The Body Keeper

by Anne Frasier

  He handed her a helmet. She put it on and adjusted the strap under her chin. “Why does this seem so odd to me?”

  “Because we’re detectives?”

  “No.”

  “Because we’re going to ride down sidewalks and the middle of a city street?”

  “No.”

  “Because I’m driving a snowmobile?”

  “That’s it.” She swung her leg over the machine and settled on the seat behind him.

  “I was driving a snowmobile by the time I was eight.”

  “Doesn’t sound safe.”

  “I’m still here. Only one concussion.”

  “That explains a few things.”

  “Hang on.” He dropped his face shield and she did the same. Then he gunned the engine and they leapt forward.

  The snowmobile was loud, but not as annoying as it would have been if she hadn’t been riding on it. Like any other intrusive sound—vacuuming, leaf-blowing—it was more irritating to be the innocent victim of the roar. Was there a word for that?

  The noise left no opportunity for conversation. It was probably a testament to the growth of their relationship, but she didn’t feel uncomfortable sitting close to him, and she didn’t mind that he was driving the snowmobile and she wasn’t. That didn’t mean she was wrapped around him. Her hands inside black gloves gripped a leather seat strap behind her. Even when he turned sharply, she didn’t give in to the reflex to grab his shoulders and hang on.

  Uriah slowed at intersections but didn’t stop for red lights. Even a snowmobile could get bogged down in deep snow, and there were very few vehicles to be cautious of. She spotted a couple of people trying to walk dogs dressed in knit sweaters and booties, but for the most part the streets were empty, and only a rare business had an open sign in the window. The ride might have actually been enjoyable except for the howling wind and near-whiteout conditions. It almost could have felt like a day off, a snow day, an interesting ride around the sleeping city, until she spotted Loring Park from around Uriah’s shoulder.

  So far, they’d gotten almost two feet of snow, but oddly enough there were areas of the frozen lake that were polished clear from strong winds. Some of the equipment trucked in to cut and remove the ice containing the body of John Doe was still there, its removal possibly hampered by the weather. Police vehicles and unmarked cars from their department were parked haphazardly on the ice. Uriah drove the snowmobile across the lake and stopped near the cluster of unoccupied vehicles and yellow crime-scene tape strung between metal poles that had been driven into the ice. Jude stepped from the machine and flipped her face shield to the top of her helmet. Uriah did the same.

  The blocks removed from the lake by the harvesters were still there, sections managing to catch rays of faint sunlight and reflect it back, monolithic and alien in their stark beauty. On site was a crew attempting to set up a tent, the kind of thing erected for the purpose of containing a crime scene when conditions were harsh. A man and a woman pounded metal spikes into the ice as others struggled to keep the large sheets of snapping and popping canvas from pulling them across the lake like parasails.

  Detective Valentine approached. He was a competent detective and a relatively new hire from Chicago. Even in the aftermath of a blizzard, he was well dressed in a long black coat, black snow boots, and black leather gloves. His only concession to the brutality of the weather was the fur-lined cap with earflaps, yet he somehow managed to make that look fashionable. With a grim expression, Valentine motioned for them to follow him. Officers backed away so the detectives could assess the scene.

  A hazy sun hung in the sky above, black trees stood at the shoreline, and the snow that circled and swirled no longer fell from the sky but instead was swept up and carried through the air to be redeposited when it found a drift to cling to. From somewhere in the distance came the sound of snowplows: the thud as the blade was lowered, followed by the revving engine, then the back-up alert. Accompanying it was a lower whir as citizens dug their way out of garages and fired up snowblowers.

  Directly below Jude’s feet, while nature amazed and paralyzed, another body slept. The repeat of the scene wasn’t lost on her. The murky ice, the size and shape of the body several inches below. This time the surface was clear, polished by snow and wind. The victim looked like a male child, dressed in jeans and a blue T-shirt, sneakers. White face, blue lips, and light hair.

  She looked up at Uriah. “What the hell is going on?”

  “Wish I knew.”

  She scanned the expanse of ice. Off in the distance, officers were walking back and forth in a weak grid formation. “They’re looking for more.”

  “Just making sure,” Valentine said. “A thorough search will be conducted now that the weather is clearing.”

  “Who found him?” Jude asked.

  “The ice cutters returned to remove the rest of their machinery, and in the process spotted him. Probably because the blowing wind cleaned and polished the ice enough to make him more visible. That’s the theory anyway.” He glanced up and saw an officer juggling carryout cups from a nearby café. “Excuse me.” He shot off for the coffee. Before Jude could emotionally or visually process the scene, she got a text from Elliot.

  It’s always night in his drawings.

  It took her a second to realize Elliot was talking about the boy. He included a drawing of a stick figure and what might have been a snowman. His observation was true. The background was black.

  After a moment, she dropped to her knees to get a closer look at the body. The lake wasn’t deep. Probably ten or fifteen feet in the center. Here, maybe eight. The victim was about a foot below the surface. Frozen beside him were plants: pondweed, muskgrass, and lacy milfoil. Years ago at her family’s cabin up north, they’d used a special wheeled rake to remove the growth when it got so thick people could no longer swim without getting caught. One time she’d gotten so tangled, she’d almost drowned. She’d screamed, and her mother had come running.

  Uriah crouched beside her.

  “I gave the boy a bath last night,” she said. “He was terrified of the tub.”

  “That tub is kind of freaky.”

  “He loved the toenails.”

  “Maybe he’s never been in one.”

  “Pretty sure he has. That was the problem. He was okay until I tried to make him lie back to wash his hair.”

  “Another sign of abuse?”

  “Maybe. I hope Child Protection Services picks him up soon. I don’t like feeling this way. Responsible for upsetting him with unknown triggers.” And worrying about him when she wasn’t there. “Why would anybody want to be a parent? I think it must always hurt. I don’t mean childbirth, obviously, but this—” She meant where they were and what they were looking at. Everything about parenthood seemed rife with pain, but to lose a child in such a way . . . Most mothers would die for their children. But then there were others . . .

  Instead of the pep talk she’d expected, Uriah was quiet a moment before saying, “I think that’s true. And maybe why I try to protect my mother from the bad things in my life.”

  She thought about his hospitalization last fall. He was keeping something to himself, and now he’d given her a possible reason.

  She took a few photos, her fingers aching from the cold. When she was done, she stuck her phone away, slipped her gloves back on, and got to her feet. “Two dead bodies, both about the same age. It’s like somebody put in an order for blond boys, then changed his mind and threw them away.”

  CHAPTER 14

  At Headquarters, Jude checked in to make sure everything was going okay with Elliot and the boy. She and Uriah had left the frozen lake two hours ago, with Valentine still in charge. There would be a repeat of the previous ice harvest, but this time the company planned to leave all equipment on site until it was confirmed that no more bodies were to be found.

  “We’re making chocolate chip cookies,” Elliot told her.

  The boy’s photo had been run through all t
he databases, including the Polly Klaas Foundation. No match. A couple of people at the police department were raking through NamUs, but the sheer volume was daunting. Every forty seconds a child in the US went missing. Every forty seconds.

  “Really homemade this time?” she asked Elliot, recalling a plate of Oreos he’d left at her door.

  “We’re lacking some ingredients, so we’ll see.”

  “I’ll try to be back in a few hours.”

  “Don’t worry. We’re fine.”

  After she hung up, Uriah motioned to her. “I want you to see something. I was going to tell you about this last night before the power outage.” He was sitting at his desk, hand on a mouse as he stared at his monitor, the glow turning his face a pasty blue. She rolled her chair close and sat down to view the screen.

  “I’ve been going through all available records,” he said, “and we’ve got missing young boys the age of Shaun Ford going back a helluva lot of years.”

  Not that odd, unfortunately, but she waited to see what he found so interesting.

  He clicked the mouse. “I pulled up images of several, and the weird thing is many of them are pretty similar in physical characteristics. I made a spreadsheet. Missing persons, twelve-year-old blond boys with blue eyes.” Another series of clicks. “Just sent it to you so you’ll have a copy.”

  She looked at the spreadsheet open on his screen. “You’ve been busy.” There were hundreds of names and dates. “How far do these go back?”

  “Twenty-five years, but they could go back even further because old information has to be added post-case. The farther back in time we go, the more likely we don’t have complete reports or we have missing reports. It’s all just a weird coincidence, right? If you go back far enough, you’re bound to find similarities, right?”

  “It’s uncanny and definitely bears deeper investigation.” Her phone rang. Child Protection Services. She answered.

  After a brief catch-up, the caller said, “Some streets have been reopened, and we should be able to pick up the child around seven tonight.”

  Jude experienced the expected relief, accompanied by a flash of anxiety.

  Later, before retrieving her car from the police department garage, she walked two blocks to a department store that had reopened after the blizzard. Shelves of food were empty, but she was interested in toys and children’s clothing. She wanted the boy to have some things to take with him when he left.

  CHAPTER 15

  Jude buzzed in the people from Child Protection Services. After climbing three flights of stairs, they were in her apartment, introducing themselves as they unwound long knit scarves from their necks. Jenny Hill, who was fairly young, maybe in her twenties, and Kim Tharp, a woman around fifty, with long dreadlocks. She seemed to be in charge. They sat on the couch, shrugging out of coats and hats and gloves.

  The child sat on the floor, playing with the toys Jude had purchased a few hours earlier. She’d also bought two stuffed animals—a panda and an orange cat—some items of clothing, and a backpack with cartoon characters. She’d gotten a little carried away. The boy didn’t appear interested in the visitors and hadn’t even glanced up at them. He was fixated on a tyrannosaurus that had come in a small red suitcase with several other dinosaurs. What was it with boys and dinosaurs?

  “Like you, we’ve been in touch with Missing Persons,” Kim said as Jenny slipped to the floor in what would probably prove to be a futile attempt to engage the boy, considering how distracted he was by the toys. “With their input, we’ve decided to release the child’s photo to local TV stations and also post it to our Facebook page. The situation is a little unusual since he’s more of a found child than a missing one. But someone is missing him. Going public puts him in a more vulnerable position, but I think at this point it’s a step we need to take.”

  Jude agreed.

  “We have a physician on call who will document”—her words trailed off as she looked at the boy—“everything.”

  Jude had been there herself after her escape and knew what it would involve.

  “We try to make it as easy as possible. We also have a child psychologist who’ll see him tomorrow. I know you mentioned drawings, and we’ll employ that technique and others. The good news is that we might have found a nice foster family for him. I’ll let you know.”

  Jenny was walking a stegosaurus across the floor. Even the boy’s dinosaur would not engage with hers. Jude silently signaled for Kim to follow her several steps away to the adjoining kitchen.

  “I’ll be watching this case closely,” Jude whispered, glancing at the interaction, or rather lack of, taking place a few yards away. “Please make sure he doesn’t go back where he was. I don’t want this story to end tragically.”

  “We don’t either. But that doesn’t mean we won’t do our best to find his mother or guardian so we can evaluate the situation. Was this Nana the abuser? Maybe, but maybe she protected him. And maybe leaving him at your door was an extension of that. We’ll also be determining the current home situation. Can we do anything to help? Can we make it better? These are just a few of the questions we ask ourselves as we process a case.”

  Footsteps and a knock at the door. Elliot showing up to say good-bye. He glanced at the people in the room, said hello, then crouched in front of the boy as Jenny gave up attempting to interact and moved away.

  “Hey, buddy. I hear you’re taking a car ride.”

  “To see Nana?”

  Interesting that he responded to Elliot after ignoring the women.

  “These ladies are going to try to find her.” He packed up the dinosaurs in the little plastic suitcase, but the boy clung to the tyrannosaurus.

  Jude helped him into his snow boots and clean coat, zipped the coat, and put the stocking cap on his head. With the dinosaur in one hand, Jenny holding the other, and Kim carrying the backpack with his new clothes, toys, and stuffed animals, they left. The dinosaur bopped along the banister as the trio descended the stairs. The boy paused and glanced up at Jude, then continued with the two women. Once they were out of sight, Jude stepped back into her apartment.

  Elliot plopped down on the couch. “I’ll miss that weird little guy.”

  The place already felt emptier. “I’m going to miss him too.” His strange presence. Wounded without even knowing it. There was something compelling and heartbreaking and innocently brave about that. She hoped his foster family would treat him well.

  Now that the boy was gone, Roof Cat made an appearance. Jude opened a can of cat food, spooned the contents into a ceramic bowl with a drawing of a yellow cat wearing a bib, and placed it on the floor. “I used to think I wanted kids, but not anymore.” She understood her limitations. She was too removed and shut off to be a mother.

  “Don’t sell yourself short. You were good with him.”

  “You and your mother are close, aren’t you?” He always acted odd whenever she mentioned his mother. He practically squirmed.

  “Yeah.”

  “You don’t sound positive about that.”

  “She can be a little . . . judgmental. Let’s just say that.”

  Elliot left abruptly for his apartment at the same time Jude received a group text from the medical examiner.

  We were able to take dental X-rays of John Doe today. Please meet me and the forensic odontologist at the morgue tomorrow morning.

  CHAPTER 16

  The next morning, residents were still digging out their cars from city streets that were narrow but passable. Jude drove her vehicle back downtown, fishtailing and bottoming out in a couple of intersections where snow was still deep and surfaces were slick from traffic.

  At the morgue, she was a little surprised to see two media vans in the parking lot. Because of the weather and the inability of people to get around, news of the second body, which was now safely ensconced inside the building, had gone almost unnoticed. Word must have been getting out. Detective Valentine continued to oversee the lake operation, but at this point no
new bodies had turned up.

  Jude parked near Uriah’s sedan and was buzzed in the back door of the morgue, where she caught up with her partner. The woman at the desk gave them a smile and a nod. “Dr. Stevenson is waiting in her office.”

  They knew where to go. As they walked side by side down the white fluorescent hallway, Jude stuffed her gloves in her pocket and pulled off her knit cap. A tap on Ingrid’s door, and they were told to come in. Coats were tossed over hard plastic chairs while the ME introduced them to the forensic odontologist, who attached a cable to a display port and mirrored her laptop to the monitor on the wall.

  The comparison of unique dental features was an accepted method of victim identification and was often used to prosecute killers. That’s how reliable it was. Not quite on the level of DNA, because it required someone specifically trained in forensic dentistry. In spite of advances in DNA profiling, fingerprints, and facial reconstruction, the comparison of dental records still played a significant role in the identification of bodies. Even if the antemortem dental records weren’t available for comparison, a forensic odontologist might be able to determine age and sex from the teeth themselves. Here, they had dental records and a fairly well-preserved body.

  Ingrid stood to one side, arms crossed, and let the specialist run the show.

  A few key clicks and they were looking at two sets of dental X-rays, one clearly labeled twenty-two years ago; the other with yesterday’s date, time, and location. Even to Jude’s untrained eye, things did not look good. She glanced at Uriah and saw he was thinking the same thing. The outcome was so obvious that they really didn’t need a specialist, and yet her role was vastly important because she would ground and validate their claims.