her. Once, a neighbour had gutted a deer that had crossed their path in untimely fashion. To her astonishment, once connections were cut, everything lifted out in a neat package.
Boone introduced Holly, who stuck out her hand in reflex until Vic held up a soiled latex glove and shook his head with a smile. Her breathing was shallow, but she noticed a strange peppermint smell. Vic cocked a thumb at an air-freshener device seen on television, puffing out occasional drafts. A white-sheeted form, blotted with a few stains, lay on the steel table. “Virgin?” he asked her.
Her face reddening, and tempted to bluff, Holly conceded.
“Yes and no. I’ve seen the procedure on...interactive videos.”
“Those little cartoons where you move the mouse and pick up the organs? Modern version of that game where you had to pull out body parts with an electric tweezer without touching the sides of the opening. Got that for my seventh birthday.”
Boone cleared his throat. Holly felt a pressure in her chest, as if she were under the massive boulder called Sir on Muir Beach.
She was not going to faint. Concentration was all. Focus.
“About time you got here. I was just going to put Angie back,” he said. “All done.”
“Anything conclusive?” She noted with approval his use of the name. Before much longer, nothing tangible would remain of the girl. She was already gone, the carapace merely a rebuke to her attendants. Like an efficient waiter, Vic’s chubby assistant was already packing up the instruments for the autoclave in the corner. She remembered the historic word for the examiner’s helper, diener, translated from the German as servant. Not an inapplicable term, but no longer PC.
He gave her a skeptical look. Vic was in his late forties, fuzzy brown hair in an Afro. He had a small, precise mouth and the ears of an elf. A cleft in his chin added a winsome touch. “Mr. Conclusive is a creature we seldom meet, a birthday present wrapped with a shiny ribbon. Life down here in the crypt isn’t like that.”
Left feeling like a television script writer in a cancelled series, Holly shuffled her feet. “Sorry, I...”
Leaving Angie’s head covered, he pulled back the sheet to breast level. “No need to compromise her dignity. We’ll use the relevant areas.”
Holly pulled up her own gown to dig notebook and pen from a pocket. “Shoot. I mean go.”
“It’s all on tape if you want a copy,” he said, pointing at the dangling microphone. “But as for highlights, she presents as a well-nourished and muscular female of seventeen. You can see the strong development in the upper arms and shoulders. In the neck, too.”
Holly added, “She was a swimmer. That’s what makes this acc—”
“All the organs are in top shape. Last meal some sort of chili. Also chocolate, marshmallows, crackers. What do you call that campfire stuff?”
The idea of eating repulsed her, but Holly answered, “S’mores. Nothing unusual there.”
Boone sucked on his empty pipe, this time a Meerschaum model. As a smoking deterrent, she supposed it wasn’t far removed from those plastic cigarettes. “Tox scan?”
“Some alcohol. About .03. Well under the breathalyser. Couple of beers, I’d say. We’re still waiting on the drug reports.
They’ll go to Vancouver to the lab.”
“So she couldn’t have been drunk and fallen into the water.”
He levelled dark little chameleon eyes at her, black, then brown as the light shifted. “You don’t have to be drunk to fall.
Broke my damn ribs in the tub one night. Pathetic.”
She bit her lip, feeling shorter than a garden gnome. “I guess not. And the head injuries?”
“Ready? One rookie fainted and split open his scalp only last week. When you see the face, it gets more personal...at least in the beginning.”
She blinked and nodded, locking eyes with Boone for a moment. His gaze sent her a blessing.
Gently, Vic pulled back the sheet from Angie’s head. Holly wondered why it had been necessary to examine the brain in a drowning. Could they determine some type of seizure? Strokes were rare in young people, but they did happen without warning. On closer inspection, she noticed no signs of cutting. Angie’s eyes were tactfully shut, and if anything, she looked peaceful though pale.
“So you don’t do a full autopsy? Take out the...brain?” she asked. Boone had a wisp of a smile on his face. She felt like a source of entertainment, then chastised herself for self-focus.
“Funny, that’s the first thing people think of. After the Y incision, it’s so classic. Bet neither of you knows when the first autopsy in North America....amend that...the first autopsy over here by Europeans, took place.”
They both shook their heads. “That’s why I love you, Vic.
I always learn something new,” said Boone.
“Winter of 1604-5. St. Croix Island down in Maine near the New Brunswick border. At a settlement of Champlain’s, nearly half of the seventy-nine settlers died over a harsh winter. Panic set in.”
Holly wondered, “How did anyone discover this?”
“Champlain’s memoirs a few years later described how he ordered his surgeon to ‘open’ some of the men. Excavations by the National Park Service in 2003 found skulls cut just like they are today. Neat as can be. Turned out it was scurvy. No need to look at the brain for that.” He gave them a grin. “Should have followed the native diet. Perfectly balanced. Now ours is killing aboriginals.”
Holly wanted a better answer. “So why not examine the brain?”
“How many tax dollars do you want to spend for little payback? It’s not that simple, either. First off, the brain fresh out of the skull is very hard to work with. It needs to firm up in formalin for week or two.”
The image brought a sudden queasiness that tugged at her gorge. “That long? So then the family can’t...” Her voice trailed off.
“That’s a tough decision. Funeral, burial, cremation might be delayed. For a useless formality, do you think they want their loved one sent to heaven without a brain?”
The floppy scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz danced across her memory. “I see. It’s a very emotional issue.” The terminology was returning. The calvarium, the vaulted part of the skull that protects the brain. A lyrical word, from the Latin calvaria, skull. A Catholic education scores again. Her father would enjoy that piece of trivia. She realized that she was babbling behind her own curtain and gave herself a mental slap “upside the head.”
“Anyway, in this case X-rays revealed no skull fracture. Drowning was clearly the cause of death.”
The skin on the girl’s face was untouched, but to the side, a section had been probed to examine the wound. “What did you find around the bruise on the temple?”
“Rock debris. Small marine pieces. Algae. The usual
