Douglas Preston - The Cabinet of Curiosities

DR. BILL DOWSON lounged against the sink, examining his precisely trimmed fingernails without interest. One more, then lunch. Thank God. A cup of coffee and a BLT at the corner deli would hit the spot. He wasn’t sure why he wanted a BLT, exactly: maybe it was the lividity of the last stiff that started him thinking about bacon. Anyway, that Dominican behind the deli counter had elevated the sandwich into an art form. Dowson could practically taste the crisp lettuce, the tang of tomato against the mayonnaise…

The nurse brought in the clipboard and he glanced up. She had short black hair and a trim body. He glanced at the clipboard without picking it up and smiled at her.

“What have we here?” he asked.

“Homicide.”

He gave an exaggerated sigh, rolled his eyes. “What is that, the fourth today? It must be hunting season. Gunshot?”

“No. Some kind of multiple stabbing. They found it in Central Park, in the Ramble.”

He nodded. “The dumping ground, eh? Figures.” Great. Another piece-of-shit killing. He glanced at his watch. “Bring it in, please.”

He watched the nurse walk out. Nice, very nice. She returned a moment later with a gurney, covered by a green sheet.

He made no move toward the body. “So, how about that dinner tonight?”

The nurse smiled. “I don’t think it’s a good idea, Doctor.”

“Why not?”

“I’ve told you before. I don’t date doctors. Especially ones I work with.”

He nodded, pushed down his glasses, and grinned. “But I’m your soul mate, remember?”

She smiled. “Hardly.”

But he could tell she was flattered by his interest. Better not push it, though, not these days. Sexual harassment and all that.

He sighed, eased himself off the sink. Then he pulled on a fresh pair of gloves. “Turn on the videocams,” he said to the nurse as he prepped.

“Yes, Doctor.”

He picked up the clipboard. “Says here we have a Caucasian woman, identified as Doreen Hollander, age 27, of Pine Creek, Oklahoma. Identified by her husband.” He scanned the rest of the top sheet. Then he hung the clipboard on the gurney, drew on his surgical mask, and with the nurse’s help lifted the sheeted corpse onto the stainless steel examining table.

He sensed a presence behind him and turned. In the doorway was a tall, slender man. His face and hands looked remarkably pale against the black of his suit. Behind the man stood a uniformed cop.

“Yes?” Dowson asked.

The man approached, opening his wallet. “I’m Special Agent Pendergast, Dr. Dowson. And this is Sergeant O’Shaughnessy of the NYPD.”

Dowson looked him over. This was very irregular. And there was something strange about the man: hair so very blond, eyes so very pale, accent so very, very southern. “And?”

“May I observe?”

“This an FBI case?”

“No.”

“Where’s your clearance?”

“I don’t have one.”

Dowson sighed with irritation. “You know the rules. You can’t just watch for the hell of it.”

The FBI agent took a step closer to him, closer than he liked, invading his personal space. He controlled an impulse to step backward.

“Look, Mr. Pendergast, get the necessary paperwork and come back. Okay?”

“That will be time-consuming,” said the man named Pendergast. “It will hold you up considerably. I would appreciate your courtesy in letting us observe.”

There was something in the man’s tone that sounded a lot harder than the mellifluous accent and genteel words suggested. Dowson hesitated. “Look, with all due respect—”

“With all due respect, Dr. Dowson, I’m in no mood to bandy civilities with you. Proceed with the autopsy.”

The voice was now cold as dry ice. Dowson remembered the videocam was on. He glanced covertly at the nurse. He had a strong sense that a humiliation at the hands of this man might be just around the corner. This would not look good and it might cause trouble later. The guy was FBI, after all. Anyway, his own ass was covered: he was on record stating the man needed clearance.

Dowson sighed. “All right, Pendergast. You and the sergeant, don scrubs.”

He waited until they returned, then pulled back the sheet with a single motion. The cadaver lay on its back: blonde hair, young, fresh. The chill of the previous night had kept it from decomposing. Dowson leaned toward the mike and began a description. The FBI man was looking at the corpse with interest. But Dowson could see that the uniformed cop was beginning to look uneasy, shifting from one foot to another, lips pressed tight together. The last thing he needed was a puker.

“Is he going to be all right?” Dowson asked Pendergast in an undertone, nodding to the cop.

Pendergast turned. “You don’t have to see this, Sergeant.”

The cop swallowed, glancing from the corpse to Pendergast and back again. “I’ll be in the lounge.”

“Drop your scrubs in the bin on your way out,” said Dowson with sarcastic satisfaction.

Pendergast watched the cop leave. Then he turned to Dowson. “I suggest you turn the body over before making your Y-incision.”

“And why is that?”

Pendergast nodded toward the clipboard. “Page two.”

Dowson picked it up, flipped over the top page. Extensive lacerations… deep knife wounds… Looked like the girl had been stabbed repeatedly in the lower back. Or worse. As usual, it was hard to make out from the police report what had actually taken place, from a medical standpoint. There had been no investigating ME. It had been given a low priority. This Doreen Hollander didn’t count for much, it seemed.

Dowson returned the clipboard. “Sue, help me turn her over.”

They turned the body, exposing the back. The nurse gasped and stepped away.

Dowson stared in surprise. “Looks like she died on the operating table, in the middle of an operation to remove a spinal tumor.” Had they screwed up again downstairs? Just last week — twice — they had sent him the wrong paperwork with the wrong corpse. But immediately Dowson realized this was no hospital stiff. Not with dirt and leaves sticking to the raw wound that covered the entire lower back and sacrum area.

This was weird. Seriously weird.

He peered closer and began describing the wound for the benefit of the camera, trying to keep the surprise out of his voice.

“Superficially, this does not resemble the random knife slashing, stabbing, or cutting described in the report. It has the appearance of — of a dissection. The incision — if it is one — begins about ten inches below the scapula and seven inches above the belt line. It appears as if the entire cauda equina has been dissected out, starting at L1 and terminating at the sacrum.”

At this, the FBI agent looked at him abruptly.

“The dissection includes the filum terminale.” Dowson bent closer. “Nurse, sponge along here.”

The nurse removed some of the debris around the wound. The room had fallen silent except for the whirr of the camera, and there was a clattering sound as twigs and leaves slid into the table’s drainage channel.

“The spinal cord — more precisely, the cauda equina — is missing. It has been removed. The dissection extends peripherally to the neuroforamen and out to the transverse processes. Nurse, irrigate L1 to L5.”

The nurse quickly irrigated the requested area.

“The, er, dissection has stripped off the skin, the subcutaneous tissue, and paraspinous musculature. It appears as if a self-retaining retractor was used. I can see the marks of it here, and here, and here.” He carefully indicated the areas for the benefit of the video.

“The spinous processes and laminae have been removed, along with the ligamentum flavum. The dura is still present. There is a longitudinal incision in the dura from L1 to the sacrum, allowing full removal of the cord. It has the appearance of a… of a very professional incision. Nurse, the stereozoom.”