Chapter Thirteen
San Luis Obispo is a very pretty college town, at least from the outside looking in. We found Higuera Street and drove down it to Osos, past small local shops, but also Starbucks, Barnes & Noble, the Firestone Grill. Jamilla told me that you could always tell the time of day in San Luis Obispo by the scents and aromas: like barbecue smoke in the afternoon on Marsh Street, or the aroma of wheat and barley at night outside the Slo Brewing Co.
We met Detective Nancy Goodes at the police station in town. She was a petite, attractive woman, with a nice California tan, very much in charge of her homicide investigation. In addition to contacting us about this exhumation, she was also the lead on the murders of two students from Cal Poly that didn't seem related to our case, but who could tell for sure. Like most homicide detectives these days, she was busy.
'We've got the permissions we need to exhume the body,' Goodes told us on the way out to the cemetery. At least the rain had stopped for now. The air was warm, thanks to Santa Ana winds.
'What can you tell us about the murder. Nancy? You worked the case yourself, right?' Jamilla asked.
The detective nodded. 'I did. So did just about every other detective in town. It was very sad, and an important case here. Mary Alice Richardson went to the Catholic high school in town. Her father's a well-liked doctor. She was a nice kid, but a bit of a wild child. What can I tell you, she was a kid. Fifteen years old.'
'What do you mean she was a wild child?' I asked Detective Goodes.
She sighed and worked her jaw a little. I could tell this case had left a wound. 'She missed a lot of school, two or three days a week sometimes. She was bright enough, but her grades were just terrible. She hung with other kids who liked to experiment - drugs like Ecstasy, raves, black magic, heavy drinking, all-night parties. Maybe even a little free-basing. Mary Alice was only arrested once, but she was giving her parents a lot of premature gray hairs.'
Jamilla asked, 'Were you at the crime scene. Nancy?' I noticed that she was respectful of the other detective at all times. Very non- threatening toward Nancy.
'Unfortunately, I was. That's one of the reasons I worked so hard getting the permissions we needed to dig up her body. Mary Alice died a year and three months ago, but I will never, ever forget how we found her.'
Jamilla and I looked at each other. We hadn't heard the particulars of the murder yet. We were still playing catchup.
Goodes continued.'It was pretty clear to me that she was meant to be found. Two kids from Cal Poly were the ones who actually discovered the body. They were parking out near the hills. It's a popular spot for submarine races. They went for a little moonlit stroll. I'm sure they had nightmares after what they saw. Mary Alice was hanging from a cypress tree by her bare feet. Naked. Except the killers left her earrings, and a small sapphire in her belly button. This wasn't a robbery.'
'How about her clothes?' I asked.
'We found the clothes: UFO parachute pants, Nikes, Chili Peppers T-shirt. No trophies were taken to our knowledge.'
I glanced at Jamilla. "The killer trusts his or her memory. Doesn't need trophies for some reason. Or so it seems. None of this follows any of the usual paths for serials.'
'No, it doesn't. I agree with that one hundred percent. Do you know what scarification is?' Detective Goodes asked.
I nodded. 'I've come across it,' I said. 'Scars, wounds. Most often on the legs and arms. Occasionally the chest or back. They avoid the face, because then people might make them stop. Usually the scars are self-inflicted.'
'Right,'said Detective Goodes. 'Mary Alice had either cut herself over the past couple of months, or someone else did it for her. She had over seventy separate cuts on her body. Everywhere but the face.'
The detective's white Suburban pulled onto a gravel road, then we passed between rusted wrought-iron gates.
'We're here,' Nancy Goodes announced. 'Let's get this over with. Cemeteries make me twitchy. I hate what we're going to do. This makes me so sad.'
It made me sad, too.