can say a word.
“It creeps me out the way you do that,” I tell him.
He shrugs, switches the magnification on his microscope, and says, “I can tell from the scents and the way people walk. It’s a talent you hone after a while.” He finally looks up at me, squinting as his eyes adjust focus. “What can I do for you?”
“There are a couple of bodies in a car wreck in the woods off Crawford Road, and Izzy wants the two of us to go out and start the preliminaries.”
“Without him?”
“For now. He’ll meet us there as soon as he’s done getting his alien anal probe.”
Arnie’s eyebrows shoot up with interest.
“He’s getting his annual physical,” I explain.
“Ah,” Arnie says. He grimaces and squirms a bit in his seat before pushing back from the table, shrugging off his lab coat, and gathering up his scene kit. “Tell me what you know,” he says.
“The cops think it’s a couple from Illinois who went missing two weeks ago. Apparently the bodies are in an advanced state of decomp.”
Arnie looks intrigued. “I wonder if it’s the Heinrichs.”
“Who?”
“Gerald and Bitsy Heinrich?” he says, looking at me like he can’t believe I don’t know them. “The oil magnate and his trophy wife?”
I shrug and he shakes his head, clearly disappointed. Then he enlightens me.
“Gerald Heinrich is the only child and sole heir of 1940s Chicago oil baron Dietmar Heinrich. Estimates list Gerald’s wealth in the billions. His first wife, Maggie, died from some type of cancer and he remarried a few years ago to a woman named Elizabeth, or Bitsy, Conklin. Bitsy used to be a . . . hmm, how should I say it . . . a specialty dancer.”
“You mean a stripper?”
“That, yes. But rumor had it she went a little farther than that in her heyday, providing private lap dances to certain clients, if you get my drift.”
I did.
“Come ride in the evidence van with me and I’ll fill you in on the rest,” Arnie says, rubbing his hands together gleefully. “This promises to be an interesting day.”
Chapter 14
I follow Arnie down to the garage where our one evidence van is stored. We stash our equipment inside and, as soon as we are underway, Arnie continues the Heinrich saga.
“Gerald Heinrich became quite smitten with Bitsy after a private lap dance or two and then paid her to quit dancing for anyone but him. It was assumed he’d keep her on the side as a mistress but he surprised everyone, especially his kids, when he married her.”
“How many kids does he have?”
“Four: two daughters and two sons by his first wife—a bunch of spoiled brats, if you ask me. They’re in their late twenties and early thirties and not a one of them has ever worked for a living. They sponge off their father’s money and spend their time partying, jet-setting, and trying to avoid the tabloids. As you might imagine, they marked Bitsy as a greedy gold digger right from the get-go and immediately declared her the enemy. Bitsy has a son and daughter of her own: father or fathers unknown, and about the same age as the Heinrich kids. And trust me, there is no love lost between the two camps.”
“Sounds like quite the tempest.”
Arnie laughs. “You have no idea. Ever since Bitsy and Gerald went missing, the rumors have been flying. Bitsy’s kids accused Gerald’s of killing the couple so they could inherit the money. Gerald’s kids countered by saying they thought Bitsy killed Gerald and took off with his money. The two sides have been battling it out in the gab rags ever since.”
I shake my head in disgust. “So if our bodies are Gerald and Bitsy, and they died as the result of a car accident, both sides may be eating crow.”
“Oh, I doubt the battle will end that easily,” Arnie says. “There’s too much money at stake. If this does turn out to be Gerald and Bitsy, our little town is going to be in for a lot of attention.”
He sounds excited at the prospect and I can’t help but wonder if he’ll end up contributing to the conspiracy mill at some point. So far, despite all his suspicions and paranoia, Arnie has shown himself to be objective and open when it comes to his work. He believes in the power and truth of evidence, and gracefully accepts it when he’s proven wrong, though it never stops him from speculating about things and developing some pretty wild theories. Occasionally, his outside-the-box thinking is helpful, but most of the time, it’s simply entertaining.
We pull up to the scene, identifiable by the ambulance, sawhorses, and police cars parked along the shoulder of the road. A storm has moved in, blanketing the sky with a morose shade of gray, and rain is coming down in big fat drops that hit the ground like overripe cherries. Apparently it’s not much of a deterrent, however, since there is also a TV truck parked on the shoulder with its antenna raised high in the air.
Arnie says, “This isn’t good. It looks like the media has already heard.”
“How do they find out so fast?”
“They have people with police scanners who monitor all the emergency calls twenty-four-seven. Whenever something sounds potentially juicy, they’ll send a crew out to investigate.”
Arnie passes by the TV truck and parks at the front of the line of vehicles. Almost immediately there are several people running in our direction carrying microphones, cameras, and lighting equipment.
“Brace yourself,” Arnie warns me. “They aren’t going to be allowed near the crime scene so they’ll be desperate for any clues they can get. Questions will be coming at you faster than a BMW on the Autobahn. Don’t say a word.”
Before Arnie has finished issuing his warning, several faces are peering at me through the van window. I reach behind me to grab my scene kit, then push back the news-hungry horde by opening the van door. As I climb out, I catch the faint odor of rotting flesh with my first breath and switch from breathing through my nose to through my mouth.
A perfectly coifed brunette wearing a tight-fitting business suit over a body not much bigger around than one of my pant legs runs up to me and says, “Is it true that the bodies you found here are those of Chicago oil baron Gerald Heinrich and his wife?” Then she shoves her microphone in my face.
I don’t say a word and smile enigmatically instead, but when I do I accidentally breathe in through my nose and the smell nearly gags me. As I’m struggling to subdue my body’s desire to recycle my breakfast, a bright light flashes in my eyes.
“Perfect!” says a voice I recognize.
Belatedly I see that Alison Miller is among the group of newspeople. I shoot her a dirty look but she has already turned around and is taking shots of all the emergency vehicles, pretending to ignore me.
I slam the van door closed, and when I try to take a step toward the grassy hillside leading down into the trees, I am once again accosted by the first woman, whom I recognize as a reporter for one of the major network TV affiliates in Madison. She begins a machine gun interrogation.
“Are there two bodies? Are there any signs of foul play? Has the Heinrich family been notified yet? How long have the victims been dead?”
I ignore the questions, glare at the cameraman, and shove my way past everyone. It’s not hard to get past the newswoman since she’s as short as Izzy even with her three-inch heels, and can’t weigh more than one hundred pounds soaking wet, which she is, thanks to the rain. But the camera guy proves a bit more challenging. He dodges around me and aims the camera in my general direction. I try a similar dodge but as soon as I step on the wet grass it’s like I’m on ice; one foot is heading downhill at a breakneck speed and the other is fixed on the shoulder of the road. Just as my legs start to feel like the wishbone in a turkey, I hear a loud ripping sound and my second foot finally gives way.
