“No matter. How do you want to handle it?”
They all turned to her and Agnes wanted a cigarette more than she wanted to breathe: wishing Carnet wasn’t here, and furious that the road to the village was impassable, although if she made it to the top of the cliff the highways would be closed by now. No phone, no way out, and no way to consult with Bardy. She didn’t need this on her first day on his team. Why hadn’t he made it here? She moved nearer the protection of the canvas walls, willing herself to focus, remembering a snowstorm early in her marriage. The joy of two days trapped at home together with George. Happier days that should have lasted forever.
“Completely frozen to the ground,” Blanchard called over his shoulder. “That’s one way to establish time of death. Take a few of this,” he motioned to Carnet, who was using his camera phone to document the scene.
Agnes turned to Petit and gestured to Estanguet. “Take him inside.” For a moment she was tempted to use the excuse of impending frostbite to join them and leave Carnet in charge. Only the memory of George stopped her. He’d been her biggest supporter from the day she applied to the police force, insisting she had good instincts and they’d be lucky to have her. She wouldn’t let him down, even now.
“I’ll look at the storm pattern,” Blanchard said. “We’ll do better to get her up and out of here quickly. Sad to think she might have taken a tumble and died, although probably not the only one tonight.”
He chipped away at the ice, uncovering first the dead woman’s face, then her coat-clad torso. When he reached the legs, Agnes shivered again. The long thin skirt had fallen to the side and the woman’s bare legs, incongruous with the boots, looked cold. She wished they would hurry and cover the body again, but she didn’t say anything, knowing that the woman was beyond feeling just as her husband had been.
It had been cool that day, a cloudy gray day typical of Lausanne in autumn. The ambulance driver had covered George before she could look, angering her and later making her grateful. There had been so many people around, watching and judging. Later she understood the sand on the road was there to absorb blood. That day she had seen only the outline of her husband’s covered form, the flash of emergency lights, and the chatter of horrified pedestrians. It had started to drizzle and Carnet was there, encouraging her to leave. Other officers pulled her toward a waiting car, asking if her children were with her; could they call someone to come for her; was her purse still in the café? They had talked and talked, to her and over her head, and all she wanted was to see George for herself, to remember every detail. She remembered tiny things like the rip down the sleeve of his jacket where his arm wasn’t quite covered by the sheet. A shame, for he loved that coat. It was the same today. The body was clad in a beautiful dress irreparably damaged by the ice, the coat torn. She looked up.
“Her coat wouldn’t have torn like that when she fell.” She stooped near the doctor and Carnet joined her. Together they shielded the body. The wind had shifted again and ice seemed to arrive from all sides.
“You’ve got good eyes,” Carnet said. “The slit looks new, made by something sharp, a knife maybe, doesn’t look like a snag on a nail. Could have been cut before she put it on.”
“The fabric’s not frayed.” Agnes held the flashlight, curiosity making her forget the cold. She gestured for Carnet to sweep the remnants of ice away from the area.
“If you want to see underneath you’d better cut it away,” Blanchard said. “The whole bit’s frozen solid, moisture in and on the fabric, and you won’t get it off her any other way. I’m going to keep her cold until we can get her somewhere to do a proper autopsy. I don’t have many medical tools with me, mostly my … farm tools.”
Carnet cut a large piece of the dead woman’s jacket away, careful to keep his blade far from the incision they were studying. Agnes focused her attention. She wasn’t thinking clearly. She had allowed the place and the weather to numb her to the possibility that this was a crime. When Carnet tried to lift the material it wouldn’t move. Carefully he touched one edge of the fabric with his knife, lifting it slightly. It pulled away and they crouched nearer, trying to protect the area from the storm. Blanchard pulled the bottom of the fabric away, shining his light on it. There was a dark frozen mass concealed between the body and jacket.
“Not natural causes, I suspect,” he muttered, running his hand under the fabric and separating it from the frozen blood. When the material of the jacket lifted away, Blanchard removed the layer of red ice and slipped it into a plastic container taken from his satchel. Beneath lay white flesh marked by the slit of a blade.
Agnes knew before Blanchard spoke that this was the reason they were here. This woman had been stabbed. She felt a thrill. This was violent crimes.