Night Probe! (Dirk Pitt 6)

Dr. Abner McGovern sat at his desk, stared thoughtfully at the cadaver stretched on the stainless steel table, and casually munched a deviled-egg sandwich.

McGovern was perplexed. The lifeless form of Jules Guerrier was not cooperating. Most of the tests on the corpse had been run four and five times. He and his assistants had analyzed the lab data endlessly, studied and restudied the results obtained by the police coroner of Quebec. And still the exact cause of death eluded him.

McGovern was one of those stubborn people who refuse to give up, the kind who stays up all night to finish a novel or add the last pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. He refused to give up now. A life did not simply cease without a reason.

Guerrier had been in pitiful physical condition. But the man was known to have a tremendous constitution. His will to live would never have extinguished like a lamp at the flick of a switch.

It had to be something other than a breakdown of bodily functions. It had to be from something induced.

Every test for poison had been run, even the exotics. All had proven negative. Nor was there evidence of the tiniest puncture from an injection needle under the hair or the nails, between fingers and toes, inside the orifices.

The possibility of suffocation kept returning to McGovern. Expiration from lack of oxygen left few telltale signs.

In the forty years he had served on the Mounties' forensic pathology staff, he could recall only a handful of cases where the victims were murdered by suffocation.

He slipped on a new pair of gloves and approached the stiff, as he referred to it. For the third time that afternoon he scrutinized the interior of the mouth. All was as it should be. No bruises, no paleness behind the lips.

Another dead end.

He returned to his desk and collapsed in the chair dejectedly, hands hanging loosely in his lap, eyes staring vacantly at the tile floor. Then he noticed a slight discoloration on the thumb of one glove. Idly he smear

ed it on a piece of paper, leaving a greasy pink smudge.

Quickly he bent again over Guerrier. Cautiously he rubbed a towel between the inner lips and outer gums. Then he peered at them through a magnifying glass.

"Ingenious," he murmured aloud as though conversing with the corpse. "Positively ingenious."

Sarveux felt terribly tired. His stand on noninterference with Quebec independence had met with a storm of opposition from his own party and the English-speaking loyalists in the west. The Parliament members from the Maritime Provinces had been especially indignant over his break with national unity. Their anger was to be expected. The new Quebec nation isolated them from the rest of Canada.

He was sitting in his study, sipping a drink while trying to wash away the day's events, when the phone rang. His secretary told him that Commissioner Finn was calling from Mountie headquarters. He sighed and waited for the click of the connection. "Mr. Sarveux?"

"Speaking."

"It was murder," Finn said bluntly.

"You have proof?"

"Beyond a doubt."

Sarveux gripped the receiver tightly. God, he thought, when will it end? "How?"

"Premier Guerfier was smothered to death. Damned clever of the killer. He used theatrical makeup to cover the evidence. Once we knew what to look for we found traces of tooth marks in the fabric of a bed pillow."

"You'll keep after Boucher."

"No need," said Finn. "Your report from British intelligence was most opportune. The print on the doorbell matches the right index finger of Foss Gly."

Sarveux closed his eyes. Perspective, he told himself; he must keep a perspective. "How is it possible Boucher mistook Gly for Villon?"

"I can't say. However, judging from the photo in the report, there is a slight resemblance. The use of makeup on Guerrier may be a key. If Gly could fool our pathologists, he may be enough of a master of disguise to fix himself up to pass as the spitting image of Villon."

"You're speaking of Gly as if he was still alive."

"A habit of mine until I see the body," replied Finn. "Do you wish me to continue the investigation?"

"Yes, but I want everything kept confidential," said Sarveux. "Can you rely on your people to remain quiet?"

"Absolutely," Finn replied.