‘If you were going to murder your wife,’ I said, ‘would you get a third party to do it while she was at work?’
‘That’s what I’ve been thinking,’ said Brian. ‘It hasn’t got the smell of a third-party killing.’
‘Would you be happy if your wife was sleeping around with your workmates?’ I asked.
‘I wouldn’t hire someone to kill her,’ said Brian. ‘Too messy.’
‘And remember, it was a consensual thing,’ I said. ‘They were all in agreement about it.’
‘Things can start out consensual and then they change. Ask a few rape victims.’
‘My gut feeling is that he had nothing to do with it and is the sort of guy who can’t live without his wife.’
Unaccountably, a memory surfaced from my crime scene days of a farmer whose wife had left him—the guy had tied a rope around a large tree trunk in a paddock, attached the other end around his neck, pointed the car away from the tree, then accelerated like crazy. He’d calculated it would break his neck and he was right. The rope had sheared his head right off. I’d come to the scene and stood staring for some minutes, trying to make sense of his torso still sitting up in the driver’s seat. I’d found his head on the back seat.
‘I’ll talk to you later,’ Brian was saying.
Kevin sorted the key to the gate from a crowded key ring but I told him and Dallas we had to wait. Debbie and a young bloke arrived about an hour later. Before unlocking the gate, I went back to the scullery and washed up, getting my spacesuit on and borrowing a pair of gumboots from the Ag Station stores.
Inside the wire, I filmed the surface of the animal pit. Debbie, her suit and shoes already muddied, squatted down, taking stills. The glittering bodies of flies coated the surface of the pit with a moving burnish. Despite the layers of earth moved by a front-end loader, the stink of rotting animals permeated the surrounds. Finally, I grabbed the shovel and slowly started turning the earth over, in methodical sections.
‘Can’t we wait till the earthmover comes?’ Debbie’s companion said.
‘No earth-digger,’ I said. ‘That could destroy valuable evidence.’
‘Evidence of what?’ he challenged.
‘That’s just it, Mark,’ Debbie called back from where she was discarding her filthy shoes and pulling on a spare pair of gumboots. ‘Dr McCain is right. We have to do it by hand. Layer by layer.’
After Mark got his gear on, the three of us stepped into the surface muck and started to work slowly and steadily, sectioning off the area into manageable slices. Even though I’d been in this game for too many years, I still found the stink revolting. Digging around in putrefying, maggot-seething material was not how I’d intended to spend my time.
Over the next few hours, apart from grunts and curses, we generally worked in grumpy silence. Despite the autumnal weather, sweat streamed down my body as I shovelled heavy, maggoty, muddy soil aside, while Debbie carefully picked over the piles. We took turns with the hose to wash down anything interesting.
Finally, we’d dug over the whole area and all we’d discovered were dead sheep in various stages of putrefaction. The more recent burials were the worst, with stomach bags bursting their contents under the pressure of our booted feet.
‘How am I going to get this filthy stink off me?’ Debbie wailed, jumping back to avoid one of the last shovelfuls thrown by Mark. ‘I’m supposed to be going out tonight. My boyfriend’s coming down from Sydney this afternoon for a dirty weekend.’
‘Give him a shovel and he can help out here,’ I said, unearthing a particularly nasty conglomerate of flesh, maggots and filth. ‘It doesn’t get much dirtier than this.’
‘Know what I hate most about maggots?’ said Mark.
‘I’ll be the mug. Tell me,’ I said, leaning on my shovel.
‘When you touch the infested area, it’s
warm
,’ he said.
When emptied of its loosened soil and animal remains, the sides and bottom of the pit showed the unyielding subsoil, a dull grey colour, hard as stone, untouched by rain for aeons.
‘We’ve dug over the whole area,’ I said, ‘and it’s clear that there’s nothing human here.’
‘No missing scientist, that’s for sure,’ said Debbie, trying to wipe sweat from her face with the back of her filthy gloves.
I made one last foray through a pile of rotten intestines and my shovel knocked onto something hard. Maybe a large animal’s skull or pelvis, I thought. But just in case, I squatted and used my double-gloved hands and a small garden trowel. Gradually, I uncovered something wrapped in stinking mud-covered plastic.
It was a large once-white plastic bag, the size of a green garbage bag, and, although filled with bulky objects, too light to contain a human body. Carefully, Debbie and I started freeing it from the surrounding mud while Mark videotaped the process. Finally we had it up on the edge of the pit, where Mark hosed it down.
‘I don’t know what’s in there,’ I said, looking at the strange shapes whose angles had torn holes in the plastic in some places.
‘Something stinks,’ said Debbie, moving back at a whiff.
‘Let’s bag the whole thing up and take it away for a good look,’ I said.
I lifted it into the waiting bag and we carried it back inside to the scullery, put it in one of the deep stainless-steel tubs and washed it down thoroughly. Now that it was cleaner, I could see that it was tightly tied off at the top with black and white striped tape. Mark filmed while I lifted it out of the sink and placed it on a nearby bench top.
‘I’m going to take it away to an examination room and do it properly,’ I said.
‘I can’t stand the suspense,’ said Debbie tearing off her filthy suit.
‘You’ll be the first to know,’ I replied.
Debbie gave me a look. ‘That was a joke,’ she said.
I cleaned up and finally took the bag to the back of my wagon.
‘Mark, you mind the exhibit book and finish up here,’ said Debbie. ‘I’m going home for a long hot soak in my tub.’
Mark and I used the facilities at the Ag Station to hose ourselves down and took showers in their wash-up area. On my way out, I called Pauline from her office and showed her the keys we’d found among Peter Yu’s possessions. She looked at them and at me.
‘I heard you dug up the animal pit,’ she said, anxious concern in her eyes.
‘And found dead animals only,’ I said. ‘But it’s these I want to know about. Have you seen them before?’
‘Yes,’ she said, picking them up and frowning. ‘They’re Peter’s keys. I remember that red and white plastic.’
‘Do you know what they’re for?’ I asked.
‘No,’ Pauline said, putting them down. ‘I just remember seeing him fiddling with them once or twice.’
‘Recently?’ I asked, thinking of my discarded girlfriend theory.
‘Oh yes,’ she said. ‘Just last week. That’s why I remember.’
I gathered up the mystery keys, said goodbye and stepped outside, pleased to be out of there.
Once at Forensic Services, with the bag from the animal pit duly logged, and Peter Yu’s keys on my desk, I realised I was very keen to get to work on examining the contents of the bag. Close attention to this new development in the Claire Dimitriou/Peter Yu puzzle was just what I needed to keep my mind focused. I placed the bag on the clean white paper under the bright lights and could see vague outlines of what looked like lab glassware and plastic containers. I rolled the bag over and looked closer at what the other side revealed. Pressed close to the misty plastic inside was matted fur. There was no way I was going to open this bag without full protection; I needed to head out and get the appropriate gear before I could continue further.
Turning to leave the examination room, I saw Florence looking at me through the glass window in the door and I beckoned her in.
‘I was hoping you’d be in today,’ she said, as she bustled over, pushing thick hair back from where it had slipped from its tortoiseshell comb. ‘There’re a few things I need to discuss with you.’ She paused, her mouth assuming an expression of distaste. ‘I’ll get my least favourite person out of the way first,’ she said.
I again fought the memory of the Brazilian, unsuccessfully.
‘Sofia Verstoek,’ she said, then, looking up at me, added, ‘What’s that strange look on your face all about?’
I rearranged my features to business-like.
‘No, I’m not going to complain. I know that’s useless.’ She gave me another look. ‘Actually, it’s because I’m
concerned
about her. It’s true that I don’t like her, but there’s something going on. Either she’s giving money to the poor, which I very much doubt,’ said Florence with a dismissive snort, ‘or she’s paying someone off. Something’s going on with her that’s not right. I thought I’d better tell you.’
I signalled for her to go on, genuinely curious now, not to mention concerned.
‘Yesterday, when I looked out and saw her, she was arguing with a man in a car and then she got in with him.’ She lowered her voice. ‘I actually thought she was going to have sex with him but she didn’t. I was working back later than usual and it must have been about dusk. I could see them quite well and they seemed to be talking and then the body language got a bit brisk. Then I saw her get out of the car, go back inside and come out again a few minutes later, and then I saw her giving money to
him
!’
‘And?’ I asked, very curious.
‘Nothing. He drove away. But I bumped into her in the tea room later and I could tell she was very upset about something.’
‘There’s no law against giving money to people,’ I said. ‘He might have been a relative. A friend with a problem.’
Knowing, as I did, that Sofia was Blue, I was hoping this incident was connected to the share-mate group. Otherwise, there could be a very ominous reason.
‘It wasn’t the first time I’d seen that fellow around the place either. He’d been parked outside the wire, on the road before. Wouldn’t a friend visit you properly, at home? Not park on the roadside like some sort of mendicant?’
It was a good point. It was essential that I discover why one of my junior analysts was giving money to a stranger and I resolved to clear it up swiftly. But right now, I could use Florence’s shrewdness in the matter of the case to hand.
‘Florence, you were a friend of Claire Dimitriou’s. What were your observations about her marriage?’
Florence looked away then back at me, uneasy. ‘I feel bad talking like this, with him lying in Woden Hospital with possible brain damage. But I have to admit I’ve never liked Anthony. There’s something sleazy about him. I’ve never felt comfortable around him. Claire adored him. But once or twice she hinted to me that he wanted—you know—kinky things,’ said Florence, looking extremely uncomfortable.
‘Like what?’
Florence’s voice dropped to a whisper. ‘She was terrified of losing him. But he wanted to experiment—sexually.’
It still didn’t sound to me like reason enough for murder—most men who had affairs didn’t kill their wives. Unless there was another woman involved and I made another mental note to check on this. The desire to be free of the spouse could become a
folie à deux
, and God knows there’d been plenty of such murders over the years—an illicit couple removing the unwanted spouse. Anthony Dimitriou had been at a conference, which could be cover for a clandestine affair. But if he’d bullied Claire into taking part as an unwilling member of the share-mates, this might go some way to explain her out-of-character blow-up with Jerri Quill. I sighed. In the murders of Claire Dimitriou and Tianna Richardson, there were just too many possibilities.
‘What you got there?’ Florence asked, interrupting my thoughts and indicating the plastic bag lying on the examination table.
‘Don’t know,’ I replied. ‘It’s something from the Ag Station that needs examining. And I’m not going any further till I’m suitably attired.’
She picked up the mystery keys on the red and white thong. ‘I haven’t seen an old key like that for a while,’ she said. ‘What does it open?’
‘That’s just it,’ I said. ‘It belongs to a missing man and I don’t know what the keys are for.’
‘That red and white plaited thing,’ she said, putting the keys down again, ‘I’m pretty sure that’s from one of the real estate firms in town. All their keys have those tags.’
I slipped the keys back into my pocket, grateful to Florence for this tip. It shouldn’t take me too long to find out which firm the keys belonged to and then I’d be on the way to finding the property that went with them. ‘Thanks, Florence,’ I said.
‘What for?’ she said.
‘Are you managing to get through your casework?’ I asked as we headed towards the area where the protective gear was stored.
‘Just. I’ve got a positive for semen from Tianna Richardson’s panties and also from the vaginal swabs,’ said Florence. ‘I’ve got them up on my screens. It’s easier if you come and see for yourself. Got a minute?’
I nodded and followed her down to her laboratory and over to her workbench.
‘I’m not having a great deal of luck with this,’ she said. ‘I’ve been able to pull out one male. Whoever picked up Tianna Richardson at the nightclub had sex with her. But so did at least one other man in the last twenty-four hours before she died.’
Tianna, you are a complicated woman, I thought. Now we had multiple contributors.
‘I can see spermatozoan all over the place,’ said Florence, ‘but so far, I’ve only been able to profile one individual.’
I felt for her. It was the sort of complication that made life difficult for us.
CSI
never had multiple contributors to sort out. Just a nice clean, clear profile. Wham! And there was the offender.
‘I ran what I could isolate through Profiler Plus,’ she continued. ‘Take a look at this.’
She touched her keyboard and a coloured DNA graph flashed onto her screen, the printer started humming and a copy of the shimmering graph spat out from the high-speed printer. I took it from her.
‘And this is from the sample sent up from the Sydney Forensic Unit,’ she said, clicking her mouse and changing screens. The case number on the top of the paper—the sample from Earl Richardson, whose identity I wasn’t supposed to know—now shimmered on the screen. I peered closer at the profiled peaks and valleys of the embattled widower and convert.
‘And?’ I asked, picking up the print-out of the DNA taken from Tianna Richardson’s murdered body. Immediately I could see the difference.
‘No match,’ Florence was saying as she printed out the second profile. Except for the twin peaks at the first locus, the sex marker, there were no similarities. I wasn’t surprised. I’d hardly imagined that Tianna had set out all dressed up to make love with her estranged husband. Earl Richardson was out of the picture as far as sex with his wife was concerned. Maybe this was the genetic ID of the mystery man who used to visit Tianna and whose discreet parking hadn’t fooled the watchful Mrs Vera Hastings.
‘Vic’s been helping me with the tape lifts and vacuumed material from the inside of Tianna Richardson’s car. He found a quantity of fabric fibres,’ said Florence, handing me a manila folder with some photographic print-outs while she scanned the report. ‘Under magnification, these fibres have the lobed cross-section that is typical of carpet or furnishing fibres. Except they don’t match anything at Tianna’s place. Nor her car.’
Even if the killer had used her car, I thought, it would only be
after
we had found him that we could check out his environment and find the incriminating object from whence the fibres had originated.
‘They didn’t match any of the clothing she’d been wearing either,’ Florence said, skimming Vic’s results.
I recalled Tianna’s black and silver outfit, the old-fashioned earrings that matched the necklace we’d found in her stepson’s car and the heavy, unglamorous woollen skirt that didn’t match anything else.
Florence hurriedly read on, turning a page over. ‘Vic goes on to say that there are indications that the fibres could have come from a tartan or chequered fabric—red and green.’ She folded the pages back down. It was a thorough report, although of little use to us just now.
‘Foreign fibres could have been brought in by anyone. Including her Aunt Mary,’ I said.
‘Or the killer,’ countered Florence.
‘If there’s any way of tracking him down, I’m confident you can do it, Florence. You and Vic. If the killer used her car, he’ll have left something behind.’
‘That’s another “if”,’ said Florence. ‘In a case full of ifs.’
‘I’m still hoping we get a trace of him and that he’s on record somewhere,’ I said, though I wasn’t feeling too hopeful. CrimTrak hadn’t been able to find a match on its database. The killer did not have a record. Yet.
‘
If
he’s a shedder and
if
he used the car, and
if
it’s not hopelessly swamped by everything else I’m going to find from that sample,’ said Florence, jabbing a finger at the container. ‘Tianna’s DNA is all over everything. You know how it is. If I can’t get anything clear this run, I’m going to have to send it over to New Zealand and get them to do Y-STRS. Pull out the male fraction that way.’
Y-STRs, male short tandem repeats similar to those we already used when extracting nuclear DNA, only occured on the male chromosome. An automated system with this capacity could greatly help sorting male from female genetic material. Unfortunately, ours was still at the ordering stage.
‘If he’s left his mark I know you’ll find it,’ I said, moving to leave.
Florence made a dismissive gesture with her hand but I could see she was pleased. And it wasn’t flattery. Florence was probably the best in the country.
‘I’ll do what I can,’ she said, reaching over and trying to tidy up a pile of physical evidence packages. On the top, I noticed an empty package, with the serrated security seals cut through, about to fall and I scooped it back up. I read the case details upside down and the name and wished I’d been more delicate with my earlier questions.
‘I am sorry about Claire,’ I said, patting her shoulder.
‘Stop patting me!’ she said. ‘Why do men always pat people? As if they’re dogs, or horses?’
‘Sorry,’ I said, whipping my hand away.
‘I’m processing Claire’s samples this minute,’ she said, as the automated system hummed through its cycles, extracting genetic material from the late Dr Claire Dimitriou’s person and clothing. I wasn’t that confident we’d be able to find anything helpful. Claire’s killer had been very thorough.
I went to leave the laboratory again but turned at the door.
‘Florence,’ I said. ‘Thanks—and I really am sorry about Claire.’
She twisted around on her wheelie chair to face me. ‘So am I. She was a great researcher. That project she was developing will stall now. It could have saved billions of dollars in lost primary produce. God knows, the poor farmers round here have had it tough the last few years.’ She pulled out a man’s handkerchief and blew her nose. ‘Three weeks ago we were all dancing at the golf club celebrating Claire’s fortieth,’ Florence continued. ‘Now she’s dead and her husband is fighting for his life.’
I couldn’t think of anything to say.
Florence sighed. ‘And the rabbit populations are building up again all over Australia after the
calicivirus
.’
The eternal fight between virus and host, I thought, and science’s endless work to stay one jump ahead of nature herself. ‘Someone else will pick it up. Her work will go on,’ I said.
‘Maybe, Jack. But Claire won’t.’
‘If you find any semen from her case, let me know,’ I said.
‘Semen? But Anthony was away on the ANZFSS conference,’ she said, frowning, her face a study in concerned bewilderment.
‘That’s right,’ I said.
I watched her face as she got it and glanced over at her humming hardware. When she spoke, her voice was small and sad. ‘I’ll let you know what I find.’
Back in number three examination room, fully suited up, I got focused on gently removing the sealing tape on the plastic bag with its murky contents. I wanted to do a good visual examination before applying anything more detailed, so I carefully opened the neck of the bag and started removing the first of the white squares I’d been able to discern through the misted plastic. Even before getting the contents all the way out, I could see straightaway that these were the first of several 96-welled plates, the sort that Dr Dimitriou’s ELISA machine used in her laboratory. In some of the wells, I could see remnants of whatever material she’d been testing. But already we had a serious problem. The plastic was buckled and distorted, as if it had come into contact with high temperatures. Even so, I hoped to be able to discover what tests Claire Dimitriou had been running through ELISA. I recalled her kind words to Kevin Waites, ‘My work is to stop them breeding, not breathing,’ as I pulled out another of the distorted ELISA plates. By rights, there shouldn’t be any pathogens involved, apart from harmless rabbit pox virus to carry the sterilising payload into the rabbits’ systems.