Aaron Elkins - Unnatural Selection

From someone else it would have been hyperbole, but Gideon had the impression Clapper was telling it as it was, without any self-inflating embellishments.

“Now the one thing I can use their assistance on is with the postmortem. Nothing against Davey Gillie, of course, but the man would be the first to admit that he’s not forensically trained. Since Teddy has already arranged for an autopsy with the Force pathologist at Treliske, I’ve let that stand. A helicopter is on its way to pick up the body even as we speak. Kyle, you’ll want to get hold of Davey right now and tell him to keep his bloody hands off the corpse.”

Robb immediately got on the telephone while Clapper clasped his hands behind his head and leaned back in his chair, savoring his victory and the job ahead.

“Just in time, Sarge, they say the body’s already on the autopsy table. Dr. Gillie’s about to get started.”

“Well, tell him to stop where he is and get the body bagged up. Have him send off whatever he’s written up, too. Oh, and see that a copy of our report goes out to Treliske along with the body as well.”

Clapper, content and serene, leaned back and re-clasped his hands, but suddenly sat up straight and smacked his forehead. “Gideon, I forgot, I’ve left the pathologist hanging on the blower. He asked to speak with you. You can take it in my office, line one, if he’s still there.”

“With me? About what?” Puzzled, Gideon got up.

“He didn’t say. I happened to mention your being here, and he said would that be Dr. Gideon Oliver, the Skeleton Detective, and I said yes, and he said, may I speak with the gentleman, and there the matter stands.”

In Clapper’s office, Gideon leaned over the desk to punch line one and picked up the phone.

“This is Gideon Oliver. Sorry to keep you waiting.”

“Not at all, not at all!” a bluff, jolly voice declared. “How are you, old friend?”

The voice was only vaguely familiar. “I’m sorry, I don’t-”

“This is Wilson Merrill!” the voice cried, after which there was an expectant pause.

It took Gideon a second to make the connection, but when he did, it was with real pleasure. “Wilson!” he said. “How good to hear your voice. Do I understand that you’re the Cornwall and Devon pathologist now?”

“Indeed, yes. My aged mother lives in Falmouth, and Lydia and I are happily settled here now. I left the Dorset Constabulary two years ago. We had some fun there, didn’t we? Remember Inspector Bagshawe?”

Gideon remembered, all right. In the annals of successful police bogglement, the experience with Detective Inspector Bagshawe of the Dorset CID was at the top of his list. Gideon had been staying in the coastal village of Char-mouth in connection with an archaeological dig nearby, and a rotted corpse had turned up in the bay. Merrill, who knew Gideon by reputation, had been responsible for the autopsy. He had asked Gideon to attend, which Gideon, who hated autopsies-especially on corpses well along the road to putrescence-had reluctantly done. As it turned out, there was so little soft tissue to work with that Merrill had simply turned the remains over to him to see what could be gotten from the skeleton. In less than an hour’s time, Gideon had emerged from the autopsy room with his conclusions.

The unidentified body, he told Merrill and the supercilious (until then) Bagshawe, was that of a large motorcycle-rider in his mid-thirties who also, by the way, happened to be a left-handed baseball pitcher (not a cricket-bowler, a baseball pitcher!). Might that possibly be of some help in identifying him?

“Fun” is not something that is generally associated with forensic anthropology, but this was surely as close to fun as it ever got. Bagshawe’s big, curving cherrywood pipe had actually fallen from his mouth and clattered to the table, scattering ash and tobacco shreds. And the delighted Merrill couldn’t have been more pleased. He’d come near to embracing him.

“You bet I remember,” a laughing Gideon said now. “Wilson, it’s really nice of you to say hello. You know, I’m not exactly sure where Treliske is-”

“It’s a neighborhood in Truro, really.”

“Well, I don’t really know where Truro is either, but-”

“Just up the road from Trelissick,” Wilson told him unhelpfully.

“-but maybe we can get together before I leave. It’d be nice to-”

“I didn’t want to speak to you merely to say hello, old man.”

“You didn’t?”

“No. I want to invite you to the postmortem! Lend a hand, don’t you know.”

He made it sound as if he’d just invited Gideon to a private reception at the White House. It was Gideon’s experience that forensic pathologists in general were a happy, outgoing crew, but he had never met another one quite as exuberant as Wilson Merrill, or one who found so much challenge and fulfillment in the grisly work that took place on the slanted metal tables. But for the notoriously squeamish Gideon, watching a human body get debrained and disemboweled to conduct a postmortem had about as much allure as watching one get dismembered to conceal a murder; namely, zero. And “lending a hand” made it less than zero.

“To the postmortem?” Gideon said, trying for surprised delight. “Well, I really appreciate that, Wilson, and of course I’d like to come but, I’m not sure how I’d get there-”

“No problem there, Gideon! The helicopter should be arriving at St. Mary’s any time now for the body. You could ride back here with it.”

“Umm… well, I’d like to, of course, but I do have some things to do here-”

“Nonsense. You can spare a few hours. We’ll have you back in St. Mary’s by teatime.”

“Oh. Well, actually…”

“I’ll see you in an hour, then. It will be a treat to work with you again. We’ll have a jolly time of it, you’ll see!”

“I’m looking forward to it, Wilson,” Gideon managed. It wasn’t the first time he’d been overwhelmed by Wilson Merrill.

Or in this case, only partly overwhelmed. He had to admit that he was extremely interested in having a look at those “complex trauma” of Joey’s skull to which Dr. Gillie had referred. It was the process of getting down to the skull that he wasn’t looking forward to.

Back in Robb’s cubicle, he was explaining what the call was about when a clatter overhead drew all three men’s eyes to the window. A red helicopter was descending mantislike toward the open space of Holgate’s Green. “Cornwall Air Ambulance,” it said on the side.

“Your conveyance, I believe,” said Clapper.

“Mine and Joey’s,” Gideon said.

Truro is a venerable cathedral and market town, but the Royal Cornwall Hospital at Treliske, on its western outskirts, is sleek, modern, and well-equipped, with its gleaming basement mortuary being no exception. The waiting room, mercifully unoccupied at the moment by any apprehensive, fearful relatives or friends, was living-room friendly, with plum-colored fabric on the walls, homey furniture, flowers, coffee-table picture books, and up-to-date magazines. Having announced himself to the receptionist, Gideon had finished an article on human cloning (“Another you-the next best thing to teleportation”) in New Scientist and was starting one on a methane-spewing volcano that had been discovered on one of Saturn’s moons, when his host came barreling through the door from the interior.

Wilson Merrill in the flesh, was, if anything, even heartier than he was on the telephone. A ruddy, stocky, country-squireish sort of man who radiated bluff good humor, he stuck out a blunt-fingered hand in greeting. “Well, well, it seems the Dynamic Duo is back in business again.”

“It’s good to see you, Wilson,” Gideon said.