The Art of Death (23 page)
Authors: Margarite St. John
Bones
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
Chester Appledorn’s burn pit turned out to be at the far end of the pine grove on land leased by Jeremy Massart. He readily gave the authorities permission to dig. He’d been meaning to dig it out but hadn’t gotten around to it.
And dig they did. Two days’ work, no more than four feet down, was all that was needed to uncover a human skeleton, pretty much intact except for the head, which was missing and -- as the authorities discovered -- stayed missing. The skeleton was found wrapped in a rubber tarp. The authorities then erected a makeshift blue tent around the site and carefully removed the tarp-wrapped skeleton to a long box.
They kept digging. More bones were uncovered, including miscellaneous small bones thought to be from animals. And then about six feet down two human femurs, part of a rib cage, and some other smaller bones, all having the appearance of fragments from an incomplete cremation. A crushed and burned 55-gallon drum, a keychain with a couple of keys, a belt buckle, some coins, and a bullet casing were found near the odd collection of bones.
“How tall was Dan Belden?” Dave asked Jeremy. They were standing under the blue canopy near a long wooden box where the skeleton had been placed, ready for transportation to the Coroner.
“About my height. I’m 6’ 2”.”
“I’m no anthropologist, but this first skeleton doesn’t belong to a tall man.”
“How do you know it’s a man?”
“Good point. I don’t.”
Dave turned to a technician from the Coroner’s office. She introduced herself as Andrea Waters. A woman of thirty-five or so, she was wearing a white haz-mat suit, rubber gloves, safety glasses, and a dust mask. “How long will it take to identify this?” Dave asked.
She pulled her mask off. “Weeks,” she said. “But I can tell you a few things right now.”
“You can?”
“Unfortunately there’s no skull. If there were I could probably tell the age from the sagittal and coronal sutures. The teeth might lead us to dental records. As it is we have only the hyoid bone. It’s intact, so the person wasn’t strangled or garroted.”
Andrea moved further down the body. “You can see that the pelvis is deep and narrow, not fit for carrying babies, so it’s a man.” She stuck her finger in a notch of fan-shaped pelvis bone. “Tight fit, no wiggle room, so, yup, it’s definitely a man. The pelvic bones are very pitted, so the man was old when he died. And you’ll notice, one hip joint was replaced.”
“How old?” Dave asked.
She squinted at the pelvis. “Craggy edges, very pitted. I’d say really old but, sorry, I can’t be more specific now.”
“What else can you tell me?”
Andrea ran her index finger down one arm without quite touching it. “Take a look at this. The bony ridge on the wrist means he did strenuous manual labor with his hands. Lots of repetitious movements requiring strength. And the break in the left arm healed long ago. Maybe we can find a medical record of that break, as well as the hip replacement. From the debris on the tarp, an entomologist might be able to tell when this poor guy bit the dust.”
“Can you tell the height of this guy?”
“Only roughly. Don’t quote me, but I’d guess under six feet.”
“What about the rib cage and femur over there?” Dave asked, pointing to a much smaller box.
“Those pieces don’t belong to the skeleton we just looked at. Those femurs are the long bones of the thigh and, just eyeballing them, I’d say they belonged to a tall person.” She walked over to the box and picked up one of the long bones. “Here, let me show you how long this bone is compared to the femur of the skeleton.” She held the stray femur next to the skeleton’s femur. “Quite a difference, wouldn’t you say? Don’t quote me, but I’d guess this person who is missing most of his skeleton was over six feet. The femoral head is 47.5 mm, so it probably belonged to a man. But without testing it I can’t tell you more about age or race. Several ribs are broken and I understand you found a bullet casing nearby. He was probably shot.”
“Any other thoughts?”
“Just the obvious,” Andrea said. “The person who was incompetently cremated -- the one who once had that long femur and the rib cage -- was buried before the skeleton-guy, so he died first. For so many big bone fragments to be left, I’d say the cremation wasn’t professional -- not enough heat.
“The skeleton-guy wasn’t burned at all, and from the nails I think he was buried within the last two or three years. Because this skeleton is what we call dry remains, I’d guess that the body was exposed to the elements for quite awhile before it was buried.”
“Where could it be exposed to the elements without wild animals tearing it apart?” Dave mused aloud.
“How about that tomb with the wrought iron gates at each end?” Jeremy asked.
“Yeah,” Dougie spoke up. “With the gates closed, who would notice?”
“But you’re out here all the time. You would have seen it.”
“I only started working out here about six months ago, and besides I didn’t go near the tomb or the cemetery because I was told not to.”
“Also,” Andrea concluded, “there are no signs in the bones that the skeleton-guy was shot or stabbed or beaten to death. Maybe a natural death.”
Walter took Dave aside. “Wanna bet the femurs are Dan’s? The timing is uncanny. He goes missing April 18. The next day Archie is given an urn to weld shut and then has to bring it out here, without delay, to cement it into place in the mausoleum.”
“The keys and belt buckle might tell us something. You have an idea about the skeleton?”
“Nothing specific. I’m thinking, though, you might want to know who else got on the wrong side of the Appledorns.”
When the skeleton of the old guy and the odd bones of the tall guy were shipped off to the Coroner, Dave called a technician at the station and told him to start reviewing missing persons reports, concentrating on men, for the last seven years.
“Don’t hang up,” the tech said. “I was about to call you anyway. There’s a woman waiting here to talk to you. She’s got something in a paper bag she thinks you might want to see.”
“Who is it?”
“Mrs. Alice Ruiter. She won’t leave the bag with us until she talks to you personally. Won’t talk to anybody else. From the things she says with a little cackle, I think she’s sweet on you. Know what I mean?”
Dave couldn’t help a little smile. “Is her dog with her?”
“Yappy little fur ball, name of Puffy. A cockapoop. How did you know?”
“You mean cockapoo.”
“No, boss. I mean cockapoop.” He made a gagging sound.
Missing Piece
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
“Well, I’m here,” Mrs. Ruiter announced when she spotted Detective Powers. “I hope you’ll give me the tour. Puffy wants one too. I promise, she won’t piddle on anything. Not like a boy dog lifting its leg on everything. Girl dogs are usually pretty polite that way, although I’m so sorry she had a little accident. That nice young man over there cleaned it up.” She waggled her fingers at the nice young man; he pretended not to notice. “Anyway, even though I haven’t seen much yet, it’s a fascinating place. Good people watching. I must say, you’re the handsomest man I’ve seen so far. I’ve been watching. Not flirting or anything, way too old for that, just telling the truth. Long past my flirting days. How are you, Detective? Gosh, I like saying that word. I’ve told everybody I know a detective. Old hat to you, a course, but not to me.”
Dave didn’t have to say a thing in greeting. Mrs. Ruiter had that rare condition wherein the brain is cabled directly to the mouth.
The flood of words continued, but finally, when seated beside Dave’s desk, Mrs. Ruiter got to the subject at hand. She opened a paper bag, removed an item, and laid it on Dave’s desk. “Puffy dragged this to the house. I don’t know where the thing originally was, somewhere on my property, but I didn’t see her when she found it. She’s bitten it pretty hard, left some teeth marks, you know how dogs do, nothing I could do about that. I was going to play tug a war with her when she dragged it onto the veranda but when I saw what it was, I tricked her with a treat into letting go and then I realized it might be something you needed to see. Don’t know if it means anything or not, but I remember that day you were out at my place talking about that strange man walking out of the cemetery and . . . well, I don’t know . . . .”
“What day did Puffy find this?”
“What’s this, Tuesday -- ?”
“No, Wednesday.”
“Sunday, I think. Yes, I’m pretty sure, it was Sunday when she found it. I had an appointment with my eye doctor Monday -- you know, my cataracts -- and Tuesday I had to drive my older sister to the grocery store -- why she won’t live with me, I don’t know, it would make things so much easier -- so I couldn’t bring it in then. It was so chewed up and icky I left it out on the veranda instead a taking it into the house. But today . . . .”
“Today you had time to bring it in and I appreciate that. It’s rained almost every day since Sunday, so this has been subjected to the elements plus Puffy’s had her way with it, so the owner’s fingerprints are unlikely to be present.”
“It’s part of a toy gun, ain’t it?”
A gun but not a toy.
“It’s something all right.”
“What’s it made of? Plastic?”
“Or carbon fiber. Some high-tech thing. Fairly lightweight. Did you see the man you saw leaving the cemetery carrying this?”
“Well, now, Detective, you’re making me think again.” She tapped his arm flirtatiously. “You’re good for my brain. Maybe. Maybe not. As I told you, I was too far away and the light wasn’t good and I have cataracts, so I didn’t see his hands. Truth be told, I didn’t look.”
“The missing piece,” Dave said under his breath. It looked like a gun grip, hammer, and firing pin that would fit the plastic pieces found in the field near the cemetery after Kimberly Swartz was shot.
“What’s that you say?” Mrs. Ruiter asked.
“Interesting piece of plastic, that’s all. . . . You’ve done a good thing bringing this in.”
“I have?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Well, then, I have a favor to ask. Could I be shut in a cell, just for a few minutes, just to find out what it’s like? Not for real, a course. Lock the door so I can feel what it’s like to hear that terrible sound, but stand there with the key ‘cause I don’t want a heart attack. I just wanna have that experience, not quite real but real enough. You know, when you’re getting to the end of your life, a new experience, something you never dreamed would happen, is pretty much the best you can hope for.”
Dave laughed. “Mrs. Ruiter. I hope your end is a long way away because you’re a treasure. You don’t know how much I needed this cap on the day.”
Passages Malibu
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
Madeleine walked aimlessly around the gorgeous grounds of Passages Malibu. The creamy neoclassical buildings with tiled roofs, the Italianate fountains and manicured grounds, the sweeping vistas overlooking the Pacific Ocean, and the beautiful patients, some of whom were at least B-list celebrities, allowed her to imagine she was luxuriating at a resort, not hiding at a rehab facility. She had much to think about.
It had been a week since Anthony was murdered. She had kept her emotions together long enough to get through the first interrogation by Detective Robins, the trip to the morgue, and Steve’s rejection of her cry for help.
But then came more rejection. Babette was polite but firm that Madeleine could not be her houseguest. Madeleine’s favorite senior employees had reasons why she could not bunk with them for a few days -- their apartments were too small, their child was sick, their mother-in-law was occupying the only guest room. An old boyfriend, now married with a child, was furious that she had even called.
She did not want to be alone, but she checked back into the Conrad anyway, just as Steve advised. It was a disaster. That first night she had an “episode.” The desk clerk sent security after her as she left the lobby for the street in her nightclothes. When security returned her to her suite, they entered a disaster zone: drapes torn off the rods, lamps broken, the bathroom trashed. “Ahab” was written dozens of times on the bathroom mirror in lipstick. The word made no sense to Madeleine’s escorts and she was too confused to explain.
A doctor was called. He offered her a sedative and the opportunity to check herself into the psych ward at Indiana University Hospital. She took the sedative but stayed far away from the psych ward. After a few hours of fitful sleep, she awoke to the conviction that Captain Ahab had killed Anthony and would kill her if she stayed in Indianapolis. She made a quick stop at ApEx’s office to pick up her cellphone and leave instructions with a few employees. Friday afternoon, she bought a suitcase full of resort clothes and shoes. Then she flew first-class to California.
When Ned Harrod divorced her after only twenty days of marriage, Anthony told her about Passages. It offered a way to recover from addiction in luxurious surroundings, he said. Gourmet food, lots of leisure activities, beautiful vistas, innovative treatment programs. At Passages, addiction was
not
an incurable disease manageable only through a twelve-step program. Instead, addiction was cured holistically by identifying underlying psychological issues. To Anthony, “holistic” was the magic word. To Madeleine, “luxurious” and “cured” were the magic words.
The problem was she firmly believed she was not addicted to anything. Not marriage, not drugs, not alcohol or work. And she was irritated by four questions posed by an earnest-looking middle-aged man on her first day. He explained patiently that the answers to his questions would identify the underlying psychological issues she needed to explore in order to be cured.
“Do you have a chemical imbalance?”
“No,” she said. “Definitely not. My chemicals are perfectly balanced. Alcohol and drugs are important crutches but I’m not what you’d called addicted. I’ll prove it to you this week by not taking any. Except for a Xanax when I have an anxiety attack and maybe a little wine with dinner. If I get a really bad migraine or a backache, I take hydrocodone. And perhaps you can prescribe something for the sleepwalking. Before he died, my beau, Dr. Anthony Beltrami, mentioned clonazepam.”
“We’ll unpack that word ‘crutches’ later. And we’ll review your medications. Are there events in your past to which you are not not reconciled?”
“No,” she said.
“What’s the hesitation I hear in your voice?”
She sighed. “A girl died when I was eleven. I tried to save her. There has been a lot more death since then. In fact, the man I was seeing -- Dr. Beltrami -- didn’t just die. He was murdered a few days ago. That’s why I came out here. I’ve been divorced three times, and I really regret one of them. But,” she said brightening, “I’ve learned to live with devastating loss. Death and divorce are just facts of life and I accept them as fuel for my art.
C’est la vie
.”
“‘Devastating loss.’ Important words. We’ll explore all that death and divorce in another session. Are there any conditions in your present life you can’t cope with?”
“Ah,” she said with a glow. “I have money and success and prestige. I’m an entrepreneur. I’m healthy and young and people tell me I’m beautiful. I can travel anywhere I want. My father’s still alive and as dear to me as ever. He’d do anything for me. So the conditions of my life are pretty good, wouldn’t you say? I can afford this place, after all. But there is one little fly in the ointment.”
“So you’re not alone in the world,” the therapist mused, a little more surprise in his voice than he intended.
“No, I’m not!” she emphasized. “Not everybody is dead. Besides my father, I have friends and employees and admirers, more than I can count. And my second husband is very good to me. I talk to him every single day. No, no, no. The fly in the ointment is Captain Ahab. He follows me everywhere. Nobody else ever sees him but he’s there. I think he’s a killer. In fact, I know he is.”
“I’d like to hear more about him,” said the therapist, who was perfectly composed but whose eyes briefly flickered with great interest. “Now, one last question. Do you believe in things that are not true?”
“Of course I do,” she said sharply. “Love, happiness, reward for hard work, the goodness of people, universal peace, a refreshing sleep. The kind of things beauty queens babble about. But love and happiness don’t last, hard work is hard, people are bad, and the only universal condition is conflict. And sleep, when it finally comes to me, is never refreshing.”
The man looked concerned. “Anything else?”
“I see dead people. I know what they were thinking at the moment of death. Sometimes I know what they were thinking after death. As a forensic re-constructionist, all I have to do is see a skull and I know what the face in life looked like down to the last little detail. As a painter, I depict emotions that make the viewer see the subject in an entirely new way. That ability to see the dead for who they really are has given me every good thing in my life.”
“In what way do you see these dead people?” he asked cautiously.
“The way an artist sees them.” She shot him a mocking look. “What? You think I see them wafting down the chimney or flowing in under the door like spirits? Sitting on a chair in my room, hiding in the closet, whispering secrets? You think I’m crazy? I’m not.”
“Did you have an imaginary friend when you were little?”
“Oh, yes. Mopsy. I suppose I got her name from the Peter Rabbit stories Mama read to me. She had adorable curls and was good at making dolls out of hollyhocks and moss. She liked to cut worms in half too. She was a very good girl because she took the blame whenever Mama found the worms.”
The therapist decided to ask a question not on his list when he noticed the scars on Madeleine’s arms and legs. “Do you cut yourself?”
The first sign of shame appeared on Madeleine’s face. A few tears escaped her beautiful turquoise eyes. “I did but not now. After the accident at the Dunes when I tried to save my girlfriend but she drowned anyway, that’s when I cut myself. I was eleven. That’s when my parents sent me to a psychiatrist.”
“What were you feeling then?”
Now the tears were flowing and her chest shook with sobs. “Very guilty for what happened. . . . Depressed. . . . Unworthy. . . . I hated myself.”
“Do you still hate yourself?”
“No.”
“So you stopped cutting yourself?” he asked, handing her a tissue and waiting for her to quit sobbing. “When was that?”
“When I was in high school. I don’t remember exactly when.”
“What caused you to stop?”
“Anthony taught me how to express my emotions. He told me I was lovable. He made me feel that way too.”
“Anthony?”
“Dr. Beltrami. The man I told you about at the beginning of this interview,” she said, a little irritation creeping into her voice. “He was my psychiatrist for seven years when I was a teenager. Then for a long time I didn’t see him, but when I got divorced the third time, I went back to him for awhile. By then, we were both adults in very different places from where we had been. We fell in love. Once that happened, he said I couldn’t be his patient any more. He was a very ethical man.”
Madeleine missed the look of skepticism on the therapist’s face.
“By then, it was okay for me to quit going to him because I was well enough not to need professional help.” She laughed shakily. “But now that he’s dead, I need him again -- not just emotionally but professionally. Isn’t that ironic?”
The therapist put down his pad and pinched the bridge of his nose. “A lot of threads to be pulled here. We’ve got plenty to work on.”
Now it was almost a week later and she had learned nothing about herself. But she had made a new friend. She was learning tai chi and tennis. She had set up a mini art studio in her room. Her employees at ApEx might or might not be doing just fine without her; she refused to take their calls or reply to their texts. Nettie Steenhardt hadn’t sent any messages about problems, so she assumed Chester was fine. Steve said there were some decisions to be made and the sooner she could make them, the better, but he didn’t sound so frantic that she needed to get home immediately. The only problems seemed to be with her lawyer, who said he hadn’t found out anything yet about Dr. Beltrami’s will. Did she know who his lawyer was? She didn’t.
She felt like staying at Passages Malibu forever.