Page 9 of Shadow of Death
It was crazy.Why would the little horses be so visible both in the pit and sent to Andy?
In the pit...maybe it was part of someone’s idealism on what they were doing. But to have a horse sent to Andy...
Was there someone out there who did want the killers caught?
One of the older medical examiners, a man of medium height and build with thinning gray hair—the man Andy had pointed out as Mike Adler—made his way toward them, shaking his head. “This isn’t just murder,” he said. “It’s torture.”
“Were the victims dead when they were deposited here—killed by other means?” Hunter asked. “Of course, we were lucky and found the one young woman alive. But on the others—assessing what I could without possibly destroying something forensics might find—I didn’t see any gunshot wounds or anything that indicated the use of a knife or other weapon.”
“No. No. No bullets, no knives—nothing that would have been quick and merciful. And that’s what I mean—being left to starve in muck and darkness, knowing help will never come?” he said. “They died slowly. Some faster than others. We need to do autopsies on all the victims, but they’ve died from the elements—or because their hearts or lungs gave out—or they starved. Oh. I’m sorry,” he said, looking at Hunter. “I’m Dr. Mike Adler, lead ME.”
“Special Agent Hunter Forrest,” Hunter told him.
“Main FBI,” Adler acknowledged knowingly. “Well, let’s hope you can help. Sorry, Andy! No offense, I just... Well, hell. This is bad.”
“I am not offended. I want all-hands-on-deck,” Andy assured him.
“Right,” Adler said. “And we’re going to take any help we can get, too. Anyway, we’ll start with the autopsies in the morning. These bodies...” He paused, grimacing. “In time, we see almost everything, but this...so many. They are going to need a lot of work. Anyway... Special Agent Forrest, welcome and thank you for being here.”
“Thankyoufor your work,” Hunter returned, lifting a hand as Adler headed off to one of the boats that would bring him across to the morgue vehicles.
“We need to get identifications,” Andy murmured. “I don’t think we’ll have much until tomorrow, if then. I’m going to head into the office and get started on going through our missing persons reports. Oh, I’ll drop your suitcases at the hotel—and one of the police officers will get you to the hotel. I’ll have your bags taken straight to the room; and in the morning, you can ask at the counter for the keys to your vehicle. Um, Amy will tell us immediately if she gets anything from Carey Allen?”
“Of course, she will,” Hunter assured him.
“And you—”
“I want to go back through the caves.”
“The forensic teams here are good,” Andy assured him.
“I know that. I just need to look around a little more for myself.”
“All right. Go for it,” Andy told him.
Hunter lifted a hand again as Andy walked to the edge of the rocks and hopped into one of the little tour boats run by the rangers.
Hunter turned and headed back into the caves. One thing was bothering him. To reach the pit, they’d all used the boats or hopped in the water as he and Amy had done.
Of course, it was possible the victims had been rendered unconscious or unable to resist, but dragging them through the water and over the rocks wouldn’t be an easy task.
Hunter believed there were more ways to the pit—ways that might lead out to a far easier access.
He meant to find it.
It was beyond gratifying to know the fact she and Hunter had moved so quickly had apparently saved a life. Carey Allen had been lucky. She had no broken bones; and other than dehydration and exposure, she had suffered no other ill effects.
Dr. Emil Firestone, in charge of Carey’s case at the hospital, told Amy that Carey had two main factors which had worked in her favor—she was young and she was in excellent health.
“You take someone with pulmonary or cardiac issues and put them in a position like that, and well, I don’t think that person would be so lucky. But we’ll have to wait for ME reports to find out what happened to the others.”
Amy winced. “Do you believe...some resorted to cannibalism?”
“I’m not a neurologist or psychiatrist but I believe in a pitch dark hole in a sea of mud for days on end, and if physical deprivations didn’t kill first, a person’s mind might well unhinge. I talked to Mike—sorry, Mike Adler, one of our medical examiners on the case—and his preliminary report suggests no one was attacked by another in the cave. There were eighteen people down there besides Miss Carey Allen. He believes several deaths were the result of heart attacks. Others were dehydration and starvation. The victims must be identified, of course. The caves themselves helped with strange levels of decomposition. However, it appears whatever small blessing it might be, there were no children brought there to die.”
“Small blessing,” Amy agreed. “May I speak with Carey? I promise, I’ll keep it brief.”
“Give it another fifteen minutes. I’d like her oxygen saturation to be a bit better. Are you all right with that?”
