Code 61 - Donald Harstad [20]
I flipped him off, in a friendly sort of way. “It's not nice to irritate your elders.”
“Tell me about it…. ” was delivered as he left the room. The whole exchange was flat, forced, but you had to try. It was really getting oppressive in there. I wanted to open all the windows, but we didn't need any flies.
I motioned Herb back toward the hallway. “Stop anybody out there from coming in, will you? Until Borman gets back.”
Alone again, I took some quick photos of the interior of the bedroom with both cameras, rotating myself clockwise, and making certain I overlapped the photos. Then I stepped back almost into the hall, and took three more shots, to establish the scene. I found I had to reload the camera. The Board of Supervisors had recommended we use twelve-exposure rolls, to “save money.” Lamar had bought twenty-four of those rolls, just to give it a try. As it turned out, I had one thirty-six-exposure roll of ISA 400 left in my bag. I loaded it into the camera, and manually forwarded the film to “1.” We'd saved money by deleting the auto-wind option, as well. Thus armed, I ventured back into the bathroom.
Between working twelve-hour shifts, and getting very little sleep before getting called out four hours early today, and the semi-stunned feeling that usually accompanies having to absorb a tremendous amount of evidence and data in a very short time, I was beginning to feel a bit overwhelmed. I stood for about ten seconds, taking a couple of deep breaths, and just sort of clearing my head. What I used to accomplish by having a cigarette. Then I started back to work.
I took four shots from the door frame, just to establish the scene. Then I took a bunch of shots of the body, as I moved alongside the tub. Each from a slightly different angle, they'd give about as complete coverage as possible without moving the corpse. I made a very conscious effort to get as much of the bloodstain patterns as I could. About halfway along, I reached into the bag at my chest, and changed from the 50mm to a 70/210mm zoom. I was getting my first good look at the huge cut in the neck, and I wanted close-ups without having to lean over the body. I kept using both cameras, but the zoom on the digital just wasn't in the same league with the single lens reflex.
I've seen lots of cuts, and this was one of the meaner ones. Only about four inches long, but length, as they say, isn't everything. It appeared to be very, very deep, because there seemed to be a bulge of muscle protruding. Muscle will do that sometimes. Especially if there's a lot of tension on it at the time it's cut. But it has to go deep. It was more of a stab wound than I'd expected. Most suicides use a sawing motion. It was not, though, a tearing wound like the one on the Baumhagen boy. For whatever that was worth.
There was a very dark spot, visible through the bloodstain, on the upper portion of the right breast. My first thought was a contact gunshot wound, but as I leaned a little closer I could see it was some sort of tattoo. That was a relief. The neck cut was certainly enough. There was lots of evidence of blood, but it didn't seem like all that much, considering the wound. The spatter marks on the inside walls of the tub made it look like there'd been more blood than there actually had been. I thought about that for a second, and decided that, sitting upright, if she'd lost enough blood to stop all brain functions, maybe that would stop the heart. Right, Dr. Carl. That's why we have medical examiners.
It then occurred to me that the open drain in the tub could explain that, but it just didn't quite fit, somehow. Something wasn't right.
I knelt down, and got some lower level shots of the wound. To get as much of the cut in frame as possible, I took a pen from my pocket, reached out, and pushed some of her hair back out of the way. As I did so, I saw her face fairly clearly. And her eyes. Big, hazel eyes, wide open, and staring right directly at me.
“Holy shit!” I stood straight up, snagging her hair with the pen clip as I drew my hand back. I reached