Color of Blood(13)

“Quite unusual, you’ll agree,” said Stanley Lynch, the medical examiner. “One bloody powerful round. Now follow me.”

Lynch, the legendary State medical examiner, took Judy and her partner, Daniel, into the dimly lit hallway of the old house.

“Here,” Lynch said, pointing the thin beam of light from his signature stainless-steel pen light.

Judy could see another hole, this one slightly larger than the entrance hole on the other side of the wall.

“My dear Judy,” Lynch said with relish, “we are far from done. Look here.” He turned around and positioned the light beam onto yet another hole, about the same size, directly across from the bullet hole they had just viewed.

“Come,” Lynch commanded. Judy and Daniel walked down the hall and followed the examiner as he entered a shoddy bedroom. Clothes were strewn on the floor, a laminate dresser was piled high with soiled socks and shirts, an armoire on the opposite wall had both doors open showing clothes hanging off hangers.

“Here,” Lynch said, pointing the pen light beam at another hole, this one at chest level. This hole was perhaps slightly larger than the entrance hole in the hallway. Walking around the bed with the histrionic flourish that was Lynch’s hallmark, the aging examiner pointed his light at a larger hole on the far wall of the bedroom.

“I’ll save you from walking outside,” he said, holding up a distorted piece of brownish-reddish metal in a plastic bag. “The round continued through the wall and finished its trajectory, quite exhausted, mind you, in the wall of the old outhouse out back. Quite extraordinary. Never seen a weapon do this before. Never, Judy. Ever.”

Judy looked at Daniel; they were both a little perplexed because Lynch was so rarely surprised by anything he saw at a crime scene. The sixty-eight-year-old examiner was beyond retirement age but had been kept on because of his irreplaceable knowledge of scenes of mayhem. He was, of course, quite taken with himself and loved to speak in dramatic flourishes, but investigators were happy to look beyond that to get at the nuances he brought to the business of explaining the mechanics of how humans kill each other.

Lynch retraced his steps out of the bedroom, down the hallway and back into the living room. When Judy and Daniel caught up with him, he clicked the pen light illuminating the opaque plastic sheet on the floor that covered the body of a young man.

“The round was fired from just inside the front door,” he said, shining the penlight onto the closed front door, “went through our young friend here, then through the living room wall here.” He focused the beam onto the original hole in the wall. “It went through the hallway, through the bedroom front wall, through the outer wall and continued to the charming little outhouse and lodged in an outer wall beam there. If the outhouse had not the good fortune of having supporting wood beams made of the finest West Australian jarrah, the round would undoubtedly have entered the street beyond, perhaps causing more mayhem.”

“Why would anyone use such a powerful weapon in close quarters?” Daniel asked.

“That is an excellent question,” Lynch said. “The weapon is undoubtedly some kind of assault rifle we have never seen before. The shooter must have known of the weapon’s prowess.”

“But Mr. Lynch,” Judy said slowly, “if the shooter were going to kill this man, he could have used any number of weapons to do so, with far less danger of hitting neighbors walking dogs or children playing in a yard. I don’t see why the shooter would risk so much collateral damage—”

“Unless,” Lynch interrupted, “there was someone else here to see the effect of this weapon.”

“Ah, of course,” Judy said, nodding.

“Of course, what?” Daniel said.

“I think we can assume that the killing was partly show,” Judy said. “Our friend here must have had guests who witnessed what happened. They’d certainly be aware of how preposterously dangerous the weapon was. It was a message, wouldn’t you say, Mr. Lynch?”

“That would be my reasoned judgment,” he said.

“Do we know who the deceased is?” Judy asked.

“Ethnic Chinese. There’s no identification.”

“Let’s see his face,” Daniel said.

Lynch pulled back the opaque plastic sheet.

“Hell,” Judy said.

Lynch and Daniel looked at her.

“I know that man,” Judy said. “Daniel, we arrested him two months ago in Fremantle. Don’t you remember?”

“You arrested him, Jude,” Daniel said. “Remember, I was on the other side of the warehouse when they came running out.”

“Yes, well, I arrested him then,” she said. “Felt sorry for the poor fellow. He had a terrible limp: ran him down without much trouble.”

“What was he arrested for?” Lynch asked.

“He was caught with a group of men who were stealing cars and shipping them to China,” Daniel said. “Don’t know what this one was doing out.”

“His lawyer got him out,” Judy said. “Remember? It was my ex, Phillip. I got pulled from the case.”

“Right,” Daniel said, nodding. “I remember now. Well, I hope Phillip got paid.”

Lynch and Daniel looked at Judy, then back at the dead man on the floor.

“Who owns the house?” Judy asked.