Speak for the Dead

by Rex Burns

  “Any other doors into the conservatory?”

  “The west end has a set. But they’re emergency doors and only open from the inside. And they got an alarm—a bell goes off if anybody opens them. Kids are all the time setting it off.”

  Wager would take a look at those later. “Are those more stairs to a third floor?”

  “Yeah. The rooftop garden. It’s for showing patio plants and such. You know, like people grow on their apartment balconies. But it’s a dead end; that’s the only stairs up to it.”

  “What’s in there?” Wager pointed to the east wall of the lobby where large wooden doors with a little-used look hung shut.

  “That’s the education wing. The auditorium’s through there, and over there’s the library and herbarium,” Solano said.

  “Does it connect with the conservatory?”

  “Only through here.”

  As Bauman had told him, the victim sure as hell hadn’t walked here. “Windows? Any windows in the conservatory?”

  “Sure, plenty. But they’re all up on top.”

  “Could somebody open one from the outside?”

  Solano’s head wagged. “No way. They work off hydraulic pistons. I’ll show you.”

  Wager followed Solano back into the humid greenness of the domed space. The shorter man pointed up to the roof where triangles of glass sat at the peak of the structure. Even if someone had climbed up from the outside, there was no way to descend. “That’s a long way up,” said Wager.

  “Fifty feet. Even the sparrows have trouble getting in.”

  Wager studied the pages of the small notebook. “Was it crowded when the place closed yesterday?”

  “I don’t know. I get off at two-thirty or so. That’s one of the nice things about this job—every afternoon’s mine. And, heck, I never could sleep late anyway. Bad kidneys.”

  “Who locks up?”

  “Depends on who goes home last. Usually it’s Mauro. But Mr. Sumner can tell you. He’s got a chart that says. Are you sure it’s O.K. to let that guy mess around down there?”

  “It’s O.K.” Wager strolled to the middle of the conservatory, heels crunching in the gravel, and looked at the variety of growing things surging up through the moist air. Why. And how. It wasn’t likely that someone brought the head in just before the conservatory closed. It wasn’t likely that entry had been through the emergency doors with their alarm system. It was likely that somebody used a key. Unless Baird came up with something that showed a lock pick, it was damned likely that someone used a key. “You live only a couple of miles away?” he asked Solano.

  “Yeah. It’s a short drive.”

  “Did you recognize the victim?”

  “What?”

  “Have you ever seen her before?”

  “Good gosh, Officer, how could anybody tell? I didn’t even think she was real, you know?”

  “Well, do you know any women who fit the description: maybe twenty-five, short blond hair, regular features?”

  “No. And I better not. The wife would be all over me.”

  “Thanks for your help.” He watched Solano walk in his quick, nervous way toward the lobby doors. Then he searched for Fred Baird. The technician was dusting the smoothest tree trunks and larger branches around the area where the head rested.

  “Have you got anything?” Wager asked.

  “Not yet. Whoever put it here had to come this way—they couldn’t reach across the stream.” This way was down a steep bank past a cluster of banana trees, giant ferns, and a tall eruption of leaves. “Great God, look at the name of this plant.” Baird giggled and pointed to the plastic tag beside the shooting green stalks. It said “Self-Heading Philodendron.”

  Wager didn’t see anything to laugh at. He jotted the fact in his little book. “Any idea how long it’s been there?”

  “Hard to say. The M.E. can make a guess if he ever gets here.”

  Solano had arrived around 6:30; it was now a little past eight. “Two hours? Maybe less?” The utility worker could have brought it in with him and then “found” it.

  “I’d say more—there’s a lot of drainage under it. But you’d better ask the M.E.” Baird stepped back and looked for other likely places a hand would rest. “I’ll bet you’re going to want us to survey this whole goddamned conservatory, aren’t you?”

  “I would like to know how it got here.”

  “Right. And why some son of a bitch would screw up such a pretty place by bringing it here.” He bent to dust another smooth tree trunk. “You want to call an ambulance? When the M.E.’s finished, it should go to the morgue for the pathologist. I sure as hell don’t care to take it back in my car.”

  Besides, Doyle’s procedure manual required corpses to be transported by suitable conveyance, and Wager supposed that meant bits and pieces as well. He keyed the G.E. radio pack holstered on his belt and sent the code for an ambulance, no siren necessary. “The deputy director’s coming down,” he told Baird. “He’s worried about his bushes and stuff.”

  “Right. And I’m worried about knocking off. Is that day shift on its way?”

  “Bauman said he called.” The conservatory’s shadows had faded to reveal, here and there among the towering palm trees, pink and white flowering vines and pulpy clusters of purple banana sprouts. This was the upper end of the area; the lobby was down at the east end where the stream fed a dark still pool whose bottom glinted with pennies and dimes. He half wondered if one of the coins had been tossed by whoever brought the head.

  Wager walked back around to the side path across the stream from the head. The face showed no bruises, no contortions, none of the knotted, frozen cords and sinews that came with agony. Instead, it seemed to have eased its life away in one long, gentle breath as if sighing at the glossiness of leaves, the richness of shoots and tendrils and moist protruding roots, the sudden flame of birds of paradise. There was a reason for it. He had been a cop long enough to know there was always a reason, even when no sane mind could understand it. This was not an easy place to get into, and most killers would dump a whole body. The person or persons unknown had gone out of their way to put just the head here, Wager figured, knowing it would be found within hours. And they’d done it because it was important to them. It was something worth taking such a chance for, something that had a reason for them.

  Wager no longer saw the gray skin or the heavy leaves glinting in the pale light. In his mind, he held side by side the living green of plants and the dead flesh of the head. The two things together meant something.

  A clatter at the lobby doors pulled him back; the day shift of lab technicians came in followed by a tall Anglo whose white hair still sprouted sleep in ruffled thrusts. Behind him, very quiet, Solano chewed his lip. The white-haired man, who must have been Sumner, talked loudly over the echo of the stream: “These are very delicate specimens—they shouldn’t be disturbed at all, and I’m quite upset that your people pursued their activities without first checking with me!”

  The lead technician from the day shift, new to Wager, bent to gaze at the head, then grunted to Baird, “Morning. Why don’t you go get some breakfast?”

  Fred snorted something like a laugh and began packing his kit. “Right. Breakfast. I’ll just go, thanks. The M.E.’s been called, my samples are over there, I’ve dusted the immediate area. Good-bye.”

  “What’s this powder on my bignoniacea?” Sumner pointed to a tree trunk.

  “It’s fingerprint powder—like talcum powder,” answered Baird. “Nothing toxic: will not harm, will not stain. It’ll rinse right off.”

  “But it will get into the soil!”

  “It’s magnesium silicate and aluminum—hardly enough for a trace.”

  “How much more do you intend to throw around?”

  Baird snapped the hasp on his kit. “Maybe some on the doors, but that should be it. These gentlemen would like to search the area systematically and look for footprints, cigarette butts, that sort of thing. Most of the search will b
e along the paths.”

  “But that’s where we place our choice growth! We have over six hundred specimens, and many are extremely delicate!”

  Wager stepped forward. “They’ll be real careful, Mr. Sumner.”

  The second of the two lab men nodded. “We’ll take good care, sir. I’m a plant freak myself. Ferns. Love ‘em.”

  “Well, yes, the asplenia are very nice, but …”

  “And,” added Wager, “we wouldn’t want to leave any hands or feet lying around, now, would we?”

  “Oh. Oh my. I didn’t think of that.” Sumner’s round eyes of anger turned into round eyes of horror. He peered this way and that among his plants.

  “Let’s go back to the lobby, Mr. Sumner. Maybe you can answer a few questions for me,” said Wager.

  “Questions?”

  “About the routine of locking up the place and such.”

  “Ah, well, that’s usually Mauro’s job. Dominick Mauro. He’s the senior assistant utility worker.”

  “Was he the one to lock up last night?”

  “I believe so; I’ll have to look at the charts to be certain. He should be here at ten.”

  That would be unauthorized overtime—without pay. It would piss off the police union, but there wasn’t anything in the bulldog’s procedure manual against pissing off the police union. Which Wager sort of enjoyed doing anyway. “Solano is the one who comes early?”

  “Yes.” Sumner relaxed for the first time, and it made his white hair look incongruous against the sudden youthfulness of his lean face. Wager guessed he was a little past fifty, but his hands moved like those of a younger man. “We’re very fortunate with those two: Salvador doesn’t like to sleep late, and Nick doesn’t like to get up early.” The tension came back. “They’re both very trusted and long-time employees, Inspector. State employees.”

  “Yes, sir. Do any other employees have keys to the outside doors?”

  “Keys? I was just looking at the key chart the other day… . We have very few keys that unlock the outer doors. I have one. The conservatory superintendent, Mr. Weimer, has one. And the chairman of our board of trustees. Though I don’t think he’s ever used it. Oh, yes, there’s the emergency key that’s kept in Greenhouse One. That makes six.”

  “What’s the chairman’s name?”

  “Mr. Klipstein. Gerald Klipstein.” Sumner frowned.

  “He and his wife are in Europe. When he returns, he’s going to be quite upset about all this.”

  “Who can get to the emergency key?”

  “The senior gardeners. They have the keys to the greenhouses, and the emergency key’s in a locked cabinet.”

  “What’s the names of these gardeners?”

  “Leon Duncan and Joe Mazzotti. Both very fine men; they’ve both been here since the nineteen-fifties. I can look it up on the longevity chart.”

  “That’s O.K., Mr. Sumner. You went home earlier than Mauro last night?”

  “Unless we have a special evening function, Mr. Weimar and I go home around four. The buildings and grounds close promptly at four-forty-five.”

  “What kind of evening functions do you have?”

  “Oh, previews for our members, occasional night classes, slide presentations. We’re really quite active when the sun goes down, ha, ha.”

  “Yes, sir. But there was nothing going last night?”

  “No, Inspector. There was ‘nothing going,’ as you say.”

  “Have you ever seen the victim before?”

  “Good Lord—I didn’t even glance at it! I have no idea what it looks like, and I really don’t want to!”

  “Could I have your address? In case I’ve got more questions later.”

  “Certainly.” Sumner gave the street address of the gardens’ administration building as well as his unlisted home telephone number. His home address was, like Solano’s, within a long walking distance of the gardens, though in a southern direction toward the Denver Country Club.

  “Is that all, Inspector? I’m afraid the press will make a field day of this, and I’ve got to warn the trustees.”

  As Sumner let himself out the main entrance, Wager saw the ambulance crew heaving a rubber-tired stretcher over the locked turnstile of the picket fence. The two attendants puffed toward him. “Where’s the victim?”

  “Through there,” said Wager. “But the M.E. hasn’t come yet. And you won’t need that thing.”

  “Oh, yeah? Why?” The lead attendant was a stocky kid with cropped red hair and freckled arms that filled the short sleeves of the smock. A blue-and-orange shoulder patch said he had passed his Emergency Medical Technician’s examination. The driver was a thin Negro with heavy oil holding his hair down in a slick crust.

  “All we have so far is the head.”

  “No shit!” said Red. “Why in hell didn’t somebody tell us that before we unloaded this thing? We had to haul it over that goddam gate to get it here.”

  “It’s not something you put on the air,” Wager said.

  “Yeah? Well we got rubber bags for that kind of thing, you know? I mean these wagons are heavier’n hell and we didn’t really need to unload it, did we?”

  “It’s down that way. You’ll see the lab people.”

  “Jesus Christ. That’s the trouble with everybody, they never think of nobody else. Come on, Ernie, let’s run this fucker back.” They swung the stretcher around and rammed it through the doorway. “Like I was telling you, Ernie, just once—just one time, man—I’d like to meet somebody that didn’t just think of their own fucking self first. Just once!”

  CHAPTER 3

  WAGER REACHED THE homicide office a little after nine with the list of people who had keys and with the slight headache he always got when he went too long without food. A team from the day shift, Ross and Devereaux, was finishing its paperwork before going on the street. When not working a homicide, the detectives were on call to help other sections of the Crimes Against Persons Division: stickup, assault, bunco, occasionally rape—though lately the politicians had given that section enough funding, and they preferred to use their own specially trained man-woman teams. And the bomb section was always on its own.

  He took the dregs of night-shift coffee from the chrome cylinder in the hall and sighed as he slid behind the desk he shared with two other men. Already two of the names on the list of key-owners had been checked off: Klipstein, who was in Europe; and the conservatory director, Weimer, who was at a three-day conference in St. Louis. That left six names. Wager scraped at his eyelids with his thumbs and sipped the strong coffee, staring at the list without really seeing it.

  “There’s the overtime kid—Wager thinks he’s still Supernarc.” Detective Ross, completing a records-search application form, winked at his partner, another tall, thick-bodied man. At five eight, Wager was half a foot shorter than any other member of the homicide section.

  “Wager thinks he needs a cup of coffee and a little peace and quiet,” Gabe said.

  The partner, Devereaux, glanced up from his stack of papers. “Fred Baird told us you really got a good one.”

  “I’m glad he liked it. Did he have anything from the lab yet?”

  Ross didn’t try to hide his irritation. “No, he didn’t have anything from the lab yet. He put in his time and he went home. You really do think you’re a supercop, don’t you?”

  Wager guessed he had just broken a rule of the office by not kidding back. “No, Ross. I’m tired.”

  “Then knock off. You’re not in narcotics any more; you don’t have to make anybody think you’re rupturing yourself for Mama and apple pie.” Ross tugged his checked sport coat over his arms. “We do things different over here. But, by God, just as good. We got a goddamned good conviction rate in this section, and we didn’t get it by being hyper—we got it by collecting the evidence!” He strode out of the office.

  Devereaux, with a little embarrassed grin, paused a moment in the doorway. “Ross didn’t sleep good again. Nightmares. You get them after a
while; you know how it goes. Is there anything you want us to follow up on?”

  “Not yet. Thanks.”

  “Ciao.”

  Wager closed his burning eyes and slumped in the hard chair to hold the coffee mug under his nose.

  The steam smelled better than the thick coffee tasted, and he inhaled deeply, feeling the rigid muscles in his neck begin to relax, listening to the rhythmic clatter of a distant teletype, the tinny rattle of telephones, voices male and female raised over the chatter from the records section just down the hall. On his desk, his portable radio popped and squawked with the business of District 2, the most active of the quadrangles that divided the City and County of Denver. All those noises added up to the familiar sounds of every division he’d worked, from street grunt to narcotics. And now homicide. It wouldn’t take long to feel at home here. But Ross’s words held some truth: the pace was slower, more methodical. In the narcotics section, you were part of the crime while it was taking place in order to have a case for court; the pace was always set by the bastard you wanted to bust. Here in homicide, you picked up the pieces after the crime was committed. If there were witnesses, you could move fast; if not, you could only go as fast as the evidence allowed.

  But there was another reason behind Ross’s anger; Wager knew Ross was threatened by Wager’s putting in a little overtime. Here was Ross doing his eight hours and happy in his stride, when along comes a runty Hispano who strides a little faster and works a little harder. All of a sudden Ross has competition. Well, piss on him—Ross didn’t have to compete unless he wanted to; and if he did, it was his worry. Because now homicide was as much Wager’s home as anybody’s.

  He took another sip of bitter coffee and picked up the telephone; the drawling voice on the other end answered, “Lab, Hawkins.”

  “This is Wager in homicide. Do you have anything yet on that head found out at the Botanic Gardens?”

  “Wager? You new up there?”