The Skin Collector(Lincoln Rhyme)

Chapter 31





At close to eleven p.m. Rhyme heard Sachs enter the hallway, her arrival announced by the modulating hiss of sleet-filled wind.

‘Ah, finally.’

She stepped into the parlor a moment later, holding a large milk crate containing a dozen plastic and paper bags. She nodded a greeting to Mel Cooper, who sagged with fatigue but seemed game to start on the analysis.

Rhyme asked quickly, ‘Sachs, you said you thought he might be around the scene?’

‘That’s right.’

‘What came of that?’

‘Nothing. Bo sent a half-dozen ESU boys and girls after him. But he was gone. And I didn’t get a good look at him. It was maybe nothing. But my gut told me it was him.’ She called up a map of Hell’s Kitchen on the main computer monitor and pointed out the restaurant, Provence2, and on the corner an office building. ‘He went down there but, see? It’s only a few blocks from Times Square. He got lost in the crowd. Not sure it was him but it’s too much of a coincidence to ignore completely. He seems curious about the investigation; after all, the perp did come back to Elizabeth Street and spied on me through the manhole cover.’

Eye-to-eye …

‘Well, let’s get to the evidence. What do we have, Sachs?’

Thom Reston said firmly, ‘Find out – what she has, that is – but find out quickly. You’re going to bed soon, Lincoln. It’s been a long day.’

Rhyme scowled. But he also accepted that the caregiver’s job was to keep him healthy and alive. Quadriplegics were susceptible to a number of troublesome conditions, the most dangerous of which was autonomic dysreflexia – a spike in blood pressure brought on by physical stress. It wasn’t clear that exhaustion was a precipitating factor but Thom had never been one to take anything for granted.

‘Yes, yes, yes. Just a few minutes.’

‘Nothing spectacular,’ Sachs said, nodding at the evidence.

But then, Rhyme reflected, there rarely were any smoking guns. Crime scene work was incremental. And obvious finds, he felt, were automatically suspect; they might be planted evidence. Which happened more than one might suspect.

First, Sachs displayed the photographs of the tattoo.



Surrounded by the scalloped border that, according to TT Gordon, was in some way significant.


Which made its cryptic nature all the more infuriating.

‘First “the second” and now “forty”. No article preceding this one but, again, no punctuation.’

What the hell was he saying? A gap of thirty-eight from two to forty. And why the switch from ordinal to cardinal? Rhyme mused, ‘Smells like a place to me, an address. GPS or longitude and latitude coordinates. But not enough to go on yet.’

He gave up speculating and turned back to the evidence she’d collected. Sachs selected a bag and gave it to Cooper. He extracted the cotton ball inside.

‘The poison,’ Sachs said. ‘One sample’s gone to the ME’s Office but I want a head start. Burn it, Mel.’

He ran the materials through the chromatograph and a few minutes later had the mass spectrum. ‘It’s a combination of atropine, hyoscyamine and scopolamine.’

Rhyme was staring at the ceiling. ‘That comes from some plant … yes, yes … Hell, I can’t remember what.’

Cooper typed the cocktail of ingredients into the toxin database and reported a moment later, ‘Angel’s trumpet: Brugmansia.’

‘Yes,’ Rhyme called. ‘Of course that’s it. But I don’t know the details.’

Cooper explained that it was a South American plant, particularly popular among criminals in Colombia, who called it devil’s breath. They blew it into the faces of their victims and the paralyzing, amnesiac drug rendered them unconscious or, if they remained awake, unable to fight their assailants.

And with the right dose, as with Samantha Levine, the drug could induce death in a matter of minutes.

Coincidentally, at that moment, the parlor landline rang: the medical examiner’s office.

Cooper lifted an eyebrow, looking toward Sachs. ‘Must be a slow night. Or you scared them into prioritizing us, Amelia.’

Rhyme knew which.

The ME official on call confirmed that devil’s breath was the poison that had been used on Samantha Levine’s abdomen in the tattooed message. He added that it was a highly concentrated version of the toxin. And there was residue of propofol in her bloodstream. Cooper thanked him.

Sachs and the tech continued to examine the trace she’d collected. This time, though, they found no variation from the control samples, which meant the residues found on her body and where the unsub had walked in the crime scene had not been tracked in by him; they were all indigenous to the underground stockyard pen.

That, in turn, meant the substances wouldn’t lead to anywhere the perp might have been.

‘Ergo,’ Rhyme muttered, ‘f*cking useless.’

Finally, Sachs used tongs to pick up a plastic bag containing what seemed to Rhyme to be a purse. ‘Thought it was a rat at first. Brown, you know. And the strap seemed to be the tail. Be careful. There’s a booby trap inside.’ A glance at Cooper.

‘What?’ Rhyme asked.

She explained, ‘It was sitting by itself about ten feet from Samantha’s body. It just felt wrong being there. I looked at it closely and saw a needle sticking up. Very small. I used forceps to collect the bag.’ Sachs added that she’d been on the lookout for traps because the NYPD psychologist, Terry Dobyns, had told them the perp might start targeting his pursuers.

‘That’s sneaky,’ Cooper said, donning an eye loupe to examine the needle. ‘Hypodermic. I’d say thirty-gauge. Very small. White substance inside.’

Rhyme wheeled close and looked; his keen eyes could make out a tiny glint near the clasp.

Cooper selected a hemostat and then cautiously lifted the purse from the bag.

‘Check for explosives,’ Rhyme said. This wasn’t the unsub’s MO but you could never be too careful.

The scan came back negative. Still, Cooper decided to put the purse in a containment vessel and used remote arms to open the bag, given the possibility that it was also rigged with some trap that might spray with toxin whoever opened it.

But, no, the needle was the only trap. The contents were mundane, if wrenching, clues to a life now abruptly ended: a health club membership card, a breast cancer donation thank-you note, a discount certificate to a Midtown restaurant. Pictures of children – nieces and nephews, it seemed.

As for the booby trap, Cooper extracted the needle carefully.

‘It’s small,’ Rhyme said. ‘What do we make of that?’

Cooper said, ‘Can be used for insulin but this type is mostly used by plastic surgeons.’

Rhyme reminded, ‘He’s got propofol too. A general anesthetic. Could be that he’s planning some cosmetic surgery as part of his escape plan. Though maybe he just broke into a medical supply house and stole what he wanted. Sachs, check if there’ve been any reports of that in the past month or so in the area.’ She stepped away to make a call downtown, requesting an NCIC search. Rhyme continued, ‘But more to the point – excuse the expression – that needle in particular: What’s inside his little present to us? Is it more of the angel’s trumpet?’

Cooper ran the sample. And a moment later he read the results. ‘Nope. It’s worse. Well, I shouldn’t say worse. That’s a qualitative judgment. I’ll just say it’s more efficient.’

‘Meaning deadlier?’ Rhyme asked.

‘A lot. Strychnine.’ Cooper explained: The toxin came from Strychnos, a genus of trees and climbing shrubs. The substance was popular as a rodenticide. It had been a common murder weapon a century ago though it was less so now since it was easily traced. Strychnine was the most pain-inducing of any toxin.

‘Not enough to kill an adult,’ Cooper said. ‘But it would keep the victim out of commission for weeks and might cause brain damage.’

On the positive side, though, from the investigators’ perspective, the poison was still sold commercially as a pesticide. Rhyme mentioned this to Sachs and Cooper.

‘I’ll see if we can find any commercial suppliers,’ the tech said. ‘They have to keep records of poison sales.’

Cooper was looking at his computer, though, and frowning. ‘Dozens of sources. Brick-and-mortar stores. And all he’d need is a fake ID to buy some. Pay cash. No trace.’

In the world of forensic science too many options were as bad as too few.

Sachs got a phone call and listened for a moment, then thanked the person on the other end of the line and disconnected. ‘No reported thefts of drugs or other medical equipment or supplies in the area, the last thirty days, except a few stoners or crack-heads knocking over pharmacies; they all got busted. No propofol missing.’

Thom appeared in the doorway.

‘Ah, my, what a stern expression.’

‘Close to midnight, Lincoln You’re going to bed.’

‘Yes, dear, yes, dear.’ Then Rhyme said to Cooper, ‘Be careful, Mel. No reason for him to know you’re working this case but still, be careful. Sachs, text Lon and Pulaski and tell them the same thing.’ A glance at the mass spectrum of the strychnine. ‘We’re targets now. He’s declared war.’

She sent messages to the two officers, then stepped to a clean whiteboard and wrote down the evidence, as well as the information she and Lon Sellitto had learned about the victim.





* * *





614 W. 54th Street



Victim: Samantha Levine, 32 – Worked for International Fiber Optic Networks

– Probably no connection to Unsub

– No sexual assault, but touching of skin



Unsub 11-5 – See details from prior scene


– Might have returned to the scene

No sightings

– No friction ridges

– No footprints



COD: Poisoning with Brugmansia, introduced via tattooing – Angel’s trumpet, devil’s breath

– Atropine, hyoscyamine, scopolamine



Tattoo – ‘forty’ surrounded by scarring scallops

– Why cardinal number?



Sedated with propofol – How obtained? Access to medical supplies? (No local thefts)



Location – Abducted from restroom of Provence2 restaurant, basement

– Kill site was underneath restroom, in 19th-century slaughterhouse culling area underground

– Similar infrastructure to earlier scene:

IFON

ConEd router

Metropolitan Transit Authority DC current feed

Department of Environmental Protection pipe



Flashlight – Generic, cannot be sourced



Handcuffs – Generic, cannot be sourced



Duct tape – Generic, cannot be sourced



No trace

Purse left as booby trap – Plastic surgeon’s hypodermic needle

– Strychnine loaded into needle

Can’t locate source

Probably not enough to kill





* * *





Rhyme gazed at the entries and then shrugged. ‘It’s as mysterious as the message he’s trying to send.’

Thom said, ‘Witching hour.’

‘Okay, you win.’

Cooper pulled his jacket on and said good night.

‘Sachs?’ Rhyme asked. ‘You coming upstairs?’

She’d turned from the board and was staring out the window at the stark, ice-coated branches bending in the persistent wind.

‘What?’ She hadn’t heard, it seemed.

‘You coming to bed?’

‘I’ll be a few more minutes.’

Thom climbed the stairs and Rhyme wheeled to the elevator that would take him to the second floor. Once there, he rolled toward the bedroom. He paused, though, cocked his head, listening. Sachs was on the phone, speaking softly, but he could still make out the words.

‘Pam, hey, it’s me … Hope you’re checking messages. Really like to talk. Give me a call. Okay, love you. ’Night.’

That was, Rhyme believed, the third such call today.

He heard her footfalls on the stairs and immediately veered into the bedroom and struck up a conversation with Thom – which must have bordered on the surreal to the aide, given that Rhyme was concentrating on his words not one bit; he simply wanted to keep Sachs from knowing he’d overheard her plea to Pam Willoughby.

Sachs crested the top stair and walked into the bedroom. Rhyme was thinking how unsettling it is when the people who are the hubs of our lives are suddenly vulnerable. And worse yet when they mask it with stoic smiles, as Sachs did now.

She saw his glance and asked, ‘What?’

Rhyme vamped. ‘Just thinking. I have a feeling we’re going to get him tomorrow.’

He expected her to look incredulous and say something like, ‘You? Have a feeling.’

But instead she glanced subtly at her phone’s screen, pocketed the unit and said, eyes out the window, ‘Could be, Rhyme. Could be.’