Beverly Connor - Dust to Dust

The rule of excavating is to work from the known to the unknown-start with bone you can see and follow it into the debris, inch by inch. Diane’s tools were a trowel, a brush, and wooden tongue depressors so as not to harm the bone. It was slow work, but the ground was relatively soft clay, silt, and sandy soil. Fortunately, it was a dry well and had been for many years. Otherwise, they would be dealing with a whole other problem-a body that had decomposed in waterlogged soil. If she were dealing with a body that had become adipocere rather than skeletonized, it would be another whole level of unpleasantness.

The bones were a gray-brown color-the same as the surrounding soil. They stood out in relief like a piece of artwork. She brushed off a last clump of dirt and took a photograph. Diane moved to the edge of the well where she knelt and took several more photographs of the bones.

She asked for the basket, which David immediately lowered down to her on the end of the rope. She removed the skull first. She turned it over and brushed the dirt off it. What caught her eye at once was the cut in the back of the skull. There was little doubt in her mind that it would fit the pottery cast. Diane set the skull on batting in the basket and signaled for David to pull it up.

The vertebrae snaked from where the skull had been lying on its side, curving before terminating at the sacrum. When they winched the basket back down, she picked up the vertebrae one at a time and put them in the basket in order, along with the pelvis. It was a female pelvis, from a teen. She signaled David to hoist them up. Next she sent the ribs.

The rest of the bones were in disarray. Diane stopped and sat back on her haunches. The angular rocks behind the wire bit into her back. She folded her arms and sat for several moments, glad the webcams weren’t aimed at her face. She took several deep breaths.

When she worked as a human rights investigator in South America, there was a nun in the mission where they were housed who was forever giving them advice that sounded like Zen koans. Once when Diane and her crew became disturbed over a mass grave, she said, “In order to get close to them, you must get far away from them.” It was a concept they all knew and relied upon, but when Sister Margaret said it, it took on a more spiritual essence. Diane often had to stop and find that faraway place to put her emotions.

The remains had been butchered. Of course, she knew they would have been, if, indeed, these were the bones that were ground up for temper. But being confronted with the jumbled, cut bones was far more disconcerting than the intellectual knowledge of what had theoretically happened.

The arm bones were behind the body, upside down, as if someone threw them down the well after the torso was thrown in. They were broken-some from the falling rock, or the falling Hector, and some from the butchering. The shoulder blades were nothing more than spines of bone. The bodies of the scapulae were gone; only jagged edges remained. Scapulae were relatively thin. Probably they were easier to grind down than the heavier bones. She took several more photographs.

She picked up one of the long bones of the arm to place it in the basket. Under it lay another. That made three humeri. The minimum number of individuals in the well went from one to two. The bones represented at least two bodies. She placed the bones in the basket and watched as they were raised to the top.

“You want to take a break?” David called down.

“Not yet,” she said. “Send down some small boxes.”

She collected the hand bones, tiny pieces that belonged to the wrist and hand. Again there were bones that represented at least two people. She rough-sorted them into left and right and size. One of the individuals was larger than the other. Most of the hand bones were missing. There were not four complete sets. Maybe they were yet to be uncovered. Maybe they too had been ground into temper.

A piece of something caught her eye. It had been under the arm bones, and like the bones, was similar in color to the earth. But this object was not bone. She began gently teasing and sweeping the dirt away. She found the edges. It was something rolled up. She believed it was leather. Once she had outlined it in the soil and excavated a few inches under it, she carefully picked it up. It was surprisingly heavy. Something was wrapped inside it.

As she put it in the basket, the object came apart and two hammers fell out: a large iron mallet and a smaller hammer with a broad face. She paused again and wiped her forehead with the back of her hand. Damn it . She knew what it was. The bone hadn’t been ground; it had been pulverized. Bones had been put in the leather and pounded with the hammers. First the large hammer to break it up, then the smaller one for finer work. She sent it up and then she climbed the ladder to the surface. She needed a break.

Up top, Detective Hanks had been watching the computer screen with Mike. It looked as though Mike had been giving him a lecture-probably on soils, or Blue Ridge geology. Neva was wrapping the bones and packing them in boxes. Scott was helping. Topside around the well looked like a scene from Road Warriors -all scaffolding and cables that had a jury-rigged quality to it. Sparks popped from the flames of a wood fire that was burning for warmth.

When David helped her off the ladder, he stared at her face. She knew what he noticed. He’d seen it in her many times, as she in him when they were working on mass graves. That forlorn, hopeless look. The knowing that even if you brought the perpetrators to justice, it wouldn’t balance the scales, because you hadn’t prevented those victims from suffering; you hadn’t stopped the killing. David put his arms around her and hugged her. The others looked up, a little alarmed, as if she might be hurt.

“Are you all right?” said Neva.

“Sure,” said Diane. “I’m just taking a break.” She tried a weak smile.

She greeted Detective Hanks as David put a cold bottle of water in her hand.

“Have you been here very long?” she said.

“Not too long. I’ve been working with Sheriff Braden. Thanks for the introduction. He’s been easy to work with,” he said.

“That’s good. The county sheriffs don’t always welcome Rosewood detectives,” she said, grinning at him. “I assume my crew has been bringing you up to speed on what we’re doing?”

“I’ve been watching you on the laptop. I’m not sure it’s helped very much. Kind of like watching paint dry, if you know what I mean. No offense. Mike’s been telling me about…” He looked at Mike. “What was that word?”

“Inceptisol,” said Mike.

Mike grinned and winked at Diane after Hanks turned back around to her. He had probably been purposely pedantic-something Mike enjoyed doing to unsuspecting people.

“Yeah, which, as I understand it, is dirt-that, soil horizons, and nice rocks. Like I said, it’s like the Discovery Channel around you guys.” He took Diane’s arm.“I thought I’d fill you in on what Braden told me.”

They sat on Marcella’s front porch. Diane took her helmet off and set it down by her feet. She hugged her brown nylon jacket around her against the cool breeze. Hanks gestured toward the helmet.

“Neva and Mike tell me that all of you explore caves together,” he said.

Diane nodded. “We do, as often as we can. I particularly enjoy mapping unexplored caves,” she said.

“Is that dangerous?” he asked, staring at her hard hat.

“It can be,” she said, “but we practice safety.”

Hanks nodded, looking back at Diane. “Mike talks a lot about rocks,” he said. “Tell me, do women really dig that?”

“They do, but I think it’s the whole package they like,” said Diane, smiling. “Mike is one of our more popular continuing education instructors.”