Capitol Reflections Read Online Free PDF

some early ulceration, but nothing advanced. I’m guessing the obvious: high stress and poor diet, on top of an h. pylori infection. Workaholic?”
    Gwen sighed and looked vacantly at the far wall as she answered.
    “That would be an understatement, though she was supremely confident and not given to worrying. Successful lawyer with an aversion to exercise. Virtually no social life.” The last statement caused Gwen to jerk her head back and look quizzically at her former colleague.
    “Any—”
    “Nah,” the medical examiner said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “No semen on the vaginal swab.”
    “Alcohol or drugs?” Gwen knew that Marci, consummate professional that she was, would not have taken a drink while working, not even at a power lunch with other legal gurus, and she had never known Marci to indulge in any kind of drug other than a little marijuana as an underclassman. She nevertheless had to ask these fundamental questions—not only for her own peace of mind, but for that of the Newmans, with whom she’d be speaking at greater length after the funeral. They would want answers. Marci had been an only child, and Lawrence Newman, a retired lawyer of considerable reputation in mergers and acquisitions, reveled in his daughter’s accomplishments.
    “Blood and urine were clean,” Dardenoff replied. “Compared to other young, attractive women who come through here, your friend was a veritable Girl Scout. Any history of anorexia?”
    “None at all. She was a picky eater, but she never starved herself.”
    Gwen sighed and sat down in a plastic chair, frustrated. Dardenoff eased his large frame into a matching chair across the table. “What did you find?” she asked. “Anything at all?”
    “Here,” Dardenoff said, taking a tube of unmarked blood from his floppy green shirt pocket and handing it to Gwen. “Spin it down and you’ll find the same things I did. There were trace amounts of aspirin and caffeine, plus the usual chemicals one sees in a smoker—nicotine, nitrosamines, cyanide, urethane, acetone, formaldehyde, butane, various metals—”
    Gwen held up her hand as she took the vial of blood and slipped it into her purse. “I know the list, Dave, although I didn’t know Marci still smoked. I thought she gave it up years ago.”
    Dardenoff folded hairy arms across his muscular chest. “Goes with the territory, Gwen. Stress, poor diet, heavy workload … ” He shrugged, as if the conclusion were a no-brainer. “And the cigarettes; I see it every day.”
    “What did her lungs look like?”
    “Pretty clean, actually. She couldn’t have been smoking for too long. As for the brain, kidneys—”
    “Just send the report to my office in Rockville,” Gwen said, holding up her hand a second time. She didn’t want to hear any of the gorier details that would conjure up autopsy procedures in her mind. She would indeed look at the full report, but only after a few days had passed and she’d had time to say good-bye to Marci in her own way, and then again, properly, at the funeral.
    “You wanted all this on the q.t., right?”
    “Yeah,” Gwen replied, feeling horribly fatigued. She knew it wasn’t because of her lack of sleep. “Send it to my attention and add ‘eyes only.’ You kept all this out of your office’s files, right?”
    “I’m afraid that’s not so easy to do, at least not completely. I can’t pretend the body wasn’t here, but I entered your friend’s name, time of death, and a few other rudimentary details into the database, and then cross-referenced the computer’s basic autopsy template, which would usually list chapter and verse for the whole procedure, with a Jane Doe brought in last week. The file shouldn’t raise any eyebrows, but if anyone gets curious—highly doubtful—it’ll look like nothing more than a computer glitch. As for any paperwork, I’ve accidentally on purpose sent the hard copy to Syracuse. Just another minor screw up. Happens all the