Ben that he had a line on Gilreath, explained how Ricky Aspen had given up a cousin who worked at the Pink Anvil.
“ Let's go see this guy, then,” replied Ben.
Alex didn't correct Ben, but rather stared into his tired St. Bernard's face and saw the depth of the other man's fatigue like a mirror of his own. “Tell you what, partner. Tonight we go home, get some rest. We'll pursue this tomorrow.”
“ Yeah, but who's the guy?”
“ Tomorrow. Tonight, we get our minds off it.”
“ But Alex, you were so gung ho before and now-”
“ You were right, partner. It's most likely a blind alley anyway, and it's late, damned late, and you've got a family waiting on you. Go home, Ben.”
Now the rain-soaked, green and mildewed pine box was being carefully hoisted and loaded into the van here at Cemetery #27, and so much that had happened the previous night seemed a confused jumble. While Alex was pursuing a lead which likely would take him into another black hole to nowhere, he might've been with Kim in her time of need, and for this reason he'd been unable to speak to her or to meet her gaze today.
But now he did so, and his stare went across a wide gulf as though the moments they'd shared earlier meant nothing. Was it his imagination, or was she simply preoccupied with the business at hand? What did she think of him? Why was it so important to him? When did he fall in love with her? All questions he could not answer.
Jessica Coran waited for the others to look away while she examined the striations on the top edge of the crypt where the lid had been pried open and forced across it, initiated by machine and completed by hand. She also closely examined the area where the butane torch had burned away the last remnants of the seal. Something seemed awry and odd, but she couldn't quite put her finger on it just yet, and having had no sleep, she couldn't focus her attention on exactly what it was that bothered her about the damned seal. But there seemed an excessive number of striation marks, more than might have been caused here this morning, and this made her wonder about the type of stone used in the area as it seemed unduly brittle; she also wondered, perhaps foolishly, just how old the crypt was, and if it had had previous inhabitants in years past, and if the premium on graveyard space was so great here that a new form of body-snatching in the 1990s was carried on. She caught Kim Desinor's gaze and the two of them, still sharing the secret of Matisak's note, now shared a questioning look.
Alex's eyes went from Jessica to Kim again, making Jessica wonder what secrets the two of them harbored. Had Kim told Alex about the note, about her intention to go to Metairie Cemetery tonight? Or were the two of them simply feeling queasy and uneasy about this exhumation? Or was it simpler yet? Were the two of them sharing strong feelings for one another and struggling with those feelings? It was impossible for Jessica to know, but she had exacted another promise from Kim to stand back and stay out of the Matisak affair.
Alex Sincebaugh called to Kim and Jessica to join him in his car or be left stranded.
From Alex's perspective, Jessica surmised that it must seem that the two women had suddenly grown closer. Of course, shared trauma, such as their predawn experience with the death of Ed Sand and the hideous way in which Sand's killer had chosen to alert Jessica Coran to his presence, certainly was enough to bring the two women around to an emotional understanding of the need for one another-comrades in arms, woman to woman. Hell, the damnable monster now knew where Kim was staying; had followed Jessica to Kim's doorstep obviously; had stood inches away from Kim just outside Kim's door. It was enough to drive the two women apart if Kim Desinor were a weak person, or bring them into extremely close unity as it seemed to have done. It also had the NOPD rethinking the blood message left on the wall at 34 East Canal, but a handwriting expert with Meade's FBI unit had gotten samples of Matisak's handwriting and a comparison showed, no contest, that it was not Matisak's script.
Jessica and Kim joined Alex, who appeared to want to take them under his wing-quite a stark comparison to the first time they'd met. Now the procession out of the cemetery with Surette's body was filing through the gate and away to Morrison's, a nearby mortuary where they could work under lights in sanitary conditions.
Ben deYampert had remained uncharacteristically silent throughout the exhumation, this ghoulish business having an obvious and profound effect on him. Sincebaugh drove with Ben beside him. Kim and Alex sat silently in the backseat, like mourners off to a funeral but going the wrong way. Jessica realized that Kim was staring back over her shoulder in the direction of the open crypt, making Jessica also turn to see that the shabbily dressed cemetery caretaker, standing quite alone, was anxiously staring after the parade of officials. The man looked like a large, thin and hungry vulture at standstill, his wings shrouding him. Jessica thought she saw a worry shadow pass like a dark angel across Kim's brow. “Something about that man Gwinn I don't like,” Kim muttered. Their eyes met. Their secret was intact.
The slab room at Morrison's Funerary Services was commandeered for the occasion, much to the delight of old Enoch Samuel Morrison, who'd been wanting more police and city business for years. He made everything available to Dr. Coran, asking out of the side of his tobacco-stained mouth about the whereabouts of Dr. Wardlaw.
Jessica and the others now looked down upon the desiccated body of a young male, and she had started to cut away the clothing when suddenly Kim Desinor said, “This… this isn't Surette.”
“ What?” asked Landry. “That's nonsense.” Ben deYampert quickly agreed. “That's right, Dr. Desinor. Alex and me, we were here a year ago when they put Surette into that very crypt.”
“ Yeah, we were near about the sum total of his mourners. Wondered then where his gay buddies were, and Ben's right, it was the same crypt.”
“ Perhaps you're being too hasty, Dr. Desinor. Give it time,” suggested Landry.
“ I think she's right,” Jessica defended.
“ What do you mean?”
“ Did Surette have red hair?”
“ Strawberry-blond, he liked to say,” Alex corrected, “but that's pretty close to red, and it has been a year without a perm.” Ben chuckled alone at this.
“ It's got to be Surette. One way to be certain,” Jessica replied. “We'll see about matching the fingerprints, the hair, the DNA, but I gotta tell you, I think we're dealing with a not uncommon problem here with grave sites for the indigent.”
“ I get a sensation that this man's body has been… plundered, but this man was not… murdered,” added Kim. “Death by injury, accidental… automobile…”
“ Maybe the good doctor's having second thoughts about laying on of hands on a dead guy,” suggested Ben deYampert in Alex's ear, shrugging.
Alex nodded heartily to this, thinking that Ben had finally come to see the light as he had. “Hell, his chest is splayed open and caved in, and I'd be willing to bet that below those sutures his heart's gone. Go ahead, Dr. Coran, cut those sutures and check for a heart.”
Jessica nodded, agreeing this would be a simple test of whether they were indeed looking down at the remains of the first Queen of Hearts victim or not. She expertly slipped her scalpel below each suture, commenting that they were not at all tough or dried up but surprisingly supple.
She followed the familiar Y section of the autopsy's viscera cut. “He's obviously had an autopsy,” she commented. In a moment, her rubbered hands pulled back the dried thin shield of the chest and stomach, sending the flaps across each shoulder, and probing with forceps, she located the various organs, but found the heart missing.
“ I guess that little suspicion is cleared up,” said Landry. “Now, can we carry on with the physical autopsy, and once that is done and he's patched again, Dr. Desinor, you can carry on with your psychic autopsy.”
Alex momentarily wondered where P.C. Stephens and Lew Meade were; he'd imagined that both men wouldn't want to miss the show. He wondered why there weren't any camera crews to film it.
Dr. Desinor stuck to her guns. “I tell you this is not him.”
“ I'm inclined to agree.” Jessica said, shocking the men. “Based on what?” Landry was unable to believe what he was hearing. “The man's heart is gone, for God's sake!”
“ Based on the age of those sutures, based on the surgical neatness with which the heart muscle was removed, and based on my faith in Dr. Desinor. And if you want further proof, I'd be happy to compare DNA samples. Those of Surette are on file, I presume, at the lab.”
“ Who'd go to such lengths for such a hoax, Dr. Coran?” asked Ben. “That'd entail paying off a lot of people, and who is this guy if he's not Surette?” DeYampert waved his hands as he questioned her.
