The Victim at Vultee Arch

by Charles Williamson

  Chris Moore might be a nice family man who’d never been in any trouble with the law. I knew that I shouldn’t judge this man by his looks, but I couldn’t help it. He’s eighty pounds heavier and at least twenty years younger than I am. All of the extra weight looked like it was muscle. Chris Moore is a scary man, and I was sorry that Chad wasn’t with me for backup.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Mr. Moore had a firm handshake but not a crushing one. I noticed that his hand was no larger than mine. His feet also seemed small in proportion to his massive body.

  “Mr. Moore, thank you for meeting me.”

  “Call me Chris. I probably wouldn’t recognize that you were talking to me as Mr. Moore. Hop in the Hummer, and I’ll take you up to the retreat center.” His voice still retained that flat quality, but his smile was friendly, and he didn’t seem intimidating in his manner.

  As we got in the open-top vehicle, I asked, “Chris, did you wrestle in the GWG?”

  “Guilty as charged, detective. I’m the notorious Marauding Moor. I hope to be back in the ring next year after I recover from a small injury.”

  We drove through the Seven Canyons Resort to a gate near the back of the complex. Chris opened it by pressing a remote control button. There seemed to be no road behind the gate. He drove up a thirty-degree slope of smooth red sandstone, which showed a slight black imprint from the passage of tires.

  “What brought you to northern Arizona to recuperate?”

  “I have relatives in Cottonwood. I visited the Verde Valley often when I was a kid, and I like the weather and scenery. How about you Detective Damson? Are you from Arizona originally?”

  “Call me Mike. No, I moved here three years ago from LA. I thought I was retiring, but I soon got restless and took a job with the Sheriff’s Office. I was thirty years on the L.A.P.D., mostly in homicide.”

  Chris Moore made no other comments until we were parked in a covered area behind a sandstone wall. I could see a beautifully carved door across a courtyard with an elaborate stream and waterfall. As we crossed on a sandstone bridge, I noticed dozens of colorful fish swimming in the mock stream. This space was as fancy as any entry courtyard that I’d ever seen. The red sandstone wall prevented the guests from seeing the view until the front door was opened. It was designed for drama. When Chris opened the massive door, the extraordinary view of the Dry Creek Area was revealed in the glass walled entry hall. A large lounge with a snooker table, two massive rock fireplaces, and a big screen TV was on one side. A dining area with five six-person tables was on the opposite side. Both rooms had glass walls along the north side that revealed a covered patio with the view beyond.

  Chris led me to a long hallway with the natural undisturbed red sandstone on one side and a row of doors on the other. There were fifteen bedrooms along the curving corridor that followed the natural shape of the ledge. A sign on the door identified the room of Dr. Quentin Thatcher.

  “That’s a nice touch to post a tasteful plaque with a guest’s name on the door.” I said.

  “I make those for each guest. I’m told they make a great impression on clients who come here for the first time.”

  The room door had no lock on the outside. I noticed a deadbolt on the inside for the privacy of the guests. The room had a dramatic view, but otherwise was similar to other upscale hotel rooms. The floors were varnished red sandstone covered with Navajo rugs. The bed had been made, and the room was spick and span. A leather suit bag and a small matching carry on case were in the closet. Personal toiletries were neatly arrayed in the bathroom, but otherwise there was no sign that the room had been used recently. A table held a bowl of fruit and a bottle of 21-year-old Glenlivet. It had not been opened.

  I looked through Dr. Thatcher’s bags as Chris Moore watched attentively. The bags contained two custom-made wool suits and two dress shirts, not the sort of clothing that I would expect for someone on vacation. There was one set of casual pants and a golf shirt. The small case was mostly full of reports and file folders, most of them stamped Confidential.

  “Dr. Thatcher was found wearing hiking clothing. There does not seem to be room for the boots in these bags. Did he keep a pair here?”

  Chris Moore smiled and said, “Let me show you the storeroom.”

  I followed him back to the lounge. A single room was located away from the view side. The room contained a shelf of boots like in a shoe store. Each pair was still in its box and stacked neatly on shelves. They were all the same brand as Dr. Thatcher had been wearing. A number below the boxes on each shelf indicated the sizes using both American and British measurement. Directly across from the hiking boots was a similar shelf with golf shoes. The room also contained boxes of daypacks and fanny packs identical to the one we found with Dr. Thatcher. A rack held various sizes of hiking pants and khaki shirts like the ones worn by Dr. Thatcher. Another rack held a variety of golf pants and shirts both in men’s and women’s sizes. Cases of water bottles and boxes of granola bars were along the back wall. One area of the room had about twenty golf bags complete with clubs.

  “They’re not like bowling shoes. We never reuse them. If a guest needs boots or golf shoes we encourage him to take them home afterwards. Otherwise, I give them to the Twice Nice Consignment of Sedona or Goodwill in Cottonwood.”

  “Your bank seems to go first class in everything. Do you know much about the company, Chris?”

  “The headquarters is in Edinburgh, Scotland. The merchant bank was formed in the early nineteenth century to funnel investments from wealthy Europeans into high return opportunities here in the Americas, at least that’s the story in the Employee’s Handbook they sent me. It’s not a bank that takes deposits and cashes checks; it’s all about investments. They have about ten billion invested in North America.”

  I was a little surprised that the caretaker of this remote location knew that much about his employer. “I understand that you had no direct contact with Dr. Thatcher during his visit. Is that correct?”

  “I didn’t see or talk to him. Mrs. Tanner, the boss’s assistant, called and told me that he’d be here sometime yesterday. I was going to come by this afternoon and see if everything was OK. They didn’t tell me how long he’d be here.”

  I wasn’t certain what I was looking for in coming to the retreat center. The simple explanation was that a young man came to Sedona and went hiking by himself. He encountered a very large rattlesnake and died from its bite. Why couldn’t I accept that simple answer? Was I just bored with the lack of action in the Sedona substation?

  I asked Chris for permission to take Dr. Thatcher’s bags with me, but I was not certain what I was looking for in them either. I did think that packing two conservative business suits was a strong indication that Dr. Thatcher’s trip was not exclusively a vacation.

  Chris seemed surprised by the request but said, “Well Mike, I’ll leave it to you to return them to the family at the proper time.” He drove me back to my Explorer. I went back to my office to see if there was any additional information yet.

  As I entered the front door, Rose asked, “Did you finally find something interesting to investigate?” I was embarrassed that it had been that obvious that I’d grown restless.

  “Rose, this might be a fascinating case. It’s too early to tell. Please put these bags in the evidence room until I have a chance to look through them tomorrow.” Our evidence room was actually a locked closet with a steel door. There was always someone on duty at the substation all night, so there was no other security for the property.

  Rose gave me two telephone notes. I decided not to return the one from Meg at the Sedona Red Rock News. It was well past her deadline, and I could call her in the morning, perhaps with additional information. The second one was from Chad.

  When I reached Chad, he explained, “It’s less than a hour until the Quentin Thatcher autopsy. Can you drive up to Flagstaff for it and then bring me back to Sedona?”

  I knew why Chad was anxious for me to be at the autop
sy. Kay Sumter, the Coconino County Medical Examiner, was famous for her sharp tongue and sarcasm. I was one of the few people in the Sheriff’s Office that she treated with some respect. The odds were higher that if I asked a question, she would not make fun of it. Dr. Sumter had moved to the county from St. Louis, and she thought most of the local officers acted like the Keystone Cops. Kay Sumter was as competent and experienced as any medical examiner in LA, and the county was lucky to have her. I told Chad that I’d meet him at Dr. Sumter’s office, and I left for Flagstaff immediately. I didn’t want to get blasted for entering the room after the procedure had started.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  NEW YORK:

  At 2:30, Sir Henry received a second call from northern Arizona on his direct line. It was unusual for his special phone to ring twice in one day. Only eighteen people knew that phone number. He answered abruptly without identifying himself or greeting the caller. “Is there a problem with your project?”

  The caller responded with a tone of defensiveness because of the abrupt manner in which the phone had been answered, “The project was discovered by a passing helicopter early this morning. I did not expect it to be noticed for three days to a week. The time difference could be a problem in the evaluation of the project. I thought you should know.”

  Sir Henry always preferred to be in total control of any important field operation, but like every manager, he had a limited span of direct control. He’d learned that he must delegate. Sir Henry hated surprises, but there was nothing that could be done about this one. His answer was much gruffer than his typical mellow and reassuring tone of voice. “The competition is probably composed of rural rubes and buffoons. I’m not unduly concerned. They are unlikely to understand the importance of the project. Keep me informed.” Sir Henry hung up without waiting for a comment.

  Henry Griffin was a proud man. He was proudest of his foresight and keen judgment. Sir Henry had been knighted a year after that foresight had allowed some members of England’s most important family to avoid substantial losses in the bonds of several American telecommunications companies. He was certain that he’d made the correct decision regarding this current matter. It was now time to focus his attention on more important decisions and put this Arizona annoyance out of his mind.

  FLAGSTAFF, ARIZONA:

  I hurried into the autopsy room with only minutes to spare. Kay Sumter, MD and my partner Chad Archer were already dressed in disposable robes and masks, but examinations of the remains of Quentin Thatcher had not yet begun.

  Speaking through her mask, Kay said, “Glad you could join us Mike. You have some of the most interesting cases. I’ve never seen a snakebite death before. Get dressed and join us at the table.”

  The body of the athletic looking young black man was lying nude on the table where her lab assistant had positioned it before I’d arrived. The ugly swollen area on the right side of his neck was the only obvious injury.

  “Kay, I always enjoy bringing you new challenges. You may get to write this one up for one of your forensic journals,” I said in a kidding manner.

  I could see Chad take a step back. He’d never heard Dr. Sumter addressed by her first name. Even the Sheriff always called her Dr. Sumter. However, Kay had suggested that I use her first name the previous summer while we worked to understand a number of fatal accidents at the Grand Canyon National Park. I had taken her up on the suggestion.

  As I approached the table, I asked, “What did you do with the snake?”

  “My lab assistant took the snake and the rock to Herman Crutchfield at NAU soon after the body was delivered. He’s a well-regarded herpetologist. Chad that means he studies snakes.” Kay Sumter had always treated Chad as a dumb jock. She spoke to him as if she were explaining things to a child. Chad had been an all conference football player at Northern Arizona University at Flagstaff, ten years earlier, but he was certainly no dumb jock.

  “It was the scariest damn rattlesnake I’ve ever seen. I’m glad Margaret didn’t see the ugly monster, or we’d be limited to hiking in the dead of winter.” Kay agreed with my appraisal of the snake and began her examination.

  The autopsy took over an hour. Kay recorded a running commentary of whatever part of the corpse she was working on at the time. Neither Chad nor I asked any questions during the procedure. We were there strictly as observers. I was surprised at the amount of time spent on the victim’s chest and arms. She looked over the whole body in ultraviolet light as well as with bright white light. At one point she got out a magnifying glass to look at the skin on the victim’s chest and then she examined the shirt that Dr. Thatcher had worn for his final hike. Dr. Sumter took tissue samples of the neck area near the bite for later examination. Her assistant took dozens of photographs as Dr. Sumter worked on each part of the body. After she’d cleaned up, the medical examiner joined us in her office to explain what she’d found.

  Kay sat at her cluttered desk and leaned back in her office chair. “Again, Mike you haven’t disappointed me. This is an interesting case. Certainly, this man died from snakebite to the neck. More precisely, he died from respiratory paralysis and an extreme blood pressure drop from anaphylactic shock as a result of envenomation by a four foot six inch rattlesnake. Lab tests can confirm that the snake you found is the same one that bit this man, but I did measure the fangs of the rattler before sending it to Herman Crutchfield. The bite marks in Quentin Thatcher’s neck exactly fit the distance between the fangs of that rattlesnake.”

  “That confirms what we found at the scene. We were certain it was that snake,” Chad said.

  Kay Sumter smiled at Chad as if to humor him and explained, “Deaths from snakebites have become so rare that they are now considered very unusual. This one certainly was.”

  “How many deaths are reported a year in the US?” I asked as I took notes on a small index card.

  “There were twelve recorded deaths last year and fifteen the year before. Most of the deaths occurred in the southern states. In a normal year about 8,000 people seek medical attention for snakebites in the US, and several hundred of those are in Arizona. Only three deaths have been attributed to snakes in Arizona in the past five years. The first was a twenty-year-old man who was free climbing near Safford. He reached onto a ledge above his head and was bitten. He died in the subsequent sixty-foot fall. The second death was a sixty-eight year old man who was golfing in north Scottsdale. He got bitten while searching for a ball in the rough. He died from an allergy to the anti venom. It’s made from horse blood, and a few people are very allergic to it. The saddest case was a two-year-old boy who was hiking with his parents west of Tucson. Small children are at much greater risk of receiving a fatal bite because of the higher concentration of the venom in their small bodies. All three victims were tourists from other states. I couldn’t find any record of a fatal bite in Coconino County in the past ten years.”

  “If you’re ready to rule it was an accident, we can wrap up this case today Dr. Sumter,” Chad said.

  Kay Sumter shot Chad a look like she would have used for a naughty inattentive boy in a grade school class. “I am not prepared to say this death was accidental, quite the contrary. It’s a very suspicious death.”

  I was embarrassed for Chad, but he’d also been in the room for the autopsy. “That’s why you said it was a very interesting case,” I said. “What did you find Kay? Did it involve the shirt and his chest?”

  Kay smiled at me. “At least one of you was paying some attention. There are bruises on the chest and on the lateral portions of each arm. They are difficult to see because of the victim’s dark skin. I found one spot where the button on the man’s shirt pocket was impressed into the skin.”

  “Would these bruises be consistent with someone holding Quentin Thatcher while the snake bit him?” My suspicion about this case not being as simple was being confirmed.

  “Yes Mike. However the bruises would also be consistent with someone dragging Mr. Thatcher away from the snake after he was b
itten. In either case, someone had their arms around his arms, pinning them to his side and around his chest. He was grabbed from behind by a very powerful man.”

  I immediately thought of Chris Moore. He was the most powerful man that I’d met in this part of Arizona. “Can you tell when the bruises occurred in relation to his time of death?” I asked hoping for the definitive evidence that a crime was committed.

  “We were lucky to have him on the table within twenty-four hours of his death. Even with that advantage, I can only tell you that the bruises occurred within four hours of death. I think someone held Quentin Thatcher while another person pushed the angry rattlesnake against his neck, but I can’t testify that occurred. However, the evidence would be consistent with that explanation.”

  “Do you have an estimate of the time of death and the period between the bite and death?” I asked. I was now working a murder case.

  “That first part of your question is fairly easy. He died between 11:30 and 12:30 last night. I don’t know the answer to the second part. I did some reading about snakebites before the autopsy, but the symptoms of this death don’t fit well with the cases I reviewed. He did not live for days. However, I don’t know if he lived for several hours or several minutes. The bite itself did not penetrate a major artery or vein. It will take some more work to pinpoint the time of the bite.”

  “Are you classifying this death as a likely homicide?”

  Kay paused and bit her lower lip as she thought about my question. After fifteen seconds she replied, “Damn Mike, I just don’t know. Maybe the examination of the snake will tell us something. I know that Quentin Thatcher had on the same shirt when the bruises on his chest were made, but I can’t say that they occurred near the time of the snakebite, because I don’t know when it occurred. Give me a day to decide, but in the meantime you should treat this like a homicide. Call me tomorrow afternoon.”