The Death Sculptor

Five

Doctor Hove pulled down her surgical mask and faced Garcia. ‘He doesn’t know?’

Hunter’s eyebrows arched.

Garcia unzipped his coverall and reached inside his pocket for his notebook once again. ‘Let me talk you through what we know, but for you to fully understand it, I have to take you back to yesterday afternoon.’

‘OK.’ Hunter was intrigued.

Garcia read on. ‘Mr. Nicholson’s oldest daughter, Olivia, came by at around 5:00 p.m. Her younger sister, Allison, arrived half an hour after her. They had dinner with their father and kept him company until about 9:00 p.m., when they both left. After that, Melinda, the nurse, helped Mr. Nicholson into the bathroom, and then tucked him into bed, as she had done every weekend night. It took him about thirty minutes to fall asleep. She never left his side.’ Garcia indicated the chair on the other side of the bed. ‘She sat over there. She had some of her study books with her.’ He flipped a page on his notebook. ‘Melinda then turned off the lights, emptied the dishwasher downstairs, and at around 11:00 p.m. retired to her room in the guesthouse.’

Hunter nodded and his attention reverted back to the wall.

‘I’m getting there,’ Garcia said. ‘Melinda remembers locking all the doors, including the backdoor in the kitchen, but she can’t say the same about the windows. When I got here earlier this morning, two of the ones downstairs were unlocked, the one in the study and the one in the kitchen. LAPD First Response said they didn’t touch anything.’

‘So chances are they were open all night,’ Hunter said.

‘Most probably, yes.’

Hunter glanced over at the sliding glass balcony doors.

‘Those were left ajar,’ Garcia explained. ‘Apparently this room can get a little stuffy, especially during summer. Mr. Nicholson didn’t like air conditioning. The balcony overlooks the backyard and the swimming pool. The problem is, the entire wall outside is covered in Morning Glories – as you probably know, the most-common climbing plant in California. The wooden trellis that supports it is strong enough for a person to climb it. Gaining access into this room from the backyard wouldn’t be difficult.’

‘Forensics will be going over the backyard and balcony as soon as they are done with the house’s interior,’ Doctor Hove added.

‘At around midnight,’ Garcia continued, still reading from his notebook, ‘Melinda realized she’d forgotten one of her study books here in the room. She came back to the house, opened the front door and made her way up the stairs.’ Garcia guessed Hunter’s next couple of questions and offered an answer before he spoke. ‘Yes, the front door was locked. She remembers using the key to unlock it. And no, she didn’t notice anything strange when she came back into the house. No noises either.’

Hunter nodded.

‘Melinda came upstairs again,’ Garcia moved on, ‘and because she didn’t want to disturb Mr. Nicholson, and she knew exactly where she’d left her study book . . .’ He pointed to the mahogany writing desk pushed up against the wall . . . ‘on that desk, she never turned on the lights. She just tiptoed into the room, grabbed her book, and tiptoed back out again.’

Hunter’s stare moved back to the bloody wall next to the bed and his heart skipped a beat as Garcia’s account of what had happened finally started to make sense.

‘Melinda slept through her alarm this morning,’ Garcia carried on. ‘She got up, got ready as fast as she could, and rushed back in here. She said she opened the front door at 8:43 a.m. She checked her watch.’ Garcia closed his notebook and returned it to his pocket. ‘She came straight upstairs, and as she entered the room she was greeted not only by what you see here, but also by that message from whoever was in the room.’ He indicated the wall again.

Among all the splatters, written in large blood letters were the words ‘GOOD JOB YOU DIDN’T TURN ON THE LIGHTS’.