The Art of Dying: A Ray Hanley Crime Thriller

by Derik Cavignano

  “I guess I could pick up some extra details,” Ray said.

  “I don’t want you to do that. You work long enough hours as it is. Maybe it’s time I go back to work, get a little adult time during the day. Put something else in my mind besides songs from the Wiggles.” She sat back and sipped her wine. “Why are you making that face?”

  “I’m not making a face.”

  “Yes, you are. Your caveman face. The one that says, ‘Me no like.’”

  Ray chuckled in spite of himself. “Part-time teaching will barely cover the cost of daycare for Petey.”

  “That might be true, but I heard Shelia is looking for babysitting work. We could probably get her for ten bucks an hour.”

  “Sheila Morrison? The girl who dropped out of community college to spend more time with her loser boyfriend?”

  “Come on, Ray, she’s a nice kid.”

  “Her boyfriend deals drugs and runs errands for Jack Flaherty.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “Why would I joke about something like that?”

  “I can’t believe you’re just telling me this. He gave Jason a lollipop the other day.”

  “What?” He slammed his fist against the patio table and nearly overturned their wine glasses. “I’m gonna kill him.”

  “See what happens when you keep stuff from me? No secrets, Ray. I mean it.”

  “Fine, no secrets. But Tommy made me swear I wouldn’t say anything. He’s embarrassed his daughter’s dating that scumbag.”

  Michelle glanced at the Morrisons’ roof deck. “Does Pauline know?”

  “She’s taking it pretty hard. You know they had high hopes for her.”

  “What will they do?”

  “Tommy wants me to catch him in the act.”

  “How will you do that?”

  “I asked Frank to tail him, figure out when his next deal will be so we can tip off Donovan from Vice.”

  “Wait a minute, Frank from down the street?”

  “No, Frank Eastman. He’s got his own private investigator’s business now.”

  “Why can’t you just tell Donovan and cut out the middle man?”

  “Because the lieutenant’s not willing to waste police resources investigating a small-time dealer like Darren Boyle.”

  Michelle considered this for a moment and then grinned. “But if Frank does all the work, gives Donovan the time and place…”

  Ray finished his wine. “Exactly.”

  “I like it,” Michelle said. “Cleaning up Charlestown one dirtbag at a time.” She leaned over and kissed him.

  It was meant to be quick, but the moment their lips met Ray felt an intensity reminiscent of their early days together, and he kissed her back long and hard. Michelle moved onto his lap and wrapped her arms around the small of his back.

  “Have you ever done it on a roof deck?” Ray whispered.

  Michelle tucked a lock of hair behind her ear and grinned. “There’s a first time for everything.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  The Artist stood in the center of the gallery and basked in the glow of his own genius. He was a pioneer. A savant. A visionary who dared to be different. They would write books about him one day, referring to him not as an artist but as The Artist. And there would be movies too. He’d be played by someone dark and brooding and handsome. Someone like a young Christian Bale.

  The process of creating an entirely new art form was nothing short of euphoric. His art spoke to him, quite literally, and he liked hearing their screams in the dark. From that first shriek of horror to the silence elicited by the mocking echo of their own voices, it was a hauntingly beautiful metamorphosis—terror blossoming into acceptance.

  A surveillance camera monitored the converted survival bunker, and although shadows draped the cavernous room, a handful of picture lights produced a sufficient glow to capture his exhibits in dramatic detail on film.

  “The newbies always scream the loudest,” he said, addressing the camera. “This sound meter registers every scream uttered in the gallery. Incidentally, Mrs. C is the reigning champion at 103 decibels. She may not possess many redeeming qualities, or any, really, but my goodness can that woman scream. Isn’t that right, Mrs. C?”

  He pointed the sound meter toward her and cocked his head. “Are you still with us, Mrs. C, or do I need to remind you of your manners?”

  A disembodied voice, barely more than a whisper, croaked the appropriate reply.

  “Good. I’m not sure you’d survive another session of behavioral therapy and I’m looking forward to spending more quality time together.” He turned back to the camera. “It seems Mrs. C has lost her usual fire. Interesting.” He whirled toward her and yelled, “Starting to taste that humble pie now, aren’t you, Mrs. C?”

  He smoothed out his dark hair and heaved a sigh. “Today, we unveil our latest exhibit, featuring our very own Barry Finkleton, curator of the prestigious Finkleton Gallery of Art. He’s been in a bit of a coma these last few days, but let’s see if we can wake him.”

  The Artist stalked to where he’d mounted Finkleton to the wall. A burlap sack muffled the sound of his moaning. The Artist climbed a stepladder and removed the sack with the flair of a magician, letting it glide gracefully to the floor.

  Finkleton’s head lolled to the side, his eyes rolling back to expose the veiny whites. The Artist slapped his pudgy face. “Come on, sleepyhead. Wakey wakey.”

  Finkleton’s eyes snapped open—bright blue and brimming with terror. The Artist slipped a pair of glasses onto the bridge of Finkleton’s nose. “Remember me?”

  Finkleton shook his head, the picture light illuminating golden beads of sweat glistening on his brow.

  “You called me a talentless loser. You told me to crawl back into whatever dark corner I hailed from and never set foot in your gallery again.”

  Finkleton’s lips, still cracked and swollen from a recent blunt force trauma, quivered.

  “Sound familiar?”

  Finkleton didn’t answer.

  The Artist clucked his tongue. “Where are my manners? I seem to be blocking your view.” He stepped off the ladder and gestured beyond Mrs. C to his other exhibits.

  “What… what have you done to them?” Finkleton blubbered.

  The Artist grinned. “Do you like it? It’s a revolutionary new style. I call it the Art of Dying.”

  Finkleton made a guttural sound and spewed vomit onto the floor.

  The Artist laughed. “I’ll take that as a compliment. But you haven’t seen the best part.” He raised a handheld mirror to Finkleton’s face. “Behold, your metamorphosis.”

  Finkleton screamed until he hyperventilated. The Artist brought him to attention with a sharp slap to the cheek. “That’s better. I honestly wasn’t sure where I was headed with this project until after I amputated your arms and legs, but when I saw all that black hair on your belly, together with your vile personality, my inner muse blurted out, ‘By God, he’s a tarantula!’ And voila!”

  The Artist stepped back to admire the prosthetic appendages he’d implanted into Finkleton’s torso—eight gnarled limbs bristling with coarse, black hair. “Did you notice the egg sac attached to your rear? Symbolizing the artists you’ve discovered over the years, the careers you helped birth. It’s genius, right? I’d appreciate your honest opinion, Mr. Finkleton. Do you recognize my talent now?”

  The Artist winced as Finkleton screamed. “My goodness, 119 decibels. I believe that’s a new record.” He slipped the sound meter into the back pocket of his jeans and chuckled. “I’m afraid I might need to cut those vocal cords sooner than I thought. Now be a chum, Mr. Finkleton, and tell me… have you seen where I put my scalpel?”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Ray swung by the medical examiner’s office on his way to the precinct, circling the block until he found a metered spot on the east side of Mass Ave, where he was surrounded by the trendy shops and meticulously restored Victorian brownstones of the South End. Had he parked one b
lock to the west on the grittier streets of Roxbury, the odds of his car being there when he returned dropped to about fifty-fifty.

  After a brief walk down a tree-lined street, he arrived at the ME’s office, an old industrial building with a half-brick, half-concrete façade. He rang the bell and waved to the camera, pushing through the door as Mrs. Granderling buzzed him in. She’d worked reception for the past few years and greeted everyone she met with the same measure of partially concealed contempt. Doc Death liked to joke that the stiffs in the morgue had more personality than she did.

  Mrs. Granderling frowned at Ray from behind the reception desk, her gray-blond hair looking especially puffy—the kind of hairstyle that could conceal a small family of raccoons. “Can I help you?” Her voice was flat and nasally, more a sigh of resignation than a question.

  “Doc Weintraub around?”

  “He’s very busy today.”

  “Can you just tell him I’m here?” he said, and favored her with his trademark smile.

  Her lips pulled back into what could’ve been a smile or a sneer. It was gone so quickly it was hard to tell. She pressed a button on the phone and mumbled something into the receiver. After a moment, she nodded and hung up. “He’ll see you,” she said, sounding disappointed.

  Ray rapped his knuckles against the desk. “Always a pleasure, Mrs. G.”

  As he strode down the hall toward Doc’s office, he felt the stench of the place seeping into his skin, smothering him in a noxious cloud of death, formaldehyde, and antiseptic. He wrinkled his nose and breathed into the crook of his arm, trying to stifle his gag reflex. The last thing he wanted was to blow chunks all over the hallway like some rookie cop.

  “What’s the matter, Ray? You don’t like our brand of fresh air?” Luis Durgin, Doc’s forensic autopsy tech, grinned at Ray as he wheeled a cart full of tissue samples down the hall, sections of heart, brain, and lungs sloshing around inside plastic containers. He was dressed in green surgical scrubs and had a pair of Beats headphones slung around his neck, the speakers buzzing with the angry wail of heavy metal.

  “I don’t know how you guys stand it,” Ray said.

  Luis shrugged. “I don’t even smell it anymore, man.” He winked at Ray, then pulled the headphones over his ears and headed toward the storage lab.

  Ray turned left at the end of the hall and found Doc Weintraub in his office sitting behind a cluttered steel desk with a pile of papers scattered around him. Doc glanced up at the sound of his approach and waved him in.

  Ray settled himself into a sturdy metal chair opposite the desk. “How you been, Doc?”

  “Well, most recently, I’ve been up to my elbows in intestines.”

  Ray gave Doc an obligatory laugh, knowing he would keep on cracking bad jokes until one triggered a chuckle… and Ray couldn’t afford to sit there all day.

  Doc’s office was dark and cramped, but thankfully the smell of freshly scrubbed death was a tad less nauseating in here. The blinds were drawn tight against the glare of the morning sun and a fluorescent light above the desk sputtered frequently enough to be annoying, but not enough to induce an epileptic fit. A Far Side calendar hung on the wall beside a shelf of medical texts, this month’s cartoon explaining the real reason dinosaurs went extinct.

  “So what’s the word on Danny the Mule?” Ray asked.

  Doc Death blinked behind his glasses, his hazel eyes clouded with confusion. “Danny the Mule?”

  “Danny McDougal. The guy we fished out of the quarry.”

  “Oh yes, him.” Doc rifled through the papers on his desk. “I’ve got the transcript from the autopsy somewhere in this pile.” After a brief fishing expedition, he held up a stack of papers. “Tina and I both attended to this one given the unusual circumstances of the body.”

  “You mean the fact that he had a penis attached to his face?”

  “I would certainly call that unusual, wouldn’t you?”

  “I’d say it qualifies.”

  “Tina’s taking the lead on this one, so I’ll let her debrief you on the autopsy.”

  Given their history, the mention of Tina and debrief in the same sentence could’ve been construed as an innuendo, but he didn’t think Doc realized what he’d said. Doc dialed her extension and Tina appeared in the doorway a few moments later, her curly brown hair flowing over her shoulders like she just stepped out of a shampoo commercial, when, in all likelihood, she’d just finished gutting a corpse.

  She met Ray’s gaze and held it, her eyes reflecting a sea of emotions. She was complicated, guarded, and intense, and he was gregarious, outgoing, and unapologetic. Together, they were like oil and water, which was why it never worked between them.

  Tina settled into the chair beside Ray. One of her knees brushed against his thigh and lingered for a moment. A test to see how he would react? Typical Tina. Always treating people like the subject of an experiment.

  “What are we looking at?” Ray asked.

  “Well,” Tina said, “we didn’t find any water in Mr. McDougal’s lungs, so that means he didn’t drown in the quarry.”

  “Not surprising,” Ray said, “given the penis rearrangement surgery. Somebody obviously tortured him to death before dumping the body. You see any evidence that he was weighted down?”

  “We didn’t find any chafing on the wrists or ankles, nothing that would suggest he was wrapped in ropes or chains. But we did find bruising around his neck from what appeared to be ligature marks that had mostly healed.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I believe Mr. McDougal had some form of restraint around his neck while in captivity, but I can’t pinpoint the source.”

  “Is that what killed him?”

  “No, he didn’t die from asphyxiation.”

  “What was the cause of death?” Ray asked.

  Tina glanced at Doc Weintraub. “We don’t have anything conclusive at this point, but we should know more when the tox screens come back.”

  “How about time of death?”

  Tina fidgeted with her notes, looking uncertain for the first time in her debrief. If she were testifying at an actual trial, the defense attorney would be salivating at the chance of cross examination.

  “It’s hard to say at this point. The cold waters of the quarry would’ve slowed down the rate of decay, but there are a host of other variables to consider.”

  “Such as?”

  Tina ticked off the points on her fingers. “Such as the temperature and humidity at the actual place of death, how much time elapsed before the body was disposed of in the quarry, not to mention the types of microorganisms in the water. It’ll take quite a bit of lab work to pinpoint a precise range.”

  Ray shifted in his seat, drawing his leg away from hers. “What’s your gut feel?”

  “Judging from the degree of decay in his intestines, and taking into consideration the water temperature, I’d say the murder took place between two to four days ago.”

  Ray turned toward Doc Death. “What do you think?”

  “I agree with Tina’s assessment. A lot depends on how long he was in the water. We’ll narrow the range with the lab results, but hopefully that gives you something to work with in the meantime.”

  “It does. Now, tell me about the castration.”

  “It was remarkably clean,” Tina said.

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning whoever did it likely had medical training.”

  “So we’re talking a doctor, a nurse, or an EMT?”

  “Possibly,” Tina said. “Whoever did this nursed Mr. McDougal back to health. We found markings on his arms consistent with IV lines. The killer obviously wanted Mr. McDougal to survive. I can only guess to prolong his torture.”

  “Danny was missing a month,” Ray said. “That’s a long time for torture.”

  “I have to admit,” Doc said, “it’s rather impressive the killer succeeded in keeping him alive for so long.”

  “All the more reason to suspect a medical backgr
ound,” Ray said. “What about the stitches in his ear?”

  “They were standard polypropylene nonabsorbable sutures,” Tina said. “We found threads of it in both ears, but there was no evidence of an underlying laceration. Not even one that had healed.”

  Ray frowned. Why would the killer stitch an ear that didn’t need stitching? “Anything else?”

  “There is one other thing.” Tina held up a Ziploc bag containing a sky-blue Hot Wheels car with white racing stripes. It looked like a 1970s Dodge Charger.

  “Where’d you find that?” Ray asked.

  Tina brushed a lock of hair from her eyes. “Halfway up Mr. McDougal’s rectum.”

  ***

  Ray walked into the precinct just as Lieutenant Spinonni kicked off morning roll call. At the sight of Ray, Spinonni halted his opening remarks and folded his arms across his barrel of a chest. “What’s the matter, Hanley, couldn’t drag yourself out of bed this morning?”

  Ray settled into the seat next to Billy. “I had to make a pitstop at the morgue.”

  “What the hell were you doing there?” Spinonni snapped.

  “Visiting your sense of humor,” Ray said, unable to resist.

  The room erupted in laughter, running the gamut from discreet snickers to full-on belly laugh. Detective Duncan landed in the latter camp, cracking up with such violence that a wave of coffee sloshed out of his cup and soaked his chinos.

  Twin bands of red lit up the lieutenant’s cheeks like the rouge of a twenty-dollar hooker. “You’d better mind that mouth of yours,” Spinonni said through clenched teeth, the hairs of his mustache bristling.

  The room quieted, but Detective Duncan couldn’t stop giggling.

  “Enough!” Spinonni bellowed. He pointed at Ray. “My office after the briefing.”

  Ray wasn’t surprised that Spinonni had singled him out. A few years ago, he’d arrested the lieutenant’s nephew for playing a role in a drug deal turned homicide, and because Ray refused to look the other way, the lieutenant’s nephew got ten years at the state penitentiary. The lieutenant had been making Ray’s life miserable ever since.