by Kathy Reichs
I didn’t doubt a fellow faculty member could kill. But Blount made my skin crawl. Something menacing lurked behind those cobalt eyes.
We paid our checks and rolled back toward Charlotte. Instead of continuing toward uptown, Slidell cut north onto I-85, toward the university, and navigated to a neat brick bungalow on a tree-shaded street lined with neat brick bungalows.
In the driveway, a tall, pale man with round horn-rims and thinning brown hair was retrieving a briefcase from a Volvo that looked older than me. He glanced our way when we got out of the Taurus.
“Jack Olsen?” Three feet out, Slidell badged him. “Charlotte-Mecklenburg PD.”
Olsen’s face pinched with a mixture of fear and relief. Anxious, but glad the waiting was over.
“Have you found Edith?” Shifting slightly, perhaps to block sight line to his front windows. Or from them.
“Edith is dead.” Skinny tried the shock approach. “We dragged her body outta Mountain Island Lake.”
Olsen’s knuckles went white on the briefcase he was pressing to his chest. “She drowned?”
“She was strangled then stuffed in a bag.”
Olsen’s long, thin fingers went tight on the leather. I noticed they were trembling.
“Blankenship was your student?” More statement than question.
Olsen nodded. Swallowed.
“You seem pretty shook up, just being her prof,” Slidell hammered away.
The owlish lenses turned to me. “Who’s she?”
“Annie Oakley. Just answer my questions.”
“I—I— Of course I’m upset. Edith was a very talented student. A very warm person.” Voice fading on the last.
“That why you killed her? She decide not to be so warm anymore?”
I thought it impossible, but Olsen’s face went paler.
“God, no! What? What are you suggesting?”
“Edith threaten to tell the missus?” Slidell pressed.
“It wasn’t like that.” Barely audible.
“You ball her during office hours? Close the door, take the phone off the hook?”
Olsen shot a look over one shoulder. More concerned about his wife than accusations of murder?
“I made a terrible mistake. I’m truly sorry. But I didn’t kill Edith.” Beseeching. “I cared for her.”
“Nothing says caring like a screw on the blotter.”
“We called it off.” The whispered denials were growing more shrill. “Edith was OK with it.”
“Teachers occupy positions of trust,” I said. “Crossing that line is never OK.”
“Edith was a grown woman. Not an undergraduate.” Defensive. “I breached my marriage vows, but not my professorial ethics.”
“She trusted you.”
“She seduced me!” Practically a squeal. “She’d call at all hours, wanting help with a sick or hurt bird. Sitting alone together . . . late at night . . . things happened that shouldn’t have.” Another anxious backward glance.
“How long did these ‘things’ happen?” Slidell demanded.
“Nine months. But it was over before Edith disappeared. I barely saw her for weeks, then she ended it. I think she found someone else.”
“Right.” Skinny snorted. “Where were you on September 8?”
“I’d have to check my calendar.”
“Or we could ask your wife?” I said.
Olsen adjusted the briefcase, as though to better shield himself. From us? From her? “What day of the week was it?”
“Tuesday.”
Olsen’s face brightened. “Tuesdays I teach from eight-thirty to one. Then I either hold office hours or come straight home. If that’s all . . .”
“Yeah? A witness at the raptor center says you’re there every Tuesday afternoon.”
A shaky finger came up in a hold-on gesture. Behind the thick lenses, Olsen’s eyes closed in thought. Opened. “Of course. In September we were still going out there. Now we do field observations at ARC, Animal Rehabilitators of the Carolinas. On Mondays. I’d forgotten.”
“Our witness doesn’t recall seeing you on the eighth. Or Blankenship. Says you both disappeared most of the time when you were there.” Skinny wasn’t letting up.
“Are you talking about Doris Kramer?”
“Am I?”
Theatrical sigh. “We didn’t disappear. We would go into the woods searching for owl pellets. Edith was researching the impact of urbanization on the hunting patterns of owls. She was testing the theory that habitat destruction is forcing owls to become city dwellers, at greater risk of injury.”
Slidell gave him the long stare.
Olsen’s Adam’s apple did another round-trip. “I won’t be badgered. I’ve answered your questions. Shall I engage a lawyer?”
“You need a lawyer?” Slidell, never breaking eye contact.
“Jack!” Sharp.
We all turned.
An Asian woman was standing in the doorway. I guessed her age at mid-thirties, her height at maybe five feet. In kitten heels. At her side, coming almost to her waist, an enormous German shepherd was straining on a leash.
“Are you going to walk the damn dog?” Sharp as a marine drill sergeant.
“Be right there, sweetie.” Olsen turned back to us, eyes pleading. “Please. I’ve done nothing criminal.”
“Explain that to Sweetie.”
Skinny strode toward the Taurus. I followed.
We drove several minutes in silence. Skinny broke it.
“Am I the only person on the planet don’t own a dog?”
“I don’t own a dog.”
“You got that brown mutt looks like a bear.”
Slidell referred to my estranged husband’s chow.
“Boyd belongs to Pete.”
“Yeah? What’s up there?”
No way I’d discuss my marital status with Skinny. Or the fact that my ex was about to marry a thirty-something blond with a bra size larger than her IQ.
“I kinda like that dog. Not a drooler.”
“Mm.”
Several moments later.
“That Canadian cop still your main squeeze?”
Definitely off-limits. I hadn’t seen or heard from Andrew Ryan in weeks, was pretty sure what that meant.
Again, my silence did not deter Skinny.
“The guy’s OK.”
“Not a drooler.”
“Whoa. I touch a nerve?”
“Can we stay on topic? What did you think of Olsen?”
“Twerp’s terrified of his wee little wife.”
I couldn’t disagree with that.
“Can’t say I blame him. Sweetie seemed like a nasty piece of work. Think maybe she learned about Blankenship and ended the problem?”
“That woman couldn’t strangle a Chihuahua.”
“Anyone can strangle a Chihuahua.” Slidell made a right. “What’s your take? You think like these ass-clowns.”
I was thinking, but not like an academic. Like a forensic anthropologist.
“Get me back to the lab.”
“Yes, Miss Daisy.”
My brain registered no surprise at Slidell’s reference to a movie in which nothing blew up. It was busy gnawing on another idea.
AN HOUR LATER I was gloved and staring at the bones. The hyoid fracture pointed to strangulation as cause of death. After spotting it, I’d been distracted by the owl pellets. Now I wanted more.
One by one, I examined the neck bones, first visually, then under the scope.
C-1 and C-2 were intact. No nicks or gouges, no breaks, no jamming of the articular surfaces. C-3 told a different tale.
Edith’s third cervical vertebra showed compression on its anterior-superior rim, and a hairline fracture where the right transverse process met the body.
Good. But not what froze my breath in my throat.
Embedded in the fracture was a single red filament. Using tweezers, I teased the thing free and placed it in a small plastic vial.
Hot damn. Call Slidell?
Not yet.
Back to the vertebrae.
C-4 through C-6 showed no signs of trauma.
The pattern made sense. In life, the hyoid lies directly anterior to C-3. The sparing of all vertebrae save that one suggested strangulation with a narrow ligature.
Then I looked at the last cervical and first thoracic vertebrae. Both had damage to their spinous processes, the projections visible as knobs running down the back of a living person. Both processes were fractured and displaced inferiorly.
I closed my eyes. Visualized the ligature looping Edith’s throat. The movement of her head. Her torso.
My eyes flew open. Shot to the vial.
I hurried to phone Slidell.
“You may have been right about Olsen,” I said when he picked up.
“How much did that hurt to admit?”
“The other Olsen.”
Pause. “The wife?”
I explained what I’d observed in the bones. In the simplest terms possible.
“And?”
“Edith was strangled, probably from behind. The fact that trauma is limited to C-3 tells us the ligature was narrow, something like a rope or cord.”
“But you’re sayin’ other parts of her back were messed up.”
“Exactly. If her killer was of equal or greater height the damage would run roughly horizontal, front to back.” I was greatly oversimplifying. “The presence of damage lower down on her back, and the nature of those injuries, suggest her upper body was yanked backward and downward. Hard.”
No response.
“Edith was how tall?” I asked.
I heard paper rustle. “Driver’s license says five-seven.” Sharp intake of breath. “We’re looking for someone short.”
“Blount and Olsen are both six-footers.”
Slidell did that thing he does in his throat.
“There’s more. I found a red fiber embedded in the fracture on C-3. I’m sending it over to the lab, but I’m almost certain it’s nylon.”
Silence hummed for a moment.
“Nylon is a common component in dog leashes,” I said.
This clue he got.
“Sweetie’s shepherd was on a leash.”
“A red one.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. A leash makes an excellent ligature.” It didn’t need saying.
“I don’t know. The woman weighs, what? Four ounces?”
“Eleven pounds of pressure applied to both carotids for ten seconds puts a person out cold. Rage, adrenaline, the element of surprise. It’s a lethal combination.”
“A woman scorned, eh?”
I heard a catch in Slidell’s breathing, knew something was coming.
“Blount’s in the wind.”
I bit back “I told you so.” “I thought you had eyes on him.”
“The tail car lost him somewhere off Sample Road.”
“Lost him?”
“Dickwad parked then pulled a rabbit into the woods. My guys ain’t Daniel Boone.”
“Sample Road is out by the raptor center.”
“Eeyuh. Even if Blount didn’t do Edith, the asshole’s guilty of something.”
“You going to bring him back in?”
“We’ll run him to ground. In the meantime, I’m gonna round up the Olsens. Park them in separate rooms, see what they have to say.”
“Keep me looped in.”
After disconnecting, I gathered the vial and called for a tech to run it over to the LEC. Then I made a quick call to one of the hair and fiber guys, not optimistic, but hoping to schmooze a fast run-around.
When done, I surveyed the lab, restless. I’d done nothing on the Mountain Island Lake John Doe since recovering Edith in her bag. Why not? Same lake. Maybe there was a connection.
I pulled the box from the shelf, knowing I’d get little from two leg bones and a pair of vertebrae. But I’ve always had goals.
Both vertebrae came from the lower spine. One was thoracic, one lumbar. Lipping on both was further advanced than I’d have expected, given the overall bone quality. Arthritis in a young to middle-aged individual. Interesting, but not mind-blowing.
I studied the tibia and fibula. Fully adult. The cortical bone was dense and healthy. The articular surfaces showed little wear and tear. A patch of remodeling on the lateral aspect of the distal fibula suggested healed trauma. Not a fracture, something affecting only the outer surface. A burn? An infection that spread from a soft tissue injury?
I was amusing myself, creating fanciful scenarios to explain my observations, when the phone rang.
“Brennan.”
“It was Mrs. Peacock in the billiard room with the candlestick.” Frank, one of the guys in trace.
“Seriously? You looked at my fiber?”
“No. But I’ve got a prelim on your hair.”
I didn’t make the link right away. Then I remembered. The short, nonhuman hairs I’d collected when first eyeballing Edith’s clothing.
“Rodent, right?”
“Some. And some canine.”
“Dog hair?”
“Six from the jeans are definitely dog.”
“German shepard?” Could we get so lucky?
His answer was not what I expected.
COME ON. COME ON.
No go. I got Slidell’s voicemail. Left a message. Disconnected and finger-drummed the counter.
Debated.
What the hell?
I googled for the number at the Gaston PD. Dialed. Made my request, wishing I had a last name. Listened to a number of clicks.
A voice I assumed to be Skip’s asked for a message.
I hung up and drummed some more. Antsy. Ready to roll.
The dog hair on Edith came from two breeds, Rottweiler and cocker spaniel. Herman Blount had a Rottweiler. Blount was out of pocket.
Too agitated to sit still, I stripped off my gear and changed to street clothes. After leaving another less polite message for Slidell, I hurried to my car.
Traveling the now-familiar route to Mountain Island Lake, I considered how to find Blount. No way I’d tramp through woods peering into underground pods. I’d ask around, see if anyone knew Blount’s habits, his hangouts. I’d start at the raptor center.
I reviewed facts as I drove. Edith Blankenship knew Blount. Blount was attractive, charismatic in a Charles Manson sort of way. Blount and Edith shared a love of birds and a hatred of utility companies that harmed them. Jack Olsen thought Edith had someone new in her life.
Blount cherished his freedom. Would he eliminate a person who threatened it? Or had it been a lovers quarrel? An accident? Eco-terror gone awry?
Other factors could account for the pattern of trauma in Edith’s vertebral column. Blount could have crouched as he attacked. Perhaps they’d been underground, Edith tying to climb to the surface, prevented by a cord lassoing her neck. I’d been hasty to assume height differential was the sole explanation.
Irrationally, I slowed on Sample Road. Scanned the woods that ran up to each shoulder. As if I’d spy Blount in the shadows, loping like Bigfoot. I saw not so much as a squirrel. Too many raptors, I guessed.
At the center, I parked by an eagle totem and entered the building. A blonde in her teens was manning the counter.
There are two types of gum-chewers in this world. Those who snap, crackle, and pop with openmouthed abandon. Those who hate the sound of loud, spitty bubbles. Blondie and I fell into opposite camps.
“I’m looking for Doris Kramer.” I cut to the chase.
“Gone today.” Snap. “We
ird. She, like, lives here.”
“Do you know Herman Blount?”
“I’ve seen him.” She grinned, jaw working like a radial saw. “Me likey.”
“When?”
“With Doris. Twice last week. He seemed, like, intense.”
“Any idea where I can find him?”
“Naw. I never talked to the dude.” Pop. “Doris might be able to tell you.”
“Do you know where she lives?”
“Up Sample Road, ’bout a mile. You can’t miss the mailbox—it looks like an eagle.”
Blount was last seen on Sample Road. Doris was uncharacteristically AWOL.
I thanked the girl and hurried out. If Doris had stumbled onto something tying Blount to Edith’s murder, she could be in danger. If not, she might lead me to him.
I did another crawl along Sample, this time scanning for the postal eagle. Spotting it, I hung a right.
Half a mile down, the rutted, weed-choked drive ended at a seedy frame box that hadn’t seen paint since Hoover took office. I parked next to a Corolla with a HAWKS LOVE ME bumper sticker and got out.
Three bowed steps led to a porch hosting a plastic table and a saggy armchair bursting its innards. I crossed to the door, instincts all prickly. Given Doris’s carefully constructed appearance, the squalor felt wrong. A private shame, unintended for guests.
A note taped to the doorbell read “Broken. Please knock.” I did. No response. I waited a moment and knocked again, louder. Nothing. I recalled the Corolla, the bumper sticker. Was pretty sure the car belonged to Doris. My concern mounted.
I took a moment and a breath to consider. Heard what sounded like muffled barking.
Doris won’t like that. Odd, but that’s what my mind sent up.
Circling the house, I spotted a structure about a hundred yards down an expanse of very dead grass. I set off.
Drawing close, I could see that the shed was leaning badly, barely maintaining contact with its cracked foundation. The boards were weathered, the hardware corroded and orange with rust.
To the shed’s right, a dozen indentations rippled the earth. Something cold traveled my spine. I dismissed the sensation as paranoia. Every depression isn’t a burial. And the hollows were too small to represent graves.
Still, I stepped gingerly, avoiding branches that might snap underfoot. Stilling keys that might jingle in my pocket.