Dead Guilty Part 4

"Yeah, we get that all the time here too," Lynn said. "Whenever I hear that, I know my money is about to be cut and my workload increased. Makes me want to gag more than this smell."

"From the mayor's point of view, it's a perfect solu tion. They get a new crime lab, and we get to keep the museum and the taxes we can't afford to pay. As an added bonus, they send us one of their employees."

"That would be Neva?" asked Lynn.

"She's kind of caught in the middle. She's not to blame."

"So, your forensic anthropology unit was swallowed up by the city's crime lab?"

"No. I wouldn't stand for that. The crime lab is separate. Half my salary and that of my forensic staff is paid by the city to operate their crime lab. It takes a team of accountants to do the paperwork. The one big downside of it is that on paper, I and a chunk of my staff are part-time employees of the city. Some times the mayor and the chief of police forget that it's only on paper."

"Bureaucracies are certainly wonderful," said Lynn. "I think I've found something on the ankle here- some kind of tattoo."

Diane walked over and took a look at the blackened skin with a barely visible darker design.

"I see it," said Raymond. "Can't tell what it is. Want me to get the lamp?"

"I think we have enough slippage so we don't have to burn off the skin. Get me a damp piece of gauze."

Raymond fetched the gauze and gave it to Lynn. Diane watched her gently rub the skin, removing a film of epidermis, revealing what looked like a yellow, blue and red b.u.t.terfly.

"Nice," said Raymond.

"Let's go ahead and get a picture of this-use the large-format camera," said Lynn.

Raymond retrieved his Horseman VH Metal Field Camera from a closet.

"I want a close-up, and another that shows the en tire ankle."

Lynn and Diane watched Raymond remove the bulky camera from the overhead mount and place it on a tri pod. He put a metal ruler just under the tattoo, framed the shot and snapped the first picture. He moved in for a close-up. "Okay, you want some digital too?"

Lynn nodded. "Just to play it safe."

"Dr. Webber never expects pictures to come out."

"It's because I'm such a poor photographer," she said.

Diane retrieved more blue cord and a strip of plastic from her case while Raymond snapped photographs of the b.u.t.terfly tattoo, duplicated all his shots with a digital backup, and filled out the photo log.

"Diane, I a.s.sume you want any internal insects when I go inside."

"Yes. If you think she may have been s.e.xually as saulted, any larvae around the v.a.g.i.n.a might be useful."

"How's that?" asked Raymond.

"A rapist's DNA can show up in the maggots who have ingested it."

Raymond laughed out loud, a deep-throated laugh as if that was a joke played on the perp.

"Diane, why don't you go ahead and remove the rope. I really need to get her arms untied so I can go inside."

"Can Raymond make photographs of the process?" "Sure."

"There's two ropes around the neck," Diane ex plained as Raymond set up her shots. "The noose and another loop of rope that leads down to the hands. If she moved around too much trying to free her hands, she'd only choke herself."

"Umpf," the diener grunted. "You want all the knots, right?"

"Yes, and I need you to show how the ropes around the hands and the neck are connected. You may have to angle the camera to see down through these loops on the hands to get a good view. It looks like the perp used multiple knots. Have you had much experience photographing knots?"

"None," said Raymond. "No, that's not right. There was that suicide that came in last winter. We don't usually see the rope."

"I need you to photograph me removing the rope. I need to have a record showing that the knots did not change as a result of my intervention."

"How 'bout I use the thirty-five millimeter for that."

"That's fine."

Diane began with the noose. First, tying the plastic around the knot to stabilize it. After securing the knot, she pulled the rope away from the skin, bringing bits of flesh with it. She slipped one end of the cord under the rope and tied it off. Three inches away she tied the other end of the cord around a section of rope. Each end of the cord had a tag that Diane labeled, indicating how the rope was oriented to the victim. As she worked, she heard Raymond snapping the camera over and over.

She cut the noose with a sharp scalpel. She slipped the noose off over the head. She placed the rope in a flat box and stuffed more plastic inside to hold it still and labeled it. She repeated the step with the second loop around the neck.

"You have to do that procedure with each loop of the rope, don't you?" said Lynn.

"I have to keep the rope as intact as I can. For tight rope arrangements like these on the hands, I made a plastic-covered, log-shaped form to slip to keep them from becoming through the loops tangled."

"I didn't realize Raymond.

ropes were so involved," said "There's a lot you can learn about the perp from them. This one is going to be more complicated," said Diane as she examined the ropes. "This guy knew his knots." She grinned up at Lynn and Raymond. "I love it when they know how to tie knots."

Chapter 6.

"You really like a.n.a.lyzing knots, don't you?" said Lynn, her eyes widened in a puzzled stare.

Diane saw that reaction a lot-a knot is just a knot to most people. "Yeah, I do. They've saved my life more than once."

"How's that?" asked Raymond.

"I'm a caver. We rely on ropes and knots." "Really?" said Lynn. "Have you explored many caves?"

"Quite a few. Not many in Georgia, even though I grew up here. But one of my employees at the mu seum is introducing me to some of the Georgia caves." "I've always wanted to see the one in Mexico with all the crystals," Lynn said.

"The one on the Discovery Channel, right?" said Raymond. "It didn't look real, all those white crystals."

"The cave is called Lechuguilla," said Diane. "The formation you're talking about is the Crystal Ballroom."

"Yeah, that's it."

"Those are gypsum crystals. They're even more im pressive in person."

"You've been there?" asked Lynn.

"Yes, I have. A couple of microbiologist friends in vited me to go on an expedition with them. It's a protected cave. I was lucky to get the chance." "It appears to be very beautiful," said Lynn. "Stunning." Diane looked down at the decayed husk that used to house a young woman. "The line of work I'm in, it's very rejuvenating to be able to look at something so breathtakingly beautiful."

"What about this knot?" asked Raymond. "Is it something special?"

"It's a handcuff knot."

"Handcuff knot? I don't like the sound of that,"

he said.

"It's good as a handcuff and for hobbling horses.

Our perp added a little twist. He took the working line and wrapped it around the vic's hands, tucking the end through the loops. I guess he didn't want her wiggling her fingers."

"Easier to cut them off," said Raymond. "Did he do that while they were alive?"

"I don't know," said Lynn. "I'm not sure I'll be able to tell."

"I think I can secure the outer loops without cutting them, but I'll have to cut the loops on the handcuffs,"

said Diane.

She took a blue cord and secured all the loops to gether and tagged each one. She treated each loop around the wrist in the same way she handled the noose around the neck-tying them off before cutting the loop free.

"It's like cutting an umbilical cord," said Lynn. As Diane slid the rope free, a cool breeze eased through the autopsy room.

"I don't believe it," said Lynn. "They got someone to fix whatever was wrong."

"Just needed a little motivation," said Raymond. "Oh, it feels good," said Lynn. She took in a deep breath, as if the cool air made everything smell better.

"Let's get this done. What do you say, Raymond?" She turned to Diane. "I hope you don't mind me running you off to the other room. I like to have as few people as possible in the room when I'm working on a body this decomposed."

"Believe me, I don't mind. I'll take these ropes back to the lab and start my team working on them, and then I'll come back. Do you intend to do the other two victims today?"

"I'd like to try. Raymond and I will collect the in sect samples."

As Diane was going out the door, Lynn started the Y incision.

RiverTrail Museum of Natural History was housed in a beautiful gothic three-story granite structure that began its life as a museum in the late 1800s. The build ing was converted into a private medical clinic in the 1940s, and was now converted back to a museum. It had large rooms with Romanesque moldings, polished granite floors and rare wall-sized murals of dinosaurs painted at a time when everyone thought the huge animals dragged their tails behind them.

Diane had a sense of peace as director of the mu seum. It was a place of scholarship, learning and fun- and she ruled. Thanks to the late founder, there were no bureaucrats between her and what she wanted to do for the museum. It was idyllic, a dream career. She couldn't imagine going back into forensics-working with death and evil in places where evil won often and was rarely punished. But she'd found, oddly enough, after helping Frank Duncan find justice for his murdered friends, that she enjoyed the hunt, the puzzle. Good thing too, for it kept the wolves from the ornate wood doors of the museum.

It was 10:00 A.M. when Diane carried the evidence from Lynn Webber's autopsy lab to her crime lab on the third floor of the museum.

"Start on the clothes," she told Jin. "Wait on the rope. I'll bring more clothing and insect specimens later."

"Sure thing." Jin took the boxes and attached crime lab tracking labels to them. He and Diane signed the labels, and he locked the boxes away. "This is a big case. People are talking about it."

"We're going to be watched closely on this one. Both the mayor of Rosewood and the chief of detec tives are going to be riding us pretty hard."

"We'll be brilliant. I'll start on the clothes right away. We can have some results for the sheriff by the end of the day."

Only a couple of technicians were in the lab, filling out papers. David's insect-rearing chambers sat in en vironmentally controlled containers in the entomology work s.p.a.ce.

"David and the others in the field?" she asked. "You know how he likes to take a final walk through. He's got Neva with him. You've got her very nervous."

"I have?"

"She said you're the one who got Detective Janice Warrick demoted last year."

"Not me. Janice botched a case and contaminated a crime scene. She's responsible for her own career situation."

"I guess Neva only knows what she's heard in the police department."

"How's she doing?"

"She's scared all the time."

"Of me?"

"You, but mostly the chief of detectives. Afraid she's going to screw up. She didn't want this job. He a.s.signed her to it." Jin shrugged, clearly not under standing why anyone wouldn't want a plum job like this one. "David's got her out now. Showing her how to look for things. David's a good guy."

"Yes, he is." Diane didn't like hearing that about Neva. This was the kind of case they couldn't mess up. "I'm going to check in with the museum, then I'm going back to the autopsy."

Jin nodded. "Want me to have David call you?"

"No. I'll talk with him later."

"When you a.n.a.lyze the rope, I want to watch. I've never done that."

"You know anything about knots?"

"I was a Boy Scout."

"Can you tie knots?"

"Sure... some."

"Go to the museum library and get a book on knots. Study the types."

Diane left and went down to the first floor. The museum had been open for an hour and was filled with summer school students on a field trip. Loud ex cited chatter swept out of the dinosaur room as she pa.s.sed it on the way to her office.