Grave Secrets (13 page)

We were in the car, heading toward the ambassador’s residence.

“But he is right.” I made a print on the dashboard with my index finger, wiped it away with the heel of my hand. “We don’t know dick about that skeleton.”

“We will.”

I made another print.

“Think Lucy was as compliant as her father believes?”

Galiano turned one palm up and raised shoulders and eyebrows, a very French gesture for a Guatemalan cop.

“Who knows? Experience tells us they almost never are.”

Two more prints. Trees flashed by outside the window. Several turns, then we pulled onto a street of large homes set far back on spacious and professionally tended lots. In most cases, the only thing visible was a tile roof.

“Gerardi may have been right about one thing, though.”

“What’s that?” I asked.

“Chantale Specter.”

The ambassador and his family lived behind hedges identical to those surrounding the Gerardi place. They also lived behind an electrified fence with enormous scrolled wrought-iron gates and a matched set of uniformed guards.

Galiano angled onto the drive and held his badge to the window for guard number one. The man leaned close, then stepped to a control booth. Seconds later the gates swung in.

We made a wide sweep to the front of the house, where guard number two examined ID. Satisfied, he rang. The door opened, and the guard handed us off to a house servant.

“Mrs. Specter is expecting you.” The man looked at us without looking at us. “Please follow me.”

The setting was a repeat of the Gerardi home. Paneled study, expensive tile, furniture, and objets d’art. This time the carpet was Bakhtiari.

The encounter couldn’t have been more different.

Mrs. Specter’s hair was copper, her lips and nails Chinese red. She wore a three-piece silk pants suit the color of sunflower petals, and matching strap sandals on her feet. The filmy material flowed around her as she crossed to greet us. So did a cloud of Issey Miyaki.

“Detective Galiano, it’s always a pleasure to see you.” French accent. “Though I’d rather it were under different circumstances, of course.”

“How are you today, Mrs. Specter?” Her fingers looked ghostly enveloped in Galiano’s brown hand.

“I’m well.” She turned her smile on me. A practiced smile. “Is this the young woman of whom you spoke?”

“Tempe Brennan,” I introduced myself.

The Chinese-red nails shot out. Her skin was so soft, her bones so delicate, it felt like shaking the hand of a child.

“Thank you so much for making yourself available to the local authorities. This means a great deal to my husband and me.”

“I hope I can help.”

“Please, forgive my beastly manners.” She placed one hand on her chest, gestured with the other. “Please. Let’s sit down.”

She led us to a conversational grouping tucked into a bay on the right of the room. Each window was covered by three-inch wooden shutters, slats closed to the morning sun.

“Would you like tea or coffee?” She looked from Galiano to me.

We both declined.

“So, Detective. Please tell me that you have good news.”

“I’m afraid not.” Galiano’s voice was gentle.

All color drained from her face. The smile quivered, but held.

“But no bad news,” he added quickly. “I just wanted to touch base, check a few facts, and see if anything has occurred to you since our last conversation.”

She dropped the chest hand to the armrest, allowed her spine to curve into the chair back.

“I’ve tried, really I have, but other than what I’ve told you, I’ve come up blank.”

Despite her best efforts, the smile collapsed. She began pulling at one of several loose threads in the upholstery by her knee.

“I lie awake nights going over and over the past year. I—it’s difficult to say this. But I obviously missed a lot that was happening in front of me.”

“Chantale was riding out a rough patch.” His tone was a galaxy from where it had been with Gerardi. “As you’ve said, she was being less than open with you and your husband.”

“I should have been more observant. More perceptive.”

Her face looked dead white within its halo of orange hair. One lacquered nail worked the threads, as though commanded by an independent source.

My heart ached for her, and I groped for comforting words.

“Don’t blame yourself, Mrs. Specter. None of us can entirely control our children.”

Her eyes shifted from Galiano to me. Even in the dim light I could see they were the brilliant green of colored contacts.

“Do you have children, Dr. Brennan?”

“My daughter is a university student. I know how difficult teenagers can be.”

“Yes.”

“Could we go back over a few things, Mrs. Specter?” Galiano.

“If it will help.”

He produced a notebook and began clarifying names and dates. Throughout the exchange, Mrs. Specter unconsciously worried the threads, alternating between twisting and smoothing. Now and then a nail would flick the fabric, sending filaments hurtling into space.

“Chantale’s first arrest was one year ago this past November.”

“Yes.” Flat.

“The Hotel Santa Lucía in Zone One.”

“Yes.”

“Her second arrest was last July.”

“Yes.”

“The Hotel Bella Vista.”

“Yes.”

“Chantale was in Canada from August until December of last year for treatment of drug dependence.”

“Where?”

“A rehab center near Chibougamau.”

Watching the downward drift of a liberated fiber, I felt a sudden jolt of neural electricity. I looked at Galiano. He gave no indication he’d noticed.

“That’s in Quebec?”

“It’s a camp, really, several hundred miles north of Montreal.”

I’d once flown to Chibougamau for an exhumation. The region was so heavily forested the view from the plane had reminded me of broccoli.

“The program teaches young people to assume personal responsibility for their drug abuse. The encounters can be harsh, but my husband and I decided the ‘tough love’ approach was best.” She gave a wan version of the diplomat’s smile. “The remote location ensures that participants complete the entire course of therapy.”

Galiano’s questioning continued for several minutes. I focused on the red nails, verifying. Finally, “Do you have any questions for me, Mrs. Specter?”

“What do you know of these bones that were found?”

Galiano showed no surprise at her knowledge of the Paraíso skeleton. Undoubtedly, her husband’s connections kept them well informed.

“I was about to mention that, but there’s little to report until Dr. Brennan finishes her analysis.”

“Can you tell me anything?” Her gaze shifted to me.

I hesitated, not wanting to comment on the basis of photos and a cursory tank-side inspection.

“Anything?”
Pleading.

My mother’s heart battled with my scientist’s brain. What if Katy were missing instead of Chantale? What if I were the one twisting threads on a tapestry chair?

“I doubt the skeleton is your daughter.”

“Why is that?” The voice was calm, but the fingers were moving toward Mach 1.

“I suspect the individual is non-Caucasian.”

She stared at me, thought working behind the electric-green eyes.

“Guatemalan?”

“Probably. But until I’ve completed my examination, that’s little more than an impression.”

“When will that be?”

I looked to Galiano.

“We’ve run into a jurisdictional hitch,” he said.

“Which is?”

Galiano told her about Díaz.

“Why has the judge done this?”

“That’s unclear.”

“I will explain the situation to my husband.”

She turned back to me.

“You are a kind woman, Dr. Brennan. I can tell by your face.
Merci.
”

She smiled, the ambassador’s wife once again.

“You’re sure I can’t get either of you a drink? Lemonade, perhaps?”

Galiano declined.

“May I trouble you for a little water?”

“Of course.”

When she’d gone I bolted for the desk, tore a strip of adhesive tape from the dispenser, raced back to Mrs. Specter’s chair, and pressed the sticky side to the upholstery. Galiano watched without comment.

Mrs. Specter rejoined us carrying a crystal glass filled with ice water, a lemon slice stuck onto the rim. As I drank, she spoke to Galiano.

“I’m sorry I have nothing else for you, Detective. I am trying. Truly, I am.”

In the foyer, she surprised me with a request.

“Have you a card, Dr. Brennan?”

I dug one out.

“Thank you.” She waved off a servant who was bearing down.

“Can you be reached locally?”

Surprised, I scribbled the number of my rented cellular.

“Please, please, Detective. Find my baby.”

The heavy oak door clicked shut at our backs.

Galiano didn’t speak until we were in the car.

“What’s with the upholstery-cleaning routine?”

“Did you see her chair?”

He fastened his seat belt and started the engine.

“Aubusson. Pricey.”

I held up the tape. “That Aubusson has a fur coat.” He turned to me, hand on the key.

“The Specters reported no pets.”

I SPENT THE REST OF SUNDAY EXAMINING SKELETONS FROM

Carlos’s body had been released. His brother had flown in to accompany it to Buenos Aires for burial. Mateo was arranging a memorial service in Guatemala City.

Elena had been to the hospital on Friday. Molly remained comatose. The police had no leads.

That was it.

They also gave me news from Chupan Ya. Thursday night, Señora Ch’i’p’s son had become a grandfather for the fourth time. The old lady now had seven great-grandchildren. I hoped those new lives would bring joy into hers.

The lab was weekend quiet. No chatter. No radios. No microwave whirs and beeps.

No Ollie Nordstern pressing for a quote.

Nevertheless, I found it hard to concentrate. My feelings were like wheels inside wheels inside wheels. Loneliness for home, for Katy, for Ryan. Sadness for the dead lying in boxes around me. Worry for Molly. Guilt for my lack of backbone at the Paraíso.The guilt prevailed. Vowing to do more for the Chupan Ya victims than I had for the girl in the septic tank, I worked long after Elena and Mateo called it quits.

Burial fourteen was a female in her late teens, with multiple fractures of the jaw and right arm, and machete slashes to the back of the head. The mutants who had done this liked working up close and personal.

As I examined the delicate bones my thoughts swung again and again to the Paraíso victim. Two young women killed decades apart. Does anything ever change? My sadness felt like a palpable thing.

Burial fifteen was a five-year-old child. Tell me again about turning the other cheek.

Galiano called in the late afternoon. Hernández had learned little from the parents of Patricia Eduardo and Claudia de la Alda. Señora Eduardo’s one recollection was that her daughter disliked a supervisor at the hospital, and Patricia and the supervisor had argued shortly before Patricia disappeared. She couldn’t recall the person’s name, gender, or position.

Señor De la Alda thought his daughter had begun losing weight shortly before she went missing. Señora De la Alda disagreed. The museum had called to inform them that they could no longer hold Claudia’s position for her. They would be hiring a permanent replacement.

By Monday I’d moved on to burial sixteen, a pubescent girl with second molars in eruption. I estimated her height at three foot nine. She’d been shot and decapitated by a machete blow.

At noon I drove to police headquarters and Galiano and I proceeded to the trace evidence section of the forensic lab. We entered to find a small, balding man hunched over a dissecting scope. When Galiano called out, the man swiveled to face us, hooking gold-rimmed glasses behind chimpanzee ears.

The chimp introduced himself as Fredi Minos, one of two specialists in hair and fiber analysis. Minos had been provided samples from the septic tank jeans, from the Gerardi and Eduardo homes, and from Mrs. Specter’s chair.

“It’s wookie, right?” Galiano.

Minos looked puzzled.

“Chewbacca?”

No glint.

“
Star Wars
?”

“Oh yes. The American movie.”

In Minos’s defense, the joke sounded lame in Spanish.

“Never mind. What did you come up with?”

“Your unknown sample is cat hair.”

“How can you be sure?”

“That it’s hair, or that it’s cat?”

“That it’s cat,” I jumped in, seeing Galiano’s expression.

Minos rolled his chair to the right, and selected a slide case from a stack on the counter. Then he rolled back to the scope and slipped one specimen under the eyepiece. After adjusting focus, he got up, and indicated that I should sit.

“Take a look.”

I glanced at Galiano. He waved me into the chair.

“Would you prefer that I speak English?” Minos asked.

“If you don’t mind.” I felt like a dunce, but my Spanish was shaky, and I wanted to fully understand his explanation.

“What do you see?”

“It looks like a wire with a pointed end.”

“You’re looking at an uncut hair. It is one of twenty-seven included in the sample marked ‘Paraíso.’”

Minos’s English had an odd up-and-down cadence, like a calliope.

“Notice that the hair has no distinctive shape.”

“Distinctive?”

“With some species shape is a good identifier. Horse hair is coarse, with a sharp bend near the root. Deer hair is crinkly, with a very narrow root. Very distinctive. The Paraíso hairs are nothing like that.” He readjusted his glasses. “Now check the pigment distribution. See anything distinctive?”

Minos was fond of the word
distinctive.

“Seems pretty homogenous,” I said.

“It is. May I?”

Withdrawing the slide, he moved to an optical scope, inserted it, and adjusted the focus. I rolled my chair down the counter and peered through the eyepiece. The hair now looked like a thick pipe with a narrow core.