He cleared his throat and continued. “She put on a bathrobe, and was walking to the living room, when the pain got worse. She sat down on the couch and delivered the baby on the floor. She went to get a towel, came back, and saw the baby wasn’t breathing. She called 911 and started CPR, following instructions from the operator. She was still on the line, and performing CPR, when the paramedics arrived and determined that the baby was dead.”
Eve glanced at Anna, sobbing on the gurney, and saw past her to the bloodstained couch, where a paramedic stood over a blanket-wrapped bundle that she presumed was the baby.
“What was the sex of the baby?” Eve asked.
“A boy,” said the deputy.
“Wait outside for me,” Duncan told the deputy, then turned to Eve, his face pale. “I’ve seen enough dead children for one lifetime without seeing one more before I retire. Do you mind waiting here for the ME’s office to come collect the body? I’ll go to the hospital with Mrs. McCaig, get her official statement, and catch a ride back to the station with the deputy.”
“Sure,” Eve said, with the confidence of someone who’d handled a dozen cases like this before. But this was the first time she’d ever been called on a stillbirth and her inexperience made her uncomfortable.
Duncan approached the gurney as it was being wheeled toward them by the two ambulance attendants. He gestured to the attendants to stop and he leaned over Anna McCaig, who was covered up to her neck with a sheet and was still crying, though with less fervor, exhaustion or weakness calming her down.
“I’m Detective Pavone, Mrs. McCaig. I’ll be going with you to the hospital. Can I grab your purse and clothes for you?”
Anna nodded, sniffled, and said in a heavily accented voice, “My purse is in the dining room.”
Eve grabbed the purse from a dining room chair and set it on the gurney at Anna’s feet while Duncan went to get her clothes. She knew he didn’t make the offer just as a courtesy. It was also a sneaky way to get her permission to go to her bedroom, open a few drawers, and look in the closet. She wondered what he was looking for. Illegal drugs that might have provoked the stillbirth? Or perhaps he was just generally snoopy. She certainly was.
The ambulance attendants continued out with the gurney and Eve went into the family room. The tiny baby was on the couch, swaddled in the blanket, like he was sleeping, only he was far too still. His skin was grayish blue and the blood and amniotic fluid had been wiped away from his face. There was some blood on a seat cushion and a little more on the hardwood floor.
The blanket around the baby bothered her.
She looked over her shoulder and saw Duncan leaving the bedroom, carrying some women’s clothing. He shook his head to indicate that he didn’t see anything unusual and went outside to the waiting deputy. The firefighters started to clear out, too. One of the paramedics was still by the couch, putting away his equipment. Eve approached him.
“Excuse me. I’m Detective Eve Ronin. Could I talk to you for a minute?”
“Yeah, sure.” He turned and wiped tears from his cheeks. “Sorry. I’m not usually so emotional. Stillbirths are always hard to take but my wife is pregnant and, well, this time it really got to me.”
“Is that why you wrapped the baby in a blanket?”
The paramedic looked over at the baby for a long moment. “I know we’re not supposed to do that, but the mother was a total wreck. I didn’t want her to have to see all that blood, the umbilical cord, and everything. I wanted her last memory of her baby to be . . . peaceful, you know? He looks peaceful now, doesn’t he?”
He did, Eve thought. Ordinarily, at an unattended death, it was wrong to cover the body or to unnecessarily disturb the scene in any way. But she could see that it was an emotionally charged situation and, judging from the paramedic’s reaction, not a crime scene, so preserving evidence wasn’t going to be an issue. Even so, it irritated her.
“Is there anything we need to know? Anything out of the ordinary?”
“No, she did all she possibly could to save her baby. She was still doing CPR and sobbing when we got here. We had to pull her away. I can’t imagine how horrible this must be for her.”
“Can I get your name for my report?”
“Rick Gage.”
“Thank you, Rick.”
He closed up his equipment case and started to leave, the last man out, when he paused for a moment in the entry hall. “I usually tell my wife everything about my day, but I’m not going to tell her about this.”
Rick looked back at Eve, as if seeking her permission. So she nodded. He gave her a half smile of thanks and left her alone with the baby’s body.
Eve had goose bumps, not from the situation, but from the cold air in the room. She thought about waiting outside in the warm sunshine for the attendant from the ME’s office, but instead she went through the motions of documenting the scene by taking photos of the baby, the couch, and everything else in the room.