The Death Sculptor

Forty-One

Hunter pulled his surgical mask over his nose and mouth and stood to the right of one of the two examination tables inside Special Autopsy Theater One. Garcia was just behind him, arms folded over his chest, shoulders hunched forward as if trying to protect himself from a freezing gust of wind.

As always, the room felt too cold, despite the hot summer’s day outside; too somber, no matter how bright the surgical and ceiling lights were; and too macabre, with its stainless-steel tables and counters, its clinical atmosphere, its honeycomb of human-body freezers, and its soul-chilling display of laser-sharp cutting instruments.

‘There’s no need for the mask, Robert,’ Doctor Hove said, a shadow of a smile playing at the corners of her lips. ‘There’s no risk of contamination and the body doesn’t really smell.’ She paused, considering her words. ‘Maybe just a little bit.’

Though every cadaver inevitably smells due to its natural breakdown of tissues and the explosive growth of bacteria after death; that odor alone never bothered Hunter. Carefully washed prior to the autopsy examination, the body’s smell was usually all but gone.

‘You do realize that your sense of smell is as dead as fried chicken, don’t you, Doc?’ Hunter replied, slipping on a brand new pair of latex gloves.

‘My husband tells me that every time I cook.’ The doctor smiled again and directed both detectives’ attention to the two autopsy tables. Nashorn’s dismembered body occupied one of them, and his severed body parts the other. Doctor Hove approached the table containing the body parts.

‘The official cause of death was heart failure, induced by severe loss of blood. Just like our first victim.’

Hunter and Garcia nodded in silence. The doctor continued.

‘I compared the lacerations to the ones on the first victim. They are consistent. The killer used the same cutting device.’

‘The electric kitchen carving knife?’ Garcia asked.

The doctor nodded. ‘But this time the killer did it a little differently.’

‘How so?’ Hunter asked, moving around to the other side of the table.

‘He took the time to try and properly stop the hemorrhage. The feet amputation carries all the signs of a proper Syme’s ankle disarticulation.’

‘A what?’ Garcia questioned.

‘It’s an ankle amputation procedure named after James Syme,’ Doctor Hove clarified. ‘He was a Clinical Professor of Surgery at the University of Edinburgh in eighteen-something. He developed an ankle-amputation procedure that is still used today. Anyway, the incisions we have here were made clean across the ankle joints. In accordance with the Syme’s ankle-disarticulation guidelines, the arteries were transfixed, and large veins ligated as much as possible, given that the entire procedure was carried out inside a boat cabin without a surgical team. Usually, smaller blood vessels are electrocoagulated during the procedure, but the killer didn’t bother with that. Either because he didn’t have the equipment, or . . .’

‘Because there was no need for it,’ Hunter took over. ‘He knew the victim would die in a matter of hours, maybe minutes. He just didn’t want him to bleed out and die too quickly.’

‘I’d have to agree with that,’ the doctor said. ‘The feet were certainly the first to be amputated. The killer used a compression dressing of fluffs, contoured over the stump and wrapped in place with a bias-cut stockinet. Nicely done.’

‘You mean professionally done?’ Garcia asked.

‘I’d say so, yes. But first, the wounds were covered in cayenne pepper powder.’

‘Cayenne pepper?’ Garcia’s brow furrowed. He thought about it for a second. ‘Jesus!’

Hunter’s memory immediately took him back to the boat and the strange, stinging smell he picked up inside its cabin. He knew he’d smelled it before, but he hadn’t been able to identify it then. ‘The pepper wasn’t used to add to the pain,’ he said, picking up on Garcia’s suspicion, and quickly dismissing it. ‘It was used to stop the bleeding.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘Robert is right,’ Doctor Hove noted. ‘Cayenne pepper has been used as a natural remedy for years. More specifically – a blood clotter.’

Garcia’s focus moved to Nashorn’s severed feet on the metal table. ‘Like coffee powder?’

‘Yes, coffee powder can have a very similar effect,’ the doctor confirmed. ‘Both powders react with the body to equalize blood pressure, meaning an extra gushing of pressure will not be concentrated in the wound area as it normally would be. Blood will quickly clot when the pressure is equalized. It’s an old trick, but it works every time. The bandaging has already been sent up to the lab for analysis.’

‘Did the killer use the same level of care for the subsequent amputations?’ Garcia asked.

Doctor Hove tilted her head to one side and twisted her mouth. ‘Kind of. Arteries and large veins in the arms were also ligated, using a thick thread, but as you’ll remember, there was no dressing of the wounds. And unlike the feet amputations, cayenne pepper was never used to try and contain the hemorrhage. But what was done would certainly prevent the victim from bleeding out too quickly.’

‘We obviously have no toxicology results yet, right?’ Hunter said.

‘Not yet,’ the doctor confirmed. ‘In a day or two. My guess is that we’ll get the same result for the heart-rate regulating drugs the killer used on his first victim.’

Hunter had the same feeling, but he noticed something else in Doctor Hove’s demeanor. Something seemed to be troubling her. ‘Is there something else?’ he chanced.

Doctor Hove took a deep breath and tucked her hands inside the large pockets on her long white overcoat. ‘You know I’ve been a pathologist for many years, Robert. And when you are a pathologist in a city like LA, you get to see pretty much the worst human beings have to offer, almost on a day-to-day basis. But I’ll tell you now, if there’s such a thing as pure evil, or a real demon walking amongst us, then this killer is it. And it wouldn’t surprise me if, when you catch this guy, you find he’s got devil horns on his head.’

Those words stopped Hunter and Garcia dead in their tracks, the image of the shadow figure cast by the sculpture found in the boat cabin coming back to them like a recurring nightmare.

‘Wait.’ Garcia lifted his hand before exchanging a quick, unsettling glance with Hunter. ‘Why do you say that, Doc?’

The doctor turned around. ‘Let me show you why.’