I see a white scalp and the red-black fissure of an open wound.
“There’s bruising here.” Using a cotton-tipped swab, he indicates the scalp surrounding the wound. “Some of the purpling could have occurred postmortem. But there’s enough bleeding and bruising present for me to safely say the trauma occurred while he was still alive.”
“Any idea what might have made that sort of wound?” Glock asks.
I glance at Glock, to find him staring down at the corpse with the rapt attention of a kid working on some fascinating science project. He’s one of those people who can remove himself from the emotional aspect of almost any situation. He keeps his cool, doesn’t get angry or outraged. That’s one of many traits that makes him such a good cop. I wish I could do the same. On the other hand, maybe my passion for the job is the instrument that drives me forward when it would be so much easier to quit.
“A blunt object, more than likely,” the doc answers. “Probably quite heavy, or at least wielded with some force. Something sharp would have opened the flesh even more. The edges of the wound would be more cleanly cut. There would be less bruising. Less swelling.” He crosses to a light box on the wall next to an overhead cabinet. “I suspected there might be some fracturing, so I took the liberty of taking an X-ray.” Moving to the counter, he picks up a film and takes it to the wall-mounted illuminator. He flips on the light, then shoves the film beneath the ledge.
A monochrome image of Solomon Slabaugh’s skull materializes. Taking a pen from his lab coat, the coroner indicates the upper-rear section of the skull. “You can see here that there’s a break in the outline of the parietal vault. See this small crescent?”
Glock and I move closer. I find myself squinting. Though the image is slightly blurred, I can make out the minute indentation in the curvature of the skull. “A fracture?” I ask.
He smiles, as if I’m an astute pupil who’s pleased him with the correct answer to a difficult question. “It’s a fracture of the right parietal bone. There’s also an acute extradural hematoma. The convexity here displaced the brain matter, producing the small crescent.”
I stare at the image. “Is it possible this could have happened a while back? Maybe he fell or was in some kind of accident and didn’t realize he had a fracture?”
The doc shakes his head. “This injury would likely have caused a concussion. There would have been pain. Confusion. Nausea. Possibly even unconsciousness. Of course, I’ll know more once I open the cranium and examine the brain. But I’m ninety-nine percent certain this injury occurred very shortly before his death.”
“Are we talking minutes? Hours?”
He shrugs. “I can’t say for certain. My best guess would be a matter of minutes.”
“Is it what killed him?” Glock asks.
“I can’t rule on COD until I complete the autopsy.”
The three of us stare down at the body. Above us, the buzz of the fluorescent lights seems inordinately loud. “Is it possible he struck the back of his head on the concrete wall of the pit when he fell in?”
“At first glance, I surmised the same scenario.” The doctor gives me a look that tells me there’s a gotcha moment on the way. “Then I discovered this.” Lowering the sheet, he lifts the dead man’s right hand.
The skin is gray and mottled. The fingers are clawlike; several fingernails are broken to the quick, as if he’d tried to claw his way out of the pit. Disturbing images scratch at my brain, but I quickly bank them. Then I notice the small red-black mouth of a cut on one of the fingers and I feel myself go still inside.
“Those three fingers are broken,” the doc says. “At first, I thought perhaps it had happened during the fall.”
“That seems like a logical train of thought,” Glock says.
“Until I looked at the X-rays.” The doc picks up another film and takes it to the X-ray illuminator. He removes the first film, jams the second one into place.
I stare at the film. Even with my proletarian eye, I see clearly that three of the four finger bones are broken at the same general point.
Glock asks the obvious question. “So what caused the fractures?”
The doctor picks up the dead man’s hand. “The index, middle, and ring fingers are fractured,” he says. “The breaks are clean, with little or no chipping. As you can see, the flesh of the index finger has been incised, as well.” The doc looks at me over the tops of his bifocals. “I would say this man was hanging onto the side of the pit and someone struck his fingers with a relatively sharp object.”
“Causing him to fall to his death,” Glock says.
“That would be my guess,” Doc Coblentz replies.
A horrific sight flashes in my mind’s eye. A man fighting to save himself from certain death. Someone else making damn sure he didn’t succeed.