Cross Bones Read Online Free PDF Page B

you stil have it?”

    “Yes.”

    “How long wil you be in Montreal?”

    “I’m leaving for a quick trip to the States on Saturday, but—”

    “If I divert to Montreal tomorrow, can you show me the original?”

    “Yes. Jake—”

    “I’ve got to phone the airlines.” His voice was so taut it could have moored theQueen Mary. “In the meantime, hide that print.”

    I was listening to a dial tone.

    4

    ISTARED AT THE PHONE.

    What could be so important that Jake would change plans he’d been making for months?

    I centered Kessler’s photo on my blotter.

    If I was right about the paintbrush, the body was oriented north–south with the head facing east. The wrists were crossed on the bel y. The legs were ful y extended.

    Except for some displacement of the pelvic and foot bones, everything looked anatomical y correct.

    Too correct.

    A patel a sat perfectly positioned at the end of each femur. No way kneecaps stay in place that wel .

    Something else was off.

    The right fibula was on the inside of the right tibia. It should have been on the outside.

    Conclusion: the scene had been doctored.

    Had an archaeologist tidied the bones for a pic, or did the repositioning reflect some meaning?

    I carried the photo to the scope, lowered the power, and positioned the fiber-optic light.

    The soil around the bones was marked with footprints. Under magnification, I could make out at least two sole patterns.

    Conclusion: more than one person had been present.

    I took a shot at gender.

    The skul ’s orbital ridges were large, the jaw square. Only the right half of the pelvis was visible, but the sciatic notch looked narrow and deep.

    Conclusion: the individual was male, more probably than not.

    I shifted to age.

    The upper dentition looked relatively complete. The lower dentition had gaps and teeth in poor alignment. The right pubic symphysis, one of the surfaces at which the pelvic halves meet in front, was tipped toward the lens. Though the photo was grainy, the symphyseal face looked smooth and flat.

    Conclusion: the individual was a young to middle-aged adult. Possibly.

    Terrific, Brennan. A grown-up dead guy with bad teeth and rearranged bones. Possibly.

    “Now we’re getting somewhere,” I mimicked Ryan.

    The clock said one-forty. I was starving.

    Removing my lab coat, I clicked off the fiber-optic light and washed up. At the door, I hesitated.

    Returning to the scope, I col ected the photo and slid it under an agenda in my desk drawer.

    By three I was no clearer on the Ferris fragments than I’d been at noon. If anything, I was more frustrated.

    People can reach only so far. They shoot themselves in the forehead, the temple, the mouth, the chest. They do not shoot themselves in the spine or the back of the head. It’s too hard to position a barrel there and keep a finger or toe on the trigger. So bul et path can often be used to distinguish suicide from homicide.

    Blasting through bone, a bul et dislodges smal particles from the perimeter of the hole it creates, beveling an entrance wound internal y, and an exit wound external y.

    Bul et in. Bul et out. Trajectory. Manner of death.

    So what was the problem? Did Avram Ferris put a gun to his own head, or did someone else do the honors?

    The problem was that the affected parts of Ferris’s skul looked like puzzle pieces dumped from a box. To consider beveling, I’d first have to determine what went where.

    Hours of jigsawing had al owed me to identify one oval defect behind Ferris’s right ear, near the junction of the parietal, occipital, and temporal sutures.

    Within Ferris’s reach? A stretch, but you betcha.

    Another problem. The hole was beveled on both its endocranial and ectocranial surfaces.

    Forget beveling. I was going to have to rely on fracture sequencing.

    A skul is designed to house a brain and a very smal quantity of fluid. That’s it. No room for guests.

    A bul et to the head sets up a series of events, each of