“ Best I stick to missing-persons cases? Dogs and cats up trees? People wishing to be reunited with their dear and dead departed? What?”
“ I'd think you'd want to spare yourself the… the discomfort of… of such a…”
“ Heart-wrenching case?” she quickly filled in for him, imagining he'd like the macabre humor as much as any cop might. “Don't worry yourself, Lieutenant. I can pluck at the old heartstrings with the best of 'em. Might even teach you a tune or two.” She worked up a smile for Sincebaugh.
He didn't return the smile, and he didn't care for the brand of humor she was doling out. “Yeah, something like that,” he sullenly replied.
“ Sorry if I don't live up to your image of the damsel in distress, Lieutenant, but there you have it. Thanks for the helping hand, but don't try to tell me how to run my business, okay?”
“ All right, if you're sure you're not hurt. Guess I was wrong to put myself out on your behalf, Doctor.”
“ As I said, I appreciated the hand up… “
“ Sure… whatever you say, Doctor.”
She felt his ire and frustration, and turning away from him, she also felt him leave. Her oval eyes now returned to the victim. Her hands clutching the rosary, she felt little or no psychical movement about the body, merely a handful of shrouded, dark flashes of energy, smoky images of the knife-wielding murderer, the monster's rage so strong and overpowering that all else was blotted out. The killer was striking out again and again at the victim, and she felt his presence. The monster was close, somewhere nearby, very much within the confines of the city. But the image was as momentary and as fleeting as Sincebaugh's moment of concern and compassion had been.
Nothing was forthcoming, and she knew that pressing it here and now would prove futile. The eel and Sincebaugh had taken the day. Unfortunately, she'd gleaned nothing of great import for P.C. Stephens and the others, and if things went as they appeared, Jessica Coran and scientific observation had won the first match.
Jessica came over to her now, not to gloat but simply to ask if she were finished, telling her that the morgue attendants were waiting and that the body would be at her disposal at the morgue later, should she wish to continue there. She even offered a consoling word, saying, “Perhaps in the solitude of the morgue, you know… without so much to distract or disturb you…”
Taking a deep breath, the sun glinting stonily in her eyes, Kim Desinor replaced her dark glasses on her face and backed away from Jessica with a swift nod, returning to the sanctuary of her escort's car, where Ben deYampert told her he'd be happy to see her to her hotel.
Sincebaugh had disappeared in the crowd, tugging someone away from Commissioner Stephens. Kim's eyes followed Sincebaugh out of curiosity, and now she realized that Alex was suddenly ensnared in what was a quiet but bitter discussion with an unknown man.
“ Sure, yes, Detective,” she replied to deYampert. “Say, who's that with your partner over there?”
“ Oh, that'd be Captain Landry, ma'am.”
“ I see. Maybe on the way to the hotel, you can tell me what you know about the previous victim found- where?”
“ At the Chantilly Pier in Gretna,” he replied. “Tell you all about it.”
“ How's your partner going to get back?”
“ Don't worry about Alex. Landry and him have some differences to iron out.”
“ Me, you mean?”
“ Hey, it's nothing personal with Sincy…Alex, ma'am. Just that he doesn't believe in changing horses midstream, if you get my drift.”
“ And what about you, Ben? You consider me a risk?”
“ Me? Well, ma'am, I told Alex that seems to me that we're not riding a horse but a two-humped camel at the moment, and if switching from a camel to a horse midstream has any merit, then by God… well, I'm willing to give it a try.”
She laughed lightly at this. Ben she liked instantly. “Tell me about Gretna, and after that tell me about Victor Surette.”
“ Surette? You know about Surette?” Ben's voice rose audibly, displaying his amazement on his sleeve.
“ I know a little about him, yes.”
“ Really? You thinking like Alex?”
“ I don't know. What's Alex thinking like?”
He hesitated, holding the door for her. “Ahh, maybe best not to discuss it just now with you; it's kinda between partners, you know.”
“ Sure… sure, I can respect that.”
“ Good… good…”
He marched around the car, grimacing at himself as he went, and in a moment they were pulling away from the wharf and all its excitement, heading for the bridge that would return them lakeside. To the locals, to simplify life, there were four directions in New Orleans: lakeside, riverside, uptown and downtown.
Once over the Mississippi again, a few blocks into the bustle of the city, she said to Ben deYampert, “Alex thinks that Surette was the first, doesn't he.”
“ What, huh?”
“ Alex believes that Surette was the first Queen of Hearts victim, doesn't he, Ben?”
“ Christ, Dr. Desinor, you're good. Got to hand you that. How'd you come to that reckoning when you've been in the city for what, less than two hours?”
14
And I find more bitter than death the woman, whose heart is snares and nets, and her hands as bands.
Jessica Coran marched up to Stephens and said, “I want to see yesterday's victim immediately.”
Stephens turned from the reporters who were pushing forward, attempting to get a word from the woman they only knew as Special Agent Jessica Coran of the FBI. He took her aside while his aides dealt with the press. “Wouldn't you care for a break, something to eat maybe, a chance to unpack?”
“ Right now, no, just yesterday's body. Can you get me to the morgue without a lot of hubbub and press on my heels, Commissioner?”
“ Sure, sure… we can arrange that easily enough. You've got to transport the evidence of this crime scene anyway, right?''
She nodded, agreeing to the protocol that said she must at all times be under guard so long as she was transporting medico-legal evidence.
“ I must say I was a bit disappointed in our psychic friend this morning,” he confided in what seemed an unnecessarily conspiratorial tone.
“ Yes, well… no one bats a thousand, as they say, and being upstaged by the eel… well, it effectively shut down the show, didn't it? What is it actors say about working with animals?'' Jessica immediately regretted the theatrical comparisons, knowing that Kim didn't deserve this and wondering why she felt so compelled to view the psychic detective as her competition.
Stephens now led her to a police car, ordering the uniformed officers there to see that she and her evidence arrived safely and efficiently at the precinct, where every item would become part of a manifest of murder. The integrity of the evidence depended upon a scrupulous cataloging of each article and substance she'd collected at the scene, all of it then placed under lock and key to maintain the integrity of the data.
This was quickly done after a ride across the city, and from the evidence room, it was a short walk to the morgue via a tunnel that ended at the lower depths of the Tulane University Hospital extension, a highly regarded state-of-the-art teaching facility.
Inside an hour and a half, she was standing over a stainless-steel, revolving slab on which yesterday's
