by Alex MacLean
He moved into an area of newer graves, and at that moment he saw two caretakers about three hundred yards ahead of him. Quickly, he retreated behind a nearby maple tree. He leaned against the trunk, feeling the hard ridges of bark against his body. His heart began racing.
He peeked around, watching them. One man was raking a rectangular patch of topsoil in front of an upright headstone of a carved angel holding a large heart. The other man was carrying rolls of sod and setting them down next to the grave. A lawn tractor with an attached trailer sat nearby.
Hoss pressed the binoculars to his face and trained them on the headstone. He adjusted the center dial, bringing the inscription into sharper focus.
Hector J. Walsh
Jan 27, 1942 – May 15, 2010
In God’s Loving Care
His heart beat faster. That was him.
Hoss lowered the binoculars and looked around, trying to orient himself. He wouldn’t have the luxury of daylight when he returned here, so he needed to memorize the location of the grave.
After he did that, he gave one final look back to the headstone.
He whispered, “Well, Mr. Walsh. Had you ever believed in the resurrection?”
36
Acresville, May 19
2:35 p.m.
Allan’s head still pounded. Shadowed by thoughts of the previous night and Cathy’s funeral earlier, much of the drive to Acresville went by unnoticed.
The police station was located on Preston Street, a small, two-story structure of brick and glass. Allan parked in the back and then went inside.
A dispatcher led him to the chief’s office.
“Detective Stanton.” David rose from his chair and reached out across the desk to greet him. “I’m pleased to meet you.”
Allan mustered a smile. “Likewise.”
As they exchanged handshakes, he noticed David’s firm grip, the smile so wide on his face that it deepened the crinkles around his eyes.
“Where would you like to start?”
“With the reports,” Allan said. “Have the autopsy results come in?”
David remained standing. “Not yet. Fitzgerald said he’ll have them to me by the end of the week.”
“Is the body still in his care?”
“Yes.”
“Then I’d like to see that and speak with Fitzgerald, if I may.”
“I’ll arrange that.” David moved out from behind the desk and walked toward the door. “I have an office that you can use during your stay. Come.”
Allan followed him down a tiled hallway to a room with a desk, fax machine, computer, and filing cabinets. A corner window afforded a view of Preston Street.
“Everything’s in there.” David nodded to a storage box on the desk. “I’ll make sure no one bothers you.”
“Thank you.”
“Any questions, I’ll be in my office.”
As David left the room, Allan went to the desk and rolled up his shirtsleeves. Slowly, he pulled the lid off the box and looked inside at the folders and manila envelopes. The folders contained the reports. The envelopes had the photographs.
Allan sat and began reading through the various reports.
When he finished he realized John Baker’s murder had special problems. To begin with, the body was found outside in a remote part of the county. That not only minimized the chances of finding physical evidence and witnesses, it also destroyed the relationship between the victim and suspect with the scene itself. Secondly, Baker had no relatives or friends who could draw a useful chronology of his movements prior to death. Thirdly, Baker was homeless, with no fixed address.
After a request for information was issued to the public, a couple came forward, claiming they’d seen Baker around 10:30 a.m., May 10, panhandling at the local park.
Allan’s chair creaked as he sat back with a weary yawn. He ran a hand hard over his face, stretched his arms over his head, and clasped his fingers behind his neck.
Tired, he thought. He was just too damn tired.
He removed the photos from the envelopes and laid them out in a collage over top of the desk. One after another, he studied them.
He held up a straight-on shot of the body. The photo showed John Baker lying on his side, feet in a brook.
Allan wanted the autopsy results. He left everything there and went back to David’s office.
“Fitzgerald will be at the morgue all afternoon,” David told him. “He said we could stop over anytime.”
“I’m ready when you are,” Allan said.
David smiled. “I like your eagerness, Detective. Let’s go.”
The morgue was located in the basement of the Acresville Regional Hospital. The two men found Dr. Fitzgerald in the autopsy room.
Two things hit Allan the moment he stepped through the door—the pungent smell of formaldehyde and the body of an elderly woman lying on the stainless-steel dissection table with her head propped up on a metal block. Her skullcap was removed, exposing the convoluted surface of the brain. Under the low-hanging fluorescent lights, the meninges glistened.
“Gentlemen!” Fitzgerald turned from a sink on the far side of the room, wiping his hands on a towel. “You’re here to see the body.”
David opened his mouth to speak, but his voice was lost in a hard swallow. With wide eyes, he stared at the blood smears on the front of Fitzgerald’s apron.
Allan said, “I’d like to discuss your findings in the Baker murder. Compare notes with another case I’m on.”
“Sure thing.” Fitzgerald removed his apron, dropping it into the sink. He grabbed a green smock from the back of a chair and shrugged it on.
“Paul Fitzgerald,” he said, extending his hand.
Allan shook it. “Detective Allan Stanton.”
“Want to see the body? It’ll be easier to explain things.”
“Let’s go.”
Allan and David followed Fitzgerald through the anteroom and into the cold storage room, where Fitzgerald walked over to a wall of refrigerated drawers. He flipped over a tag that was attached to the handle of drawer 3 and gave the handle a gentle tug. Quietly, the drawer rolled out on its casters.
A body lay draped in a white sheet.
Fitzgerald removed it. “Our victim is a fifty-eight-year-old Caucasian male.”
All at once, Allan’s gaze dropped to the elbow stumps. He felt a weird tingle in his stomach.
He asked, “Were those cut off before or after death?”
“After,” Fitzgerald said. “I found no sign of vital reaction in the wounds.”
Scratching a temple, Allan examined the right stump. “What instrument do you think was used to remove them?”
“A saw. The multi-stroke marks on the bones have the class characteristics of one. I made silicone rubber casts of the impressions on the bones and sent them off to the forensics lab in Halifax. Once they analyze the striations on the kerf wall, they should be able to narrow it down to a particular saw.”
Allan shot David a questioning look. “Nothing was found at the scene?”
David stood three feet away with his back toward the body and a stricken face bowed to the floor.
“Chief?”
David cleared his throat. “We never found anything. No saw. No weapon. No body parts.”
“You okay, Chief?” Fitzgerald asked. “You’re looking a little green.”
“Think I need a drink of water,” he said weakly.
Allan watched David walk out, the door brushing closed behind him.
Fitzgerald said, “He knew the victim. They were old school friends.”
Allan nodded. He looked back at the body.
“Tell me about these injuries on the victim’s face,” he said.
“The abrasions on the eyelids and lips were caused by insects. There’s no accompanying bruising. Maggots were discovered on the body, and as you can see, they were doing a good job on the upper arms. You’d be surprised at how fast they can clean away a human body.
“I
remember this elderly man who went missing a couple years—”
Allan had stopped Fitzgerald by lifting his hand. “I know, Doctor. I’m well aware of what maggots can do to a body.”
A crooked grin lifted Fitzgerald’s cheeks. “You knew I was going there?”
“I figured that’s where your story was heading.”
“A little squeamish, are we?”
Allan regarded him with an impassive expression. He didn’t know whether the young coroner was trying to impress the big-city cop or gross him out.
“Just a little,” he said.
Fitzgerald laughed.
Allan asked, “Have you estimated a time of death?”
“Four to six days. I factored in the usual variables: temperature, clothing, victim’s body type, and the poor health he was in.
“As you can see, the skin over a large portion of the abdomen is of a greenish color. This is due to the formation of sulph-hemoglobin. It would take about four to six days for a body to reach this stage of putrefaction.”
Allan thought that over. The timeline seemed right. Last seen on the tenth. Found on the sixteenth.
Fitzgerald added, “The entomology report will take weeks. I didn’t find any pupae in the soil around where the body was. That led me to believe the maggots were from the first generation.”
“Was the victim moved after death?” Allan asked.
“No. The heavy lividity is consistent with the way he lay. Furthermore, the compression marks in the skin matched the texture of the surface of the ground beneath the body. Rock imprints that had been trapped under the body were clearly visible.
“Like the lividity, the initial compression marks never disappear. If the body was taken from one location and then dumped at the Timbre Road location, there would’ve been a second set of marks in the skin.”
Allan considered this. He wondered how the suspect got John Baker out there. Con approach?
He said, “Tell me about the more-serious injuries.”
“There are three stab wounds. One in the umbilical region of the abdomen. Two in the epigastric region. I numbered the wounds based on their depth. Shortest to longest.
“The first one in the umbilical region is eleven and a half centimeters deep. Eleven o’clock to five o’clock. Blunt margin superior, tapered margin inferior. This injury wasn’t life threatening.
“The two stabbings in the epigastric region caused grave damage to the stomach, pancreas, and left lobe of the liver. The aorta was also damaged. The second wound is roughly fourteen and a half centimeters deep. Twelve o’clock to six o’clock. As with the first one, the blunt margin is superior, the tapered margin inferior.
“The third wound is eighteen and a half centimeters deep. No doubt you’re aware, the wound tract can be longer than the actual blade because the abdominal wall compresses, carrying the point of the blade much deeper than its actual length. With enough force, even short-bladed knives can perforate the abdomen by ten to fifteen centimeters. In many regards, a knife’s lethality is superior to firearms.
“As you can see by the V shape of this particular wound, the blade was either twisted, or the victim moved when the blade was withdrawn. If you look closely, there’s slight bruising in the inferior margin. The guard of the knife caused this. And being in the inferior margin tells me the blade entered the body at an upward angle.”
Allan said, “Cause of death was exsanguination?”
Fitzgerald nodded. “Exactly. I found one and a half liters of blood in the peritoneal cavity.”
Allan studied the three injuries. “Did the cuts in the clothing correlate with the stab wounds?”
“Yes.”
“Is the blade straight?”
“Yes.”
“How long do you think it is?”
“About six inches.”
That gave Allan pause. Same length as the one used in the Hawkins murder.
“Have you determined the handedness of the suspect?”
“Right.”
Quiet a moment, Allan nodded to himself.
“Anything else of importance?” he asked.
Fitzgerald said, “Nothing really pertinent to your investigation. The victim hadn’t eaten anything for several hours before his death. The stomach was completely empty. He wasn’t in the best of health, either.”
“No?”
Fitzgerald shook his head. “He was very sick. His spleen was enlarged. His liver was fatty and cirrhotic. He had an ulcer in the stomach.”
“Okay,” Allan said. “Thank you for your time.”
“Thank you,” Fitzgerald said. “It was nice meeting you.”
“Likewise.”
Allan found David in the hallway outside the anteroom. In profile, he seemed thoughtful, sad. As Allan approached him, he saw the whiteness of his face.
“You all right?” he asked.
David turned to him. “Yeah, I just couldn’t stay in there. I knew the victim.”
They began walking.
“Was he a friend?”
David shook his head. “I knew him from school. Many years ago.”
They rode the elevator to the first floor. In the hospital gift shop, Allan purchased a bottle of aspirin. He popped two tablets into his mouth and washed them down at a nearby fountain. Then he followed David out into the late-afternoon sun.
Next on Allan’s agenda was to visit the crime scene. By the time they reached it, his headache had dissipated.
As he got out, Allan realized just how remote the location was. From here the trees seemed to stretch for miles. Everything that told a murder had occurred here was gone—the wooden stakes, the barricade tape, the evidence markers.
He walked to the edge of the road, looking at the bent vegetation and impact marks that drew the path of John Baker’s tumble down the embankment. At the bottom, Allan could just see the footprints in the banks of the creek, signifying the recent activity.
David went over to where he stood. Quietly, he reached into a shirt pocket and produced a slim black case. He took out a cigar.
“What’s on your mind?” he asked.
Allan gave a light shrug. “Just wanted to get a sense of the crime scene. What appeal it had to the killer.”
David struck a match and lit the cigar. “It’s isolated.”
“Exactly,” Allan said. “It would allow the suspect ample time without being interrupted.”
David stared at the cigar burning in his hand. “It’s not going to be easy catching this guy, is it?”
For a brief, depressing moment, Allan felt the truth of this. Experience had taught him one thing—dumb luck usually solved cases like these, not a detective’s ingenuity, not forensic evidence.
He said, “If I’m right, this man has killed three people already. Two of whom he targeted for body parts. He’ll screw up, and when he does, we’ll catch him.”
As David turned to him, Allan saw the same conveyance of doubt that he felt inside.
“If he screws up,” David said. “This guy could be already somewhere else looking for his next victim.”
37
Acresville, May 19
7:45 p.m.
Allan found a small restaurant downtown. As he entered, he took in the people and the ambience with one sweeping glance. It was half-filled, he saw, with families and older couples. The décor had a rustic feel with red-and-white checkered tablecloths, wood floors and walls.
He chose a quiet booth in the corner. The waitress, a pleasant-faced brunette, appeared with a menu. After a quick look at it, Allan ordered turkey on rye with soup of the day and tea.
While waiting, he sat back and reflected on the investigation ahead. He needed to enter the details of the Ambré and Baker murders into ViCLAS—a case-linkage database that tracked serial offences Canada-wide—to see if there were any similar murders committed elsewhere in Canada. Perhaps this killer had struck before.
Allan decided to call the ViCLAS center in Halifax first thing in the morning t
o have two questionnaire booklets sent up to him and get the procedure started. In preparation he took out his notebook and wrote down some keynotes about the murders, beginning with John Baker:
1. Victim dismembered
2. Arms sawed off at elbows
3. Not recovered
4. The scene demonstrated control
5. Offender seemed familiar with it
6. Offender possesses characteristics under both the organized and disorganized dichotomy.
7. Murder was planned
8. Attack was outdoors, involved surprise
9. No restraints
10. Con approach possibly used
11. No theft
12. Victim had multiple stab wounds, sufficient to cause death
13. Knife was used, brought to the scene by the offender and removed after the crime
14. No other trauma involved: beating, kicking, strangulation, burning, or gunshot.
15. Victim was awake.
16. Victim’s body was left with no apparent concern as to whether or not it would be discovered. Not hidden by brush or buried.
17. Not moved after death
18. No sex involved
19. Offender used precautions: chose a location where he’d have minimal risk of being seen, heard, or interrupted.
20. No DNA evidence available
As Allan looked over his notes, he realized he knew more about John Baker’s murder than Trixy’s. Where was the location of her initial crime scene? If it was the Eastern Canadian Tugboat wharf, as he believed, then he had a starting point. But he wasn’t sure.
Allan turned to the window next to him, marshaling his thoughts. Out past the town’s low-rise buildings, the sun was falling behind the jagged line where mountain met sky.
The waitress arrived with his order.
“Thank you,” Allan told her.
He ate his meal quickly, surprised at how hungry he was. As he sipped his tea, he wrote down notes about Trixy’s murder:
1. Victim dismembered
2. Eyes removed – cut – unskilled?
3. Not recovered
4. Murder was planned