for decomps, floaters, and other aromatics. I work there a lot.
Like its three counterparts,
After locating the bay in which LSJML-49744 waited, I got the Nikon and checked its battery. Then I pulled the stainless steel handle.
The smell of putrefying flesh rode the whoosh of refrigerated air. Disengaging the foot brake, I pulled the gurney from its slot.
Pomerleau and Lauzon had dispensed with the usual body bag. Understandable, given Lowery’s exotic outerwear.
I was shooting wide views when a door clicked open and footsteps squeaked across tile.
Seconds later Lisa Savard appeared.
Honey blond, with a ready smile and Dolly Parton jugs, Lisa is the darling of every straight homicide cop in Quebec. She’s my favorite, too, for different reasons. The woman is the best autopsy tech in the province.
Wanting to improve her fluency, Lisa always speaks English to me.
“A strange one, yes?”
“Definitely.”
Lisa studied Lowery a moment.
“Looks like a Ken doll still in the package. Radiology?”
“Yes, please.”
While Lisa shot X-rays, I went through Lowery’s dossier. So far it held little. The police incident sheet. The morgue intake form. Bandau’s report of the NCIC hit. A fax showing an ancient fingerprint card.
I checked the source of the fax. NCIC.
Curious. If Lowery died in ’68, why was he in the system? Were prints that old typically entered?
On impulse, I called the fingerprint section of Service de l’identite judiciaire. A Sergeant Boniface told me to come on up. Grabbing the file, I climbed the back stairs to the first floor.
* * *
Forty minutes later I descended, knowing a dizzying amount about tented arches, ulnar loops, and accidental whorls. Bottom line: though Boniface was uncertain why Lowery was in the FBI database, he had no doubt the match was legit.
Lowery now lay on a floor-bolted table in the center of
LaManche and Lisa were examining X-rays popped onto wall-mounted light boxes. I joined them as they moved along the row.
On each film, the skeleton glowed white within the pale gray of the flesh. I noted nothing unusual in the skull or bones.
We were on the fifth plate when LaManche’s gnarled finger tapped an object lying by Lowery’s right foot. Radiopaque, the thing lay angled across the calcaneous.
I agreed.
The next prize appeared in a view of the thorax. Roughly eight centimeters long and two centimeters wide, the second object glowed as bright as the first.
Great. The bizarre death now made sense to the chief. I still didn’t get it.
I considered the shape on Lowery’s chest. It wasn’t another knife. Nor was it a watch, a belt buckle, or a piece of fishing paraphernalia. I hadn’t a clue.
Crossing to the body, LaManche began dictating notes.
“Victim is enclosed in what appears to be a homemade bag constructed of a large plastic sheet doubled over and secured with duct tape. The bottom and all but the top ten centimeters of one side are sealed from the outside. The neck end and top ten centimeters of the side are sealed from the inside.
“The plastic has been freshly cut, exposing the right hand. Moderate insect activity is evident in the region of the cut.”
As LaManche droned on with details, the photographer snapped away, repositioning the case identifier with each shot.
“It appears the victim entered the bag, then secured the plastic using one arm extended through the ten- centimeter side opening, which was later sealed from the inside.”
LaManche gestured to Lisa to measure the ankle rope.
“The left foot is booted and attached to a rock by a twenty-centimeter length of polypropylene rope. It appears the victim secured the rope to the rock then to his ankle, which was left exterior to the plastic.”
