Code 61 - Donald Harstad [30]
“Hi, Hester. Thought you'd be here sooner.”
“Hard to find this place. I must have missed the drive the first time.” She smiled, in sort of a weary way. None of us get enough weekends off. She'd probably been counting on this one. “So, Carl,” she said as we paused in the atrium, “just what do we have here, anyway?”
I told her, in about two minutes. Told her that it could be a homicide. Told her that it looked like a suicide.
“So, are you leaning either way?”
I shrugged. “It doesn't look right. The clothes, or lack thereof. The wound, although that could be self-inflicted, God knows.” I'd told her what Doc Z. had said about the arterial spurts and the bruises. And the Coumadin.
“But we don't know, yet, if there was any major arterial damage caused by the wound?”
“Right.”
She smiled again. “So, do I just sign for the free pathologist and lab team, or am I going to have to work today?”
“I feel so transparent,” I said, grinning back at her. “No, I'm afraid you're going to have to work on this one.” I told her about the body in Wisconsin.
We went into the parlor, and I introduced her around. We left Borman in charge downstairs, and I took Hester up to meet Edie.
Afterward, we compared notes, Hester seated at Edie's vanity, and me leaning against the bathroom door, where I could keep an eye on the door to the hallway.
“You got an extra pen in that camera bag of yours?”
“Sure.” I handed her the bag. “Right-hand front pocket, there.”
“I want the lab team here,” said Hester, peering into my camera bag. “I don't know just exactly what we have here, but we can't wait for them to come up to process the scene until after the autopsy.” The lab team had to come from Des Moines, some four to four and a half hours away.
“I'm for it,” I said, as brightly as possible. This third visit to the tub had been difficult. “What do you think? Can we move the body out now? I'd like to get her out as soon as practical.”
“No problem. I don't think the victim has any more to tell us until the autopsy.”
“Good.”
She found the pen, and browsed absently through the bag. “You've got just about everything in here, Houseman. Exam gloves, bags, labels, fflm, batteries, pens, scissors, tweezers … ” She unzipped the side pocket, and looked up. “Girl Scout cookies? Are these Girl Scout cookies?”
“Caught me. Want one?”
Hester ate the chocolate mint cookie in two swift bites, and then looked for a place to put her notepad on the vanity.
“Look at the neat stuff.”
“Pardon?”
“Her makeup,” she said. “Lipstick colors. Interesting. Like these: Tar, Bordeaux, Garnet, Pulsing Blood … ”
“Oh.”
“With foundation names like Porcelain. And glitter for the eyelids. Little stick-on holograms. Neat stuff.”
“You betcha, Hester.”
“No, really. This isn't your mother's kind of makeup, chances are. And not the shades and colors that are usually worn around here.” She gave me a smug look. “Sort of a gentle rebel, this Edie. Look more closely. She took very good care of all this stuff. It's orderly. Neat. Her appearance was important.”
“I caught the neat part right away,” I said. “Always makes me feel out of place. Speaking of makeup, you notice her nails? The multicolored thing. Does that mean something?”
“Probably not. Whimsy, I'd think.”
“Whimsy. Like with the frilly clothes?”
“You mean the brocades, the lace, the velvet and satins hanging over there?” She gestured toward the walk-in closet.
“Yeah.”
Hester smiled. “I'd think she enjoyed being a girl.”
“Oh.”
She ate one more cookie, then pulled her walkie talkie out of her pocket and went on to the mobile repeater channel. That was so neat. She was talking to her car radio via a secure channel, which, in turn, transmitted to State Radio repeater towers down to Cedar Falls State Radio, also via secure link, and enabled her to order