A Death in China - Carl Hiaasen [119]
He sat on the bench, watching a group of young girls from a parochial school chase a runaway kite, their plaid skirts beating together as they ran. Their laughter trailed off after the kite string.
Stratton opened the Post. The front section was clotted with the usual turgid political news. Stratton dismissed it and turned to the local pages to see if there was any mention of the grave robbery. There, on 10-C, a headline midway down the page grabbed his attention: ART BROKER FOUND DEAD IN BURNING AUTO.
The article was an Associated Press report from Grafton, West Virginia:
TWO PERSONS were found dead Monday at the scene of a single-car traffic accident on Shelby road, two miles south of Grafton.
Police said the victims were discovered in a burning automobile after the car apparently had run off the highway and crashed. Grafton Police Sgt. Gilbert Beckley said that rescue workers who reached the scene were forced to wait for the fire to subside before approaching the car.
Authorities have identified one of the victims as Harold G. Broom, an art dealer from New York. Police said Broom carried business cards listing him as an associate of the Parthenon Gallery and the Belle Meade Exhibition Center in Manhattan.
The second victim found in the car carried no personal belongings and has not yet been identified, police said. The accident was reported by a Greyhound bus driver who passed the scene but did not stop.
Tom Stratton stuffed the newspaper into a trash basket, bought himself a lemon ice, and jogged exultantly back to his hotel.
GIL BECKLEY WAS NOT what Stratton expected. He was not a middle-aged hillbilly with hemorrhoids, but an athletic young cop with a Jersey accent and two junior college diplomas on the wall. If Beckley felt it was beneath him to work traffic accidents, he hid the resentment well. In fact, he seemed pleased to meet this angular, quiet man who had arrived with information about the Shelby Road fatalities.
Stratton introduced himself and said, “I read about the accident this morning in the Post.”
“That was the official version,” Beckley said.
“What do you mean?”
“The two people in that car didn’t die in any wreck. They were shot. Classic murder-suicide, I’d say.”
Stratton was dazed.
“When you called, you said you knew something about the passengers,” Beckley prodded. “Can you help us out?”
Mentally Stratton dusted off his story.
“Harold Broom was doing business with a good friend of mine. They’d been traveling together for the last week or so.”
“Had you seem them recently?”
“Yes,” Stratton said. “Day before yesterday. In Washington. They rented a car.”
“So you think the other victim could be your friend?”
“I’m afraid so,” Stratton said. “That’s why I drove straight over here after I saw the story in the paper.”
“We appreciate it,” Beckley said. From a bottom drawer in the gray metal desk the policeman withdrew a stiff brown envelope. “How’s your stomach, Mr. Stratton?”
Stratton took the envelope. His hands trembled. He scratched at the gummed flap.
He wasn’t acting anymore.
“What was your friend’s name?” Beckley inquired.
Stratton pretended not to hear. Be there, he said silently.
He slipped the photographs from the envelope. They were black-and-whites, the usual eight-by-tens. The top picture captured what was left of Harold Broom after he had been dragged from the smoldering car. His clothes dangled like charred tinsel. His chest and face were scorched; the flesh on the upper torso was scabrous. The face was raw, frozen in a death scream. The eyelids had burned away completely, leaving only a viscous white jelly in the sockets. Broom’s outreached arms had constricted into the common rigor mortis of burn victims—elbows sharply bent, fists clenched in front of the face, as if raising a pair of binoculars.
Tom Stratton took a deep breath. He felt clammy.
The next two pictures, taken from different angles, were also of Broom.
“The next one,” Beckley said, watching closely. “That’s the one you’re interested in.”
Stratton looked at the photograph