Dead Man's Song (Pine Deep 2)

“I may be staying at Val’s for a couple of days. ”

“Wait…you want me to run the store by myself?”

“Yeah. ”

Mike sat there, too stunned to even feel pain. “Alone?”

“Yeah…good with that?” Crow paused. “Mike—I’m counting on you here. ”

“Crow, I don’t know if I—”

“Yes, you can. Jeez, kid, you know the layout of that store better than I do. The register is a snap, and you can open up right after school each day. Mornings and early afternoon are never my best times anyway, so you working afternoons and evenings will keep me out of the poorhouse. Besides, let’s face it, isn’t the store a better place to spend your days than hanging around the house?”

That said it all. Mike could not talk about Vic with anyone, not even Crow, but he knew that Crow understood. He felt tears stinging in the corners of his eyes. “Crow…I…”

“Dude,” Crow cut him off, “if you are planning to make some kind of ‘I won’t let you down’ speech, then save it. Both of us hurt too much for that and besides it’s way too After-School Special for either of us. Just say, ‘Thanks, Crow, you’re one helluva guy. ’”

Mike laughed. “Thanks, Crow, you’re one helluva guy. ”

“This I know. Now, I called Judy from the yarn place across the street, and she’ll keep her eye on you if I’m not there. She has the same kind of register if you have questions. ”

“Wow,” Mike said. “Okay…this sounds great. ”

(8)

Saul Weinstock said, “Turn him over,” and watched as his nurse tugged the cold, limp body of Nels Cowan on its side. Bending close, Weinstock examined the buttocks, the backs of the thighs. He frowned and reached for a scalpel. “Hold him steady,” he said and plunged the razor sharp blade into the corpse’s white left buttock, then drew a long line down toward the top of the thigh. He removed the scalpel and stared at the black mouth of the wound. “That’s weird,” he said.

The male nurse, still supporting the ponderous weight of the corpse, peered over its shoulder. “What’s weird?”

“Well, as you know, when the heart stops pumping, all of the blood settles down to the lowest points on the body, it gathers in the buttocks, the backs of the thighs, the back, so the procedure to drain the blood is to open those areas and let the blood drain out. ”

“Uh huh,” said the nurse, who did know this and wondered why he was getting a lecture.

“So, tell me, Barney,” said Weinstock, “what’s wrong with this picture?”

The nurse looked again. “Oh,” he said after a handful of seconds.

“Yes indeed,” agreed Weinstock. “Oh. ”

“There’s no—”

“Not a drop. ”

“None?”

“None,” said Weinstock flatly.

Barney lowered the body back onto the stainless steel table. “Well, doctor, look at all the massive trauma to the neck and chest. Surely with all that flesh torn away the blood would have drained out. ”

Weinstock shook his head. “Doesn’t work that way. No matter how traumatic a wound, there is pretty much no way to completely exsanguinate a body short of hanging it upside down after decapitation. This body is completely drained. Look at the face, at the arms. The veins are collapsed, the body is shrunken. ”

“He was lying out there in the mud,” Barney said. “Maybe the blood just drained into the mud. ”

Weinstock thought about that, then shook his head. “Nope. I saw the crime scene photos. I read Dr. Colbert’s report. There was some blood, true enough, but not nearly enough. ”

“Then…what?”

“Hell if I know,” Weinstock said, and then shrugged. “Okay, now I want to take a look at the other guy. Castle. Wheel him out here. Let’s look at him right now. ”