The Big Thaw (16 page)

“What’s ‘M.F.D.’ stand for?” asked Nancy, in a hoarse-sounding voice.

“Mean Fucking Dude,” said Shamrock. Her voice sounded a little weak.

“Oh.”

“Got an eraser? I had it down as Mighty Fuckin’ Dumb.” I chuckled.

Actually, it went rather well, as autopsies go. I tended to get in quite close, and had to back away for Shamrock several times. She was having no problems at all, which was kind of too bad, as I had all sorts of “Shamrock” and “green” lines ready. Well, she was a bit pale, maybe. Mostly the smell, I think.

There were very clear “tattoos” on each of the three entrance wounds. Perfect circles made by the impact of unconsumed particles of gunpowder moving out of a gun barrel at several hundred feet per second. Because the particles are so small, they disperse and slow very quickly. Perfect circles such as these meant the end of the gun barrel was in contact with the skin when the shot was fired…

“Contact wounds,” said Dr. Peters. “No doubt about it.”

You just can’t get closer than that.

He washed the head of Victim Number One, filling the drain gutters in the table with pale pink water, which ran down toward the body’s feet, and into a clear tube which was plugged into a large container. With the dried blood out of the way, the tattooing was even more pronounced. “Victim Number One, Royce Colson,” he intoned into his recorder.

“We won’t probe,” said Dr. Peters. “We’ll do sections. The X rays have the gross angles for us…”

With that, he incised the skin in a half circle around the top of the skull, and proceeded to fold the scalp down over the victim’s face. He picked up a small rotary saw, and began cutting around the circumference of the head, being very careful not to disturb the wounds. As he was beginning to cut, I peered in closer, and saw the entry wound. Small dark hole, with reddish and bluish discoloration around it. Big bruise, or, at least, it would have been. Fascinating to see one under the skin. The cracking of the skull was just barely visible. Not like a fissure or anything, just a hairline crack.

The smell of the hot bone under the saw, coupled with a fine mist rising from the work, lent sort of a surreal air to things. The whine of the saw was occasionally interrupted by a deeper tone as it encountered more pressure when Dr. Peters had to change position.

Nancy left the room. Wise move. I’ve never understood the derision some people heap on those who have sensibilities. I, for example, can look at blood and entrails all day without a twinge. Yet, if somebody vomits, I likely will, too. Which is the main reason I appreciated somebody having the courtesy to leave before they tossed up their lunch. But I also respected their judgment.

Dr. Peters removed the brain, and placed it on a small cutting board that rested on the victim’s chest. “Let’s see where this one ended up,” he said, shining a light into the cranial cavity. “There! See, the dark spot right there…”

He was pointing to what looked at first like a small lump of clumpy bluish blood. If you looked really close, though, you could see it was a misshapen slug, in a glossy dollop of what appeared to be mucus. Cerebrospinal fluid, plus membrane.

“See,” said Dr. Peters. “It was coming just about straight down the pipe, so to speak. Just missed the foramen magnum. Good thing, lot harder to find if it went down that road.”

We stood back, while Dr. Peters used a probe to indicate the location of the slug for Shamrock, who took three photos with each camera. Dr. Peters then picked the bullet up, and used a very sharp probe to scratch an initial in the base of the round. He placed it in a bag, and initialed it, along with the date, time, place, and his name.

Dr. Peters moved over the victim’s chest, to the brain which rested on the cutting board. With all the commentary he was muttering into his tape recorder, and with all the sight-seeing he was helping us with, I couldn’t help noticing that he was very, very gentle with the cadaver. Almost like it was capable of being injured further. He reached over to a stainless-steel tray, and picked up a large knife. Looked to me every bit like a large piece of cutlery you’d find in a kitchen. Complete with a black plastic handle.

“Where’d you get the knives?” I was just making conversation, really. Mildly curious.

“Katie’s Kitchen Korner,” said Dr. Peters, as he judiciously sliced into the brain. “Set of four assorted sizes. Great for this sort of thing.” He laid a large portion of the brain aside. “Not nearly as much as they’d ask for the same sort of equipment in a surgical supply store. And surgical supply stores rarely have sales.” He probed the tissues with gloved fingers. “Don’t need a scalpel for this… it’s not like we have to worry about scars or healing…”

“Oh.” I was imagining a TV commercial … And, wait, there’s more…

“Wonderful set,” he continued. “Great place to shop.”

“Sure is,” said Shamrock. “I got a ten-inch frying pan and a French whisk there last month.”

“The whisks that were on special, near the checkout counter?” asked Dr. Peters.

“You bet,” she said. “Great for meringue…”

That got her points.

“Ah, here we are,” said Dr. Peters. “The bullet’s track.”

He pointed at the sectioned brain, and I was very hard put to see what he was talking about. “Where?”

“Here. Tissues swell back after the passage of a projectile like this one … but see the perforation in the membrane here … and the depression in this white tissue here?”

That I did. We studied the track for a few seconds. No real reason, but it was important evidence, even though we ourselves wouldn’t be testifying about it. After a few moments, Dr. Peters began hunting for the second bullet. He looked at the X rays. “Should be right about here…”

With the brain on the board, I had a difficult time maintaining my orientation between it and the holes in the skull. Not Dr. Peters.

“Here we go … fragment … and here…”

He pointed the track and fragments out to us. We “studied” them, too. While we did, Dr. Peters was slicing some very fine tissues off the brain, and preparing them for the laboratory examination that would be done.

He opened the chest and abdomen, and we continued our tour. No remarkable evidence turned up. That was good. We sure as hell weren’t expecting any. Dr. Peters did complain about the pain in his hands, though. Very, very cold inside the victims. You could see little sparkles of frost underneath as he removed the liver.

The second victim was much like the first, except for the additional wound and track. We found only what we’d expected, and pending laboratory examination, there had been absolutely no surprises. Good news. But the slugs were so mangled I still couldn’t definitely identify them as .22s. Then again, I’m not a ballistics guy.

At the conclusion of the autopsies, I had a brief meeting with Dr. Peters, while Nancy and Shamrock sat in the waiting room.

I had a question I just had to ask. “Doc, would either of the victims be capable of any significant movement after the shots were fired?”

“I don’t think so,” he said. “Although Victim Two might not have gone straight down.”

“Dirk Colson,” I said. “The one with two wounds.”

“Right. The first one went well forward, and might not have laid him down immediately. Which may well have been the reason for the second. I would expect him to have been seated or kneeling. Didn’t topple with the first shot. But both wounds came from just about the same angle, in just about the same spot. From the nature of them, not more than a second apart.” He thought for a second. “The scene tells me that they weren’t lying down when they were shot. The angles aren’t right for that, given the clearance. And, if somebody’s lying down, on a floor, for example, the shots would come in the front, back, or sides of the skull, not the top. And the one with the exit wound put the round into the wall. So, no, they were seated or kneeling, or standing. Not lying down.” “Why were you thinking they were lying down?” “That’s common in executions,” said Dr. Peters. “Just as common as kneeling.”

“You think that’s for sure what we have here?” “Now that I’m certain of the contact wounds, and the track … Yes. I should think so.”

It wasn’t exactly a revelation, but there’s always a certain sense of having sailed over a major hurdle, when the pathologist reaches a definite conclusion.

So, where did that leave us? Well, we were still in the creek, but with fewer holes in the boat.

“The lab results will be in a few days, I hope,” said Dr. Peters. “There have been some problems lately…”

True enough. The state kept cutting the criminalistics laboratory budget, reducing the number of criminalists and analysts every year. There was such a backlog that they were currently unable to guarantee processing marijuana samples within forty-five days, for example. Doesn’t sound like much of a problem, but since forty-five days is the limit for a speedy trial, it meant that a savvy defendant could get you in court before you had any confirmation of evidence. As in “acquittal.”

We would have priority. But it still would be several days, at best, before the toxicology report came back.

“Any real problems with that?” I asked.

“Well,” drawled Dr. Peters, “unless somebody got to them with an aerosol that caused instant paralysis … probably not.”

“There’s no sign of restraints,” I said. “Is that going to give us a problem with the execution approach?”

“No,” said Dr. Peters. “Not at all. The fact that there were no marks, I mean. Marks are caused by very tight restraints, by strong overpressure caused by someone resisting the restraints, or residue left by adhesives. And by length of time.” He shrugged. “It’s like wearing a belt with your trousers. It doesn’t leave prominent marks when you take it off.” He looked at me, and smiled. “Well, with some exceptions, of course.”

“Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.” He leaned back against a stainless-steel sink. “Don’t forget that many things can restrain. Fear. Surprise. Dominance. The totally unexpected.”

He described a case where a man had shot three women in the lingerie section of a department store. The three had been several feet apart, when the man came in and shot the clerk. He turned, and shot the customer she’d been waiting on, and then walked over to another clerk and shot her. Only the first clerk had died. She’d been his ex-wife. The other two victims had both been rooted to the spot by disbelief.

“He was quick about it,” he said. “If he’d hesitated a few seconds, either of the other two victims probably would have reacted. But he shot all three within two to three seconds.”

“Pretty efficient,” I said.

“Remarkably so. And he never said a word. Lent an aspect of unreality to the whole thing. The other two women said in interviews that they’d been so immobilized by disbelief that they didn’t even become afraid until after they had been shot.” He shook his head. “The third woman took several seconds just convincing herself that she’d actually been harmed.”

“I can see that. Environment, too, don’t you think? If it had happened in a parking lot, they probably would have been more on edge in the first place.”

“Precisely so. Even more if it had been at night.” He began to take off his lab apron.

“Then,” I said, “let me try this … Okay, our two victims break and enter what appears to be a vacant home. They just gain access, when they’re confronted. Let’s say they claim to be cops, looking for a burglar. It’s worked for them before, maybe even something they’ve planned to say.”

“Yes…”

“So they’re really prepared to talk their way out of the thing, and all of a sudden, somebody sticks a gun in their face and says, ‘Kneel down and put your hands behind your head.’ One of them says something bright, like ‘What?’ and gets shot for being reluctant. The other kneels, right?”

“I would,” said Dr. Peters.

“And probably asks not to be shot.”

“And…”

“And, while he’s asking, the captor walks around behind him and pops two into his head.”

“Could have been,” said Dr. Peters. “Sounds to me like you have a theory you’ve been working on.”

“Well … yeah. Sort of. Long way to go, though.”

“I certainly couldn’t rule that scenario out,” said Dr. Peters.

“Sort of like ‘Don’t shoot, we’re cops.’ Then ‘You’re what?’ ‘Cops.’
Bang
. ‘Don’t shoot me!’
Bang, bang
.” I thought about what I’d just said. “You know what, I’ll bet nobody had to say, ‘Get on your knees.’ I’ll bet he did that spontaneously.”

In my mind, at least, another little piece drifted into place. “The second victim…” I said to myself. “Yeah…”

“Elapsed time … what … five seconds? Hi.
Boom
. Hello.
Boom, boom
. You go in…” I looked at the big wall clock with the sweep second hand. “Four seconds, maybe, if you have to wait for the first one to drop, and move to the second. All the way to ten minutes, once the second victim gets to his knees. Getting the first one dead, and the second one controlled is the key.”

Back outside, where the air was fresh and cold, I met with Nancy and Shamrock.

“Well, that was fun.” Nancy patted Shamrock on the shoulder. “I’m glad one of us is hardy enough for this.”

“No problems,” said Shamrock, who was busy ejecting the last roll of film from her “official” camera.

“Let’s go sit in our car, and we can talk a couple of details,” I suggested. “Where it’s warmer.”

Car meetings aren’t the best way to do things, but cops have to use ’em all the time. It’s cramped, the roar of the defroster muffles things, and the coffeepot is usually several miles away. But we managed. Shamrock transferred the required film to us, and we went over the ground rules.

“No number of shots,” I said.

“Sure,” said Nancy.

“Either specific or vague. None of the ‘several shots were fired,’ or anything like that. Just ‘shot.’ That’s plenty. And no caliber. Nothing about a .22, or a .38 or anything like that.”

“Okay, Carl. Not to worry.”

“Now, how are you planning to go about getting us what we want?”

“Interview, like a follow-up. You know. Back to the ones who mentioned cops being killed. Like I’m following up a lead. Get talking. At least let them know I’m interested.” Nancy turned to Shamrock. “She’ll get some shots. One or two, with the interview subject.”