ARC: The Buried Life (9 page)

“Can I quote you on that?”

The nurse finally turned her attention back to Jane. “OK, there’s not much else we can do for her now, except keep an eye on her. I normally wouldn’t allow this, but under the circumstances, I’ll let her go with you as long as you promise to check in on her regularly.”

“On my honor.”

“Every few hours,” she said, shaking a blunt finger at him. “At the first sign of any drowsiness, dizziness, or abnormal behavior, bring her back to us. Understood?”

“Completely.”

“Wonderful.” She whipped hear head around in the direction of a contingent of frantic nurses and hollered, “Open bed in 382! Next one in!” With a long-suffering shake of her head, the nurse retreated down the hall. Jane and Fredrick looked at each other.

“Well, Freddie, at least one of us has some celebrity.”

“I’d settle for not looking like a creep.”

Jane patted his arm. “Don’t take that one to heart.”

The corners of Fredrick’s mouth and eyes twitched up in well-meaning mischief. “Speaking of looks, when are we going to find a nice, non-creepy type for you?”

Jane exhaled in something between a laugh and a sigh. “Careful, or you’ll really make my head hurt.”

“Someone like that nice young inspector. He was rather attractive, wasn’t he?”

A little surprise of a grin tripped over Jane’s lips. “Now that you mention it, he was.”

“Yes. Too bad he’s sleeping with the older one.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“Just because you don’t like it doesn’t mean it’s false.”

“And just because it’s juicy doesn’t mean it’s true.”

#

“All due respect, Malone, but is that your idea of a bedside manner?” Sundar said. Malone looked over at him with the closest thing she had to a casual glance. “You make the killer look friendly by comparison.”

“She’s fine. We needed answers, and we didn’t have time to waste.”

The inspectors were on the surface street above the hospital. Sundar leaned against the smooth marble of a veranda. “We did get answers, anyway. She definitely isn’t hiding anything.”

“No.”

“What do you think about the door, though?”

Malone folded her arms and scanned the streets around them. “Witnesses make mistakes like that all the time.”

“What if the murderer left through that door?”

“He fled to the surface last time. It would have been safest this time, too.”

“Lin said the underground streets were empty.”

“No moon out last night. The Vineyard underground is better lit. Anyway, I think she didn’t shut the door, or at least she didn’t shut it properly.”

“Maybe the killer broke it on the way in.”

Malone shook her head. “Every door, every lock was intact.”

Sundar bit his lip, frowning. “Getting a key to Fitzhugh’s would be even harder than getting a key to Cahill’s.”

“I know.”

The young inspector sucked his teeth. “So, we really are assuming this was the same person. That it wasn’t a coincidence that two prosperous citizens were murdered in their homes in or around the Vineyard without any apparent break-in.”

“I don’t believe in coincidence.”

Sundar nodded. “For someone with a key, he has a conspicuous way of making an exit. Think about the overturned laundry cart.”

“It’s interesting.” Malone spent a few moments in silent thought before shrugging. “A stray dog could have done that.”

“Maybe, but the clothes weren’t torn or dirtied or anything. Just scattered. And quite meticulously, at that.”

“Drunk partygoers, then.”

“You think someone would have seen the open door and walked right past it? Besides, this was in the Vineyard. I don’t get the idea that there are too many hooligans running amok.”

“You’d be surprised at what goes on there.”

Sundar considered it. “Is it possible,” he said, “that whoever attacked Lin left a trail of clothes to the open door on purpose? So that she’d be discovered, I mean.”

Malone began to walk. “You think the killer was looking out for her.”

“He did knock her out,” he said, following.

“The murderer has preyed on two defenseless old men. I don’t see him going out of his way for anyone.”

They walked in silence for several paces, watching the Saturday morning traffic before Malone continued. “Miss Lin’s account doesn’t tell us much about the killer, so we’ll have to look for those answers elsewhere.” She turned to Sundar. “Next steps, Inspector?”

“We can check on the coroner’s report if we return to the station now,” he said. “I don’t know if he’ll have anything definitive, but it’s worth a try.”

“The Chief will also want to know what we found this morning.”

A brisk walk from the hospital and its immaculate, white veranda brought them to the station’s familiar pavilion of impassive grey. A drop down the stairs, a turn from the rotunda into one of the smaller hallways, and a short march to its conclusion brought them to the coroner’s office. Malone knocked and the elderly man let them in, wearing crisp whites and a multicolored smock that had originally been white, too. The coroner’s eyes lighted with recognition on Malone, and he pumped her hand with surprising vigor, the corners of his mouth forming a crinkly smile.

Malone’s own mouth melted into grin. “Good to see you. Dr Brin, this is my new colleague, Inspector Sundar.”

Sundar extended his own hand in greeting. “Nice to meet you.” Stepping forward, he caught a whiff of something pungent. “Wow! I didn’t know that you embalmed specimens in your office, Doctor.”

Brin’s smile dropped. “I don’t.”

Sundar frowned. Malone could tell that he was entering dangerous territory, but the young inspector was oblivious. “Oh. Where’s that formaldehyde coming from, then?”

“Young man, that is not formaldehyde.” Brin turned his back on the pair and marched toward his desk. Before Sundar could press the issue further, Malone elbowed him.
Aftershave
, she mouthed. Now it was his turn to blush.

“Please, Inspectors, have a seat.” Dr. Brin put on his spectacles, two thick wedges of glass connected by a flimsy-looking wire, and lifted a sheet of paper. “I doubt I’m telling you anything new,” he began, “but here’s what I found: Cahill suffered a blow to the head, just below the base of his skull, after which he fell, breaking his neck. Death was instantaneous.”

“With the blow or with the break?” Sundar asked.

Dr Brin did his best to ignore Sundar while answering the question. “With the break. Any surprises here, Inspector Malone?”

“Helpful as always,” she said. “Any way this could have been an accident?”

“Oh no, Inspector Malone,” he said, raising his eyebrows. “This was intentional. The attacker struck with great force and precision.”

“And the attacker? Did you discover anything about him?”

“Nothing conclusive, I’m afraid. Simply that he or she was strong and agile enough to overpower a seventy-year-old man. And right-handed. There were no hair fibers, snatches of clothing, or foreign materials on the corpse or at the scene which could help us identify the attacker.”

“So it was a naked bald guy,” Sundar said.

“That’s all we need, Doctor,” said Malone. “Can you estimate when you’ll complete your examination of the second body?”

Dr Brin’s brow furrowed. “The second body?”

“Lanning Fitzhugh. The victim discovered this morning.”

“Oh, him,” he said, removing his spectacles and polishing them on his oddly-stained smock. “I’m afraid we don’t have it.”

“What do you mean? The City Guard had already removed it from the domicile when we showed up.”

Brin puffed on the lenses. “It was my understanding that they were keeping it for their own examination.”

“And then?”

Dr Brin shrugged. “Cremation. The courier didn’t give me details.”

Sundar blinked. “There must be some mistake, Doctor.”

Brin scowled as he replaced his glasses. “Young man, I may be funny-smelling, but I’m not hard of hearing. The courier said we would not receive the body.”

Malone stepped in. “Has something like this ever happened before?”

“No, but there’s a first time for everything, including a murder chain in the Vineyard. I’ve lived long enough to know that much.”

“I see. Well, thank you for your help.”

“Of course, Inspector Malone. Always a pleasure to work with you.” He gave Sundar a pointed look.

Their first appointment thus concluded, Sundar and Malone continued to their next, where Farrah informed them that the Council had not yet signed the contract. Entering the chief’s domain, the detectives greeted Johanssen and laid out the new facts.

“And the victim?” Johanssen asked. “What do we know about him?”

Sundar stepped forward. “Mr Lanning Fitzhugh was Master Architect of the city, sir. He worked on planning and design in Recoletta for thirty years, and then he took charge of the Bureau of Architecture about a decade ago.”

“What about recent projects?”

“His specialties were sustainability and tunnel excavation. Looking through some of his certificates, it appears that he worked on a good deal of the southeastern districts in his younger days, though he seemed a little less active of late. Then again, he was sixty-two, sir,” Sundar added. He looked to Malone, who nodded and made no further comment.

Johanssen sighed. “I’m going to venture a guess that you think these two murders are related.”

“We do,” said Malone.

“And the motive this time?”

“The same, sir,” she said. “Someone is looking for information.”

Johanssen’s hands came down heavily on the desk. “Do you have anything to support that theory? Beyond the Vineyard connection?” The tone of his voice, not quite agitated, but not far from it, told the inspectors everything they needed to know about his enthusiasm for the idea.

“Well, there are the obvious valuables and money that the assassin passed over,” Sundar said.

Johanssen waved an open hand over his desk. “Any sign of disturbance? Any upturned book stacks or rifled desk drawers?”

“None, sir,” Sundar said.

“Then while I’ll agree that this was no ordinary burglary, how do you know the killer was looking for information? If he had a key,” Johanssen said, a grimace crossing his heavy features, “he could have gotten what he wanted at any time. That these two men are dead suggests something more.”

Malone nodded to Johanssen and pushed her open palm down next to Sundar, signaling him to wait. “That’s why we believe the killer targeted these men based on shared knowledge,” she said. “Since dead men don’t talk, they can’t tell us what it was.”

“Shared knowledge? And how to you figure that? One was a reclusive historian and the other an aristocrat and an architect. They moved in different circles.”

“Not entirely, sir. Lanning Fitzhugh was in Charley Hask’s office at the same time as us,” Sundar said. “At the Directorate of Preservation, where Cahill worked.” Malone inclined her head toward him, recalling their visit.

The chief sighed. “Sundar, you’re new at this, so let me explain something. We maintain a delicate working balance with the Council and its directorates.” He held out two flat palms in demonstration. “Contracts, like everything else in the city, go through the Council because the Council’s in charge. The Council assigns them to us because we’re independent. And they dislike working with us because we’re independent. But they really dislike getting dragged into scandals and rumors, even if only by suggestion. I’m not ready to make our relationship any more difficult based on a hunch.”

“Sir, are you saying that we shouldn’t investigate this contract?” Sundar asked, his brow wrinkled.

“I’m saying that the Council, and, more broadly, the whitenails, don’t like any attention that they don’t direct. So before you get too bold with these theories, I want to make sure you know what you’re talking about.”

“We’re sure it was Fitzhugh, if that’s what you’re worried about. We saw him clearly,” Sundar said. “Dr Hask dismissed him by name when we arrived.”

Johanssen massaged his temples and the skin around his thick, ridged sockets. Malone pursued the advantage. “This murder was cleaner than the last, sir. From Miss Lin’s story, it seems that he possesses a detailed knowledge of the victims’ domiciles… one might even call it ‘familiarity’.”

Johanssen clamped his eyelids shut. “That’s what worries me.”

Only the crackle of the fire and the sound of Johanssen sighing broke the silence of the office, and Malone continued. “When we saw Fitzhugh at the Directorate of Preservation, he had rolls of papers with him – blueprints, maybe.”

“You think the killer took them?”

Malone rested an elbow on Johanssen’s desk. “Impossible to say – we didn’t get a good look at them. But, whatever they were, it tells us that Fitzhugh was visiting Hask for business. And he took papers with him. I don’t think that too many things leave that directorate under Hask’s eye.” Malone paused, watching the chief’s expression as he considered her words. She continued in the same tone.

“After observing the latest scene, I’m convinced that the murderer has copies of the victims’ house keys – we saw no broken locks and no evidence of tampering.”

“Despite the open door,” Sundar added.

Malone’s eyes rolled back to the chief. “This means the murderer has an accomplice among the whitenails – assuming he isn’t one himself.”

This last remark pushed the chief over the edge, as Malone had anticipated. His forearms came down on the desk with a weary thud, but his eyes betrayed the energy of purpose. “Make no mention of this conversation, Inspectors. Continue with this contract. I’ll give you every authorization and reinforcement at my disposal, just keep your heads down.” His eyes rested on each of them briefly. “You may be onto something, but watch where you sling these accusations – those people are almost as sensitive as they are suspicious. I don’t want the city thrown into an uproar over this. We haven’t had a flurry in the upper ranks since the Sato incident,” he said. “And you know what happens when panic breeds from high up.”

Malone nodded. “It floods down, sir. We were hoping to follow up at the Bureau of Architecture, where Fitzhugh worked,” she said. Wordlessly, Johanssen pulled a sheet of paper from a desk drawer and signed a warrant for the detectives.

“Just don’t ruffle any feathers. I expect regular updates on this contract, Inspectors. Consider it trouble if I hear about your exploits from anyone other than yourselves.” This time, his eyes darted to Malone.

“Yes, sir.”

“Dismissed.”

Sundar started out of the office, but Malone paused again. “Sir, do you know anything about Roman Arnault?” she asked.

Johanssen rubbed his hands together thoughtfully. “Moves in the upper circles, foreign-born, comes from money. Eccentric. A loner. Why?”

“Lin overheard a bit of conversation between Arnault and Councilor Hollens. Not enough to tell us anything, sir, but she made it sound interesting.”

Johanssen pondered a moment. “I’ll keep an ear out for any unusual talk in the higher circles, and I’ll let you both know if I find anything. Until then, Malone, close this contract.”

“Sir,” she said, departing with a bow.