CHAPTER 5
Great. Just great.
Standing in the basement of the SoHo boutique where Chloe Moore had been abducted, Amelia Sachs grimaced, leaning down and peering into the utility room. She was staring at the narrow tunnel that led from that room to the crime scene itself, apparently a larger tunnel, where Chloe had been killed.
The body was just visible and brightly lit by lamps the first responders had set up.
Palms sweating, Sachs continued to peer through the tiny shaft she’d have to crawl through.
Just great.
She stepped back into the cellar and inhaled two or three times, sucking moldy, fuel oil scented air deep into her lungs. Years ago, Lincoln Rhyme had created a database of layouts of underground areas in New York, assembled from the Department of Buildings and other city government agencies. She’d downloaded one through a secure app on her iPhone and – with dismay – reviewed the layout before her.
Where did phobias come from? Sachs wondered. Some childhood trauma, some genetic imprinting that discourages us from petting poisonous snakes or cavorting on mountain ledges?
Serpents and heights weren’t her problem; claustrophobia was. If she believed in former lives, which she didn’t, Sachs could imagine that she, in an earlier incarnation, had been buried alive. Or, if you followed the logic of karma, more likely she’d been a vindictive queen who’d slowly interred her rivals as they begged for mercy.
Sachs, close to six feet tall, looked at the chart of her nemesis: the twenty eight or thirty inch diameter tunnel from the utility room to the bigger transport tunnel, the site of the killing. The narrow passage was, according to the chart, twenty three feet long.
It’s a round coffin, she thought.
The site of the killing was also accessible through a manhole thirty feet or so from where the body lay. That was probably his entrance to the kill site but Sachs knew she would have to wriggle through the smaller tunnel, collecting trace as she went, since that’s where he’d crawled to get to the basement of the boutique – and through which he’d dragged Chloe before murdering her.
‘Sachs?’ Rhyme’s voice crackled through the headset. She jumped and cranked down the volume. ‘Where are you? I can’t see anything.’ The com device Sachs wore featured not only a microphone and earpiece but also a high def video camera. She’d just donned the unit and hadn’t activated the visual yet.
She touched a button on the surprisingly small camera – about the size of a double A battery – and heard, ‘Okay.’ Then a grumbled ‘It’s still pretty dark.’
‘Because it is dark. I’m in a basement – and about to climb into a tunnel the size of a breadbasket.’
‘I’ve never actually seen a breadbasket,’ he replied. ‘I’m not sure they exist.’ Rhyme was always in good humor when approaching a new crime scene. ‘Well, let’s get going. Scan around. Let’s see what we’ve got.’
She often wore this equipment when she searched a scene. Rhyme would offer suggestions – many fewer now than when they began working together and she was a novice. He also liked to keep an eye out for her safety, though he never admitted that. Rhyme insisted that officers search a scene solo – too much distraction otherwise. The best forensic experts bonded with the scene psychologically. They became the victim, became the perp – and accordingly located evidence they might have missed. That connection didn’t happen, or it didn’t happen as easily, when somebody else searched with you. But being alone was a risk. It was surprising how many times a scene turned hot: The perp returned, or remained, and attacked the officer walking the grid. It even happened that, though the perp was long gone, another, unrelated attack might occur. Sachs had once been assaulted by a homeless man, a schizophrenic who thought she’d come to steal his imaginary dog.
She looked into the utility room once more, to give Rhyme a view, and then gazed through the tunnel of hell briefly.
‘Ah,’ he said, now understanding her concern. ‘Breadbasket.’
Sachs made the final adjustments to her outfit. She was dressed in a white Tyvek jumpsuit, hood and booties. Because poison had been the apparent weapon, she wore an N95 respirator. The toxin had been injected, the first responders reported, via the tattoo gun, and there seemed to be no airborne chemicals to worry about that they’d noted. Still, why take the chance?
Footsteps behind her, someone approaching through the moldy, damp basement of Chez Nord.
She glanced back at an attractive crime scene officer who’d be helping process the boutique. Sachs had known Jean Eagleston for years; she was one of the stars of the CS oper ation. Eagleston had been interviewing the store manager, who’d found the body. Sachs had wanted to know if the manager had entered the scene itself – where Chloe’s body lay – to check on her employee.
But Eagleston said, ‘No. She noticed the door was open and looked into the utility room, saw the vic lying there. That was enough for her. She didn’t go any farther.’
Can’t blame the manager, Sachs reflected. Even if one wasn’t claustrophobic, who’d go into a deserted tunnel with an apparent murder victim lying on the ground and, possibly, the killer still there?
‘How could she see the victim?’ Rhyme asked. He’d overheard the conversation. ‘I thought I could see spotlights there now, from the medics. But wasn’t it dark then?’
Sachs relayed the question. But the crime scene officer didn’t know. ‘All the manager said was that she could see inside.’
Rhyme said, ‘Well, we’ll find out.’
Eagleston added, ‘The only other people at the kill site were one responding uniform and one medic. But they backed out as soon as they confirmed death. To wait for us. I’ve got samples of their shoes, so we can eliminate any footprints. They tell me they didn’t touch anything other than the vic, to check on her condition. And the EMT was gloved.’
So contamination of the scene – the introduction of evidence unrelated to the crime itself or the perp – would be minimal. That was one advantage of a murder in a hellhole like this. A crime on the street could have dozens of contaminants, from blowing dust, pouring rain and fierce sleet (like today) to passersby and even souvenir seekers. One of the worst contaminants was fellow officers, especially brass grandstanding if reporters were present and eager to grab a video bite to slap on the twenty four hour news cycle.
One more glance at the circular coffin.
Okay, Amelia Sachs thought: Knuckle time …
A phrase of her father’s. The man had also been a cop, a beat patrolman working the Deuce – Midtown South; back then Times Square was like Deadwood in the 1800s. Knuckle time meant referring to those moments when you have to go up against your worst fears.
Breadbasket …
Sachs returned to the access door and climbed through it and down into the utility room below the cellar. Then she took the evidence collection gear bag from the other officer. Sachs said, ‘You search the basement, Jean?’
‘I’ll do it now,’ Eagleston said. ‘And then get everything into the RRV.’
They’d done a fast examination of the cellar. But it was apparent that the perp had spent minimal time there. He’d grabbed Chloe, subdued her somehow and dragged her to the access door; her heel marks were visible.
Sachs set the heavy bag on the floor and opened it. She photographed and gathered evidence from the utility room, although, as with the basement, the perp and the victim would have spent little time here; he’d’ve wanted to get her out of sight as soon as possible. She bagged and tagged the trace and set the plastic and paper containers on the floor in the cellar for the other crime scene officers to cart to the RRV.
Then Sachs turned to the tiny shaft’s opening, eyeing it the way one would glance at the muzzle of a pistol in the hand of a desperate perp.
Breadbasket …
She didn’t move. Heard her heart thudding.
‘Sachs.’ Rhyme’s voice sounded in her ear.
She didn’t respond.
He said softly, ‘I understand. But.’