Grave Matters

by Max Allan Collins

  “That perfect crime you hear so much about.”

  “Not so perfect.”

  David frowned. “Where’s the flaw?”

  Warrick grinned. “Somebody smart like you, David, can see right through it.”

  David beamed, but Warrick didn’t let him bask in the praise, asking, “What do you hope to accomplish with the X-ray?”

  With a gesture toward Vivian Elliot, who posed under the X-ray’s eye, David said, “The cardiovascular system is a closed system. Despite the fact that there’s over 60,000 miles of arteries, veins, and capillaries, the air bubble will show up on an X-ray. If there’s an air bubble, Vivian Elliot was murdered. If not…I’ve wasted a lot of valuable time, and this poor woman is still dead.”

  “Dead not murdered.”

  “Dead but not murdered…. Only, doesn’t this woman have a right for us to make a serious effort to find her cause of death?”

  Warrick gave David the complete and profound answer the assistant coroner was hoping for: “Yes.”

  They moved the body and took more X-rays. Working in silence for a while, they finished their task in a relatively short order.

  Holding up the last undeveloped X-ray, Warrick said, “Is this the only way to find out if she was murdered by an air bubble?”

  Shrugging a little, David said, “There is one other way, but I don’t think Doctor Robbins would ever go for it.”

  “Well, try me.”

  David’s eyes flicked wide. “Well…you crack the chest and fill the cavity with water. If there’s an air embolism, it’ll leak out, and the ME will see bubbles in the water.”

  “That’s nasty,” Warrick said.

  “So is murder.”

  “Good point.”

  “I’ve heard about this technique, but I’ve never actually seen anyone do it in practice. The X-rays are still our best bet.”

  “Well,” Warrick said, “let’s take these vacation pics to one-hour photo, and see if our next trip’s gonna be to track down a murderer….”

  Catherine stretched her arms wide, yawning herself awake. The windowless office was pitch-black, the only light coming in under the crack of the door. She checked the iridescent dial of her watch and realized she’d slept five more minutes than the twenty she’d planned. Blessed with an uncanny internal clock, Catherine seldom had use for an alarm and only wore a watch for confirmation of what her body was already telling her.

  She reached over to switch on her desk lamp. When her eyes had adjusted to the light, her gaze came into focus on the framed picture of her daughter Lindsey. The blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl smiled at her and Catherine smiled back. Not long ago, she might have felt a twinge of guilt over the many hours she spent away from the child.

  But she had come to terms with her single-parent status, and dedication to her job was something to feel pride about, not shame. Catherine’s nightshift work actually made it possible for her to spend more time with Lindsey than many a working mom…although in doubleshift marathons like this one, that notion was put to the test.

  At a counter in her office, Catherine reached at random for one of the brown bags of evidence from Vivian Elliot’s room. After breaking the seal, she realized she’d picked up the one filled with sheets. She set that aside, saving that for the layout room where she’d have more space. For now, she selected the bag containing Vivian Elliot’s personal belongings; inside was a smaller bag of valuables as well, which she’d picked up from the Sunny Day office.

  She carefully emptied the contents of the smaller bag onto the counter: three rings, a watch, a gold cross necklace, a wallet, and a cell phone. A few years ago, the cell phone might have surprised her, with a woman of Vivian’s age; but now the whole world seemed to have one, and many seniors in fact carried cells for I’ve-fallen-and-can’t-get-up emergencies.

  The rings were a gold wedding band with an attached diamond engagement ring, possibly a karat, and a decorative number with a diamond-centered ruby rose. The rings weren’t cheap, but they probably weren’t from Tiffany’s, either.

  Likewise, Vivian’s gold cross necklace was a nice mid-range piece that looked like she’d had awhile, but had taken good care of it, as with her rings. The watch was a Bulova that looked to be about ten years old; it seemed as well-maintained as the other pieces, and the band was a replacement one, fairly recent.

  Nothing terribly significant—a woman with enough money to have nice if not lavish things, which she took care of and (as in the case of the Bulova) made last.

  The cell phone was what really interested Catherine—cells often held a wealth of information just waiting to be tapped.

  She jotted down the numbers from the speed dial—only three, but one might be the mystery woman who had visited Vivian right before her death. Next, Catherine checked the call log, which gave her the last ten numbers Vivian had dialed, the last ten calls she’d received, the calls she’d missed, and the in-box for text messages, though the latter was empty. Several of the numbers turned up again and again, most likely Vivian’s closest friends. Women Vivian’s age often rivaled teenage girls for phone time with their gal pals….

  In fact, one of the numbers showed up on the speed dial, the missed calls, the received calls (three times), and the dialed calls (four times). That would be where Catherine would start, figuring that number (keeping in mind the late woman’s lack of family) probably belonged to Vivian’s best friend.

  Catherine was going through this list of cell phone numbers when she realized neither she nor Warrick had gotten a log of the calls to and from Vivian’s room at Sunny Day. She made a mental note to ask Warrick about it, then picked up her own cell phone and dialed Vega.

  “It’s Catherine, Sam—got time for a question?”

  “From you, always.”

  “Did you and Doctor Whiting discuss the telephone in Mrs. Elliot’s room?”

  She could hear the smile in Vega’s voice as he said, “I was wondering when the most diligent CSI in Vegas would get around to asking about that.”

  Sighing her own smile, Catherine said, “Oh-kay, smart guy—don’t gloat. You may pull a double shift someday.”

  “How about last week?…Anyway, there’s only two numbers on the list, and frankly I haven’t had time to run ’em yet.”

  “Got a pen or pencil?”

  “Shoot.”

  Catherine gave him the number she figured belonged to Vivian’s best friend.

  “What are you, Catherine—psychic? That’s one of the two!”

  “The number comes up on her cell phone a buncha times. Give me the other one, would you, Sam?”

  He did and said, “If we have the best friend, we may have the mystery guest at Vivian’s room.”

  “Did that mystery guest sign in, Sam? At the guard shack?”

  Vega sounded a little embarrassed as he admitted, “When I went back to check, the shift had changed. I need to go back and talk to the guard who’d’ve been on duty. Sorry.”

  “Hey, even the most diligent detective can get overworked, and tired….”

  Vega laughed. “Okay, Cath. We’re even.”

  And they broke the connection.

  Catherine set the phone numbers aside to run later. No point in getting too deep into this, until she knew what, if anything, they were into…and that she wouldn’t know until after the autopsy.

  The final item before her was Vivian’s wallet.

  A black nylon tri-fold number, the wallet had one zipper pocket on the outside. Catherine opened it, finding nothing. She undid the snap and laid open the wallet on the desk. The first section was the fold-over outside, the next a coin purse with what Catherine assumed was Vivian’s spare car key and a dollar-and-a-half in change. The front of the coin purse was a four-pocket credit card holder with a cardboard educator’s discount card from a bookstore chain, an insurance card, a Visa card, and an ID from a cost club superstore.

  Not much help.

  The final section held Vivian’s driver’s l
icense and a clear plastic credit-card holder with four more credit cards—a department store, a house-and-garden store, a women’s clothing store, and a MasterCard. Behind the three sections was a wider one with seventy-two dollars. Absently, Catherine wondered where Vivian Elliot’s checkbook was. Other than that, everything seemed pretty normal with this woman—exceedingly normal.

  Over the next two hours, Catherine cataloged the evidence and sent the biohazard materials off to the lab. She’d already spent the better part of a day on the Elliot case and still didn’t even know if it was a crime.

  Time to go to the morgue….

  There, she found David, Warrick, and Dr. Al Robbins hard at work. Robbins was performing the Vivian Elliot autopsy with David’s help while Warrick looked on.

  She slipped on a lab coat, gloves, and a paper mask, now matching her outfit to the others; they might have been a team of surgeons saving a life, not investigators probing a death.

  Stepping up next to Warrick, across the table from David and Robbins, she asked, “Anything?”

  Robbins said, “How about cause of death?”

  “How about it?”

  “Myocardial infarction.”

  “Heart attack.” Catherine frowned in thought, looking at the exposed organ in question. “Caused by?”

  With a facial shrug, Robbins admitted, “I think David’s probably right…about the air embolism.”

  Warrick said, “Shared that theory, did he?”

  This was the first Catherine had heard about it.

  Robbins nodded, his eyes on his work. “I had gone through the autopsy already, and could find no good reason why this woman was dead. Her heart seized and stopped…but there was no real damage apparent before the event. She wasn’t overweight, didn’t have high cholesterol, minimal artery blockage—nothing, really, for a more or less healthy woman of her age.”

  “Natural causes maybe?” Warrick said with a silent chuckle. “A euphemism for ‘who knows what killed her?’ ”

  “A woman of her age could have a heart attack,” Robbins said, “in the ‘natural’ course of events…but that doesn’t really happen much. Something went very wrong with this woman’s heart…and I can’t find any reason for it.”

  David stepped forward. “Doc—I, uh…took X-rays of her when we brought her in.”

  Robbins looked surprised. “You did?”

  David swallowed. “I thought, you know…you might want them.”

  The medical examiner gave David a sideways look. “Good idea.”

  David’s relief was palpable.

  “David,” Robbins said patiently, his eyes on his assistant. “What do they say in Missouri?”

  David thought about that. Then he asked, tentatively, “Show me?”

  “Right. Why don’t you?”

  Spring in his step, David stepped out of the room, then came back in a flash carrying a large manila envelope. He handed it to Robbins, who grabbed his crutch and limped over to the light box on the wall.

  Warrick flipped the switch and Robbins slapped the film up and began to study it. Moments later, he shook his head and moved on, taking that X-ray down and putting up another. On the second film, he found what he was looking for.

  “There,” he said, pointing to a dark spot near the center of a chest X-ray.

  “What are we looking at, Doc?” Warrick asked.

  “The dark spot in the pulmonary artery, Warrick. That’s an air bubble.”

  Catherine drew in a breath, then asked, “And just how did that air bubble get there?”

  Robbins gave her a grave glance. “I found no needle sites other than the IV catheter…. My guess is that’s where it went in.”

  “Easy entry,” Warrick said.

  But Catherine was fighting the urge for immediate acceptance of the theory with a Grissom-taught insistence upon other options. “Could the air bubble be left over from the trauma of the car wreck?”

  Robbins shook his head. “Doubtful.”

  “Possible?”

  “Anything’s possible…but my judgment is, in that case, it would have come up before, if it was going to. I think David is right.”

  Warrick’s expression was grave. “You think we have an angel of mercy on our hands, Doc?”

  “God knows it wouldn’t be the first time someone killed the people they were supposed to be caring for.”

  Catherine turned to Warrick. “Get Vega on the cell. Tell him it looks like murder and we’re going to investigate it like one. Until or unless we find evidence that it wasn’t…this case is a homicide.”

  “I’m with you, Cath. But what do you want me to tell Vega we’re doin’ next?”

  Catherine thought for a moment, then said, “The lab work is going to take some time…and we’ve already been to Sunny Day….”

  “Vic’s house?”

  “Vic’s house.”

  An hour later, Vega’s Taurus pulled up and Warrick parked the Tahoe in front of Vivian Elliot’s stucco home on Twilight Springs in Green Valley.

  An average home for the neighborhood, pretty much matching the tile-roofed design of the others, the Elliot place had a lush green lawn that looked freshly mowed, a pair of well-tended small bushes on either side of the front door.

  Catherine had gotten Vivian’s keys from the late woman’s purse. The missing checkbook hadn’t been in there either, and Catherine could only wonder if someone had made off with it. She unlocked the door and the three of them entered.

  The entranceway was small, a hallway, really, that led to the back. To her left, Catherine saw a short cherrywood table with a ceramic pot in which a peace lily bloomed.

  “Lawn looked mowed,” Warrick said, looking around. “That lily’s healthy enough.”

  “Thriving,” Catherine said.

  “The Elliot woman was in the hospital for weeks, before transferring to the rest home. Somebody’s coming around to take care of things.”

  Catherine shook her head, half-smiled. “A little eerie, don’t you think? Air conditioning on, everything so normal—like Vivian’s going to walk in the door, any second.”

  “If she does,” Warrick said, “that won’t be normal.”

  The hallway was inlaid Mexican tile and Catherine could almost feel its coolness through the soles of her shoes. She turned to the right and found herself in a small but immaculate living room, a flowered sofa against one wall, two chairs framing the picture window onto the front yard. An entertainment center occupied the opposite wall, complete with Book-of-the-Month-Club–filled bookshelves on either side of the 27” TV. The wall to the left had a potted plant in either corner and was home to an array of photos at various heights in assorted frames—family photos, most taken before the death of Vivian’s seventeen-year-old daughter.

  The girl looked similar to Lindsey—same big blue eyes and wide, easy grin. Her hair was darker than Lindsey’s, but that was the only real difference. Catherine felt as if she were looking into the future. Then, recalling the fate of this child, she felt a chill…that chill of dread that only a parent, contemplating the death of a child, can understand.

  Off the living room was a small study, pine-paneling with nature prints beautifully framed, built-in bookcases with volumes on hunting, fishing, baseball, and football, and a desk with a computer, circa 1995.

  “Husband’s home office,” Catherine said.

  “Clean as a whistle,” Warrick noted. “But not in use for some time, I’d say.”

  Back in the living room, the trio compared notes.

  “Nice enough digs,” Warrick said.

  “Clean,” Vega said.

  “Think somebody went over it?” Warrick asked.

  “It’s not a crime scene, Warrick,” Catherine said. “A cleaning lady cleaned it.”

  “Or her friend?”

  “Or her friend…. Let’s get the lay of the land before we get too carried away.”

  “You’re the boss,” Warrick said.

  She looked at him.

&nbs
p; “What?” he said.

  With a wrinkled grin, she said, “It’s just…every time you say that to me, I look for sarcasm and can’t quite find it.”

  He grinned. “Maybe you’re not good enough a detective to.”

  The house was only one story, and their tour didn’t take long. When Catherine went back into the hallway, she followed it to the entrance of the combination kitchen/dining room, where another hall peeled off to the left. Catherine went that way, the other two right behind.

  The first door on the right was a bedroom—a small tidy room with a sewing machine, bed, and dresser. A ’70s vintage portable stereo was on a stand under a bulletin board adorned with David Cassidy pictures cut from teen fan magazines. On the pink bedspread were stuffed animals with big eyes that stared accusingly at the investigators.

  “Daughter’s room,” Catherine said.

  “Doesn’t look like it’s been changed much,” Warrick said, “since the kid’s death.”

  “Sewing machine is probably Mom’s.”

  “I don’t know, Cath. Kids sew, too.”

  “Mine doesn’t.”

  Warrick lifted his eyebrows. “Neither does this one, anymore.”

  There were more green plants in here—three sitting on a ledge attached to the windowsill. Healthy looking.

  Across the hall was the bathroom and, beyond that, another bedroom—this one rather anonymous with a desk with a computer and a plastic organizer filled with files; on a small table next to the desk, an AM/FM radio. Across the room the glass face of a small TV on a stand winked at them. Green plants dotted this room, too.

  Next was a bedroom, obviously Vivian’s. Two pictures sat on the far nightstand—her husband, her daughter. Yet another TV perched on a table on the wall opposite the bed. A giant armoire filled the wall next to the door and a long dresser consumed the far wall, leaving barely room to walk around the bed. Catherine managed, though, and beyond the armoire was a door to another, smaller, bathroom. Judging by the toothbrush, hair spray, toothpaste, and other products Catherine had seen no sign of in the other, bigger bathroom, this was the one Vivian had used most of the time.

  “Big house like this,” Warrick said, “nice, too—and she relegates herself to, essentially, a small apartment. Rest of the place is like a shrine to her lost family. Sad.”