Chris Carter: Gallery of the Dead

‘Yeah, OK,’ Garcia agreed.

White also nodded.

‘And as you can see,’ Hunter continued, still indicating as he spoke, ‘whoever did this used only straight lines, no curves, which gives us two options. One — he drew some of the letters this way on purpose, or two — he wasn’t paying that much attention to precision as he drew them. Nevertheless, what we are left with here are several lines that fail to connect where they were supposed to, either by falling short or missing the target altogether. That’s why some of these look more like symbols than letters.’

Garcia, White and Tommy, who had stopped taking pictures to concentrate on Hunter’s explanation, still looked very confused.

Hunter tried to clarify.

‘Like here, for example. This is supposed to be a “P”.’ Hunter used his finger to redraw the letter over the existing carved one without touching the victim, but this time he used a curved line. ‘And this is a “D”.’ He repeated the process. ‘Some are also very skewed and out of line, which makes it a lot harder to see it, like here — this is supposed to be an “H”, this is an “M”, this is an “S”, and this is a “C”.’

As Hunter redrew the letters with his fingers, his argument began to make a lot more sense.

‘I’ll be damned,’ White said, his eyes widening at the markings. The puzzle was beginning to come together for him, but it still wasn’t quite there yet.

‘The next problem we have—’ Hunter wasn’t done yet, ‘—is that as everyone can see, we have four distinct horizontal lines here, which would suggest that we also have four different words, but we don’t.’

Garcia was still staring at the carvings, but the look in his eyes was a very lost one.

‘How many words do we have?’ White asked.

‘Three,’ Hunter replied. ‘But they’ve been split at completely random places to form four lines. If you give me a piece of paper and a pen I’ll show you.’

‘I can get you one,’ Tommy said, walking over to his camera case, which he had left by the bedroom door. A couple of seconds later he handed Hunter a notepad and a pencil.

‘So this is the first line.’

Hunter said each letter out loud as he first indicated it on the victim’s back, before writing it on the notepad.

Finally Hunter showed them what he had written.

PULCHR.

ITUDOCI.

RCUMD.

ATEIUS.

‘What the fuck?’ Garcia said, as he and White placed the body back onto a lying position.

He knew that Hunter saw things differently than most people did. His brain worked differently too, especially when it came to putting puzzles together, but sometimes Hunter did more than surprise him, he scared him.

‘How the hell did you manage to see all that from these crazy cuts to her back, and so fast, too?’

‘I was just about to ask you the same thing,’ White said. ‘Have you seen something like this before?’

Hunter shook his head before playing it down. ‘No, never. Maybe it was the angle I was looking at them.’

White’s attention returned to the piece of paper Hunter had shown them. ‘Pulchritudocircumdateius.’ He first read it at an overly slow pace and as a single word before finally splitting the three words correctly. ‘Pulchritudo Circumdat Eius.’ His pronunciation was spot on.

Garcia’s eyebrows arched, as his stare ping-ponged between Hunter and White. ‘Unfortunately the last time I spoke Latin was — never. What the hell does it mean? Does anyone know? Is it supposed to be some sort of Devil incantation or something?’

‘No.’ This time it was White who shook his head. ‘I don’t think so.’

‘So what is it?’

‘If I’m not mistaken,’ White replied, ‘it means — Beauty is all around her.’

‘That’s correct,’ Hunter confirmed. ‘Beauty is all around her... beauty surrounds her. The words in English may vary, but the meaning is the same.’

For a moment Garcia paused and looked around the room again in astonished disbelief, his gaze moving from blood smudge to blood smudge. ‘Beauty is all around her? What beauty?’

White’s stare followed Garcia’s. It was then that a thought came to him. ‘You wanted to know what all this was?’ He addressed the detective. ‘All this blood everywhere for no apparent reason? Maybe you’re right. Maybe all these smudges were done on purpose. Maybe this killer believes he’s...’ White cringed at his own suggestion, ‘... an artist or something. Maybe to him...’ He nodded at the skinned and mutilated body. ‘All this — the victim, the room, the blood, the position he left her, all of it — is nothing more than a... morbid art piece.’

Hunter could feel goose bumps kiss the back of his neck. He took a step back and tried to take in the whole scene one more time.

‘The carvings to the victim’s back...’ White said in conclusion, ‘they could be just how the killer chose to sign his work.’

Before anyone could reply, the female forensics agent who had been dusting the surfaces in the living room for latent prints appeared at the door to the bedroom.

‘Jesus Christ!’ she said, her expression one of sheer disgust. ‘Whoever this killer is, he’s one sick sonofabitch.’

Everyone frowned at her.

‘You guys better come and have a look at this.’

Hunter, Garcia and White followed the agent out of the bedroom and through the short hallway that led back into the living room, but contrary to what they were expecting, the agent didn’t direct them to any of the surfaces she’d been dusting for prints, nor did she lead them to the front door or the outside of the house. Instead, she took a right as they entered the living room and guided everyone into a sharp-lined, modern-looking kitchen.

The kitchen was surprisingly spacious, with black granite worktops running along three of the walls and contrasting perfectly with the shiny white floors and cupboard doors. The chrome extractor unit above the black stove matched the stainless-steel sink and the wall-mounted oven. A large double window, directly above the sink, would no doubt bring more than enough sunlight into the kitchen during daytime. The fridge, the freezer and the dishwasher were all hidden behind cupboard doors, making the kitchen look and feel clean and decluttered, and that was exactly the first thing Hunter noticed as he stepped into the room — how clean it all seemed to be. There was no real mess anywhere. No crumbs or leftovers on any of the surfaces, including the floor. Nothing to be put away, except three items left inside the sink — a fork, a small salad bowl and a wine glass. The wine glass and the salad bowl were both empty. The glass showed residues of red wine and a very noticeable red lipstick smudge around its rim.

‘I finished with all the surfaces in the living room,’ the agent explained. ‘Second in line was the kitchen.’ She nodded at her equipment case on the floor, to the right of the door.

Despite her steady voice, Hunter picked up a sincere hint of distress in her tone. While she spoke, his eyes carried on scanning the room.

‘As I’m sure you have already noticed,’ the agent continued, ‘every appliance in this kitchen, except for the oven and the microwave, sit hidden behind one of the cupboard doors.’

She indicated the first door on the far left, under the worktop that hugged the east wall.

‘We have a dishwasher right here,’ she said, before diverting their attention to the two tall doors that flanked the wall-mounted oven on the west side of the kitchen. ‘Over there you’ll find the fridge on the left and the freezer on the right.’ She paused and took a deep breath. ‘Why don’t you go ahead and have a look inside the freezer?’