Whispers of the Dead dh-3

by Simon Beckett

  His name was Kyle Webster.

  ‘He’d been dead eighteen months,’ Jacobsen told me, when I’d called her after seeing a news report on TV. ‘There’re going to be questions about how an impostor could have secured a job in the morgue, but in fairness his documentation and references were authentic. And there was enough of a resemblance to the real Webster to fool anyone who only had old photographs to go on.’

  I supposed it was in keeping with everything else he’d done. The man we’d known as Kyle Webster had delighted in misdirection all along. It shouldn’t have come as a surprise that he’d slipped into the life of one of his victims as easily as he had the sloughed skin from their hands.

  ‘So if he wasn’t Kyle Webster, then who was he?’ I asked.

  ‘His real name was Wayne Peters. Thirty-one years old, from Knoxville originally, but worked as a morgue assistant in Nashville and then Sevierville, until he disappeared off the map two years ago. But it’s his background before then that’s interesting. Father unknown, mother died when he was an infant, so he was brought up by his aunt and uncle. Extremely bright by all accounts, did well at high school and even applied for medical college. Then things went sour. Around the time he was seventeen school records show he suddenly seemed to lose interest. He didn’t make the grades he needed and wound up working for the family business until it went broke when his uncle died.’

  ‘Family business?’

  ‘His uncle owned a small slaughterhouse. They specialized in pork.’

  I shut my eyes. Pigs.

  ‘His aunt was his last remaining relative, and she died years ago,’ Jacobsen went on. ‘Natural causes, so far as we can tell. But you can probably guess where she and the uncle were buried.’

  There was only one place, really.

  Steeple Hill.

  Jacobsen also gave me one other piece of information. When Wayne Peters’s medical records were examined, it was found that as a teenager he’d had several operations to remove nasal polyps. They’d been successful, but the repeated cauterizations had resulted in a condition known as anosmia. Insignificant in itself, it answered the question Gardner had raised in the spa at Cedar Heights.

  Wayne Peters had no sense of smell.

  The recovery operation at the sanitarium was still going on, the grounds being dug up to ensure no more victims’ remains were concealed. But my own role there had ended after that first day. By then not only had other faculty members from the Forensic Anthropology Center joined the effort, but the scale of the operation meant that the regional DMORT—Disaster Mortuary Operational Response Team—had also been called in. They’d arrived with a fully equipped portable morgue unit, and less than twenty-four hours after Paul and I had first climbed through its fence, the sanitarium and its grounds swarmed with activity.

  I’d been politely thanked for my help and told I’d be contacted if my presence was required beyond the statement I’d already given. As I’d been driven through the ranks of TV and press vehicles camped beyond the sanitarium’s gates, I’d felt both relief and regret. It felt wrong leaving an investigation like that, but then I reminded myself that it wasn’t really my investigation.

  It never had been.

  I’d been prepared to either extend my stay in Tennessee for Tom’s memorial service, or even fly back for it later if I had to. But in the end there had been no need. Regardless of what factors had contributed to it, Tom had died in hospital of natural causes, and so the formality of an inquest had been avoided. I was glad for Mary’s sake, even though it left a sense of unfinished business. But then what death doesn’t?

  There had been no funeral. Tom had donated his body for medical research, though not at the facility. That would have been too disturbing for his colleagues. Mary had been dignified and dry-eyed at the service, standing beside a plump middle-aged man in an immaculate suit I didn’t at first realize was their son. He carried himself with the faintly irritable air of a man who had better things to do, and when I was introduced to him afterwards his handshake was limp and grudging.

  ‘You work in insurance, don’t you?’ I said.

  ‘Actually, I’m an underwriter.’ I wasn’t sure what the distinction was but it didn’t seem worth asking. I tried again.

  ‘Are you staying in town long?’

  He looked at his watch, frowning as though he were already late. ‘No, I’m catching a flight back to New York this afternoon. I’ve had to reschedule meetings as it is. This came at a really bad time.’

  I bit off the retort I’d been about to make, reminding myself that whatever else he might be, he was still Tom and Mary’s son. As I walked away he was looking at his watch again.

  Gardner and Jacobsen had both attended the ceremony. Jacobsen had returned to work already, the dressing on her shoulder all but invisible under her jacket. Gardner was still technically on sick leave. He’d suffered a transient ischaemic attack—a mini-stroke—from being held for so long in the chokehold. It had left him with slight aphasia and loss of sensation on one side, but only temporarily. When I saw him the only noticeable after-effect was a deepening of the corduroy-like lines in his face.

  ‘I’m fine,’ he told me, a little stiffly, when I asked how he was. ‘There’s no reason I can’t work now. Damn doctors.’

  Jacobsen looked as pristine and untouchable as ever. Except for slightly favouring her left arm no one would have known she’d been shot.

  ‘I heard a rumour that she’s up for a commendation,’ I said to Gardner, while she was offering her condolences to Mary.

  ‘It’s under review.’

  ‘For my money she deserves one.’

  He unbent a little. ‘Mine too, for what it’s worth.’

  I watched as Jacobsen spoke solemnly to Mary. The line of her throat was lovely. Gardner cleared his throat.

  ‘Diane’s still getting over a tough time. She broke up with her partner last year.’

  It was the first hint of a personal life I’d had about her. I was surprised he’d offered the information.

  ‘Was he a TBI agent as well?’

  Gardner busied himself brushing something from the lapel of his creased jacket.

  ‘No. She was a lawyer.’

  Before they left, Jacobsen came over to say goodbye. Her grip was strong, the skin dry and warm as she shook my hand. The grey eyes seemed a little warmer than they had, but perhaps that was my imagination. The last I saw of her she was walking back to the car with Gardner, graceful and athletic beside the older agent’s crumpled figure.

  The ceremony itself was simple and moving. There had been no hymns, only two of Tom’s favourite jazz tracks to start and close: Chet Baker’s ‘My Funny Valentine’ and Brubeck’s ‘Take Five’. I’d smiled when I’d heard that. In between had been readings from friends and colleagues, but at one point the solemnity was broken by a baby’s crying. Thomas Paul Avery howled lustily, despite his mother’s best efforts to calm him.

  No one minded.

  He’d been born not long after Sam arrived at hospital, perfectly healthy and squalling his annoyance at the world. Sam’s blood pressure had caused the doctors some concern at first, but it had returned to normal with remarkable speed after the birth. Within two days she’d been back at home, still pale and hollow-eyed when I’d visited, but with no other visible signs of her ordeal.

  ‘It seems more like a bad dream than anything else,’ she admitted, when Thomas had fallen asleep after nursing. ‘It’s like a curtain’s been pulled across it. Paul’s worried I’m in denial, but I’m not. It’s more like what happened afterwards is more important, you know?’ She’d been gazing down at her son’s wrinkled pink face, but now she looked up at me with a smile so open it broke my heart. ‘It’s like all the bad doesn’t matter. It’s wiped everything else out.’

  Of the two of them, Paul seemed to be finding it harder to deal with what had happened. In the days immediately afterwards, there was often a shadow in his face. It didn’t take a psychologist to know h
e was reliving the ordeal, still cut by how close they’d come, and what might have been. But whenever he was with his wife and son the shadow would lift. It was still early days, but looking at the three of them together I felt sure the wounds would heal.

  They usually do, given time.

  My tea had gone cold. With a sigh I stood up and went to the phone to play back my messages.

  ‘Dr Hunter, you don’t know me, but I was given your number by DSI Wallace. My name is—’

  The sound of the doorbell drowned out the rest. I paused the playback and went to answer it. The last of the daylight filled the small entrance hall with a golden glow, like a forerunner of summer. I reached out to open the front door and was overwhelmed by a swooping sense of déjá vu. A young woman in sunglasses stands outside in the sunlit evening. Her smile turns into a snarl as she reaches into her bag and pulls out the knife…

  I shook my head, scattering the images. Squaring my shoulders, I unlocked the front door and threw it wide open.

  An elderly woman beamed up at me from the step. ‘Ah, Dr Hunter, it is you! I heard someone moving about downstairs and wanted to make sure everything was OK.’

  ‘Everything’s fine, thanks, Mrs. Katsoulis.’ My neighbour lived in the flat above mine. I’d hardly spoken to her before I’d been attacked the year before, but since then she’d taken it upon herself to turn vigilante. All four foot ten of her.

  She hadn’t finished with me yet. She peered past the hall into the living room, where my bags were still waiting to be unpacked.

  ‘I thought I hadn’t seen you around for a while. Have you been anywhere nice?’

  She stared up at me expectantly. I felt my mouth start to twitch as I fought down an urge to laugh.

  ‘Just a work trip,’ I said. ‘But I’m back now.’

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Whispers of the Dead is a work of fiction, but the Anthropology Research Facility in Tennessee is real. Thanks are therefore due to Professor Richard Jantz, Director of the Forensic Anthropology Center in Knoxville, for granting permission to feature the facility and for his help with technical aspects. Dr Arpad Vass provided his usual quick responses to forensic queries and allowed Tom Lieberman to borrow his research, while Kristin Helm, Public Information Officer of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, was a mine of valuable information.

  Thanks to my agents, Mic Cheetham and Simon Kavanagh, to Camilla Ferrier and all at the Marsh Agency, Simon Taylor and the team at Transworld, Caitlin Alexander at Bantam Dell, Peter Dench, Jeremy Freeston, Ben Steiner and SCF. I’d also like to thank my sister Julie and Jan Williams, without whom the writing of this book would have almost certainly have taken far longer: as someone who has now fully recovered from ME, I can recommend the Lightning Process to anyone who hasn’t.

  Finally, as ever, a huge thank-you to my wife, Hilary. I really couldn’t do it without her.

  Simon Beckett, 2008

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  SIMON BECKETT is the bestselling author of three thrillers featuring forensics expert Dr David Hunter—The Chemistry of Death, Written in Bone and now Whispers of the Dead. In 2002, he went on an assignment for the Daily Telegraph Magazine to Tennessee’s world-famous Anthropological Research Facility, the Body Farm. As well as providing the inspiration for David Hunter, what he saw and learned there, together with his meticulous approach to research, helps make his novels so frighteningly authentic. Simon Beckett lives in Sheffield. To find out more about him and his books, visit www.simonbeckett.com.

  Copyright

  WHISPERS OF THE DEAD

  A Delacorte Press Book / June 2009

  First published in Great Britain in 2009 by Bantam Press, an imprint of Transworld Publishers

  Published by Bantam Dell, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group

  A Division of Random House, Inc.

  New York, New York

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved

  Copyright © 2009 by Hunter Publications Ltd.

  Delacorte Press is a registered trademark of Random House, Inc., and the colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Beckett, Simon.

  Whispers of the dead / Simon Beckett.

  p. cm.

  eISBN: 978-0-440-33822-2

  1. Forensic anthropologists—Fiction. 2. Serial murderers—Fiction. 3. English— United States—Fiction. 4. Tennessee—Fiction.

  PR6052.E286 W47 2009

  823/.914 22 2009001673

  www.bantamdell.com

  v3.0

  FB2 document info

  Document ID: ea6cde79-6895-4250-8b25-31326c262c95

  Document version: 1

  Document creation date: 4.2.2013

  Created using: calibre 0.9.17, FictionBook Editor Release 2.6.6 software

  Document authors :

  Namenlos

  About

  This file was generated by Lord KiRon's FB2EPUB converter version 1.1.5.0.

  (This book might contain copyrighted material, author of the converter bears no responsibility for it's usage)

  Этот файл создан при помощи конвертера FB2EPUB версии 1.1.5.0 написанного Lord KiRon.

  (Эта книга может содержать материал который защищен авторским правом, автор конвертера не несет ответственности за его использование)

  http://www.fb2epub.net

  https://code.google.com/p/fb2epub/