A petite woman with short blond hair got out and retrieved a good-sized roller bag from the rear. She had on a maroon knit dress and yellow pumps, smiled and waved at us. Wide smile enhanced by perfect teeth. On to a new adventure. Dr. Basia Lopatinski’s default approach to life.
When she got to us, Milo said, “Different one, Basia.”
“My guys told me.” Pleasant lilt to her voice. Faint Polish accent.
“Will you be able to determine TOD?”
“No way to tell without examining her, I’m talking down to the cellular level. Even with that it could be tough. If she was frozen shortly after death there’s likely no decomp or insect visitation and rigor’s certainly not going to be a factor.”
“Ah.”
Basia reached up and patted his shoulder. “All is not lost, Milo. One positive aspect of a frozen body is cause of death is likely to be well preserved. Same for identifying factors though I understand that’s not an issue here. And there are other variables that could possibly tell us something. For example, if she was thawed and refrozen, there’ll likely be ruptured blood cells. That’s what I meant by cellular. And of course, the arms. We’ll do tool-mark analysis and try to get you logical possibilities.”
“We’ve got a possible TOD of around four days.”
“How so?”
He told her about the barking dog.
She looked unconvinced. “Well, we’ll see.”
Running her hands over her dress, she tapped the roller bag. “Time for impermeable and disposable. So much for fashion.”
Chapter
6
Time stretched.
Milo and Alicia grew antsy but when he said, “Gotta let Basia do her thing,” she nodded and returned to her phone. Confirming the victim’s warrant and the availability of Detectives Moses Reed and Sean Binchy for the toss of the house.
Milo said, “Good, tell them to head over.”
His phone-work had been less productive. Trying to access Martha Matthias’s retirement papers and coming up against multiple-choice voicemail at human resources that ended nowhere.
He growled. “Don’t these bastards ever work?” Glanced toward the house, like a kid wondering whether to broach the cookie jar. Tapping his foot, he walked a few feet away and paced for a while. Had just returned when two crime scene techs arrived.
Alicia told them to hold off until the pathologist was through.
One of them said, “Pathologist? Must be a juicy one.” Unperturbed, they returned to their van, phones out, fingers clicking.
Milo returned, left, paced some more. Alicia looked grim.
The waiting game. Crime Scene 101.
—
Twenty minutes in, information began to trickle in from the canvass. Three other neighbors had noticed the staggering woman on theirblock but none had paid her much attention or had linked her to Martha Matthias.
The common belief: The homeless were everywhere, city government was useless, ignore the mess.
Closed-circuit cameras were located on eight homes over a two-block stretch. Five were focused narrowly on entrances and failed to cover the street, one was a dummy, and two were inoperative due to computer glitches.
Just as that had settled in, Gloria Mendez came out and said, “Want to take a look?”
—
I followed Milo and Alicia toward the rear of the house, wondering if what I was about to see would stay with me. Sometimes terrible stuff does, etching mental pictures in my brain that come back from time to time during unexpected moments. Sometimes, though, the pictures don’t register. I haven’t found any correlation to anything and I’m not sure what the inconsistency says aboutme.
