The Kristina Melina Omnibus: First Kill, Second Cut, Third Victim

by Laurent Boulanger

  ‘Did you seal the entire area?’ I asked.

  ‘Front and back of the lane way are guarded by two uniformed officers. They have instructions to not let anyone in the scene. Not easy since most of the shop-owners need access to the back of the shops either to park their cars or to bring in their goods for the day.’

  ‘They can wait. It’s not going to kill their business to close for one day. And no damn politicians at the scene. I don’t care who they are or who they answer to.’

  From the smile Frank gave me, he must have known I had Goosh in mind. The Deputy Commissioner of Police made it a habit to walk into a crime scene without warning, chain-smoking and contaminating everything in sight. Somehow that sonofabitch thought he was above the law, but in my books he stood where everyone else did. Behind the police line.

  Although I didn’t say anything, I was grateful Frank was taking my orders in a professional and diplomatic manner. Normally he would give me those looks as if to say why don’t you do it yourself? But he must have sensed that I was highly strung, and I didn’t need anyone getting in my way.

  I went on, ‘While we’re waiting for the SES, let’s do another walk-through with the video camera this time. I need you to fill me in on what you’ve found so far. Also, I’d like the Saab taken to the Centre for examination. But first, let’s get changed.’

  We made our way back down the lane way

  ‘Are you okay?’ Frank asked.

  ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘You look tensed.’

  I turned around and faced him, ‘What do you expect? I haven’t done this kind of shit for six months. Yeah, yeah, I love the excitement, but somehow this morning it‘s different.’

  ‘You want to go home, you just give me the go-ahead, and I’ll take over. No questions asked.’

  I didn’t reply. He knew I wouldn’t back away.

  And that was why he called me in the first place.

  Six months ago, I was determined to never investigate another murder.

  Today I was back on the beat.

  CHAPTER TWO

  The State Emergency Services came within half an hour, just when I had finished videotaping.

  Videotaping was challenging, especially when it’s raining like a dog. But it would provide us with a perspective on the crime scene layout, which wouldn’t be as easily perceived with photography or sketches. The medium was more reliable, and people, especially in a court-room situation, could readily relate to it. The other reason for using videotaping was that we might have missed evidence or picking-up clues during the walk-through. Once on tape, we would have time to cover the crime scene over and over again at our own leisure.

  Once the video camera was switched on, I didn’t stop filming until the thirty-minute tape ended. Everything was painfully shot in slow motion. Years ago, when I first began using a camera, I rushed through the filming, panning from one section of the crime scene to the other, not allowing the camera to properly capture details. Using a video camera was not something I had been taught, but something I learned from trials and errors.

  I used a combination of wide angles, close-ups and macros to demonstrate the layout of the evidence and its relevance to the crime scene. I made sure to capture the name of the lane way and to use measuring comparable devices, such as a stainless steel ruler or a twenty cent coin, whenever necessary and appropriate.

  When it came to filming the body, my hands were trembling. I had to concentrate twice as hard on what I was doing. I’ve never had to attend a crime scene where the victim was someone I had been close to. My emotional nerves were raw and bleeding.

  During filming, Frank was responsible for keeping everyone present at the crime scene silent. The last thing we needed was someone yelling out some smart-ass comment on tape and having to start all over again.

  Filming in the rain was hell, but at 8.15 a.m., we got a lucky break. The rain had turned from downpour to fine silver needles. It made the recording process much easier, not having to worry about humidity inside the camera and the film.

  Frank was searching the lane way for physical evidence. I was busy overlooking the SES workers removing Evelyn Carter from the fence. It was a hell of a job, and not only because of the position she had found herself in. I ordered that the body should be touched to a minimum to preserve any trace evidence, even though I knew there would be little left at this stage.

  Frank and I looked like a cosmonaut in our white protective outfits and surgical gloves - a contrast to the SES workers dressed in bright orange overalls with sawn-on patches from the organisation.

  ‘Can you guys try to be a bit more gentle?’ I asked when one of the male workers pulled the body upward from the neck, trying to dislocate the impales armpit from the fence. ‘We don’t want to cause any more injuries to the body than there already is.’

  They proceeded, ignoring my request. Somehow they managed to bring the body down from the top of the fence. The lower part of her body hit the ground. I cringed but kept my mouth shut, trying hard not to come across like someone with an authoritative chip on my shoulder. These people were highly trained volunteers, and I guessed they knew more about removing bodies from unlikely places than I did. If I had been left on my own, the body would have been totally dismembered by the time I got it down from the fence.

  By now, somehow, I managed to shut down my emotional channels, a natural defence mechanism which helped me deal with what most people considered unbearable situations. I knew that my stance was temporary, and although I looked tough on the outside, I was no different from every other human being. There was no doubt in my mind that I wouldn’t be able to sleep that night. The face of Evelyn Carter would be flashing on the ceiling of my bedroom, that the cry of her desperate soul would ring in my ears for justice to be served.

  After my last investigation, I had to go on Prozac for a while, just to help me face the challenges of every day life. It was during that three-month period that I’d decided to give up on homicidal investigations. For years I had predicted that eventually the accumulated horrors of what I had seen throughout the 90s would eventually get to me. Back at university, all those books and theories on crime sounded exciting and drew my curiosity to the point of obsession. But on site, things were different. Everyday we were dealing with real people - not only the victims, but also family and friends of the victims. And that was the difficult part. Criminology lecturers never tell you about the effects of attending a crime scene can have on an investigator. The focus is on the stress endured by victims’ relatives and peers. The rest of us just have to grind our teeth throughout the investigation.

  The body was gently rolled inside the mortuary van as Frank paced towards me.

  ‘How’s everything going?’ he asked.

  ‘Fine. Did you find any evidence?’

  ‘Nope, apart from a witness who says Evelyn got here by cab, not in her Saab.’

  I puzzled over this information for a few seconds. ‘Why would she take a cab when her car was already there? This doesn’t make sense.’

  ‘Maybe she was meeting someone. Maybe she went somewhere and didn’t want to take her car because of the traffic, and then she returned by cab and got attacked on her way back to the Saab.’

  ‘That’s a possibility.’ And then: ‘Who’s the witness?’

  ‘The guy from the bookshop.’

  ‘I thought he didn’t see anything.’

  ‘Details came back to him. At first, he never associated the cab with the murder. It’s only later that her recalled a car stopping near the shops during the early hours of the morning. He walked up to the bedroom window and saw this yellow cab pulling up. He though he heard the driver and the female passenger argue, but now he’s not so sure. He doesn’t know if what he saw wasn’t part of a dream he was having after he gone back to bed.’

  ‘He lives in the bookshop?’

  ‘Upstairs. A two-bedroom apartment.’

  ‘Get his name and address, I’d like to talk to him
before I leave the scene.’

  ‘Done.’

  He passed me his log book, from where I wrote down the details of the bookshop owner.

  David Boyd was thirty-five, I found out later, but he could have been five years younger.

  When I met him, I felt a churning in my stomach which I confused with hunger. He was behind the counter of his second-hand bookshop, surrounded by posters of various book jackets, including John Grisham’s The Partner and Thomas Kennelly’s Schlinder’s Ark. The interior of the bookshop consisted of an assortment of pine and particle-board book shelves of various heights. On top of each book shelves were laser-or-inkjet-printed inscriptions, cataloguing books into subject areas—General fiction, Australian Literature, Science-Fiction, Crime, New-Age, Health & Nutrition, Science, Psychology, Philosophy, Hobbies, Films & Cinema, Sports, Autobiography & Biography, Textbooks, American Literature, Foreign Books, and Children. A fluorescent tube above each book shelf bathed the spines of the books in a bluish light.

  The shop smelled of paper pulp and ink, a smell I associated with old libraries. I had spent countless hours in various libraries, losing myself into books, not strictly because of my study requirements, but because I had nothing else better to do. Books were the love of my life, and I would have rather spent an evening by myself with a Sue Grafton novel than in front of the television or at a dinner party with friends.

  I approached the counter and spoke matter-of-factly.

  ‘I’m Dr Kristina Melina, the person in charge of investigating the body we found behind your premises.’

  David Boyd smiled in return, green eyes sparkling like emeralds behind tortoise shell glasses. There was a touch of grey on his temples blending in with his black hair, giving him an air wisdom and self-assertiveness. The lines on his face were thin but well defined and perfectly symmetric. A cute dimple sat in the middle of his chin, and when he spoke his voice was warm and soothing.

  ‘I’ve already spoken to your colleague,’ he said.

  ‘I know, but I’d like to speak to you myself,’ I said.

  ‘Sure, as I said, I’ve already told him everything I know.’

  ‘Sometimes we forget details. Maybe something will come back to you, something you don’t remember right at that moment.’

  He shrugged as if my persistence was the least of his worries in the world.

  ‘You want to talk,’ he said, ‘I’ve got all the time in the world. Not many people buy books these days, so it’s not like we’re suddenly going to get a massive crowd storming in here.’

  He was rubbing fine sandpaper along the edges of a hard-cover book.

  Seeing I was curious, he explained:

  ‘For those who do buy books, especially second-hand books, they want to get value for money. There are two main reasons why people buy second-hand books - the first is that they like the idea of saving money, and the second is to find a work out-of-print. Some second-hand book sellers just toss the books on the shelves and hope they will sell. Of course some do, but by presenting a book in its best light, the price is justified.’

  He grabbed a book from a pile next to him and continued.

  ‘See the marks and browning on the edges.’ He slid his finger lengthwise along the pages of the book. ‘It’s grey, dull and stained in a few places. Now watch this.’ In a swift motion, he gently applied the sandpaper against the pages of the book, leaving a white dust of cloud behind. ‘Now look.’ He turned the book towards me. The pages were white, like those of a brand new book.

  ‘That’s interesting,’ I said. ‘I’ll keep that in mind if I ever want to open a second-hand bookshop.’

  Before I had time to add another word, he asked, ‘Do you read?’

  I wanted to get on with my questioning, but because of the genuine look on his face, I couldn’t help being polite. ‘Now and then, whenever I get time.’

  ‘What do you read?’

  ‘Mostly crime books.’

  ‘Fiction? Non-fiction?’

  ‘Both. It helps me with my own investigations.’

  ‘Who’s your favourite fiction author?’

  ‘I don’t have one. I like Grafton, Patterson, McDermid, Cornwell, Reichs. I read Garry Disher as well. His Wyatt series reads like Richard Stark’s novels.’

  ‘What about John Camp?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, John Camp. He write under the pseudonym John Sandford. The Prey books. Rules of Prey, Silent Prey, Mind Prey—’

  ‘Don’t like the protagonist. He can be a bit chauvinist.’

  ‘I agree. Lucas Davenport. You’re right, he does treat women like objects.’

  He was mentioning the character of Stanford’s novels as if he was a real person.

  He moved from behind the counter and went on, ‘Let me show you our crime section. I’m sure —’

  ‘Look, I know you mean well, but I’m not here to buy books. Maybe another time. I need to talk to you about the girl we found in the lane way behind your shop.’

  ‘Oh, sure, I’m sorry, I just get carried away sometimes. You know, I love books so much, I assume everybody else does.’

  ‘You don’t have to apologise. Not enough people read nowadays.’

  He shifted from one foot to another. ‘So, what is it you wanted to ask me?’

  I found myself staring at the green irises of his eyes for a few seconds too long. ‘I just want to know exactly what you saw last night.’

  ‘Like I said to your colleague, not much. I heard a car screeching outside, got out of bed, looked across the street from my window and noticed a taxi. The passenger and the driver were arguing.’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘Hey, I don’t know. I was two floors up. I just heard this male and female voice screaming at each other.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘And then she left the taxi.’

  ‘What did the woman look like?’

  ‘Long black hair, slim. That’s all I can tell, it was dark out there.’

  ‘What about the cab driver?’

  ‘Never left his taxi.’

  ‘Did you get the cab company’s name?’

  ‘Black Cabs. It was written on the side of the taxi.’

  ‘My partner says you’re not sure whether you heard the cab driver and the woman argue or whether it was your imagination. Can you explain?’

  He puzzled for a few seconds. ‘Well, that’s true, I was asleep when the taxi woke me up. I walked to the window and returned to bed immediately. I was still thinking about what I’d seen outside when I went back to sleep. And at that moment, you know just when you’re about to fall asleep, but you’re still conscious...’

  I nodded.

  ‘...well, that’s when I remembered they were yelling at each other. Or were they? Maybe my imagination took over then, I don’t know. When I woke up in the morning, I remembered them yelling, but I’m aware that it might have been my imagination.’

  ‘Okay, that’s still good. Anything else you can tell me?’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Was the girl injured? Was she limping?’

  ‘Hey, look, I wish I could be more helpful, but I only looked for a few seconds. It didn’t seem like a big deal, people always argue about nothing.’

  ‘That’s true. You married?’

  He looked at me surprised.

  I blushed. ‘Oh, no, I didn’t mean it that way. I thought someone else in the house might have seen something.’

  He smiled and said, ‘I’m not married and never have been, which is not to say I’m not interested in marrying the right person.’

  I couldn’t hold back a small laughter. ‘I really didn’t mean it that way.’

  ‘Freudian slip. It’s all right, I think you’re quite attractive too.’

  Now he did it. I knew the churning I felt in my stomach when I first saw him was definitely not hunger. Somewhere upstairs, Cupid was playing with his chemicals again.

  He went on, ‘May
be you’d like to go on a private tour of my bookshop when you have the time.’ He handed me over a white, crisp business card with no-nonsense Roman fonts. David’s Bookshop. How original.

  ‘I’d love too.’

  I took the business card and slid it in the inside pocket of my jacket.

  ‘Just give me call, and I’ll close the shop just for you.’

  ‘Are you always this charming?’

  ‘Only when someone interesting and beautiful comes along.’

  CHAPTER THREE

  The police complex at 412 St Kilda Road in Melbourne houses the Homicide Squad, the Arson Squad, the Burglary Squad, the Drug Squad and the Fingerprint Branch.

  The Homicide Squad is found on the ninth floor of the twenty-storey building. It deals with investigations resulting in death in connection with criminal violence or assault; accidents, including criminal negligence, vehicle, rail road, aeroplane and boat accidents; suicides; drowning; any sudden death, or death which occurred under suspicious or unusual circumstances; and all deaths during confinement in jail or in a detention cells.

  Without any doubt, Evelyn Carter’s death had been classified as assault and murder. Her body was resting at the mortuary, waiting its turn for the necessary autopsy, which I would be forced to attend straight after lunch.

  I was sitting at the end of a mahogany table designed to sit up to twelve people.

  Frank was overlooking through a large bay window at an unlimited view of South Melbourne and beyond.

  Behind my back was a white board with several colour markers, which were used whenever something complex had to be explained, and the spoken word wasn’t the best medium to convey ideas.

  A half drunk cup of coffee stood next my yellow manilla folder. I sipped from it, filling my mouth with lukewarm, cheap-brand instant coffee.

  ‘How long is Goosh going to be?’ I said, ‘I don’t want to be locked in this room all day.’

  ‘He said he’d be here in five minutes,’ Frank said.

  ‘That was five minutes ago.’

  ‘Be patient.’

  ‘No, Frank, I’m not going to be here all goddamn day, five more minutes and that’s it.’