The Death Box

Morningstar and I brushed fingertips in an approximation of a handshake, though it was more like the gesture of two boxers. Roy took my arm and swung me toward the pit. We stepped down on hastily constructed stairs, the wood creaking beneath us.

“Now to get serious,” Roy said. “Damndest thing I’ve seen in twenty years in the biz.”

Three techs stepped aside as we walked to the object. Seemingly made of concrete, it resembled a carved column from a temple in ancient Egypt, its surface jagged and pitted with hollows, as though the sculptor had been called away before completion.

“More light,” Roy said.

The techs had been working with focused illumination. One of them widened the lighting, bringing the entire object into hard-edged relief.

A woman began screaming.

I didn’t hear the scream, I saw it. Pressing from the concrete was a woman’s face, eyes wide and mouth open in an expression of ultimate horror. She was swimming toward me, face breaking the surface of the concrete, one gray and lithic hand above, the other below, as if frozen in the act of stroking. The scenic was so graphic and lifelike that I gasped and felt my knees loosen.

Roy stepped toward me and I held my hand up, I’m fine, it lied. I caught my breath and saw ripples of concrete-encrusted fabric, within its folds a rock-hard foot. I moved to the side and saw another gray face peering from the concrete, the eyes replaced with sand and cement, bone peeking through shredded skin that appeared to have petrified on the cheeks. One temple was missing.

My hand rose unbidden to the shattered face.

“Don’t think of touching it,” Morningstar said.

My hand went to my pocket as I circled the frieze of despair: two more heads staring from the stone, surrounding them a jumble of broken body parts, hands, knees, shoulders. Broken bones stood out like studs.

My hands ached to touch the column, as if that might help me to understand whatever had happened. But I thrust them deeper into my pockets and finished my circle, ending up at the screaming woman, her dead face still alive in her terror.

“It was found yesterday,” Roy explained. “A worker was grading land when his blade banged a chunk of concrete. The foreman saw a mandible sticking out and called us. We had the excavation started within two hours.”

Most municipal departments would have needed a day to pull the pieces together, maybe longer. But that was the power of a state organization. The FCLE arrived, flashed badges, and went to work.

“What formed the column?” I asked.

Morningstar tapped the object. “The concrete was poured into an old rock-walled cistern. Stones initially surrounded the object, but the techs spent last night dislodging them.”

“Any idea when it was put here?”

“Could be a few months, could be two years. I’ll get closer as we analyze more samples.”

“You’re gonna find different times,” called a basso voice from above. “Older bodies, newer ones. The bottom bodies may go back years, decades even.”

I looked up at a guy on ground level, mid-forties or so, dark complexion, black suit, gray shirt. His sole concession to festivity was a colour-speckled tie that seemed from one of Jackson Pollock’s brighter days. The man’s gleaming black hair was swept back behind his ears. He wore dark sunglasses on a prize-winning proboscis, more like a beak. With the clothes, nose, and down-looking pose he called to mind a looming buzzard.

“What you been up to, Vincent?” Roy asked.

The guy brandished the briefcase. “Copying property records at the Dade County assessor’s office. Someone had to know the cistern was here, right?”

Roy nodded approvingly. “Come down into the hole, Vince. Got someone you should meet.”

I shook hands with Vincent Delmara, a senior investigator with the Miami-Dade County Police Department. Though the FCLE might swoop in and start bee-buzzing a crime scene, shutting out the locals invited turf wars which, in the long run, had no winners.

“You’re thinking these bodies were built up over time, not just dumped all at once?” Roy asked Delmara.

“We got us a serial killer,” Delmara exulted. “He’s been using the hole as a dumping ground over years. We’re gonna solve a shitload of disappearances.”

I understood Delmara’s enthusiasm. Miami-Dade, like any large metro area, had a backlog of missing persons. If this was a serial killer and the bodies were identified, a lot of cases could be cleared and families granted closure.

“I’m thinking he used an ax,” Delmara said. “He dumps the corpse in the cistern and pours in concrete to cover. They were supposed to stay hidden for ever, except development got in the way.”

“What do you think accounts for the brownish cast to the concrete?” I asked. “And the rusty streaks, like here?”

“Mud mixing with the cement. Dirt.”

Roy produced an unlit cigar to placate his fingers. “The only problem I got is picturing a guy mixing a tub of ’crete every time he dumps a body. It gets riskier with repetition.”

“Maybe he gets off on the risk,” Delmara said. “Mixes his concrete as an appetizer, dumps the body for his entree, jacks off into the hole for dessert.” Delmara circled his fingers and mimed the concept.

“For Christ’s sake,” Morningstar said.

“How many crime scenes you been at where jism’s squirted all over the place, Doctor Morningstar?” Delmara grinned. “More than a few, I’ll bet.”

I closed my eyes and pictured the area as if it were a time-lapse documentary, day turning into night and back to day, clouds stampeding across blue sky, white clouds turning black, sun becoming rain becoming sun again.

“Maybe the concrete was poured in dry to save time and risk,” I suggested. “Rain would soak the cement powder, time would harden it.”

“Genius,” Roy said, clapping a big paw on my shoulder. “No fuss, no muss, no mixing. Plus cement contains lime, which helps decomposition.” He looked at Delmara. “What you think, Vince?”

“Tasty.”

“You think we got us a serial killer, Carson?” Roy asked.

I turned to the column to study a splintered ulna, a severed tibia, a caved-in section of rib cage. Many seemed the kind of injuries I’d noted in car crashes. Whereas Delmara was seeing an ax used on the bodies, I was picturing a sledgehammer. Or both, the violence was that horrific. Something felt a shade off, though I couldn’t put my finger on it; having no better idea, I nodded.

“It’s the way to go for now.”

“Hell yes,” Delmara said, punching the air. “We’re gonna close some cases.”

Morningstar stepped forward. “Excuse me, boys. But if you’re done being brilliant, I’d like to get back to work.”

Delmara made notes. Roy and I retreated up the steps as Morningstar motioned her team back into place. The chipping of chisels began anew.

We stopped at the entrance. Roy lowered his voice. “Look, Carson, I want you to start work early and be the lead on this case.”

“No way,” I said.

“I need you, Carson.”

“Your people are gonna be drooling for this case, Roy. It’s a biggie.”

“How many bodies did John Wayne Gacy stack up under his house before he got nailed?” Roy said. “Twenty? Thirty? How about Juan Corona? We might have a grade-one psycho out there, Carson. Your specialty, right … the edge-walking freaks?”

“I’ve not even met your people, Roy. If I start by giving orders I’ll start by stepping on toes. Bad first step.”