Death at Charity's Point Read Online Free PDF

suicide note. Most commonly, that spells suicide. Logical, eh?”
    I shrugged.
    “We have a saying, Mr. Coyne. We say, ‘the commonest things most commonly happen.’ It’s a guide, understand. We’re not enslaved by it. It’s not like your mystery stories, where what appears to be is dramatically different from what really is, where you need a slick sleuth to uncoil a tangled web of clues.”
    I averted my eyes. This mild gentleman had me properly pegged.
    “We’re not, as I said, enslaved by that principle,” the doctor said, his eyes crinkling as if he had read my mind. “But we do find that, by and large, what seems to be, usually is.”
    “But not always,” I said, perhaps a bit defensively.
    “Of course not. We’d both be out of business, if the commonest things always happened.” He chuckled, and I smiled at his joke.
    “I’m afraid I was hoping that something uncommon happened to George Gresham,” I said.
    He shook his head. “Our findings don’t seem to bear you out.”
    “Can you tell me what you did find?”
    “Oh, yes. I have a report, of course. You’re welcome to read it. But you’ll find it pretty technical, I expect. Here’s what happens. My first task is to try to estimate the time of death, which, as I’m sure you know, is a most inexact science. If you should hear a pathologist claim that he can say with any certainty when someone died—even committing himself to an estimate within a couple of hours—on the basis of examining the body, don’t trust that pathologist. It’s mainly a lot of guesswork. You see, for pathological purposes we define death as the cessation of the heartbeat. Brain death occurs subsequently within minutes. The organs begin to ‘die’ shortly thereafter. As they do, the body ceases to produce heat. Hence, our single most important tool in estimating time of death is the amount of heat loss. So, of course, we take its temperature, both external and internal.”
    He paused for a moment, adjusting some of the papers on his desk. I waited.
    “But there are so many variables. The body does not lose its heat at a regular, predictable rate. It tends to retain its heat for a while—longer or shorter depending on the temperature of the atmosphere. In the desert you might come upon a body with a ‘normal’ temperature that has been dead for hours. In the Arctic, it would lose its heat rapidly, depending on how heavily clothed it was, how much body fat it had, the position of the body, and so forth. Mr. Gresham’s body posed special problems, since it presumably had been immersed in the Atlantic Ocean. Which is pretty cold in April. Suffice it to say that I recorded his temperature, but attributed no particular significance to it.”
    He peered at me. “What about rigor mortis?” I asked.
    He smiled. “We place little faith in rigor these days, partly because it’s difficult to measure, and partly because, as in the case of body temperature, there are so many variables that can intervene. Crudely speaking, complete rigor occurs within the first twelve hours after death, lasts approximately twelve hours, then gradually disappears over the next twelve to twenty-four hours. Rigor begins in the small muscles—mouth, eyelids—and progresses to the larger muscles. Again, crudely, it begins at the head and moves down the body to the legs. Nysten’s Law.” Dr. Clapp shrugged. “Of little practical value. Take Mr. Gresham’s body. Rigor had only begun to occur. The chill of the ocean will inhibit rigor mortis. Conversely, of course, extreme heat will accelerate it.”
    “So you weren’t able to estimate time of death?”
    “I can put a frame on it. You, Mr. Coyne, could do the same.” I frowned, and he allowed himself a chuckle. “On the basis of when he was last seen alive, and when he was found dead, you see. It doesn’t take a forensic pathologist to draw conclusions from those data.”
    “When was he last seen? Alive, I mean.”
    “At the end of