Whispers of the Dead dh-3

by Simon Beckett

  Come on, get a grip. You can’t let Tom down.

  Gardner came over to the trestle table as we were ripping open the plastic bags of overalls.

  ‘You might want to strip down to your shorts under those. Pretty hot in there.’

  Tom gave a snort. ‘I haven’t undressed in public since I was at school. I don’t aim to start now.’

  Gardner swatted at an insect buzzing round his face. ‘Don’t say I didn’t warn you.’

  I didn’t share Tom’s modesty, but I followed his example all the same. I felt enough out of place as it was, without stripping down to my boxers in front of everyone. Besides, it was only spring, and the sun was already starting to go down. How hot could it be in the cabin?

  Gardner rummaged amongst the boxes until he found a jar of menthol rub. He smeared a thick dab under his nose, then offered it to Tom.

  ‘You’ll need this.’

  Tom declined. ‘No thanks. My sense of smell isn’t what it used to be.’

  Gardner silently held out the jar to me. Normally I didn’t use it either. Like Tom I was no stranger to the odour of decomposition, and after spending the past week at the facility I’d become well and truly acclimatized to it. But I still accepted the jar, wiping the scented Vaseline on my top lip. My eyes instantly watered from the pungent vapour. I took a deep breath, trying to still my jangling nerves. What the hell’s wrong with you? You’re acting like this is your first time.

  The sun was warm on my back as I waited for Tom to get ready. Low and dazzling, it brushed the tops of the trees as it made its slow descent into evening. It would come up again in the morning no matter what happened here, I reminded myself.

  Tom finished zipping up his overalls and gave a cheery smile. ‘Let’s see what we’ve got.’

  Pulling on our latex gloves, we walked up the overgrown path to the cabin.

  CHAPTER 3

  THE CABIN DOOR was closed. Gardner paused outside. He’d left his jacket with the boxes of overalls, and had put on a pair of plastic overshoes and gloves. Now he slipped on a white surgical mask. I saw him take a deep breath before he opened the door and we went inside.

  I’ve seen human bodies in most states of death. I know how bad the different stages of putrefaction smell, can even differentiate between them. I’ve encountered bodies that have been burned to the bone, that have been reduced to soap-like slime after weeks underwater. None are pleasant, but it’s an inevitable part of my work, and one I thought I was inured to.

  But I’d never experienced anything like this. The stench was almost tangible. The nauseatingly sweet, bad-cheese stench of decomposing flesh seemed to have been distilled and concentrated, cutting through the menthol under my nose as though it wasn’t there. The cabin was alive with flies, swirling excitedly around us, but they were almost incidental compared to the heat.

  The inside of the cabin was like a sauna.

  Tom grimaced. ‘Good God…’

  ‘Told you to wear shorts,’ Gardner said.

  The room was small and sparsely furnished. Several of the forensic team had broken off what they were doing to glance over as we’d gone in. Shuttered blinds had been pulled up to allow daylight in through the windows on either side of the door. The floor was black-painted boards covered with threadbare rugs. A pair of dusty antlers hung over a fireplace on one wall, while a stained sink, cooker and fridge stood against another. The rest of the furniture— TV, sofa and armchairs—had been roughly pushed to the sides, leaving the centre of the room clear, except for a small dining table.

  The body was lying on it.

  It was naked, spread-eagled on its back, arms and legs draped over the table edges. Swollen by gases, the torso resembled an overstuffed kitbag that had burst open. Maggots dripped from it to the floor, so many of them that they looked like boiling milk. An electric radiator stood next to the table, all three of its bars shimmering yellow. As I watched, a maggot dropped on to one of them and disappeared in a fat sizzle.

  Completing the tableau was a hard-backed chair that had been positioned by the victim’s head. It looked innocuous enough, until you thought to wonder why it was there.

  Someone had wanted a good view of what they were doing.

  None of us had gone any further than the doorway. Even Tom seemed taken aback.

  ‘We left it like we found it,’ Gardner said. ‘Thought you’d want to record the temperature yourself.’

  He went up a notch in my estimation. Temperature was an important factor in determining time since death, but not many investigating officers I’d come across would have thought of that. Still, on this occasion I almost wished he’d been less thorough. The combination of heat and stench was overpowering.

  Tom nodded absently, his gaze already fixed on the body. ‘Care to do the honours, David?’

  I set his case down on a clear area of floorboards and opened it up. Tom still had much of the same battered equipment he’d had since I’d known him, everything well worn and neatly ordered in its place. But while he might be a traditionalist at heart, he also recognized the benefits of new technology. He’d kept his old mercury thermometer, an elegant piece of engineering with its handblown glass and tooled steel, but alongside it was a new digital model. Taking it out, I switched it on and watched the numbers on its display quickly start to climb.

  ‘How much longer will your people be?’ Tom asked Gardner, glancing at the white-clad figures working in the room.

  ‘A while yet. Too hot for them to stay long in here. I’ve had an agent pass out already.’

  Tom was bending over the body, careful to avoid the dried blood on the floor. He adjusted his glasses to see better. ‘Have we got a temperature yet, David?’

  I checked the digital readout. I’d already started to sweat. ‘Forty-three point five degrees.’

  ‘So now can we turn off the goddamn fire?’ one of the forensic team asked. He was a big man, with a barrel-like stomach that strained the front of his overalls. What was visible of his face under the surgical mask was red and sweating.

  I glanced at Tom for confirmation. He gave a nod.

  ‘Might as well open the windows too. Let’s get some air in here.’

  ‘Thank the sweet Lord for that,’ the big man breathed as he went to unplug the fire. As its bars dimmed, he opened the windows as far as they would go. There were sighs and mutterings of relief as fresh air swept into the cabin.

  I went to where Tom was staring down at the body with a look of abstract concentration.

  Gardner hadn’t been exaggerating; there was no question that this was a homicide. The victim’s limbs had been pulled down on either side of the table and fastened to the wooden legs with parcel tape. The skin was drum-tight and the colour of old leather, although that was no indication of ethnicity. Pale skin darkens after death, while dark skin will often lighten, blurring colour and ancestry. What was more significant were the gaping slits that were evident. It’s natural for the skin to split apart as the body decomposes and becomes bloated by gases. But there was nothing natural about this. Dried blood caked the table around the body and blackened the rug below it. That had to have come from an open wound, or possibly more than one, which suggested that at least some of the damage to the epidermis had been inflicted while the victim was still alive. It might also explain the numbers of blowfly larvae, as the flies would have laid their eggs in any opening they could find.

  Even so, I couldn’t recall ever seeing so many maggots in a single body before. Up close, the ammoniac stink was overpowering. They had colonized the eyes, nose, mouth and genitals, obliterating whatever sex the victim had been.

  I found my eyes drawn to the way they seethed in the gaping slit in the stomach, causing the skin around it to move as though it were alive. My hand involuntarily went to the scar on my own.

  ‘David? You OK?’ Tom asked quietly.

  I tore my gaze away. ‘Fine,’ I said, and began taking the specimen jars from the bag.

  I could feel h
is eyes on me. But he let it pass, turning instead to Gardner. ‘What do we know?’

  ‘Not much.’ Gardner’s voice was muffled by his mask. ‘Whoever did this was pretty methodical. No footprints in the blood, so the killer knew enough to mind where he put his feet. Cabin was rented out last Thursday to someone calling himself Terry Loomis. No description. Reservation and credit card payment were made by phone. Man’s voice, local accent, and the guy asked for the key to be left under the mat by the cabin door. Said he’d be arriving late.’

  ‘Convenient,’ Tom said.

  ‘Very. Don’t seem too worried about paperwork here so long as they get paid. The cabin rental ended this morning, so when the key wasn’t returned the manager came up to take a look and make sure nothing was missing. Place like this, you can see why he’d be worried,’ he added, glancing round the threadbare cabin.

  But Tom wasn’t paying any attention. ‘The cabin was only rented from last Thursday? You sure?’

  ‘That’s what the manager said. Date checks out with the register and the credit card receipts.’

  Tom frowned. ‘That can’t be right. That’s only five days ago.’

  I’d been thinking the same thing. The decomposition was much too advanced for such a short period of time. The flesh was already displaying a cheesy consistency as it began to ferment and moulder, the leathery skin slipping off it like a wrinkled suit. The electric fire would have speeded things up to some extent, but that didn’t explain the amount of larval activity. Even in the full heat and humidity of a Tennessean summer it would normally have taken nearer seven days to reach this stage.

  ‘Were the doors and windows closed when he was found?’ I asked Gardner without thinking. So much for keeping quiet.

  He pursed his lips in displeasure, but still answered. ‘Closed, locked and shuttered.’

  I batted flies away from my face. You’d think I’d be used to them by now, but I’m not. ‘A lot of insect activity for a closed room,’ I said to Tom.

  He nodded. Using tweezers, he carefully picked up a maggot from the body and held it up to the light to examine it. ‘What do you make of this?’

  I leaned closer to take a look. Flies have three larval stages, called instar, in which the larvae grow progressively larger.

  ‘Third instar,’ I said. That meant it had to be at least six days old, and possibly more.

  Tom nodded, dropping the larva into a small jar of formaldehyde. ‘And some of them have already started to pupate. That would make the time since death six or seven days.’

  ‘But not five,’ I said. My hand had strayed towards my stomach again. I took it away. Come on, concentrate. I made an effort to apply myself to what I was looking at. ‘I suppose he could have been killed somewhere else and brought here post mortem.’

  Tom hesitated. I saw two of the white-suited figures exchange a glance, and immediately realized my mistake. I felt my face burn. Of all the stupid…

  ‘No need to tape the arms and legs to the table if the victim was already dead,’ the big crime scene officer said, looking at me oddly.

  ‘Maybe corpses in England are livelier than over here,’ Gardner said, deadpan.

  There was a ripple of laughter. I felt my face sting, but there was nothing I could say to make it any better. Idiot. What’s wrong with you?

  Tom fastened the lid back on to the killing jar, his face studiedly impassive. ‘Think this Loomis is the victim or the killer?’ he asked Gardner.

  ‘Well, it was Loomis’s driver’s licence and credit cards that were in the wallet we found. Along with over sixty dollars in cash. We ran a check: thirty-six years old, white, employed as an insurance clerk in Knoxville. Unmarried, lives alone, and hasn’t been in to work for several days.’

  The cabin door opened and Jacobsen entered. Like Gardner she was wearing overshoes and gloves, but she managed to make even those look almost elegant. She wasn’t wearing a mask, and her face was pale as she went to stand by the older agent.

  ‘So, unless the killer booked the place in his own name and considerately left his ID behind, the likelihood is that this is either Loomis, or some other male we don’t know about,’ Tom said.

  ‘That’s about it,’ Gardner said. He broke off as another agent appeared in the doorway.

  ‘Sir, there’s someone asking to see you.’

  ‘I’ll be right back,’ Gardner said to Tom, and went outside.

  Jacobsen remained in the cabin. Her face was still pale, but she folded her arms tightly in front of her as though restraining any weakness.

  ‘How d’you know it’s male?’ she asked. Her eyes flicked automatically to the seething activity around the corpse’s groin, but she quickly averted them again. ‘I can’t see anything to say either way.’

  Her accent wasn’t as strong as some I’d heard, but it was pronounced enough to mark her as local. I looked at Tom, but he was engrossed with the corpse. Or at least pretending to be.

  ‘Well, apart from the size—’ I began.

  ‘Not all women are small.’

  ‘No, but not many are as tall as this. And even a big woman would have a more delicate bone structure, especially the cranium. That’s—’

  ‘I know what a cranium is.’

  God, but she was spiky. ‘I was about to say that’s usually a good indication of gender,’ I finished.

  Her chin came up, stubbornly, but she made no other comment. Tom straightened from where he’d been examining the gaping mouth.

  ‘David, take a look at this.’

  He moved aside as I went over. Much of the soft tissue had gone from the face; eyes and nasal cavity were heaving with maggots. The teeth were almost fully exposed, and where the gums had been the yellow-white of the dentine had a definite reddish hue.

  ‘Pink teeth,’ I commented.

  ‘Ever come across them before?’ Tom asked.

  ‘Once or twice.’ But not often. And not in a situation like this.

  Jacobsen had been listening. ‘Pink teeth?’

  ‘It’s caused by haemoglobin from the blood being forced into the dentine,’ I told her. ‘Gives the teeth a pinkish look under the enamel. You sometimes find it in drowning victims who’ve been in the water for some time, because they tend to float head down.’

  ‘Somehow I don’t think we’re dealing with a drowning here,’ Gardner said, clumping back into the cabin.

  He had another man with him. The newcomer also wore overshoes and gloves but didn’t strike me as either a police officer or a TBI agent. He was in his mid-forties, not plump exactly, but with a sleek, well-fed look about him. He wore chinos and a lightweight suede jacket over a pale blue shirt, and the well-fleshed cheeks were covered with a stubble that stopped just short of being a beard.

  But the apparently casual appearance was a little too contrived, as though he’d styled himself on the chiselled models from magazine advertisements. The clothes were too well cut and expensive, the shirt open by one button too many. And the stubble, like the hair, was slightly too uniform to be anything other than carefully groomed.

  He exuded self-assurance as he walked into the cabin. His half-smile never wavered as he took in the body tied to the table.

  Gardner had dispensed with his mask, perhaps out of deference to the newcomer, who wasn’t wearing one either. ‘Professor Irving, I don’t think you’ve met Tom Lieberman, have you?’

  The newcomer turned his smile on to Tom. ‘No, I’m afraid our paths haven’t crossed. You’ll have to excuse me if I don’t shake hands,’ he said, theatrically showing us his gloves.

  ‘Professor Irving’s a criminal personality profiler who’s worked with the TBI on several investigations,’ Gardner explained. ‘We wanted to get a psychological perspective on this.’

  Irving gave a self-deprecating grin. ‘Actually, I prefer to call myself a “behaviouralist.” But I’m not going to quibble about titles.’

  You just have done. I told myself not to take my mood out on him.

  To
m’s smile was blandness itself, but I thought I detected a coolness about it. ‘Pleased to meet you, Professor Irving. This is my friend and colleague, Dr Hunter,’ he added, making up for Gardner’s omission.

  The nod Irving sent my way was polite enough, but it was obvious I didn’t register on his radar. His attention was already moving to Jacobsen, his smile widening.

  ‘I don’t think I caught your name?’

  ‘Diane Jacobsen.’ She seemed almost flustered, the cool she’d displayed so far in danger of slipping as she stepped forward. ‘It’s a pleasure to meet you, Professor Irving. I’ve read a lot of your work.’

  Irving’s smile broadened even further. I couldn’t help but notice how unnaturally white and even his teeth were.

  ‘I trust it met with your approval. And, please, call me Alex.’

  ‘Diane majored in psychology before she joined the TBI,’ Gardner put in.

  The profiler’s eyebrows rose. ‘Really? Then I’ll have to be extra careful not to slip up.’ He didn’t actually pat her on the head, but he might as well have. An expression of distaste replaced his smile as he considered the body. ‘Seen better days, hasn’t it? Can I have a little more of that menthol, please?’

  The request wasn’t addressed to anyone in particular. After a moment one of the forensic team grudgingly went out to get it. Steepling his fingers, Irving listened without comment as Gardner briefed him. When the agent returned, the profiler accepted the menthol without acknowledgement, dabbing a neat smear on his top lip before holding out the jar for her to take.

  She looked down at the proffered jar before taking it. ‘Any time.’

  If Irving was aware of the sarcasm he gave no sign. Tom shot me an amused look as he took another specimen jar from the bag and turned back to the body.