CEDAR CREEK, MICHIGAN: THE BODY

“Christ, Barney. You can’t have the love of your life gradually fade away and then suddenly act all cheerful like Happy the Clown.”

“That was over five years ago,” Barney said. “I think you can stop wearing black now.”

“It’s my Johnny Cash look, ok?” Hank said. “Five years? Has it really been that long?”

“Every day of it,” Barney said. “I loved her, too. We all loved her. She made one hell of a lemon pie.”

“Change the subject, Barn. I don’t want to talk about this.”

“Okay, let’s discuss dead kids,” Barney said.

“Mark my words, every dip-wad reporter this side of Lansing will be out here before supper.” Hank stared out the window. Barney wondered if Hank was tearing up.

“I hope Steve had enough sense to secure the scene. He doesn’t have much experience.”

“He’ll be okay. He was at the top of his class at the Academy.”

“I meant to talk to you about that,” Barney said. “I checked his references, and he didn’t attend the one he listed. I’m going to pursue that bit of information.”

“I saw his certificate,” Hank frowned. “He even has a picture with his graduating class stuck inside his locker.”

“Oh, good. I was getting a hinky feeling about the whole deal.” Barney plucked his grandpa’s silver shoehorn from his shirt pocket and waved it at Hank. “We’re going to need tools, so I brought this.”

“Do you even have a procedural manual?”

“Shoehorns are handy, my friend. You can dig with them or even eat a bowl of chili when you’re in a pinch. Come to think of it, you can even scratch your backside with one. Like I was saying, Steve claims it’s a child. I was hoping for a tiny adult or a leprechaun.”

“That is an insane notion, Barney. What have you been putting in your coffee?”

“Well, shit. Whiskey. Make it anything but a child. It is just a nightmare. A dadgum hellish thing. My heart hurts, Hank.”

“To be precise, he said it was a head. Who’s to say the rest of the body is even there?”

“That’s gruesome, even for you.”

“I’m hoping the rest is buried. Bad enough as it is without imagining a damned baby head rolling around the countryside,” Hank muttered. The parade of farms flashed by. He knew every person by name. “Did Mike plow it up with a cache of turnips?”

“Nope. Amelia said little Maggie found it. She went out to burn the trash,” Barney wheezed. “Then she came running back to the house like she’d seen the Devil himself.”

“Poor kid.”

“It’s a goddamn shame. Had a dirty ribbon she’d pulled straight out of the dirt. The tassel of hair came right up out of the soil. Poor kid thought it was a horse’s tail.” Barney screwed up his face like he did when something gnawed at his guts. “Mike said he just couldn’t bring himself to believe it was a person, and it did kind of look like a horse’s tail.”

“Nothing unusual about livestock turning up dead around here.”

“Well, it might seem a little strange if it wasn’t your livestock.”

“True,” Hank inhaled and let the nicotine soothe him. “Very true. And we still must consider what Esther VanderLaan said earlier today. What was Mike doing at the cemetery last night?”

“What was Fly doing riding his bike at the crack of dawn?” Barney countered.

Taking a right, they drove down the rutted driveway that runs along the western edge of O’Bryan’s property.

“I don’t relish having a case of mysterious cadaver on our hands,” Hank admitted. “Brings the nuts out of the woodwork, psychics and shit.”

“Every crackpot’s going to be hunkered in our lobby. Not to mention the psychos who want to have a look-see.” Barney spotted something on the side of the road; an opossum’s remains lay in a death curl. “I love roadkill. That’s the only kind of cadaver I want in my jurisdiction.”

Barney carefully drove the patrol car through patches of turned soil, scraping the muffler on fallen branches. The rear wheel skidded on the loose dirt before slipping into a crevasse and getting stuck. He stepped out to check the buried hub, while Hank sniffed the air.

“Smells like you parked on some good old American cow shit to me.” Hank grabbed his equipment and made his way to safe ground. “You’ll notice that Steve had the good sense to stay on the road. This could work out, though. Wait till you get a gaggle of news hounds and then floor the son-of-a-bitch.”

Barney was not laughing when the state police car pulled in, tried to go around them, and got stuck on another mound of dung. Sergeant Elmo Carter stepped out, none the happier.

“What’s the matter, Carter? Are you stuck?” Barney grinned.

Elmo muttered a few curses.

“You seem like a man with a hot foot, Elmo. The body isn’t going to get any deader!”

Elmo tripped over a rock, picked it up, and heaved it into the ditch. He stood at least six-four, dwarfing his colleagues. A menacing frown replaced his usual pleasant nature.

“Tread lightly, Deters,” Elmo Carter said. “I’m in a terrible mood today.”

“Who called the State Boys?” Barney shouted as his foot sank into the dark loam. “Aw, shit. Who called you?”

“Don’t know.” Carter quickened his pace.

Hank followed them, wondering if he might have to be a witness when they fought each other. Then he noticed people standing at the tree line, watching. He wandered over.

“Can I help you?” he asked because the woman was nearly beautiful and clearly out of her element.

“I’m Hallie Ruben, from WQIP,” Louey said. “This is Marlin Fishbrain.”

“Martin Fishbein,” the youth corrected. “I’m an intern.”

“I’ll just bet you are,” Hank said. “Listen, we need to preserve this scene. Could you go back to the road, Miss?”

Hallie felt like a schoolgirl. She thought he had nice eyes. He turned and walked away. Then he looked back at her for no good reason.

She grabbed Martin’s arm and guided him toward the road.

“Come on, Marlin,” she said. “Do what the man says.”

“Are we getting in on this or what?” Martin asked, earning himself an extra twist that almost took his forearm off his elbow.

“You need to learn to play nice, Martin,” Hallie hissed. “If they take a dislike to you, you’re shut down in no time.”

Mike O’Bryan sat atop his horse, talking with Brooks. The clearing was an oasis from the scrub of the fallow field, with loosely turned dirt and deadfall piled in the middle.

There was a burn barrel, or at least part of one. One side had collapsed, spilling incinerated trash debris from its yawning, rusty top. The area was marked with bright yellow crime scene tape.

Even a novice detective could identify the tracks: horse’s hoof prints and a small child’s bare feet. Along the eastern edge of the circle, there were indistinct prints of a man’s right shoe and a bare left foot. Branches had been dragged across the area, but the prints remained clearly visible in the soft dirt.

“Who cordoned this scene?” Carter asked, interrupting Steve’s first real police interrogation.

“I did,” Steve shot back. “Who’s working on this anyway? I thought it was ours.”

Barney joined the debate, still panting from the chase.

“It’s within the city limits, Elmo. We incorporated Wisteria Township last year. This is our turf.” He bent over, gasping for breath.

“Damn it, Deters.” Carter kicked at the loose dirt. “I’m just following orders.”

“That’s way more interesting, Elmo—since O’Bryan only called us about twenty minutes ago. You guys are more than an hour away.” Barney looked at the officer suspiciously. “How did you know there was a body here if Maggie hadn’t found it yet?”

“Why don’t you call one of those Psychic Hotlines and ask them?”

Hank looked at Barney, whose face was turning redder by the minute. The old man was about to lose his temper.

“You involved in this, Elmo? This doesn’t even make sense. You had to get a call before the body was found. What aren’t you telling us?”

“I don’t like your tone,” Elmo snarled. He got the call while he was at a meeting in Lansing. That was at seven this morning. His report would say it was anonymous, but it had come from the governor’s office. His instructions were clear: go to O’Bryan’s place, find a body in the clearing, and make sure a man from the state crime lab has access.

“That’s shady, Elmo,” Barney shot him a dirty look.

“You questioning my integrity? I think you know me better than that, Deters.” Elmo’s voice was menacing as he towered over the Chief.

“Uh, excuse me, fellas. Can I go home now?” Mike’s horse was uneasy. It pawed at the loose dirt. “This guy is ready for fresh hay.”

Getting no response, O’Bryan lifted the reins and headed back to the barn.

“Stay at the house, Mike,” Hank called after him. “One of us will be over later.”

Barney watched Mike’s face. He seemed nervous, maybe more than someone who just stumbled upon a dead body in his field should be. This whole situation was going to get uglier before it got better.

“Okay, you two prima donnas, let’s get to work.” Hank, always the peacemaker, clapped both Elmo and Barney on the back, breaking the tension. “You’ve been friends for a long spell. Let’s dig up this poor kid, and you two can fight over who owns the case later.”

Steve had covered the gruesome scene with a blanket. As he moved it away, Barney took his first deep breath in years. Hank was caught off guard by a swarm of bees that was suddenly released into his head. Then, the dizziness passed.

A shock of coarse red hair was tangled next to the child’s head. Her eyelids were slightly parted, and dirt particles dotted the whites of her cloudy green eyes. She stared at the sun, unblinking.

The men shared a quick glance. Hank shrugged and took off his shirt. The hot sun warmed the cold sweat he’d broken into. He tied his red bandana around his head to keep the flow of sweat down. Then he grabbed a shovel and carefully started digging around the head where Steve had left off.

Working silently, he loosened the soil while Barney and Elmo scooped it carefully away from the body. She had died too recently for decomposition to distort her peaceful face. They bagged the soil to sift through later.

After what seemed like forever, a little girl’s bare body lay exposed, her long burgundy hair spread around her like a shroud. Black soil clung to her skin, making her appear even paler than she had in life.

Steve took pictures with the thirty-five-millimeter camera. By late afternoon, news reporters from Detroit lined the shoulder of North Territorial Road.

Hank lit a cigarette. His hands were covered in dirt; streaks of tears ran down his tired face. Barney stood silently, thinking that the world was definitely a dangerous and ugly place.

Alec Golden, the medical examiner for Washtenaw County, arrived just after four o’clock. He was seventy-two and had long since retired from family practice in Ann Arbor. Doc was a sharp man. Although he might have lacked sophistication, he made up for it with common sense. Using his clear-headed analytical skills, he had corrected more than a few police officers’ missed observations.

He began examining the body by stabbing the lifeless child in the liver with a thermometer to check her core temperature, as was protocol for this type of scene.

“I’d say she died about 24 hours ago, give or take a little,” Doc stated.

Then a commotion erupted at the edge of the clearing. Elmo Carter was approached by a short, dark-haired man in a white lab coat. Elmo nodded and then led him directly to the makeshift morgue on a tarp.

Doc Golden eyed the swarthy fellow; he had never seen him before.

“This is Dr. Firdaus from the State Crime Lab,” Elmo explained. Golden didn’t know where it came from, but a seed of doubt planted itself somewhere in his frontal lobe. He may be a detective, but the whole thing reeked like a day-old trout to him.

“Please, if I may introduce myself, I am Syringh Firdaus.” The swarthy man breathed into Dr. Golden’s ear, a cloud of pungent curry following him like an aura of stinkweed. “I have been ordered to obtain some samples.”

“Alec Golden, at your service.” Dr. Golden rose to his feet and offered his hand. “Be my guest.”

The stranger’s grip was weak. Golden cringed. He firmly believed that handshakes reveal everything. Doc stomped off to join Barney and Hank, who crouched a few feet away, examining the contents of the burn barrel on a yellow tarp.

The lab technician worked on the body openly, showing no attempt to hide what he was doing. He lifted the right arm and made a small cut with a scalpel. Doc happened to see this act of desecration.

“Hey, what do you think you’re doing?” Doc hollered. “You can’t do that!”

“Oh, sir, I am running a test on the body to see what substances might have been ingested before death. I need a small tissue sample for this purpose,” the diminutive brown fellow deferentially replied.

“Who do you think you’re talking to? That makes no sense at all. And how am I supposed to know if there’s any wound on the child’s skin if you go and tamper with it?” Alec was irritated. “Do I look like I just clocked out of a 7-Eleven?”

“I certainly did not disturb any area showing a sign of injury. It is a tiny nick, as you see, which I have made in the skin.” The man’s ethnicity was difficult to determine by his color or accent, but his pungent perfume made Alec think of Bombay.

“It looks damn strange, and I don’t like it at all. In fact, I’m going to call your office and talk to your supervisor, Dr. Firdaus.”

“You are welcome to do this, sir,” he said, picking up his things and retreating. “I am quite finished, you know. Thanks to you all, sirs. I wish you a good day.”

“This is fixing to go down in history as a Twilight Zone moment,” Hank said. “We’d better be sure to get that down for the record.” He shook his head and glanced at old Doc Golden.

“Doc, what’s your impression of the girl? Any ideas?”

“Well, son, I’d estimate she’s about five years old. She shows no external signs of abuse, except for the slash our little foreign friend made in her armpit. Her hair is red, and redheads usually have fewer hairs than other types, but I’d say this child’s hair is sparser than usual. It might indicate some malnutrition.”

“Hmmm,” Barney mused. “So, we’ve got ourselves stuck with an abandoned kid and an unknown cause.” He looked around and bellowed, “Can we put that blanket over her?”

“Don’t know why not,” Hank grumbled. “Steve got evidence all over the poor soul anyway.”

“How long do you think she’s been in there?” Barney nodded at the shallow grave.

“Hard to say. Like I said, she died about 24 hours ago. That doesn’t mean she landed in O’Bryan’s field then, though.” Doc Golden sat down on a log beside the pile of sorted rubbish waiting to be bagged and labeled. “It’s a damn funny place to leave a body, buried so shallow.”

Grabbing a piece of cloth with his tweezers, Barney dropped it into the evidence bag.

“The perp was in a rush,” Barney noted. “Too many mistakes.”

“Maybe he chose this spot because the ground’s soft. It’d be easy to dig a shallow grave. One person could do it,” Hank pondered this.

“He buried her here because he had to,” Steve said. “Maybe he was interrupted. Maybe his car had a breakdown nearby. He left lots of tracks. He was alone, in a hurry, and this wasn’t his original destination.”

“Barn, I think the young guy has got a good head on his shoulders.”

“He’s not just a pretty face, like me,” Barney agreed.

Humor couldn’t soften the tragedy beneath the shroud. The men stood over their lifeless charge.

“I’ve got to get my car out of that damn hill I’m stuck on,” Carter turned to leave.

“Elmo, I have some questions regarding this phone call issue.”

The state officer snarled and continued walking.

“Oh, and while you’re at it, have someone call me from the Crime Lab. I want a clear explanation for the procedure your technician performed on my deceased.”

Hank and Barney made their way back to the road. The air was heavy with mosquitoes. Cows lowed in the distance. It was nearly milking time. As the men stepped out of the field, reporters pushed forward, waving their microphone booms and trying to capture the perfect sound bite for the five o’clock news.

Hank wandered off, heading toward the nearly beautiful reporter in a casual denim jumper.

“Your name again? Hallie, you said.” He plastered a charming smile on his face.

Barney watched as Hank seemed to come alive, and it was clear the lady was interested. She might just be trying to get a story, but Hank wasn’t dumb.

Barney watched the crowd. Reporters pushed and yelled to get his attention. In front, he saw Jennifer Chambers, and beside her, Lance Strong. The big guns were there.

He looked back at Hank. He had put his shirt back on, but the bandana gave him a rakish pirate look. He was lost in some animated conversation. I think this could be promising. It will kill two birds with one stone.

Barney cleared his throat and moved toward the microphones.

“This is a tragic day for Cedar Creek. We have a little girl about five years old, according to Doc Golden. Cause of death is unknown.”

“Who is it?”

“Do you know of anybody who’s missing?”

“Any suspects?”

“I’m going to make this easier,” Barney said. He pointed at the woman standing next to Hank. She looked surprised. “You, there. You’re going to be our press pool representative. All the rest of you—get out of here. Any information we have will come through that young lady.”

Hallie Ruben stared in disbelief, as did Lance and Jennifer. Hallie’s euphoric feeling was short-lived. Moments later, Hank Bradford wheeled a gurney to the medical examiner’s van. Nearly lost on the cold morgue stretcher was a tiny black body bag. It wasn’t just a story; it was a dead little girl.

This can only mean one thing, Hallie thought. It’s heartbreaking for everyone she’s touched in her short life.
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