Текст книги "Spider Bones"

Автор книги: Kathy Reichs

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I SWALLOWED HARD.

The remains consisted of five amorphous lumps and an eighteen-inch segment of human lower limb. The skin was puckered and celery green, the underlying tissue gray and textured like pot roast.

Stepping to the table, I bent for a closer look.

The severed leg was sparsely populated with short, dark hairs. Bones were visible deep in the flesh, a partial femur up, a partial tibia and fibula below. All three shafts terminated in jagged spikes. Bones, skin, and muscle were scored by gouges, cuts, and parallel slashes.

“It’s a knee, right?” Perry asked.

“Left. This came from the ocean?”

“Yeah. Check out the X-rays.”

Perry crossed to a double-tiered illuminator, flipped two switches, and tapped a film lying on the box’s horizontal surface. I joined her.

An object glowed white within a segment of flesh. Bean-sized, it looked like a cartoon whitecap.

“Shark tooth,” I said.

“Yeah. There are others.” A blue-lacquered nail jabbed two more films.

“You’re thinking death by shark attack?”

Perry waggled a hand. Maybe yes, maybe no. “I see no hemorrhage in the tissue.”

Dead hearts don’t pump. Bleeding at a trauma site usually means the victim was alive when injured. No blood usually means the hit was taken postmortem.

“Could the absence of hemorrhage be explained by immersion in salt water?”

“Sure.”

“So the dismemberment could have resulted from postmortem scavenging.”

“I’ve seen it before.”

I scanned the films, each taken at a different angle. Like the knee, three other hunks of flesh contained portions of skeleton.

“That’s the pubic bone and a bit of ischium.” I indicated a plate showing part of the pelvic front.

“Good for sex?”

“Not tonight.”

“Hardy fucking har.”

I braced for an arm-punch. Didn’t come.

“The V-shaped subpubic angle, blocky pubic body, and broad ischio-pubic ramus suggest male.”

Perry nodded.

“That’s a bit of iliac crest.” I pointed to a section of the curving upper border of a left pelvic half. “It’s only partially fused to the iliac blade. Assuming male gender, to be on the safe side, I’d say you’re looking at an age of sixteen to twenty-four.”

“Sonovafrigginbitch.”

“That’s a portion of proximal femoral shaft, from just below the head and neck. Left, like the knee and pelvis.” I was pointing at a plate clipped to the light box’s vertical surface. My finger moved to the one beside it. “And that’s part of the left foot and ankle. Those are remnants of distal tibia, talus, and some smaller foot bones, I’d say the navicular and the third and second cuneiforms.”

“Can you get height from them?”

I considered. “No. I could do a statistical regression off measurements taken from the partial leg bones, but the range would be almost uselessly broad.”

“But you could say if the kid was very big or very small?”

“Yes. The muscle attachments suggest a robust build.”

“What about race?”

“No way. The skin appears pale, but that could be the result of postmortem bleaching or skin sloughing due to immersion in salt water.”

Human pigmentation is contained solely in the epidermis, the skin’s outer layer. Lose the epidermis, we all look Scandinavian, a fact often misinterpreted by those unaccustomed to seeing bodies recovered from water.

Perry knew that. I knew that she knew that. The answer was strictly reflex. My attention was focused on the remains.

Returning to the table, I examined each mass in turn. Then, “Where was this found?” I waved a hand over the grisly assemblage.

“Come on, I’ll loop you in.”

Degloving, Perry led me back up the corridor. We encountered only one person, an elderly Hawaiian with a bucket and mop. The man dropped his eyes when we passed. Perry did not acknowledge his presence.

The chief ME’s office looked like Danny Tandler’s on uppers. Files and papers occupied every horizontal surface—desktop, coffee table, chair seats, windowsill, file cabinets, floor. Books, magazines, and reprints teetered in stacks. Open journals lay with spines cracking under the weight of overlying issues.

The window was covered with cheap metal blinds. The walls were hung with photos of an impressively large black dog, probably a Lab. Other decorative touches included a hanging skeleton, a pair of conch shells, now repositories for rubber bands and paper clips, several ashtrays from Vegas, a fake fern, and a collection of plastic action figures whose getups and weapons meant nothing to me.

Perry gestured to the single uncluttered chair.

I sat.

Circling the desk, my host dropped into one of those winged-meshy things designed for NASA missions to Mars.

“Nice pooch,” I said. Actually, the dog looked scruffy and mean. But Southern ladies are bred to show interest in strangers. The mechanic, the receptionist, the dry-cleaning lady. Doesn’t matter. Dixie daughters exude warmth to one and all.

Dr. Hadley Perry was not an exuder.

“Day before yesterday a couple of high schoolers were snorkeling in Halona Cove, between the Blowhole and Hanauma Bay. You know it?”

Setting for the famous Lancaster-Kerr kiss, Halona Cove was known to locals as From Here to Eternity Beach. The little inlet has soaring cliffs, killer waves, and very few tourists. Accessed only by a steep, rocky path, the spot is a favorite with local teens hoping to get more sand in their shorts than Deborah and Burt.

I nodded.

“Kids spotted something on the bottom, maybe twelve feet down, in one of the rock cuts. Brought it up, dimed nine-one-one when they realized their prize was a human knee.

“Cops called me. I ordered divers, went out there myself. The girl was still tossing chunks. The boyfriend was trying for macho, not pulling it off.”

Perry worked a way too colorful nail on her blotter, brushed the flotsam with the back of one hand.

“Divers searched for over two hours. What you just saw is what they collected.”

“Got any MPs fitting the profile?”

Perry lifted a printout and read.

“Anthony Simolini, date of birth December fourteenth, nineteen ninety-three. Haole.”

“Meaning white.”

“Sorry. Yeah. Brown hair, brown eyes, five-eleven, a hundred and eighty-five pounds. On February second of this year, at approximately ten p.m., Simolini left a Zippy’s restaurant on the Kamehameha Highway in Pearl City. He was heading home but never showed. Kid’s a high school senior, big-deal athlete. Friends and family say no way he’s a runaway.

“Jason Black, date of birth August twenty-second, nineteen ninety-four. Blond hair, blue eyes, five-nine, a hundred and sixty pounds.”

“Haole,” I said.

“January twenty-seventh of this year, Black had a throw-down with his parents, stormed out of the home, vanished. Kid has a history of drug abuse, problems at school. Friends say he often talks about splitting for the mainland.

“Ethan Motohiro, date of birth May tenth, nineteen ninety-three. Asian, black hair, brown eyes, five-four, a hundred and twenty pounds. Last September Motohiro set off to circle the island by bike. A motorist saw him on the Kalanianaole Highway near the entrance to Makapu’u Point, probably on the seventh. That was the last sighting.”

“Makapu’u Point is close to Halona Cove, right?”

“Yeah. Motohiro had a steady girlfriend, was an A student, planned on attending university.”

“Not the pattern for a runaway. Also, he may be too small. I think this kid was pretty big.”

Back to the printout.

“Isaac Kahunaaiole, date of birth July twenty-second, nineteen eighty-seven. Native Hawaiian, black hair, brown eyes, six-three, two hundred and seventy-five pounds. Worked night security at the Ala Moana Shopping Center, lived at home with his parents and four of six siblings. December twenty-second, two years back, Kahunaaiole boarded a bus for Ala Moana. Never showed up. Coworkers say he was cheerful, well liked, had a good work ethic.”

“Maybe. Size sounds right.”

“Four males sixteen to twenty-two. I suppose I could expand the age range. Or the time frame. I only went back two years.”

“Given the amount of soft tissue, I doubt this kid has been dead that long.”

Perry snorted. The sound was not pretty.

“A body drops deep enough, all rules about decomp fly out the window. Add sharks to the equation, forget it. I had a suicide once, a poet from Perth. People saw him jump off Makapu’u Point. Choppers got there within the hour. Sharks had already opened a soup kitchen. The guys in the chopper watched the bastards strip the body down to bone. A month later, I get a call. A fisherman found a segment of arm inside a shark belly.”

“The dead poet?”

“Yep. Still wearing his engraved watch. In there with him I found seven corn husks, an alarm clock, a Cutty Sark bottle, and the hind leg of a dog.”

Note to self: Research shark digestion.

“Hell, if this is murder, the kid could have been buried for a while. Or stashed in a freezer, then taken out and dumped.”

“Have you queried missing boats and planes?”

“One body was never recovered following the Ehime Maru collision.”

In 2001, a Los Angeles-class fast track submarine, the USS Greeneville, struck a Japanese fishing training boat, the Ehime Maru, just south of Honolulu. Thirty-five students and crew went down with the ship.

Later, the U.S. Navy raised the Ehime Maru from a depth of two thousand feet with most bodies still on board, and divers recovered additional victims. Thanks to the Honolulu ME, all but one crew member were identified.

“Unlikely,” I said.

“I agree,” she said.

I looked at Perry. She looked at me. From the hall, I heard the old man’s mop clank his bucket then smack the floor.

I glanced at my watch.

“Now what?” Perry ignored, or missed, the obvious message.

“When you’ve done all you can, taken photos, collected samples, et cetera, clean the bones. When they’re ready, call me.”

I rose.

Perry rose.

Pointedly, I gripped my briefcase in my right hand and held my keys in my left. Sorry, no fingers available for cracking.

Approaching Kailua Beach, South Kalaheo Avenue doglegs, crosses a bridge over Kaelepulu Stream as Lihiwai, and emerges on the other bank as Kawailoa.

Ryan called as I was entering the bridge. He wasted no time on chitchat.

“Plato Lowery is one obstinate bastard.”

“Oh?”

“The old goat refuses to provide a DNA sample.”

“Why?”

“Beats me.”

“He gave no reason?”

“He says he doesn’t need one.”

Lowery was right. He didn’t.

As my mind groped for ideas, my foot eased off the gas. Behind me, a car horn blared. So much for the aloha attitude.

“Are there any other relatives?” I asked. “I thought Plato mentioned a cousin.”

“Not that we’ve found.”

The horn sounded again. My eyes flicked to the rearview mirror. A big-ass SUV was right on my bumper.

“The Robeson County sheriff was present when I did the exhumation in Lumberton. His name is Beasley. Call him, see if has any suggestions.”

“Worth a try.” Ryan’s tone conveyed little optimism.

I arrived home as the sun was flattening into the sea.

Katy’s mood had improved buckets since the previous day. So had her appetite. In fact, she was starving. Buzz’s Steakhouse was close, so we fired over there.

The Hawaiian gods were smiling. We scored a deck table and dined overlooking Kailua Beach. I ordered mahimahi. Katy chose teriyaki chicken.

As we ate, Katy described her day. She’d spent the morning in a helicopter, the afternoon sunning on Lanikai Beach.

Lots of blocker?

Yes, Mom.

Hat?

Hm.

Skin cancer. Wrinkles. Blah. Blah. Blah.

Eye roll.

“OK. Start at the beginning. How did you get to the chopper?”

“Took a bus. TheBus, it’s called here. I like that. Direct.”

“What did you see?”

“Downtown Honolulu, the harbor, some tower with a marketplace.”

“The Aloha Tower at Pier 9. One of the premier landmarks of the state of Hawaii.”

“The pilot mentioned that.”

“Since the twenties, that lighthouse has guided ships at sea and welcomed visitors and immigrants to Honolulu.”

“He mentioned that too. Compared it to the Statue of Liberty.”

“Fair analogy. What Lady Liberty does for New York City, the Aloha Tower does for Honolulu. For four decades it was the tallest structure in Hawaii.”

“The pilot also talked about shops and restaurants.”

“The Aloha Tower Marketplace opened in nineteen ninety-four. But that’s just one feature. The Hawaii Maritime Center is there, and the historic vessel Falls of Clyde. I read somewhere that Honolulu Harbor is the only harbor in the nation to combine a visitor attraction, retail and restaurant outlets, and working commercial harbor facilities in a single location.”

“I think they do that in Baltimore. My earphones were pretty buzzy. I missed a lot of the commentary. We also flew over something called the Punchbowl.”

The National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific. A final resting place for American soldiers. I didn’t say it.

“And we saw another lighthouse.”

“At Makapu’u Point?”

“I think so. And Mount Olomana. Cool name. Easy to remember.”

“That’s over here, on the windward side of the island.”

“The pilot said there was an awesome trail to the summit. I might try hiking it. And we overflew a place where some Hawaiian king won a battle to unite the islands. Didn’t catch his name or who he was fighting. But I’m guessing he won.”

“Nu’uanu Pali. Ready for some history?”

“Do I have a choice?”

“In seventeen ninety-five King Kamehameha I sailed from his home island of Hawaii, leading an army of about ten thousand soldiers. After conquering the islands of Maui and Molokai, he moved on to Oahu. The defenders of Oahu, led by Kalanikupule, became trapped at Nu’uanu Pali. Kamehameha drove more than four hundred of them over the cliff to their deaths.”

“Brutal.”

“But effective.”

“Will that be on the quiz?”

“Yes.”

For dessert we shared an order of cocolatta, a vanilla bean ice cream–coconut creation that filled us with awe. Our waiter, Fabio, provided instruction on topping the concoction with juice squeezed from fresh limes.

Yeah. Fabio. Bleached hair, unbuttoned shirt, puka beads and all.

Driving home we laughed until our sides hurt.

WEDNESDAY I WAS BACK AT THE CIL BY NINE.

Danny was in his office, hunched over his desk. He spun a wheelie with his chair when I entered.

“Aloha.” Beaming.

“You look like one of those obnoxious smiley-face logos.”

I’d slept badly, awakened with bongos thumping in my head. The drive into Honolulu hadn’t helped.

“I feel happy.” Danny spread both arms and feet.

“And pretty, and witty, and gay?” Shoving aside journals, I dropped onto a love seat many years past its shelf life.

“Are we having a grumpy-pants day?”

“Headache.”

“Did the ladies enjoy a hearty night out?”

“Katy downed the ten-gallon mai tai, not me.” Rubbing circles on my temples. “What brings such glee into your world?”

“I finally got the poop on the Huey crash.”

“The chopper transporting Spider Lowery from Long Binh?”

“The very one.”

“And?”

“According to the REFNO, the fifth body was never recovered.”

Danny used the shortened version of “reference number.” REFNO files contain information on all military misadventures, including the names of those who died, those who survived, the location, the timing, the aircraft type, the artifacts recovered—all known facts concerning an incident.

“The missing crew member?”

“The maintenance specialist.”

“Do you have a name?”

Danny’s grin stretched so wide I thought his head might split and the top fall off, as in one of those Monty Python animation sequences. Maybe I was projecting.

Impatient, I gestured for more.

“Luis Alvarez.”

It took a moment for the import to worm through my pain.

“The guy was Latino?”

“Presumably.”

I shot upright. “Let me see.”

Danny handed me a fax. “IDPF to follow shortly, I’m told.”

The information was meager but telling.

“Spec 2 Luis Alvarez, maintenance specialist. Date of birth February twenty-eighth, nineteen forty-eight,” I read.

“Alvarez was a month shy of twenty when the chopper went down.”

“Five-nine, a hundred sixty-five pounds. Home of record, Bakersfield, California.”

I looked up.

“Alvarez is listed KIA/BNR.” Killed in action, body not recovered.

Danny nodded. “Here’s my take. Lowery was just out of jail, so the mortuary staff at Tan Son Nhut assumed the victim wearing no uniform insignia was him. The profile fit, the location, it all made sense. But they blew it. The burned corpse was really Alvarez.”

“If Alvarez was still MIA, why do you suppose they ruled him out?”

“You and I agree that 2010-37’s racial architecture is a mixed bag. Given body condition, the guys at Tan Son Nhut probably missed what we saw. Or maybe someone with little knowledge of bone noted only the more Caucasoid craniofacial features. Either way, they concluded that the guy was white.”

“Thus Lowery.”

“I’ll bet the farm Alvarez’s records say Latino.”

I agreed.

“Dr. Brennan, I think we’ve done it.”

“Dr. Tandler, I think we have.”

“Oh, Cisco.” Danny raised a palm.

“Oh, Pancho.” I high-fived it.

We whooped. It hurt.

“Here’s what I don’t get.” Danny began swiveling his chair from side to side. “Alvarez ends up buried in North Carolina. Lowery ends up diddling himself in Quebec. How’s that roll?”

I had no explanation.

Seconds passed. Watching Danny loop back and forth started making me seasick.

I shifted my gaze to the desk. Remembered the gold whatsit locked in the drawer.

“Has Craig come up with any ideas on the duck-mushroom thing?”

“Not that he’s shared.”

“Now what?” I asked.

“Now we await the Alvarez file.”

“And?”

“Reconstruct what’s left of the skull.”

That’s what we did. I did. Danny was busy with a case review meeting most of the morning.

As I maneuvered and glued fragments, a maelstrom of emotions swirled inside me. If we were right about the mix-up back in ’68, the Alvarez family would finally have closure. Plato would be forced to accept an altered reality.

So goes life. A positive for one, a negative for another.

Images elbowed for attention in my aching head. Plato leafing through photos in my car. Squinting in the sun at the Lumberton cemetery.

I wondered. I seemed to have his trust. Now, how to tell the old man that the grave at which he’d mourned all those years had never held his son?

I was squeezing Elmer’s on a hunk of frontal when a thought blindsided me.

My hands froze.

Spider Lowery was from Lumberton, North Carolina. Robeson County.

No way.

I pictured Plato.

The faces in his album.

The boy in the snapshot in Jean Laurier’s desk.

Way?

I returned to Danny’s office and checked Spider’s file.

Wherever a form queried race, a check marked the little box beside the word white. A handwritten note in the dental record described Lowery as “Cauc.” Caucasian.

Yet.

I looked at the clock. Twelve forty.

I went to the kitchen and downed a yogurt and a granola bar. Popped a Diet Coke. Considered.

Returned to gluing.

Again and again I circled back to one simple truth.

People misrepresent when filling out forms. Men record themselves as taller. Women record themselves as slimmer, younger.

People lie.

One thirty.

Not too late.

I punched a number into my BlackBerry. Area code 910.

Twelve rings, then the line went dead.

Clicking off, I entered a different set of digits. Though the lab was cool, sweat now beaded my brow.

“Sugarman’s Funeral Home,” a syrupy voice purred.

“Silas Sugarman, please. Temperance Brennan calling.”

“Hold, please.”

“Dance of the Blessed Spirits” from Orpheus and Eurydice? Meant to be soothing, the music only agitated me further.

“Dr. Brennan. What a pleasure. You’ve returned from Hawaii?”

“I’m calling from Honolulu.”

“How may I help you?”

“I’m in need of personal information on Spider Lowery.”

“Perhaps you should talk to Spider’s daddy.”

“Plato isn’t answering his phone.”

“I’ll do what I can.” Apprehensive. “Within the bounds of ethical constraints, of course.”

“Of course. Are the Lowerys Native American?”

Sugarman didn’t reply for so long I thought he’d found my question offensive. Or an invasion of privacy.

“You mean Indian?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Hell’s bells, little lady, most folks in Robeson County have a papoose or two up the old family tree. My own great-grandma was Indian, God rest her soul.”

“The Lowerys, sir?”

“Course they’ve got blood. Plato’s half Lumbee, his wife too, come from up the road in Pembroke.”

Sugarman referred to the Lumbee, a Native American group taking its name from the Lumber River.

Descended mainly from Cheraw and related Siouan speakers, the Lumbee have occupied what is now Robeson County since the eighteenth century. They’re the largest tribe in North Carolina, the largest east of the Mississippi River, and the ninth largest in the nation.

And perhaps the most disadvantaged.

The Lumbee were granted formal recognition as a tribe by North Carolina in 1885. Three years later they started pressing claims with the federal government for similar recognition. To date, they’d met with limited success.

In 1956, Congress passed a bill acknowledging the Lumbee as Indian, but denying them full status as a tribe. As a result, they are ineligible for the financial support and Bureau of Indian Affairs program services provided to officially recognized groups.

All forty-seven thousand are pretty cheesed off.

“—don’t take my meaning wrong.”

“Of course not.” I couldn’t wait to get off the phone. “Thank you so much.”

Danny was still in his case review meeting.

Damn. I was seriously jazzed.

Back to gluing fragments.

By the time Danny broke free I practically manhandled him into his office.

When I’d explained my misgivings, he checked Spider’s file as I had done.

“Mongoloid features. Alvarez was undoubtedly Latino. Lowery had Native American blood. So probably we’re back to square one. Your boy could be Lowery or Alvarez.”

“Fingerprints say Lowery died in Quebec.”

“Maybe the screwup belongs to the FBI, not to Tan Son Nhut.”

“Maybe.”

I thought for a moment.

“What if 2010-37 is neither?”

“Neither?”

“Alvarez or Lowery.”

Danny’s brows shot up.

“Was anyone else BNR from the region where the Huey went down?”

“I could do a REFNO search using geographic coordinates. What do you think?”

“I think you dazzle,” I said.

“As do you.”

“Me?”

“Don’t forget.” Danny winked. “I’ve seen you naked.”

Heat flared across my face.

“How about I go back a month from the date 2010-37 was recovered?” Danny was once again all business.

“I should think that would do it, given the mortuary officer’s description of decomp.”

“Could take a while.”

“I’ll soldier on with the Elmer’s.”

Danny wasn’t kidding. It was 4:45 when he finally reappeared. One look told me that something was up.

“You got a hit?” I asked.

“No. But I found this.”

Danny waved a paper. I grabbed, but he held it beyond my reach.

“A decomposed body was recovered on August seventeenth, nineteen sixty-eight, less than a quarter mile from the site of the January Huey crash. The remains were processed through Tan Son Nhut. White male, midtwenties to midthirties. The deceased came stateside as case number 1968-979.”

“And?”

“There is no and.”

“Was he identified?”

“No.”

“Where are the bones?”

“Here.”

Danny strode toward Red Sweater, who was sitting at his desk. I watched as he requested the case. Red Sweater disappeared into the movable shelving.

Time passed. A lot.

Red Sweater reappeared carrying what looked like a very old box. The color was different and the cardboard corners looked scraped and worn.

Danny accepted the box, swiped his badge, and rejoined me. Together we moved to the designated table.

Questions winged in my brain.

Was Luis Alvarez Latino, as his name implied?

Was 2010-37 Luis Alvarez?

Was 1968-979 Luis Alvarez? If so, why weren’t Alvarez’s remains ID’ed back in August of ’68?

If 1968-979 turned out to be Alvarez, then who was 2010-37? And how did this man end up designated as Spider Lowery and shipped to Lumberton, North Carolina?

The Lowerys had Native American blood. Could 2010-37 be Spider after all?

Clearly the body shipped from Long Binh and the body in the pond in Hemmingford could not both be Spider Lowery.

Danny lifted the cover on the box holding 1968-979.

We both leaned in.

Seconds passed.

Our eyes met.

Reflected mutual shock.