Hour Game

"Okay, what does that tell us?" asked Michelle.

"A lot. Jane Doe was a young woman, well developed and nourished but not overweight. Rigor on her would have fallen within the normal parameters absent extraordinary environmental forces. The ambient temperatures the night before she was found had dipped into the high forties, which would have inhibited somewhat the rigor's progression. Well, rigor on Jane Doe was fully resolved and her body flaccid when I examined her at the crime scene. That means she had been dead for three days at most by that time, or at the very least thirty hours. Given the resolution of rigor despite the chilly weather, I'd lean more toward her being dead three days when she was found."

"But you said rigor's not precise. Maybe there was something else, another factor that skewed it," suggested Michelle.

"I had another check beyond the rigor. When I examined the body in the woods, it was already discolored, and swollen with gas from the bacteria engulfing the body. The skin also was blistering, and fluids were leaking from all orifices. That almost never commences until three days after death." She paused. "And if she'd lain in those woods for even thirty hours much less three days, the insect infestation would have been dramatically different than what I saw. I expected to see heavy infestation of bluebottle and green bottle flies, both outdoor varieties. Flies attack a dead body almost immediately and lay their eggs. Within one to two days the eggs hatch, and the cycle keeps going. Now, when I examined the mouth, nose and eyes, I did find fly-hatched larvae, but of what turned out to be house flies. The outdoor fly larvae hadn't yet hatched. Also, burial and carrion beetles should have been swarming the body by the time we found it. Nothing stops insects from doing their thing. And on top of that, after three days in those woods wild animals should have attacked the body and removed large parts of the extremities. All that was missing were fingers."

She turned the body on its side and pointed out reddish-purple patches on the front where the blood had settled postmortem. "I also had yet another way to check my theory of the body's being moved. The position of the lividity really told me all I needed to know. As you can see, lividity gives the appearance of bruising with its darkish hues. However, here, you can also see that the discoloration is on the front of the torso and the thighs and lower legs. The white streaks you see on the abdomen, lower chest and parts of the legs are where the body was lying against something hard and the resulting pressure inhibited the process."

She shifted the body so they could see the back of it.

"You can see that there is no such discoloration on the back or the backs of the legs. Conclusion: she was killed and then was laid facedown, and the blood-settling process commenced. Lividity usually first occurs around one hour after death and is complete within three to four hours. If the body is moved within another three to four hours, the original discoloration may partially disappear and new ones form as the blood shifts again. However, fresh lividity patterns are not produced by position changes twelve hours after death, because blood drainage becomes fixed at that time."

She gently laid the corpse back down. "My opinion is that she was killed indoors or perhaps in a car by the shot to the head. I believe her body remained indoors for at least twenty-four to forty-eight hours and then was taken to the place where it was discovered. She couldn't have been in the woods longer than ten to twelve hours."

"And the transport by car? And the plastic?" asked King.

"What was he going to do, carry her in his arms down the road?" said Sylvia. "And neither I nor the police found any fibers on her clothing, the sorts of trace you would expect to see from the carpeting in a car or a car's trunk. And I didn't find any on the body. Plastic doesn't leave much if any residue."

Michelle said, "I found the body at around two-thirty in the afternoon. The boys would have seen it maybe minutes before that."

"Counting back," said King, "that means the body would have been dumped there, using your twelve-hour outside number, no earlier than two-thirty in the morning."

Williams had stood in the background all this time, but now he stepped forward. "Nice work, Sylvia. Wrightsburg is lucky to have you," he said.

She smiled thinly at his praise. "A postmortem doesn't tell who committed the crime unless the killer left behind things like semen, saliva or urine that we can test. The post just tells us how and what." Sylvia glanced at her notes and continued. "As I said, there was no evidence of rape, no injury to the rectum or vagina, and she'd never had a baby. I'd put her age at about mid-twenties and her health as physically sound. In life she was a well-built woman about five feet five inches tall. She'd had breast implants, and collagen injections in her lips. And she also had had her appendix removed. We'll know more when the toxicology screens come back in a couple of weeks." Sylvia pointed at Jane Doe's slit-open stomach. "Todd, she was pierced on her belly button, perhaps for a belly ring, but there was none on the body. That might help you in identifying her."

"Thanks. I'll check it out."

"The only helpful identifying mark I found was this." She picked up a magnifying glass, lifted the sheet off the lower part of the body and held up one of the legs, positioning the glass at a spot toward the inside thigh very near the woman's crotch. "It's a little difficult to make out with the extensive discoloration of the body, but it's a tattoo of a cat."

Michelle looked at the tattoo of the feline and the proximity of it to the woman's genitals and stood straight up. "I really don't want to think about that co

"Damn," said Williams, reddening.

"I know, not very ladylike, is it?" said Sylvia.

She looked up as Kyle entered the room.

"There's another police guy out front, wants to talk to the chief here, Doc."

"Police guy?" Her tone was a little strident. "Try police officer. "

"Right, this police officer wants to see the chief."

"Can you ask him to come back here?"

A malicious smile passed across the young man's features. "That's the first thing I did, Doc. The police officer declined, without explanation. Come to think, though, he looked a little green when I suggested it."

"I'll go out front," said Williams, and he hurried off with Kyle right behind.

Five minutes later Williams returned with a nervous-looking uniformed patrolman in his wake who was introduced by Williams as Officer Dan Clancy. Williams looked stricken. "We might have an ID on the girl from the picture we circulated," he said, his voice trembling slightly as they all stared at him. "Looks like she worked briefly at the Aphrodisiac."

"The Aphrodisiac?" exclaimed King.

Williams nodded. "As an exotic dancer. Her ‘stage' name was Tawny Blaze. Not real imaginative, I know. Her real name was Rhonda Tyler." He glanced at the paper in his hand. " Tyler worked there for a while but left when her contract was up."

"Will the person who recognized the picture come down and attempt to make a positive ID?" asked Sylvia. "Although with the state the body's in, I'm not sure that's possible. But if-"

Williams cut in. "That won't be necessary, Sylvia."

"Why not?" she demanded.

"We were told she has a distinguishing mark." Williams looked embarrassed.

It hit Michelle in an instant. "A tattoo of a cat next to her…?"

Williams's mouth gaped even as he nodded.

"Who was the person who provided the information?" asked King.

"The manager of the Aphrodisiac. Lulu Oxley."

Now King's mouth gaped. "Lulu Oxley! Junior Deaver's Lulu Oxley?"