her back into numbness and sleep. So she closed her eyes again and contemplated what lay ahead of her, and wondering if she'd been too exhausted last night to set her alarm properly. Why hasn't it gone off by now… Must be seconds away from ringing… How can I sleep knowing that?
She wanted to see Joyce Olsen's body one last time, perhaps to verify that it had ever happened. Most certainly for a final, closer look, wishing to find the secret message in the dead woman that she ought to be able to discover. Joyce Olsen's wrong-side-up or upside-down autopsy had been a strange postmortem indeed. Cleaned of blood, the wound had been like a gash torn from the body of a battlefield victim hit by heavy mortar fire. All the parts disfigured, out of place, surreal.
Jessica wondered now if she was losing her touch, her edge, her instinct for the chase. She had learned nothing new in the autopsy. Perhaps it was to be so and to remain so with this particular victim, but it nagged at Jessica. In the past, she had often discovered something that had gone unnoticed by others, including other medical examiners. But not this time. Not now. Perhaps it was the attitude with which she approached the Olsen woman's body. Jaded, unfeeling, all the emotion knocked from her at the scene. Or perhaps she simply expected too much, expected that the very way in which the killer had carved Joyce Olsen up might lead to something, might tell them something, might grant them some small insight into the mind capable of such a monster's appetite. But neither the body, nor the enormous insult to it, nor the autopsy itself had revealed any great insights. And another go-round-the continuation of the autopsy with Sands this morning-she rather doubted would net anything new or useful, either. Still, Sands was going to “dig” deeper, and so, Jessica felt she'd best be present.
In his own subtle way, Ira Sands seemed to want to best Jessica, given this opportunity to work alongside the FBI's finest forensic detective. He'd turned it into a macabre competition she wanted no part of. No doubt he had the body prepped, ready and already waiting.
She pulled herself up against the headboard, and squinted at the clock: 6 A.M. She'd set the alarm for 6:30. She clicked it off so it would not ring in her ears. She next worked gummy sleep residue from her eyes. Then she looked across the room at the table where she and Reynolds had spent some time early in the evening yesterday working before they'd gone out to the terrace to work there.
Suddenly, the massive dark shadow at the table registered in her waking mind.
My god, it's Darwin. Here all night. He never left. She realized that Reynolds had fallen asleep there, too, sitting upright in a chair, the autopsy report of Louisa Childe lying in disarray on both the table and at his feet. He looked like one of those big Klingons in the Star Trek movies, his eyes closed, head back, slightly snoring.
Shit, how in the hell did this happen? she asked herself.
Pulling her robe on and tight around herself, Jessica rolled from bed and grabbed clothing from her unpacked bag. Reynolds blinked and yawned, coming around. “What time is it?” he asked matter-of-factly, as if no time had passed at all.
Jessica decided she had to cover any sign of embarrassment. “Six-oh-five. We both flaked out. Wake up, will you? Call down to room service for a pot of coffee while I freshen up and dress.”
She disappeared into the bathroom, and Reynolds staggered to the phone.
After showering, she rejoined Darwin, and while doing her makeup and hair at the mirror, she summed up what they had discussed the night before, ending with a solemn, “OK, then, I am convinced beyond doubt that the deaths are indeed, in some fashion or other, related.”
“I knew it! I knew you'd see it my way!”
“Curb your enthusiasm, Darwin. We've got a long way to go.”
“But you believe me? You believe me!” He stepped out on the balcony and yelled a hurrah to the sky and the morning traffic.
Once he had calmed and returned from outside, an enormous smile on his face, Jessica calmly said, “After seeing all this?” She pointed to the circumstantial but compelling evidence he had lain out before her. “Yes, I'm onboard with you, Darwin.”
Darwin's large black hands exploded, sending a thunderclap bounding off the walls. “Excellent. Think of it. Dr. Jessica Coran's backing. That'll cut the governor's cheese.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence, but what the governor of Oregon knows about Jessica Coran is not likely to be much.” “Are you kidding? With your rep? With all the FBI cases you've solved? All that behind you?”
“Damn but you make me feel old, Darwin Reynolds.”
“I–I-I didn't mean it the way it came out, I swear.”
“I'll bet you didn't. Look, Darwin, seriously… Trust me, I don't pull a lot of weight.” She said this as she pulled a brush through her long, rich hair.
“Trust me, you do. You make a big difference.”
“I think there's another insult in there somewhere.”
“What?” He looked confused.
“Con yourself if you like, Darwin, if it helps, but I'm not so sure.” She paced the room, thinking aloud. “Now, as I see it, we need to put out an all-points bulletin on this creep's MO.”
“Sure, right.”
“Should be forwarded electronically to every law-enforcement agency in the country to alert them to anything smacking of these uniquely gross murders, and anything in the way of peculiar sketches being left at a crime scene.”
Darwin nodded, taking notes. “Yeah, we want to be notified immediately if a similar killing takes place anywhere in the country.”
“Right. We've got to proceed under the assumption of zero help coming out of Minnesota or Oregon, since we've no way of knowing if Richard will be successful or not.” Jessica returned to the mirror, sat and continued brushing out her wet hair as she spoke.
Reynolds watched the shining auburn hair pick up the morning light coming through the balcony windows. “The man who sketched the charcoal drawings did not sign his work, but his signature is all over the drawings.”
“Yeah, if someone pops out of the woodwork and happens to see them, and happens to know the artist, we have it made. But you're right, of course. We need an art expert to tell us what he can about our boy.” “I've already got a guy.”
“An expert who will back our contention that in each case, the artwork is the same hand at work.”
Darwin insisted, “I've got it covered, and I'm satisfied with-”
“Who's your expert?” she challenged.
“My wife's brother.”
She dropped her brush and her chin.
“Now wait a minute! Ronnie's an art major at Columbia. He knows this stuff.”
“No, Darwin, no! We gotta get art professors and dealers plural to cover our asses on this,” she argued. “Multiple opinions, understood? If it's to cut any ice with the governor in Oregon.”
“Yeah… you're right, sure. Important thing is you're with me now, one hundred percent!”
There was no curbing the man's enthusiasm now.
NINE
What a dance I am Leading.
The same time
As Giles Gahran worked with hammer and nail, putting his fully packed traveling crates together, he thought of how often he had done just this, picked up his entire circus and left town overnight, bleary-eyed from lack of sleep. He looked in over the lip of the collapsible crate he'd finished assembling, readying to hammer the lid shut. Inside lay Luanda's naked body wrapped in absorbent packing materials. From Lucinda's purse he'd gotten Keith
