Dead Secret

clothing. David was there looking for fingerprints on the photograph.
    “I found something interesting,” she said as she put the memory stick in the lab computer and called up the pictures.
    “What is that?” said David. “Looks sort of like a robotic sperm, or perhaps an android tadpole.”
    “It’s an eye shunt. It’s used in glaucoma patients to drain the eye fluid and relieve pressure.”
    “Where did you find it?”
    “In Jane Doe’s eye socket. The best part is, this little deal has a serial number.” Diane looked at him and grinned broadly.
    “Well, damn, I wonder if we can track her from the number?”
    “We can try.”
    “I’ll get on it when I finish here. I took a swab of the photograph before I dusted it for prints. Besides dirt, there was some other stuff on it.”
    “Work’s piling up, isn’t it?”
    “Have you thought about hiring an extra person?” said David.
    “I’ve thought about it. What I haven’t thought about is how to approach Chief Garnett. Let’s get through this. We’ll do a time audit on ourselves and I’ll make a proposal to him. When he finds out we all have to work overtime just to get the normal work done, perhaps he’ll let me hire additional criminalists.”
    “It would be good. You’re only supposed to be part-time. If I’m not mistaken, you work full-time in both your jobs. Not much time for a life away from the office.”
    “Frank has to work long hours too, so we’re well suited in that respect.”
    “Why don’t you two get married?”
    “Why don’t you mind your own business?” she said without rancor. “Things are good the way they are.” Diane wondered why everyone wanted her to marry. Things were just fine.
    David opened his mouth and shut it again. “You and Frank seem like a good match to me,” he said finally. “You are always happy together. At least move away from those neighbors.” He looked at the photograph. “No prints, just smears.”
    “I have been thinking about a house,” said Diane.
    “It’s good to have goals outside of work,” said David. “Dead bodies can start weighing on your psyche . . . as you know.”
    “How about you? What would you like to do?”
    “I’ve been considering teaching some photography courses at the tech school.”
    “We have workshops at the museum. Why don’t you work up a plan and submit it to me—like bird photography?” suggested Diane. “You can make an exhibit of your bird photographs.”
    David looked up from his work, surprised. “That’s a good idea. I’d like that. I would. There are a lot of nice places on the nature trail to get pictures. Thanks. I’ll do that.” He nodded his head up and down. “Yeah. Good idea.”
    “Unless you have any more suggestions about my private life, I need to finish Mrs. Doe.”
    “Mrs.?”
    “A guess. There’s a wedding band among the detritus. No engraving.” Diane put the evidence in one of the drawers and labeled it JANE DOE.
    Diane went back to the lab and worked on Jane Doe. A sad-sounding name , she thought. Jane Doe lying dead in the woods, and no one knowing where you are or who you are.
    She examined the pelvis and discovered that Jane had probably given birth. She had arthritis in the knees, hands, shoulders and back. Her pelvis was thin, and so were several of her vertebrae. Her left radius was broken, and there was no sign of healing. Deputy Singer hadn’t done it with his shovel. It had happened around the time she died. The deputy had broken two of her ribs, however.
    Jane Doe was Caucasoid, in her eighties, and was about five feet, two inches tall and stooped when she walked. She was left-handed. She was a small, elderly woman, and someone broke her arm, strangled her, cut her with a knife from head to toe and dumped her body in the woods for Deputy Singer to come along and violate with his shovel.
    Diane hoped it wasn’t a serial killer. She didn’t want to think about more anonymous people lying alone in the woods waiting to be found. She took Jane Doe’s bones in the other room, where she had a colony of dermestid beetles. Nothing could clean bones like they could. Their mouth parts were enormously strong for their small size, and they loved dried flesh. The dermestarium was kept separate from the room where the bodies were examined to reduce the chance the colony would be contaminated by mites that lived on beetles from the wild. A mite infestation could wipe them out. The museum’s colony came from a