Bones

“The marsh is political, right? And the chief’s a politician.”

As I drove back toward the city, he phoned for details, got a sketch.

Recent kill, white female, twenties, evidence of ligature strangulation.

Removal of the entire right hand by way of a surgically clean cut.

“One of those,” he said. “Time to keep both your eyes open, Doctor.”

The Bird Marsh is a two-acre triangle of uneasy compromise half a mile east of the ocean, where Culver and Jefferson and Lincoln boulevards intersect. Three sides of the triangle face multilane thoroughfares, condominium-crammed bluffs loom over the southern edge, the LAX flight plan brings in mechanical thunder.

The bulk of the wetlands occupies a bowl-like depression, well below the view of passing motorists, and as I parked across the street, all I could see was summer-brown grass and the crowns of distant willows and cottonwoods. In L.A. anything that can’t be appreciated from a speeding car doesn’t count, and federal protection for the flora and fauna sandwiched between all that progress has remained elusive.

Five years ago a film studio run by a klatch of self-proclaimed progressive billionaires had tried to buy the land for an “environmentally friendly” movie lot, funded by taxpayer money. Shielded from public exposure, the plan progressed smoothly, the usual soul kiss between big money and small minds. Then a talk-radio dyspeptic found out and latched on to the “conspiracy” like a rabid wolverine, leaving spokes-people tripping over each other in the rush to deny.

The save-the-marsh volunteer group that formed soon after disavowed the shock jock’s tactics and accepted two Priuses donated by the billionaires. So far, no sign of earthmovers.

I turned off the engine and Milo and I took a few minutes to soak in the long view. Cute little wood-burned signs fashioned to resemble summer camp projects were too distant to read. I’d visited last year with Robin, knew the signs granted street parking-a generosity now rendered irrelevant by yellow tape and orange cones.

A larger white sign directed pedestrians to remain on the footpath and leave the animals alone. Robin and I had figured on a hike but the path covered less than a fifth of the marsh’s perimeter. That day, I’d spotted a scrawny, bearded man wearing a Save the Marsh badge and asked about the lack of access.

“Because humans are the enemy.”

Milo said, “Onward,” and we crossed the street. A uniform stationed in front of the tape swelled his chest like a mating pigeon and blocked us with a palm. When Milo’s gold shield flashed, the cop said “Sirs” and stepped aside, looking cheated.

Two vehicles were parked in a gap between the cones-white coroner’s van, unmarked gray Ford Explorer.

I said, “The body was removed last night, but the crypt crew’s back.”

“Fancy that.”

A hundred feet north, two other uniforms walked out of some foliage and climbed up to the sidewalk. Then a broad-shouldered, stocky man in blue blazer and khakis appeared, brushing off his lapels.

Blazer seemed to be studying us, but Milo ignored him and peered up at the mountain of condos. “Gotta be a hundred units, minimum, Alex. All those people with a clear view and someone chooses this place to body-dump?”

“All those people with a clear view of nothing,” I said.

“Why nothing?”

“No streetlights around the marsh. After sunset, the place is ink.”

“You’ve been here at night?”

“There’s a guitar shop in Playa Del Rey that runs concerts from time to time. A few months ago, I came to hear flamenco. I’m talking nine, nine thirty, the place was deserted.”

“Ink,” he said. “Almost like a genuine bucolic nature preserve.”

I told him about my daytime visit, the limited access.

“While you were here, you didn’t happen to see a slavering bad guy skulking around, wearing a large-print name tag and offering a DNA sample?”

“Sorry, never met O.J.”

He laughed, checked out the bluff again. Turned and sca

We slipped under the tape, walked toward a white flag waving from a high metal stake. The stake was planted five or so feet off the path, set in dirt solid enough to hold it still. But a few yards in, the soil melted to algae-glazed muck.

The path continued for a few yards, then took a sharp turn. Voices behind the bend led us to three figures in white plastic coveralls squatting in shallow water, partially hidden by saw grass, tule, and bulrushes.

Submersion in water could slow decomposition, but moisture combined with air exposure could speed it up. As would heat, and this year June was starting to feel like July. I wondered what state the body was in.

Not ready to think about who the body had once been.

The stocky man materialized around a second curve, walked toward us while removing a pair of mirrored shades. Young, ruddy, dirty-blond crew cut.

“Lieutenant? Moe Reed, Pacific.”

“Detective Reed.”

“Moe’s fine.”

“This is Dr. Alex Delaware, our psychological consultant.”

“Psychological,” said Reed. “Because of the hand?”

“Because you never know,” said Milo.

Reed gave me a long look before nodding. His unshielded eyes were clear, round, baby blue. The blazer was square-cut, made him look boxier than he was. Pleats and cuffs on the khakis, bright white wash ’n’ wear shirt, green-and-blue rep tie, crepe-soled brown oxfords.

Dressed like a middle-aged preppie, but late twenties, tops, with the short-limbed, barrel-chested build of a wrestler. The barley-colored buzz cut topped a round, smooth face the sun would ravage. He smelled like a day at the beach; fresh application of sunscreen. He’d missed a spot on his left cheek, and the flesh was heading toward medium-rare.

A car door slamming caught our attention. Two attendants got out of the coroner’s van. One lit a cigarette and the other watched his partner smoke. Milo eyed the white-clad women in the water.

Detective Moe Reed said, “Forensic anthropologists, Lieutenant.”

“The body was buried?”

“No, sir, left out on the bank, no attempt to conceal. Had I.D. left on it, too. Selena Bass, address in Venice. I went over there at seven a.m., it’s a converted garage, no one was home. Anyway, in terms of the anthropologists, visibility was poor so I thought it would be a good idea to bring in a K-9 unit, make sure we hadn’t missed the hand. We hadn’t but the dog got all excited.”

Reed rubbed his left nostril. “Turns out, there were complications.”

The Belgian Malinois named Edith (“a search dog, not a cadaver dog, Lieutenant, but apparently it doesn’t always matter”) had arrived with her handler at one thirty a.m., sniffed around the dump site, then proceeded to race into the marsh. Stopping at a spot thirty feet south of the body, she dove into the outer lip of a pocket of brackish silt no more than six feet from the bank.

Freezing in place. Barking.

When the handler didn’t get there fast enough, howling.

Ordered back on land, the dog just sat there. The handler asked for hip waders. Those took another half hour to arrive and the dog stayed in place for ten minutes, suddenly bolted.

Setting in another spot, farther up the marsh, panting.

“Like she was proud of herself,” said Moe Reed. “Guess she should be.”

By five a.m., three additional bodies had been confirmed.

Moe Reed said, “The others seem to be mostly bones, Lieutenant. Could be one of those Indian burial rights situations.”

One of the crypt drivers had come over. He said, “Sure don’t smell like ancient history.”