Dead Past

objects that might hold DNA or other clues to victims’ identities. Diane didn’t recognize the policewoman. She thought she was learning all the personnel on the force, but apparently there had been some recent additions.
    This young woman looked just out of the academy. In fact, her smooth unlined face looked like she could still be in high school. She was unloading a grocery bag, setting boxes of different sizes of Ziploc freezer bags on the desk.
    Lynn Webber walked on past to a waiting cup of hot coffee, but Diane stopped at the desk.
    “Hi.” She hoped she sounded friendly. “Are those all the bags for holding objects for comparison DNA samples?”
    “And you are?” said the young woman without looking up from her task.
    “I’m sorry.” Diane held out the identification that hung around her neck. “I’m Diane Fallon. I’m head of the Crime Lab here in Rosewood.”
    The woman looked up and gave her a tight smile. “Yes, I’m to collect the samples from the parents.”
    “Plastic bags are good for transporting evidence,” Diane said. “But for storage, plastic isn’t right for all evidence. Let me bring you some evidence bags. . . .”
    “My sergeant told me to get these.” Her voice was curt; she broke eye contact and continued unloading the plastic bags.
    “If a parent brings in a damp bath towel, for example, it would . . .”
    “I do what my sergeant tells me.”
    “Of course you do. I’m sorry to have brought it up to you.” Diane took her phone from her pocket, flipped it open, and called Garnett. “Chief Garnett, I would like the evidence from family members collected in the evidence bags from our lab, and I need you to talk to the sergeant in charge so he can change the orders of the patrolman at the scene here.”
    Diane paused. The policewoman looked at her, wide-eyed. She sat back and expelled her breath in a huff.
    “I’m in the coffee tent, or whatever you call it. The police are setting up a desk here to receive the samples.”
    Diane paused again, listening to Garnett. “I did tell her myself. She is very into chain of command.” Diane handed the phone to the policewoman. “It’s Chief Garnett. He wants to speak to you.”
    The young woman took the phone hesitantly, eying Diane as she said hello.
    “Sergeant Davis told me . . .” She stopped talking for several moments. “Yes, sir,” she said and handed the phone back to Diane.
    “I’ll have someone bring you the proper bags and boxes,” said Diane, punching Neva’s cell number. She told Neva what she wanted and apologized for pulling her off the scene. Diane was thinking that things like this could be avoided if she gave workshops to the police on collecting evidence. They had resisted the notion, but she’d talk to Garnett about it again.
    Diane smiled and thanked the policewoman, but she could see she hadn’t made a friend. Great, she thought, I’ll never get on good terms with the police.
    The other two medical examiners, Pilgrim and Rankin, were in a corner, sitting on a couple of folding chairs and drinking from steaming Styrofoam cups. She waved at them and headed in their direction. They had barricaded themselves in with folding chairs held in place by their booted feet. Their bodies looked relaxed, but their faces showed deep frowns. Rankin was on his cell phone. Lynn was a few feet away, drinking her coffee with an amused expression. She handed Diane a cup as she walked by.
    “It’s good coffee,” Lynn said, grinning at Diane. “You were so nice. I’d have ripped her a new one.”
    “She was only doing what she was told. It always amazes me how little influence I have.”
    Lynn’s laugh was almost a giggle. The two of them pulled up chairs and sat across from Rankin and Pilgrim.
    “I just got off the phone with Whit,” said Rankin, shifting his position and putting his cell phone back on his belt. “He’s thinking there may be as many as thirty bodies.”

Chapter 5

    Diane stood at a shiny stainless steel table in the cold morgue tent, looking down at a shock of blond hair held together by an iridescent blue clip. The hair and a small bit of scalp were attached to a piece of parietal bone from the right side of a skull.
    Explosions and fires are odd. They consume or blacken most everything, but occasionally there are surprising anomalies, such as this beautiful lock of blond hair—almost untouched, somehow thrown free in the explosion, along with scalp and bone.
    Diane measured the