Prelims completed, Karras sent the tech home. Hazardous road conditions. Perhaps a vote of confidence in me. She’d noted my comments in radiology. Observed as I’d helped dislodge and maneuver the corpse.
Then Karras and I went to shower and change into fresh scrubs.
By 8:40 we were regoggled, regloved, and re-aproned. Though I’d done a quickie shampoo, my hair felt itchy under the surgical cap holding it back from my face.
The barrel victim was female. She lay on the table, hair glued over her face, syrup dripping from her body with soft little ticks. She was nude and her skin looked oddly bronzed, an effect of the amber liquid in which she’d been stored.
I waited as Karras dictated height, weight, and gender, holding off on age until we could get to the teeth. I watched her search the scalp, displacing what hair she could disengage, clump by clump.
After several minutes. “Look at this.”
I stepped to her side. Sticky with syrup, the blue plastic sheeting protecting the floor pulled at the footies covering my shoes.
The victim’s hair was blond, with a half inch of dark growth at the roots. A bleach job, amateur, probably done at home from a box.
Karras lifted a handful of strands, revealing an oval lesion roughly two inches long by one inch wide. The scalp was gone, and yellowed bone gleamed naked in the egg-shaped defect.
“What is it?”
No response. The woman was definitely not a talker.
“An abrasion due to contact with the barrel?” I suggested.
“Her head was resting on the other side.”
“Rodents?” I didn’t believe it.
“No tooth striations in the bone or tissue. And she was too far below the surface. Besides, how would mice exit the barrel after gnawing on her scalp?”
“Are there other lesions?”
“Two. Hand me the magnifier.”
I did.
“The edges appear mushy, not clean. But that could be an artifact caused by the syrup.”
I ran through possibilities in my mind. “Something external? A burn? Exposure to a caustic chemical?”
“None of the surrounding hair or tissue is affected.”
“Mites? Ticks? Bedbugs? Lice? Brown recluse spiders?”
“I didn’t spot any eggs or excrement. But I suppose areas of infestation could have become infected, eventually necrotic.”
“An autoimmune response? Something like Pemphigus?” I was referring to a group of skin disorders that caused blistering of the skin and mucous membranes.
“Mmm.”
“An infectious process? Leishmaniasis? MRSA?” Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus.
That drew another noncommittal response.
“Eczema? Pustular psoriasis? Either could lead to skin abscess.”
“We’ll have a better look when I retract the scalp.”
Discussion over.
Karras took measurements, dictated, made notes on a diagram. Then, using her index finger, she tried teasing hair from the face. It held firm.
I withdrew as Karras ran the lens over the neck, shoulders, breasts, belly, and tops of each leg, checking for moles, tattoos, birthmarks, scars, fresh wounds.
“Hello.” Holding the right arm. She switched to the left. Gestured me over.
Under magnification, I could see a cluster of pinpoint discolorations on the inside of the right elbow. “Same on the left?”
“Three.”
“Injection sites?” It didn’t look right.
“If so, the pattern is atypical.”
Karras continued examining the body. The skin on the palms looked rough and chapped, the nails unkept. Working hands, I thought.
“Both wrists show bands of reddening.”
“Ligatures?”
“Maybe.”
Several beats passed.
“Ever work one of these?” Karras asked.
“I once got a corpse in a barrel of asphalt. Maple syrup, no.”
“Any sense how long she’s been in the stuff?” Checking the right armpit.
“She’s in good shape,” I said. “Some skin sloughing on the tip of the nose, the shins, a few toes. That’s about it.”
“Probably contact points.”
Several more beats. Then Karras made her first sortie into non-autopsy-related conversation. “I live near an old cemetery. Small, just a few graves. There’s a kid buried under a headstone that says he died in England in 1747. Says they shipped him home in a barrel of honey.”
“Embalming didn’t exist back then.”
“Alexander the Great.” Left armpit. “Died in 323 B.C. They preserved him in a coffin filled with honey.”
“Yes.” Hiding my surprise that she knew.
“Can’t recall why they did that.”
“Alex kicked in Babylon but needed to get to Macedonia.”
No chuckle. Rule of thumb. If a joke needs explanation, there is no point. I let it go.
“The Assyrians used honey as a means of embalming,” I said. “So did the Egyptians.”
“How’s it work?” Karras moved down the table to the feet. Started spreading and checking inter-toe spaces.
“Honey is composed mainly of monosaccharides and H2O. Since most of the water molecules are associated with the sugars, few remain available for microorganisms, making it a poor environment for bacterial growth.”
“No access to the body’s exterior, and no anaerobic action in the gut. End result, no decomp. Syrup has the same effect?”
“Apparently.” The point Rodas had been making with his lecture on maples and sugaring.
My cellphone buzzed. I walked to the counter and, without touching it, checked caller ID. Slidell.
“I’d better take this.”
No reply.
I pulled off a glove and clicked on.
“The mother says Leal had problems with her monthly time.”
My eyes sought the ceiling at Slidell’s outdated euphemism.
“Didn’t ask details, but sounds like the kid got some real bad bellyaches. Mother once took her to the ER. She thinks that’s the reason for the Internet sites.”
“Did she have any thoughts on possible passwords?”
Across the room, Karras was collecting scrapings from under each nail.
“A few. I bounced them to Pastori.”
“Did she regulate Shelly’s use of the Internet?”
“She says yeah, but I get a different vibe.”
Karras crossed to the counter and opened the fingerprint kit. Not wishing to disclose confidential information, I turned my back and lowered my voice. “Did you circulate the Pomerleau sketch?”
“Issued an updated BOLO right after I emailed it to you.”
“Any action?” I asked.
Karras returned to the table.
“Geraldo called pronto. Pomerleau wants on the show.”
I let that go without comment.
“What’s happening up there?” Slidell asked.
I heard movement behind me. Knew Karras was inking and then pressing each fingertip to a print sheet.
“I’ll tell you later.”
“Where’s Ryan?”
“Tossing a sugar shack.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Later.”
I heard a metallic rattle, then water hitting stainless steel. I turned. Karras was using a spray nozzle on the hair covering the face. Slowly, the strands yielded and drifted back toward the temples.
The features came into view.
My jaw dropped.
CHAPTER 23
“GOD ALMIGHTY!”
Karras was eyeing me, stony with disapproval.
I found an image on my phone, crossed to her, and held the screen so she could see. Her gaze moved between my iPhone and the glistening bronzed face on the table. A very long moment passed.
“Who is she?”
“Anique Pomerleau.”
Blank stare.
“Pomerleau may have murdered Nellie Gower and several other children.”
“Go on.”
I did. But kept it short.
“You’re sure it’s her?” Studying the corpse. “It’s her.”
“We’ll run the prints and take samples for DNA testing.”