Under the Cold Bright Lights

by Garry Disher

  Karalis was a tall man, gaunt, a wheeze away from old age. When he shook Auhl’s hand, he did a double-take. ‘Thought you’d retired.’

  ‘They can’t function without me,’ Auhl said.

  Karalis crossed swiftly to the autopsy table, spoke his name and the date into the overhead microphone, lifted the face mask over his nose and mouth and stared at the mess before him. A collection of grimy bones hung with scraps of cloth and dirt. The cheap trainers had fared better. He made a circumnavigation of the table, halting to peer at and lift a couple of bony limbs, noting succinctly his initial impressions of the body.

  That done, he said, ‘Now for a closer look.’

  Under his supervision, the assistant removed the footwear and the cloth scraps, placing them on an adjacent table. The pathologist peered at them, straightened, said, ‘They don’t tell me anything in particular,’ and ordered them sent for forensic analysis.

  ‘Now for the bones.’

  He stood over the skeleton with his hands on his hips and said, ‘Trauma is present in the rib cage and L5 region of the spine. If one is an entry point and the other an exit point, then a downward projection is indicated.’ He turned to Helen and Auhl. ‘Was a projectile found with the remains?’

  Auhl answered. ‘No. He was buried in soil, under a concrete slab. No bullet or bullet fragments—no arrow head or spear-gun point for that matter—leading us to believe he was shot elsewhere then moved.’

  ‘Pity.’

  Helen Colfax said, ‘So he was shot, Doctor Karalis?’

  ‘That would be my opinion, yes. Certainly a projectile of some kind, and more likely a bullet than, say, an arrow.’

  ‘Shot in the back?’ Helen asked. ‘The front?’

  ‘Shot in the front, the projectile then nicking the spine on exit.’

  ‘A downward trajectory,’ said Auhl. ‘A taller person?’

  ‘Or the victim was on his knees?’ said Colfax.

  ‘If I had to put money on it I’d say he was face to face with a taller person when he was shot,’ Karalis said. ‘Now, age. The teeth are a useful indicator here. A cross-section analysis will reveal the age to plus or minus a year, but this young fellow had all his teeth and there is very little sign of wear. Second, the skull is not fully knitted, indicating a person in his late teens, early twenties.’

  ‘Height?’

  The assistant measured it: 172.5 centimetres. ‘About five feet eight in the old scale,’ Karalis said, ‘but bear in mind the cartilage has contracted and the flesh on his skull and feet has decomposed, so he was slightly taller than that. Five nine? Not tall.’

  ‘Ethnicity?’

  ‘Caucasian,’ the pathologist said promptly. ‘The teeth tell us that.’

  ‘DNA?’

  ‘You’re firing the questions today, Helen,’ said Karalis mildly.

  ‘Sorry, doc.’

  ‘This is a cold case.’

  ‘They’re all hot to us, doc,’ she said.

  Karalis said, ‘As to DNA, I should be able to create a profile from marrow in the long bones. But it will take time to do that and then see if this poor fellow’s in a database.’ He continued to examine the body, muttering, ‘No further signs of injury…’

  Auhl glanced around the room restlessly. It was an eight-bay lab, homicides, suicides, OD cases, accident victims, other reportable deaths. The bodies were stored on steel trolleys in refrigerated units. Even the gleaming steel added to the chill in the air.

  A movement in the corner of his eye. Up in the glass-walled viewing room, standing at a rail, a couple of students. One waved at him with sly cheek. He nodded back to her. She grinned, nudged her friend.

  ‘Okay.’ Karalis had finished. He stripped off his gloves. ‘I’ll get the rest of the team onto the bones and teeth and DNA extraction. Obviously we can’t do a toxicology examination. Do you have his wallet? Wristwatch?’

  ‘No,’ Helen said.

  ‘We have a coin dated 2008,’ Auhl said.

  Karalis cast a brooding look at the bones. ‘That would fit. Meanwhile let’s hope the DNA gives us something. But he might not be in the system—he is on the young side to have a criminal record.’ He glanced at the clothing. ‘The shoes might give you something, but they’re everyday cheap runners.’

  Helen Colfax had been staring into the distance. ‘Certainly run the DNA, but that’ll take weeks, I expect. It would be good if we could release a face to the media. Any chance someone here can whip up a digital reconstruction?’

  ‘Whip up. I like that,’ Karalis said. ‘I’ll need to see if anyone’s available. Better yet, has the time. Better yet, has a case number and budget approval.’

  ‘Come on, doc,’ Auhl said. ‘Haven’t you got any tame PhD students in the building?’

  The pathologist gave it some thought. ‘Actually, yes.’

  ‘They might get a kick out of joining the fight for justice,’ Colfax said.

  ‘They might get a kick out of a few dollars, too,’ Karalis said, and Auhl could see him considering the paperwork, the budget, whom to sweet talk. ‘I’ll see what I can do.’

  BEFORE THEY LEFT, Auhl spread the contents of the Elphick file across an empty autopsy table.

  ‘Wondered if you could have a look at these, doc.’

  ‘We could do this in more salubrious surroundings,’ Karalis said, with a wink for Helen Colfax.

  ‘Humour the bugger,’ she said.

  Karalis bent over the Elphick report, scanned it and said, ‘My predecessor performed this post-mortem.’

  ‘And reading between the lines,’ Auhl said, ‘he didn’t want to go out on a limb about the cause of death.’

  Karalis grunted. He picked up the file and read aloud:

  ‘Depress fracture, left frontotemporal skull. Subdural haematoma, left frontotemporal skull. Lobe cerebral contusion, left frontotemporal skull.’ He glanced at Auhl. ‘The left frontotemporal skull took a fair old whack.’

  ‘If you say so, doc.’

  ‘Jaw fractures…abrasions, contusions and lacerations…a broken tooth…’

  Karalis read the rest in silence, the icy air around him antiseptic. Somewhere a saw started. Auhl pictured the ripping of saw-teeth and winced.

  ‘Third left finger fractured,’ Karalis said, ‘contusions and lacerations to the left hand, some bleeding with dirt and vegetable matter in the injuries.’

  He looked at Auhl, who said, ‘He put his hand out to absorb the fall.’

  ‘What fall?’

  ‘He was hit on the head,’ Auhl said, ‘and fell to the ground.’

  Karalis grunted. He read on. He said, ‘Crusted abrasions, both knees,’ and turned to the photographs: the body, the fence, the ute, the ute’s interior.

  Auhl said, ‘As you can see, doc, blood drops were found in various places between the fence and the ute, on top of the bonnet, and around on the other side of the ute, and inside the ute. It suggests a lot of movement while bleeding.’

  ‘Entirely possible,’ the pathologist said. ‘He might have had a dizzy spell. It says here that blood, hair and skin tissue were found on the edge of the roo bar. He fell, knocked his head on the roo bar, got up, disorientated, then staggered around a bit. Falling, getting up again…’

  ‘But if you look at the photos there’s an injury on the top of his head.’

  ‘If he was bent over and fell forward onto the roo bar, that would account for such an injury.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah. Meanwhile there’s also blood on the drivers seat and the drivers-seat headrest,’ Auhl said. ‘He got into the ute at one point.’

  ‘And fell out again?’

  ‘Or was pulled out. First he was hit on the head and fell, hitting the roo bar, then got up again and was chased right around the ute, trying to get away. Managed to get behind the wheel but was pulled out again.’

  ‘That’s one explanation,’ Karalis said, gesturing at the photographs. ‘There are others, equally plausible.’

  ‘Account for the blood
on top of the bonnet, doc.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Karalis was silent. ‘Again, the guy fell, hitting his head on the roo bar, staggered upright, dazed, shaking his head. Flinging off blood drops.’ He paused. ‘But I’m not a blood-spatter expert.’

  Auhl, faintly impatient, said, ‘All I want to know is could someone have hit Mr Elphick on the head as he stood between the front of the ute and the fence. He fell onto the roo bar, got up again, tried to get away, eventually climbed behind the wheel, was pulled out again and given another whack on the head and fell to the ground, where he died.’

  Karalis shrugged. ‘It’s plausible, no more than that.’

  In the car on the way back to the police building Helen Colfax said, ‘You heard the man.’

  ‘Give me a couple of days, boss, that’s all I’m asking.’

  8

  JOSHUA BUGG AND Claire Pascal had their heads down when Auhl and Colfax returned. Typing, making calls.

  Helen Colfax headed straight for the whiteboard and announced, ‘Slab Man, everybody.’

  When they’d angled their chairs in a semicircle, she delivered a fast, concise update: the slab, the body, Auhl and Pascal’s door-to-door, the pathologist’s findings.

  ‘So that’s where we stand,’ she said in conclusion. ‘He was young, no older than early twenties, Caucasian, not tall, and probably shot. Shot elsewhere, then buried under the slab.’

  Bugg said, ‘Any idea where?’

  She shrugged. ‘Possibly an old house that was on the property, but it was pulled down some years ago.’

  ‘Shame,’ Bugg muttered.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Missing persons?’ Pascal said.

  ‘That’s an obvious place to start. I want you on that, Josh. We have a possible first name: Sean. Start no earlier than ten years ago and no later than five. If that doesn’t pan out, broaden the parameters.’

  ‘Boss.’

  Colfax turned to Auhl and Pascal. ‘Some enterprising reporter’s going to wonder who used to own or live at the property, so I need the pair of you to stay a step ahead. Certainly track down the daughter if she’s still alive, but also search property records. And check utilities: phone, gas, electric. Who demolished the place? Do they remember blood on the floor, signs of struggle? Was there ever an old structure over the concrete slab? So on and so forth.’

  ‘Real estate agents,’ suggested Auhl. ‘They always seem to know plenty.’

  ‘Excellent. The place was a rental at one point, yes? Did any of the local real estate firms handle that?’

  ‘And we need to find Donna Crowther,’ Claire Pascal said. ‘See if she can explain the boyfriend disappearing from her life.’

  ‘Good, good, we’re on a roll. Were Crowther and the boyfriend known to police?’ Colfax continued. ‘Not only domestic disputes, but were they dealing out of the old house, for example.’

  ‘DNA from the bones,’ Bugg said.

  ‘There’s a backlog,’ Helen said. ‘And he was a young guy—quite likely he’s not on any database, so we’re looking at releasing some kind of facial reconstruction to the public.’

  ‘What about our other cases?’

  Helen gave Bugg a smile devoid of pity. ‘I expect you to continue to discharge your obligations in that regard, Leading Senior Constable Bugg.’ She paused. ‘You’re working Bertolli?’

  Antonio Bertolli was a Mildura market gardener, shot dead in 1978. He wasn’t the only one of his profession murdered around that time, the common denominators being the Vic Market and the Calabrian Mafia. The case was reopened every few years. This time it had taken Bugg to Mildura for a couple of days, even though few of the original figures were still alive.

  ‘Lost cause,’ Auhl said, before he could stop himself.

  ‘Words of wisdom from the old geezer, always much appreciated,’ Bugg said.

  ‘Children,’ Helen said. She glanced at Claire. ‘You’re working Waurn?’

  The desiccated remains of Freda Waurn had been found on her kitchen floor after she’d defaulted on her mortgage and her bank hired a locksmith to break in. He found a skeleton: she’d been dead for two years. Her hyoid bone was broken, every room of the house ransacked.

  ‘Still looking,’ Claire said. ‘No spouse, no children, no siblings. She didn’t seem to have anyone in her life.’

  Helen turned to Auhl. ‘Alan?’

  ‘Well…Elphick, boss.’

  ‘Backburner, all right? I want you on Slab Man.’

  ‘Boss.’

  Joshua Bugg was looking at him with an unfriendly grin.

  ‘Got spinach caught in your teeth, Josh,’ Auhl said.

  LATE MORNING NOW. Auhl and Pascal strolled across the river to the Land Titles Office in the CBD. Expecting bureaucratic resistance, Auhl was pleased they were given quick access to the deeds related to the property where Slab Man was buried. Bernadette Sullivan and her husband Francis had bought the property in 1976. Terra Australis AgriCorp owned it between 2012 and 2015.

  ‘So if Slab Man has been there for ten years, the Sullivans were still the owners when he died,’ Pascal said.

  Auhl said, ‘The parents are dead, the daughter inherited.’

  They examined the certificate of title, a stiff document smelling faintly of mould. At the top were the volume and folio numbers and the quaint address Blackberry Hill Farm…being part of Crown Allotment 60A. The owners were listed in two columns, with Bernadette Sullivan named as a Married Woman and joint proprietor with Francis Sullivan Fire Officer in 1976. Then in 1986 Bernadette was listed as Surviving Sole Proprietor. The property passed to Angela, her daughter, in 2011; she later sold it to Terra Australis, who sold it to Nathan and Jaime Wright.

  ‘Next stop, Angela Sullivan,’ Auhl said.

  BACK AT THE COLD CASE Unit they were stopped by Helen Colfax. She gave Auhl an odd look. ‘You remember Bluebeard?’

  Auhl tried to read the look. ‘He’s killed wife number three? What’s her name…Janine?’

  ‘Not exactly. He’s claiming she wants to kill him.’

  9

  BACK WHEN DR ALEC Neill’s second wife died as mysteriously as his first, Auhl was the Homicide Squad sergeant in charge of the investigation. His team had never been able to prove anything but Auhl, convinced of Neill’s guilt, had had a quiet word with Neill’s new girlfriend, a hand therapist employed at one of Neill’s hospitals: Don’t let yourself become murdered wife #3.

  ‘He’ll get tired of you, Janine. He’ll meet someone new and he’ll fake a suicide or an accident.’

  She’d given him a look of disgust and walked off.

  Auhl recalled a slim woman, incensed, her gym-toned flesh tight over her bones, her lips a slash across her over-refined face. The way she’d stalked away from him on a tide of vanity and gratification that day in 2012. Auhl, keeping an occasional eye on the pair, heard that she’d gone ahead and married Neill, living half the week in East Melbourne and half on a hobby farm near St Andrews, less than an hour north-east of the city.

  Worst case, Auhl thought he’d see Janine Neill on the mortuary cutting table one day. Best? Divorcing her husband—or even giving evidence against him to the Homicide Squad. The last thing he expected was Neill in fear of his life from her.

  Colfax told him some of it as they walked upstairs to the victim suite, where Neill had been telling his story to Homicide Squad detectives. ‘Apparently he found drugs hidden in her car yesterday, and he thinks she used them to kill his second wife—the one she replaced—and his girlfriend.’

  ‘Girlfriend.’

  ‘She died a few weeks ago. Suddenly, mysteriously.’

  ‘Before he married her? That’s new.’

  ‘Keep an open mind, Alan. The man might be genuine.’

  ‘Not this fucker,’ Auhl said, remembering the well-groomed surgeon he’d questioned all those years ago. The slender bony nose steering a patrician, faintly contemptuous, face. The calm monosyllabic replies, Neill staring back across the interview table as if charti
ng and storing the thoughts and feelings of his questioners.

  They entered the victim suite, a soft, bland expanse of curtained windows and sofa, with books and magazines, a tea urn and a percolator. Forgettable landscapes and cute animals decorated the walls. Neill was seated at a long table with a crumpled-looking Homicide sergeant named Debenham, and went rigid when Auhl and Colfax walked in.

  He pointed a trembling finger at Auhl. ‘What’s he doing here?’ He turned to Debenham. ‘Is this an ambush? I come to you with information about two murders, and you turn him on me?’

  Debenham cocked his head at Auhl, who said, ‘I questioned Doctor Neill a few times concerning the deaths of his first two wives.’

  ‘Questioned me? You all but accused me. I got the distinct impression you would have liked to smack me around when no one was looking.’

  You bet I would, thought Auhl.

  Neill looked different. Still good-looking, well tended, but raw with emotion today. But then Auhl recalled that Neill had the ability to adjust to situations. Cold in interview, but when questioned at the coronial inquiry following his second wife’s sudden, apparently suspicious, death he’d appeared anguished and self-flagellating. Upset that he hadn’t been able to diagnose the illnesses that had taken each of his wives.

  And here he was, upset again.

  Neill swiped at his reddened eyes. ‘I don’t want that man here.’

  Debenham patted the surgeon’s arm. He seemed bored with Neill, as if he couldn’t see why he should offer comfort, but knew he had a job to do. ‘Alan isn’t here to hassle you, Doctor Neill, he’s interested in your accusations. Isn’t that right, Acting Sergeant Auhl?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ said Auhl, ignoring Helen Colfax’s warning touch on his sleeve.

  Neill subsided, glowering.

  Auhl and Colfax sat in the chairs opposite Neill and Debenham. ‘The first sign you’re investigating me,’ Neill said, ‘I’ll call my lawyer.’

  Auhl gave him an empty smile as Colfax introduced herself. ‘Why don’t you fill us in, Doctor Neill.’