
pictures of
the peo
ple watching.’’
‘‘Good for you.’’
‘‘We found a secret closet.’’
‘‘No. A secret closet?’’
‘‘It was next to the main closet, with a bookcase for
a door. You can imagine what ran through our minds
as we were opening it.’’
‘‘Collections of fingertips.’’
‘‘That’s what we all were thinking.’’
‘‘Well, what was in it?’’
‘‘His collection of memorabilia from the old Negro
Leagues. I’m sure he was keeping it hidden from bur
glars. You know he’s got a bat signed by Josh Gibson?
He
hit
over
nine
hundred
home
runs
in
his
career,
eighty-four in one season. I actually held a ball signed
by Satchel Paige. I mean, you should see the stuff the
guy had.’’
‘‘You think it was a burglary gone bad?’’
‘‘That’s what Chief Garnett thinks.’’
‘‘Was Raymond tied up like Chris Edwards?’’
‘‘No. His hair, face and chest are wet. That’s what
Garnett is keeping back.’’
‘‘Do I detect a note of disagreement? Is there any
evidence this is connected to Edwards or the Cobber’s
Wood victims?’’
‘‘Not exactly. But . . .’’ Diane heard sounds of David
walking. She assumed he was going someplace where
Garnett couldn’t hear him. ‘‘The place is tossed like
Edwards’. Chris Edwards was caught unawares in his
bathroom, dazed by a blow to the head and then tied
up, but he was able to put up a fight. I think there’s
a possibility that the killer tried the same thing with
Raymond, but hit him a little too hard, tried to revive
him, but he had killed him.’’
‘‘The
perp
could
still
have
been
looking
for
the
baseball stuff.’’
‘‘Yes, he could. We’ll see if there’s anything in the
trace evidence similar to Edwards.’’
‘‘Keep up the good work. I hope we are all able to
get some sleep sometime this week.’’
‘‘Sleep? You don’t still do that, do you?’’
‘‘Call me if you need me.’’
‘‘Frank not back yet?’’
‘‘As a matter of fact, he is.’’
‘‘Does he know about the flowers?’’
‘‘The
flowers.
It
turns
out
the
person
who
left
them called.’’
‘‘Oh,
who
was
it?’’
David
had
asked
about
the
flowers in jest, but he sounded cautious now. Diane
briefly
told
him
about
the
caller.
David
whistled.
‘‘Okay, this isn’t good.’’
‘‘It could be completely innocent...’’
‘‘Normal people don’t act like that—only crazies or
people guilty of something.’’
‘‘Can you hand your phone to Garnett.’’
‘‘Sure.’’
After a moment, Garnett’s voice came on the phone
and Diane related the story a third time.
‘‘I don’t like this. You say you kept him talking long
enough for the phone company to trace the call?’’
Diane hesitated a beat. ‘‘Yes. A policeman went to
check it out, but I imagine he’s long gone.’’
‘‘I’ll call and tell them to talk to anyone who might
have seen anybody using that pay phone.’’
‘‘I got an answer from the E-mail. You know of a
policeman
named
Lenderman
or
something
like
that?’’
‘‘There’s a Marty Lenderman. You saying it’s him?
He’s a very down-to-earth guy. I can’t even imagine
it’s him.’’
‘‘The person who replied said they didn’t send the
message and not to bother them, that their father was
a policeman. The address was JMLndrmn. I just added
some vowels to what looked like it might be the last
name. Does he have a kid with the initials J. M.?’’
‘‘Sure
does.
Jennifer
Marie.
She’s
only
about
six
teen. You think she did this as a prank?’’
‘‘I
don’t
know.
Can’t
spammers
hijack
E-mail
addresses?’’
‘‘I’ll talk to Marty. In the meantime, I’ll have some
one trace where the E-mail message came from.’’
‘‘I can probably do that here.’’
‘‘Okay.
All
this
may
be
just
some
prank,
but
be
careful anyway. I think Raymond was probably killed
for
his
collection.
It’s
pretty
valuable,
according
to
your guy David.’’
‘‘I heard him drooling over the phone.’’
Garnett laughed. ‘‘I haven’t heard of most of the
guys except Satchel Paige, but that ball by itself should
be worth some money.’’
*
*
*
The museum restaurant was a maze of tall archways
made of salvaged bricks that looked like it could have
been an ancient monastery library, and yet for all its
vaulted height and medieval atmosphere, it felt cozy.
Five dark rough-hewn wood tables sat in each of the
five chambers made by
four contiguous archways at
right angles to each other. Booths in arched brick al
coves lined the walls. Diane and Frank chose a booth.
Near
the
entrance
in
another
recess
sat
a
line
of
four computers—for all its Old World museum look,
the restaurant was also an Internet cafe.
The restaurant was
known for its great
salad and
fruit bar. It also had a varied menu. Diane made her
self a chef salad with a fruit side dish and took it back
to the table. Frank ordered a steak.
‘‘How’s Star?’’ Diane asked as she sat down oppo
site Frank.
He tore off a piece of bread and dipped it in herbed
olive oil. ‘‘She’s like that little girl with the curl in the
middle of her forehead.’’
‘‘She’s not really horrid, is she?’’
The waitress brought Frank’s steak. As Diane ate
her salad, she was beginning to wish she’d ordered a
piece
of
red
meat
too.
She
felt
the
need
for
a
lot
of protein.
‘‘Star’s
doing
pretty
good,
considering
her
family
was murdered a year ago. She wanted to go with me
to the West Coast—insisted that she didn’t need any
one watching her while I was in court. Can you imag
ine me letting her loose by herself in San Francisco?
Want some of my steak?’’
‘‘No, go ahead and eat,’’ she said, but Frank cut off
a
piece on
the
tender side
and put
it
on her
salad.
‘‘Frank, that’s the best part.’’
‘‘If you’re going to insist on burning the candle at
both
ends, you
need to
eat.
So, tell
me about
your
mummy. Know anything about him yet?’’
‘‘So far, we’ve X-rayed him. Jonas is translating the
sarcophagus, though it’s probably not his.’’
Diane
related
what
they
had
discovered,
skipping
over the details of what abscesses were like at a time
when dental care was not what it is today. Frank was
laughing
over
the
story
of
the
Victorian
pickle
jar
when Diane took the last bite of her fresh pineapple.

The
white walls and overhead lighting did make the
room look bright, as the shiny tables, sinks and micro
scopes made it look new.

‘‘You’ve
been here. You’re one of the few who’ve
had the grand tour.’’
‘‘I suppose I’m surprised
it hasn’t fallen into that
dingy
hospital
look.
Do
you
paint
the
walls
every
few weeks?’’
‘‘I’m very neat in my work.
I clean all the blood
spatters off my walls every day. You remember where
my office is?’’
Diane
led
him
to
a
corner
door,
unlocked
it
and
turned on the light. The small office had pale off-white
walls that, if she remembered correctly from the paint
can,
was
called
Candle
Glow.
The
floor
was
green
slate,
the
desk
and
filing cabinets
a
dark
walnut.
A
long burgundy leather couch sat against one wall, its
matching chair close to her desk. There was adequate
space, but no more.
Although she needed a private office in the osteol
ogy
lab,
it
was
her
second
office,
and
she
hadn’t
wanted to use more space than absolutely necessary.
She chose the leather and wood furniture so the room
wouldn’t look as hard-edged as the lab with its stark
metal tables and impersonal equipment, but something
about the room was still cold. Perhaps it was the lack
of a carpet. She didn’t have a carpet installed because
she wanted neither the static electricity nor the fibers
it would generate. The walls were mostly bare—one
lone watercolor of a wolf hunting in the wild.
‘‘You can rest in here, if you need to,’’ she said.
‘‘Actually,
I
got
a
lot
of
rest
on
the
plane.
Why
don’t I watch you work?’’
‘‘All right. But it’s like watching paint dry.’’
‘‘I think you underestimate yourself.’’ He drew her
into another kiss. In the privacy of her office, Diane
didn’t feel obliged to break off as soon. ‘‘You know,’’
said Frank, when he pulled away, ‘‘this looks like a
real comfortable couch.’’
‘‘It
is.
If
you
need
to
rest,
I’m
sure
it’ll
be
soft
enough. I have to look at Red Doe now. If we can
find where these people belong, we can discover who
killed them.’’
Red
Doe
sat
in
the
box
on
a
table,
waiting.
As
Diane laid out the bones, Frank walked around the
lab looking at the microscopes, wall charts, books and
various other lab paraphernalia. When she started the
examination, he wandered back over and watched.
‘‘Male or female?’’
Diane looked up at him silently.
‘‘Sorry,
I’ve
never
seen
you
work
before
and
I’d
like to know how you do it. You know, in case I come
across some bones.’’ He grinned.
‘‘If you come across any bones, you call in an an
thropologist,’’ she said. A moment passed before she
spoke again. ‘‘It’s female. You can tell by the pelvis.’’
The pubic symphysis had more wear than the other
two, but not enough to throw it into another age cate
gory. All the victims were around the same age. Red
may have been a little older, but she also may have
been more active. The muscle attachments on her pel
vis
were more
developed than
Blue’s—and Green’s.
Interesting.
Red
Doe’s
face
was
orthognathic,
with
an
almost
flat profile. Her cranial index—the ratio of breadth to
length—was
the
lowest
number
in
the
mongoloid
range. In fact, all her cranial indices measured at the
low
end
of
the
mongoloid
range.
Red’s
teeth
had
even-edged
occlusion,
but
she
did
not
have
shoveltooth incisors. Like Blue and Green, Red had no cavi
ties. They all had grown up with fluoride and regular
dental checkups.
‘‘She’s Asian,’’ said Diane.
Frank squinted at the skull. ‘‘How can you tell?’’
‘‘There are certain features you look for, but mainly
it’s
in
the
math.
There
are
indices
calculated
from
measurements
of
precise
points
on
the
skull.
The
index numbers fall within ethnic ranges. There are also
differences in the rest of the skeleton that fall within
ethnic categories. That’s why accurate measurement is
important and why I must do so much of it.’’
‘‘Looks
like
there’d
be
computer
programs
that
would compute these things.’’
‘‘There are and I have them, but I still have to do
the measuring.’’
‘‘Your
fancy
machine
doesn’t
take
the
measure
ments?’’
‘‘It does make external measurements for the skull,
but I still have to make all the other measurements
on
the
skeleton
the
old-fashioned
way
and
put
the
numbers into the program. In the end, I’ll have a very
detailed mathematical description of the three skele
tons to give Sheriff Braden.’’
‘‘These bones look nice and clean,’’ said Frank.
‘‘Raymond . . .’’ She paused. Her mind went back
to the autopsy, his good humor, his competence, his
interest
in
what
she
did.
‘‘Raymond
Waller,
Lynn
Webber’s assistant, cleaned them.’’
‘‘You all right?’’
Diane met Frank’s gaze and realized he didn’t know
anything about Raymond. ‘‘He died tonight—he was
murdered.’’
‘‘Is that the crime scene your team’s on?’’
Diane nodded.
‘‘That’s
certainly
a
coincidence—him
having
just
worked on these bodies.’’
‘‘Especially when you consider that one of the men
who
found
the
bodies
was
also
murdered
and
the
other one is missing.’’
Frank stared at her a long moment. Having said it
out loud to Frank, it didn’t sound like it could possibly
be a coincidence, even though she had been kind of
buying into Garnett’s theory that Raymond’s murder
had to do with his collection of Negro Leagues base
ball memorabilia.
From
the
look
on
Frank’s
face,
she
could
tell
he
didn’t
think
it
was
a
coincidence.
But
Frank
never
believed
in
coincidences.
In
his
universe,
everything
was
connected;
you
just
had
to
follow
the
train
of
consequences of that butterfly flapping his wings.
‘‘That’s
certainly
interesting.
And
you’re
getting
calls and E-mails about the murders?’’
‘‘I don’t know that they’re about the murders. Nei
ther the E-mails nor the caller mentioned any of the
murders.’’
‘‘I’ll trace the E-mail account for you tomorrow.’’
‘‘Garnett’s working on it—I think.’’
‘‘I’ll have a look too.’’
‘‘The
murders
could
be
a
coincidence,
couldn’t
they?’’ said Diane, not really believing it herself.
‘‘Not in a town this size.’’
His comment just hung in midair, effectively ending
this part of the conversation. Diane returned to her
measurements.
As
she
examined
the
postcranial
skeleton,
all
the
bones except the skull, Frank watched everything she
did with a keen interest.
‘‘Red Doe may have been a ballet dancer,’’ Diane
said, breaking the silence.
‘‘How’s that?’’ asked Frank.
‘‘She has very well-developed attachments from her
calf muscles, greater than any other part of her body.
That’s a major muscle used in ballet dancing.’’
‘‘Calf
muscles,
that’d
be
the
gastrocnemius,’’
said
Frank.
‘‘Very good. You know your muscles?’’
‘‘You have them on the chart over there.’’
‘‘You memorized the chart while I was laying out
the bones?’’
‘‘I just saw a couple of names I recognize. Besides,
anyone who ever lifted weights knows the names of
the major muscle groups—you know, deltoids, pecto
ral, biceps, six-pack.’’
Diane laughed and shook her head.
‘‘There must be more evidence than that—I mean,
maybe she just did a lot of calf exercises.’’
‘‘Red Doe’s had some serious inflammation in her
right flexor hallucis longus, probably due to the plan
tar flexing involved in being
en pointe.
’’
Frank stared at her a moment, amusement dancing
in his eyes. ‘‘Okay, she had sore muscles from dancing
on her toes.’’
‘‘Frank, you surprise me. That wasn’t half bad.’’
‘‘Well,
I
know
what
flexing
means,
and
jumping
around on your toes can’t be good for you—besides,
I’m a detective.’’
‘‘The hallucis longus tendon starts on the fibula, one
of the lower leg bones, goes under the foot and con
nects to the big toe. That constant hyperflexed posi
tion can do damage to the tendons severe enough to
leave lesions on the bones. You’re right—it’s not good
for the toes or any of the joints. During a dance, the
dancer can increase the forces on her joints as much
as ten times her body weight.
‘‘Red Doe’s toes show signs of stress from that kind
of
pounding.
That
goes
along
with
other
lesions
I
found on the left femur, where she had chronic tendi
nitis of her psoas tendon from the repetitive turn-out
position
of
the
leg.
I
suspect,
but
don’t
know,
that
Red went
en pointe
too young.’’
‘‘Why
in
the
world
would
anyone
put
their
body
through that?’’
‘‘Would you like to discuss football?’’
‘‘Yeah, well, that’s different.’’
‘‘Right.’’