The Dark Room(56)

“Decedent appears fit and well-nourished, and does not have any external physical deformities. Rigor mortis is fully progressed and the body is cool to the touch, having been in refrigeration since two o’clock this afternoon.”

She pointed to the dark welting of settled blood that discolored his right side.

“Livor mortis is fixed and pronounced on the right side of the body, except over pressure points—his right hip and shoulder took most of his weight,” she said.

Cain stepped between Grassley and Chun. He whispered so that his voice wouldn’t carry to the official autopsy tape.

“We found the body under the desk, curled up on his right side,” he said. “What do you make of the livor mortis?”

“He wasn’t moved,” Chun whispered back. “After he died, he stayed where he fell. The blood settled and made those bruises.”

Cain nodded and looked back at Dr. Levy, who was working up Castelli’s corpse, narrating as she went.

“—his genitalia are normally developed for an adult. He has a two-inch appendectomy scar on his abdomen. He’s wearing a gold band on his left ring finger, and has a two-tone Rolex watch on his right wrist. I’m removing both items and giving them to Inspector Cain, who is present.”

She twisted the ring off his finger, forcing it past his knuckle by wiggling it side to side. Then she unclasped the watch and squeezed the band over his stiffly splayed fingers. She put it into a property bag along with his wedding ring and set it on an empty table alongside the clothes that had been cut off of him.

“His fingernails are neatly clipped and clean. We’ve taken samples from each of them for DNA testing. He has three parallel scars on his right forearm. Each scar is approximately eight inches long, running from his elbow toward his wrist. Judging from the placement of his watch, decedent was likely left-handed—”

Cain made a mental note to find out.

“—so that these scars would be consistent with a prior incident of self-mutilation.”

“A suicide attempt?” Fischer asked.

“Or maybe just cutting,” Dr. Levy answered. She moved away from the microphone so that this would be off the record. “These scars—look at them. They’re decades old. Unless you find someone who knows the story, or luck into a medical record, it’d be hard to say.”

Cain looked at Chun, and she nodded. She was still tracking down leads in Berkeley. Maybe one of her contacts would know something about the scars. Dr. Levy picked up a clipboard, which held the notes she’d taken in her first run on the external examination. She flipped a page, then went to the microphone.

“Decedent has a tattoo on his right scapula. Greek—pi kappa kappa. Each letter’s an inch across. Dark green ink.”

“How old is it?” Cain asked.

Dr. Levy came away from the microphone again.

“No idea. It’s not new—the edges aren’t sharp, and the color’s faded,” she said. “But think about it. It’s a frat tattoo. Who gets one of those except when they’re eighteen and pledging?”

She lifted Castelli’s head and repositioned the block under the back of his neck. She put her left palm on his chin, then covered the back of that hand with her right. She bore down, her elbows straightening as she put her weight into him. As Castelli’s mouth opened, his jaw made a sound like a pencil snapping.

“Powder burns on his palate and tongue,” she said. She was leaning over the mayor, a flashlight positioned against his bloody lower lip. “Entry wound at the anterior of the hard palate. It looks—”

She put out her hand, snapping her fingers. Jim slipped her a pair of inside-diameter calipers. She gave the flashlight to him and he held it for her while she inserted the calipers and dialed the knob on the right to take the entry wound’s measurement.

“—four-tenths of an inch. That’s consistent with a thirty-eight in soft tissue.”

“All right,” Cain said. Where he was standing, he couldn’t see the entry wound at all. But he’d caught a little of the mayor’s shattered grin as Dr. Levy had opened his mouth. “What’s the story with his teeth?”

“The chipping?” Dr. Levy asked. She pulled his bottom lip out, and ran her gloved finger over the broken teeth. “You see that, this kind of suicide. End of a pistol’s barrel has a raised sight. It’ll crack the hell out of your teeth when the gun kicks.”

“The bottom teeth?” Grassley asked. “The sight’s on top.”

“Most of your gun-in-the mouth guys,” she said, “they put it in upside down. What else are they going to do—pull the trigger with their thumbs? So when it kicks, the sight knocks out their bottom teeth.”

Cain stepped back and nodded at the microphone.

“What do you say, Rachel?” he said. “Gut instinct.”

She reached up and turned the microphone off.

“Suicide,” she said. “It’s easy, right? We’ve got gunshot residue on his hands. Powder burns and stippling inside his mouth. The body wasn’t moved, and the door was locked from the inside.”

“Lean down and smell him,” Cain said.

“What?”

“Go on.”

She bent back toward Castelli’s mouth, lowering her paper mask. He watched as she breathed through her nose.