Bones: Buried Deep

by Max Allan Collins

  “The marsh is on Highway 12, south of the highway in Indiana.”

  “We’re on our way there now,” Brennan said. “You want me to paste the gold star on your chart, or can you handle it yourself?”

  A grin was in his voice. “I’ll wait for you, Doctor.”

  They rang off and she updated Booth as he drove.

  “Where are we?” she asked.

  “Highway 12.”

  She glanced around at a low-slung cityscape. On the North Side, railroad tracks ran parallel to them, woods beyond that, Lake Michigan beyond the woods. After a while a sign near the tracks said Chicago South Shore and South Bend Railroad.

  She asked Booth, “How did you know to go this way?”

  “I stashed Musetti down the road in a place called Ogden Dunes.”

  “As in Dunes Express?”

  Booth looked pained.

  “Sorry,” she said.

  “Truth hurts.”

  “You’ve been out here recently then, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Was there any construction?”

  He considered that. “They’re renovating some of the homes along the lake.”

  “Are they using a lot of cement?”

  “Not particularly, they’re wood homes… but the Homeland Security Department is building a two-lane highway from the interstate to the south to U.S. Steel to the north.”

  “Homeland Security?” Brennan asked.

  “Steel is considered intrinsic to national security. No steel, no tanks, no Humvees, no gun barrels. The HSD wants the road into the plant to be secure, so they’re building it themselves.”

  “Where at?”

  He pointed off to the left. “That over there?”

  She could see the huge steel mill up the road a little north of the South Shore railroad tracks. “Yeah, U.S. Steel.”

  “Right,” he said. “The road will come up to it from the right.”

  “Where’s the marsh?”

  “That’s the west edge of it.”

  Brennan sat forward again. “They’re building the road through the marsh?”

  “Not quite, but close.”

  She stared at him.

  “Don’t go tree hugger on me now, Bones. Wasn’t my idea to put the road there.”

  She stared harder.

  “Hey, they’re almost finished with it. Be done before winter. Seriously, I wouldn’t have put it there either, but I wasn’t consulted.”

  She didn’t tell him that her reaction was not environmentalist in nature… at least, not entirely.

  They passed the construction of the northbound highway, which was still a good half mile south of crossing Highway 12, and would have to bisect both 12 and the railroad tracks before it reached U.S. Steel.

  She wondered why, if the HSD wanted the road secure, they would cross this highway and the tracks. This didn’t make a lot of sense, but in her dealings with the FBI, she’d found that making sense did not seem to be high on the federal government’s priority list.

  She gave up trying to understand the government and watched the prevailing westerly wind carry dust past the car window.

  Booth hit his right turn signal just as Brennan saw a sign for the Indiana Dunes Inland Marsh.

  He pulled into the parking lot and turned again, stopping with the front bumper facing a log rail.

  They alighted, and Brennan stretched.

  It felt good to be out of the car. The dust wasn’t so bad that you noticed it breathing, but she could see buildup on the leaves of nearby plants and the log in front of the car.

  A huge framed map on log legs stood off to the right of the parking lot, the marshland trails plainly visible behind Plexiglas.

  “What’s next?” Brennan asked.

  “We can’t search it by ourselves,” Booth said.

  She shrugged and walked over to the map, Booth on her heels.

  “When did this area become protected?” she asked.

  “Why would you think I’d know that?”

  Brennan got out her cell phone and speed-dialed.

  “Zach Addy,” her cell said.

  “It’s me.”

  “Dr. Brennan. And how are you?”

  “Fine, Zach. Are you near your computer?”

  “What do you think?”

  “Are you online?”

  “Of course.”

  She told him what she wanted to know, then listened to him tap some keys.

  “The state park opened in 1926,” he said.

  “Are we in the state park?” Brennan asked Booth.

  “Barely. This is the southeast corner of the Indiana Dunes State Park; rest of it is across the road, runs back west from here.”

  “All right, Zach, thanks.” She ended the call. “Okay, the park has been here since 1926. How long has the cement been here?”

  “Maybe six months,” Booth said, eyes tight.

  Brennan studied the map and the winding trails that it showed. One trail led away from the parking lot, then — maybe a mile out — branched into different trails that serpentined around the marsh, all coming back to the main trail at that point.

  “Depending on the wind,” she said, “these trails are all too far from the construction to absorb a great deal of cement dust.”

  He frowned. “Are we in the wrong place?”

  Back to the west, maybe a quarter of a mile, a smaller area (according to the map) had a modest parking lot, a few tables, and a single looping trail called the Inland Marsh Overlook.

  This spot squatted in the shadow of the new highway.

  She pointed at the map and grinned. “Booth, I think we just narrowed our search area….”

  They climbed back into the Crown Vic and he drove them to the picnic area. Westbound, a sign pointed to it; but looking up the highway, the sign they should have seen, coming from the west, had been sheared off and lay flat in the ditch next to the road.

  No wonder they had missed it.

  Booth pulled in and parked.

  They got out again, this time Brennan more confident about their search. Booth popped the trunk and removed the trowel she’d used in Jorgensen’s basement.

  “You might want to lose the suit coat before we go,” she said.

  He took her advice, dropped it in the trunk, his gun looking even larger now without the jacket to hide it.

  Picking up a folding shovel, he asked, “Do we need anything else?”

  She shook her head. “Not yet. If we find something…. we’ll deal with it then.”

  As they strode to the trail, she took the lead. It was his investigation, but this was her turf.

  The sun was high in the autumn sky, a light breeze blowing from the west; although she wore a long-sleeved tee shirt, Brennan felt a slight chill and wished she’d brought a windbreaker.

  Then again, a mile of walking through the woods would heat her up and she would probably end up wishing she’d worn a lighter-weight, short-sleeved shirt.

  The trail was nothing more than a worn path through the high grass and foliage sprouting from the sandy soil. From the texture of the earth, Brennan knew they were much closer to finding the source of the skeletons than they ever had been in Jorgensen’s basement.

  A stray strand of hair tickled her face at the same time a stray thought tickled her mind. “Does Jorgensen have a valid driver’s license?”

  “I don’t know. Why?”

  “Well, if he’s responsible for the skeletons, this is a long way from his house.”

  “Couple hours,” Booth agreed.

  “And if he had this place, why use his crawlspace?”

  Booth frowned. “Do you still think he’s the guy delivering skeletons, Bones?”

  “That sounded a little redundant, don’t you think?… I doubt Jorgensen’s our skeleton assembler; but he’s guilty of multiple homicides, which means you may wind up having to prove he didn’t send them.”

  “To nail the right guy for this, you mean,” he said, noddi
ng. “Good point.”

  This sunny landscape was thick with pine and beech trees, leaves still on them, trees fooled by the drought and excessive heat that lasted beyond summer — not enough leaves to block out the sun, but trees and bushes were everywhere, as well as goldenrod and several other weedy-looking plants that Brennan didn’t recognize.

  She did recognize, however, that these were not the plants found in trace portions on the first two skeletons.

  Brennan moved farther into the wilderness, her eyes scouring the ground for any clue, checking the plants for the level, if any, of cement dust accumulated on the leaves.

  Finally, as they neared the marsh overlook — a green space with scattered picnic tables and trash cans — she started seeing cement dust on plant leaves.

  Stopping, she pointed this out to Booth.

  The FBI agent stepped forward, his face moist with sweat, rings starting under his arms. She could feel perspiration on her own face, her hair matted to her forehead, and figured she must be about as disheveled as he was.

  “Cement dust,” she said.

  “So much for the marsh as wetlands,” Booth said. “What did they do with the ‘wet’?”

  The ground they’d trod over hadn’t seen rain in weeks or longer.

  She sighed, hands on hips. “The drought’s hit this area really hard. My guess, they’re at least a foot short of normal rainfall.”

  Looking up ahead, she saw scraggly cattails and wispy bulrushes.

  “Look sharp now,” she told the FBI agent. “We’re getting to where we should find something… if there’s anything to be found.”

  “What exactly are we looking for?”

  “Clues,” she said.

  He touched her shoulder and stopped her. “A little help, here, for the laymen in the crowd — what kind of clues?”

  Facing him, she said, “You once told me that it was like pornography — I would know it when I saw it.”

  Clenching his jaw, he nodded.

  Brennan put her head down and veered off the trail to the right, toward the construction site.

  “Where are you going, Bones?” he asked, still on the pathway.

  “If you were a killer,” she said, without looking back at him, “would you bury the body on the trail?”

  “I’d bury it in the marsh.”

  “Right.”

  Booth fell in behind her again.

  Maybe a hundred yards off, on her left, something white winked at her from the ground near a clump of weeds.

  She stopped… … but it was gone.

  Booth stopped too. “What?”

  She said nothing, her eyes roving the area as if that alone would unearth whatever she had seen.

  Nothing.

  She backed up two steps, then saw it again. Keeping her eyes on the object, she moved to it and knelt. Dusty but white as a pearl in the sun, was a one-inch square buried in the dirt.

  “What?” Booth repeated, next to her now, looking down.

  “You don’t see it?”

  He squatted next to her, putting the thing in shadow. She used a hand to scoot him a foot to the left, letting the sun in again, and pointed to the white square.

  “A rock?” he asked.

  She looked at him. “A rock?”

  “Not a rock?”

  “How about a bone.”

  “You’re sure?”

  She tilted her head and arched both eyebrows at him.

  He smiled weakly. “Of course you’re sure. But is it human?”

  “One way to find out….”

  She used her cell phone to snap three quick pictures from different distances, then eased the trowel in and met resistance.

  Pulling the trowel out, she moved six inches farther from the square and tried again.

  This time, no resistance.

  She dug down, repeating the process all around the object until she had a perimeter.

  Then she snapped more photos, before digging up as much ground as she could without disturbing the object.

  With that done, she dug with the only tool she had more control of than the trowel — her hands.

  The more she cleared, the more photos she took.

  Unable to help, Booth walked a few steps away and made a cell-phone call.

  When he finished, he said, “That was Woolfolk.”

  “What did he have to say?”

  “Jorgensen’s spilling his guts. He’s talking so much they can’t shut him up. It’s like a Dr. Phil show out of control.”

  “I don’t know what—”

  “Bones, he’s been killing gay men for fifty years.”

  “…That does fit the time frame of our made-to-order skeletons.”

  Booth was shaking his head. “Yeah, but he’s denying that.”

  “He is?”

  “And if he’s done it, why would he? He’s copped to over thirty murders, but Woolfolk says he vehemently denies delivering the skeletons.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yeah — the guy who did that? Must have been sick, he says.”

  She went on digging. “Keep talking. Tell me more.”

  “Woolfolk says word on the street is that the other crime families are turning against the Gianellis.”

  She frowned and glanced at him, pausing in her work. “Turning on their own?”

  “You’ve got to understand,” Booth said. “The Gianellis run most everything, and what they don’t run, they don’t want. They’re public figures… they’re like rock stars or something. You remember John Gotti?”

  She nodded.

  “The older Gianelli’s the same sort of gangster. He craves the attention, the crowds, and the younger Gianelli is even worse. And ever since Al Capone attracted too much attention with the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre… you have heard of that?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, ever since, and particularly in modern times, the mob has sought to be a low-profile operation.”

  She pulled the object free from the ground. “There.”

  “Human?” Booth asked, moving closer.

  Brennan held up a skull that was dirty but otherwise whole.

  A human skull.

  “Jackpot,” Booth said.

  “Could be,” Brennan granted, “if we can match dental records.”

  She swiveled the skull so Booth could see the back. “And I’m thinking maybe this is the cause of death….”

  She pointed to where two small caliber bullets had bored through the back of the skull.

  “Double tap,” Booth said. “Mob-style execution.”

  “We’re going to need more people,” Brennan said, “and ground-penetrating radar.”

  “You have but to ask,” Booth said, getting out his cell phone. “I think we just found ourselves a Mafia graveyard.”

  “Whatever it is,” she said, “this is most likely the source of our skeletons… and there are probably more.”

  Booth called for help and then, as he was putting the cell away, his eyes panned toward the construction site and froze.

  Then he was smiling, his eyes wide.

  “What?”

  “That’s why,” he said. “The construction’s coming too close to the graveyard! They had to move it. They couldn’t risk us finding all these bodies!”

  “Possible,” she allowed, not wanting to go much further without proof.

  “It’s logical, Bones. Just the kind of thing you like. The mob’s been burying guys out here for God only knows how long, and now with the drought exposing their hiding place, and the encroaching construction? They had to move the bodies. More than that, get rid of them…. Then, to throw us off the track, they put us on the trail of a serial killer.”

  “How would they even know about that?” she asked skeptically.

  “Trust me, no one knows what goes on in their city better than the Outfit.” He waved his arms. “The cops, us feds, we’re just trying to keep our heads above water; but the mob guys? They know everything, anything that might h
elp them turn a buck.”

  “There’s a certain logic to what you say,” she admitted.

  “Thank you.”

  “But how does knowing about a madman like Jorgensen help them ‘turn a buck’?”

  He frowned, just a little.

  “Don’t mean to rain on your parade,” she said.

  “No. Valid point. Gotta think about that, Bones…. Don’t let me stop you.”

  If they were standing in the middle of a graveyard, she was going to be busy for a very long time.

  She surveyed her surroundings.

  This was a big area to search. Would be more like one of those mass graves in Bosnia or Guatemala.

  Booth was on his phone again, this time relaying news of their find to the higher-ups while Brennan poked around the ground, wondering how many sorry souls had taken the one-way ride on the Dunes Express.

  Knowing that, dead gangsters or not, they deserved the dignity of identification.

  10

  The inland marsh site swarmed with agents, cops, and crime scene techs.

  Not only had Booth and Brennan narrowed the focus of their search, a combination of science, drought, and luck had helped them win the forensics lottery: actually finding a skull.

  Already the Chicago PD was going through missing persons records, trying to get a dental match with Brennan’s discovery, while the same information had been forwarded to the FBI computers.

  The skull itself would be sent to Brennan’s staff at the Jeffersonian for them to add their insights and expertise.

  Right now Brennan was supervising a pair of techs operating the ground-penetrating radar. To their right, a Chicago PD Crime Scene Unit was literally dug in, doing exploratory work in spots flagged as potential graves.

  Other FBI agents had searched the area and found signs that the park had been home to considerable digging, particularly the ground nearer the construction site; still other agents were searching farther down the trail in either direction.

  Several agents were at the Visitor’s Center and ranger station, questioning anyone they could find. Still other FBI personnel, down at the Dirksen Building, had started delving into any mob-related crimes that might have a victim who ended up here. (That would be a long list.)

  For his own part, Seeley Booth had been thinking.

  Seemingly unconnected pieces — pieces from what he’d thought were separate puzzles — were fitting together; he was seeing things from a different angle. Now he could flip the situation one hundred eighty degrees and examine it from the bad guy’s point of view.