Malicious Intent (8 page)

‘A friend.’

Her clenched fist trembled. Martin would try to further manipulate the situation. He always did.

‘Hey kiddo, come and say hi to your mum.’

Covering her face with her hand, Anya clutched the phone to her ear. She couldn’t keep Martin offside for too long. While unemployed, he remained eligible for Legal Aid, whereas she wasn’t because she earned a living. Not only did she pay him maintenance but she supported a secretary’s wages and paid off the Annandale house. She didn’t have the extra money needed to legally fight Martin when he pulled stunts like this. Dan Brody had helped with some advice and recommended a lawyer friend – who charged more than he did! In some ways, being divorced was worse than being married. She still did all the work but Benjamin wasn’t there when she came home.

‘Hello, Mummy?’

Ben’s voice almost made her cry.

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‘Hi there, sweetheart. Daddy said you’re having a holiday?’

‘We saw kangaroos that hop really fast! And there were lots of ducks going quack. One of the naughty ducks ate my lunch.’

‘Did you like the kangaroos?’ Suddenly the animals seemed more important than any feud with Martin.

‘Uh-huh.’ He paused, then added, ‘I like kangaroos.’ Benjamin panted with excitement. ‘We are sleeping in a van with Nita. And I went into the water, all by myself. I went all by myself, Mummy. And Nita played golf with me and I hit the ball into the hole . . .’

Anya winced and held her breath. This woman even took her three-year-old to mini golf. Her son loved the sea, being outside and playing ball sports. She hoped that was all he had inherited from his father.

Benjamin chatted away, and then asked the painful question:

‘Mummy, when are you coming to our van? I miss you.’

Trying to find the right words, she answered, ‘I can’t come to the van, darling. I have to talk to Daddy about seeing you as soon as you come back to Sydney.’

She could hear Martin in the background telling Ben to say good-bye and get ready for bed. Martin took back the receiver before Anya could say good night.

‘There you go, you had a good chat. That should satisfy you.’

‘You know damn well the court granted me access every second weekend.’ She fought back tears.

‘Go whine to one of those fancy lawyers you hang around with.’ His resentment was unmistakable. ‘I’m not in the mood for an argument now. We can talk next week,’ he said before hanging up.

‘You bastard!’ she screamed at the dead line. ‘Everything’s always on your terms.’

As she slammed down the phone, the framed photograph crashed off Ben’s bedside table, shattering its glass cover. A piece sliced her finger as she brushed aside the shards. Ignoring the bleeding she picked up the photo of Benjamin squealing with delight as she lifted him into the air.

9

Early the next morning, Anya pulled into the car park outside the mortuary located at the Western Sydney Center for Forensic Medicine. She entered the building through a glass door, buzzed the intercom and waited.

‘Anya Crichton, here to see Jeff Sales.’

The door opened and Anya followed the sound of the Stryker saw, which echoed through the corridor to the postmortem suite change rooms.

According to the clock on the wall, she was due to give an opinion in another coronial inquest in three hours. That left enough time to chase the Deab girl’s histopathology, report back to Dan Brody and return to town. That was, if everything went to plan.

She exchanged her navy suit for blue surgical scrubs, pulled on a couple of shoe protectors and headed back along the corridor to the autopsy suite. She entered and cupped her hand over her nose. Only a decomposing body could smell that bad.

Holding the saw over the corpse was Gilbert Rowlands, the longest-serving pathology technician at the WSCFM.

The room was brighter than normal, with spotlights glaring over each of the eight stainless steel tables.

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Gilbert interrupted the rib cage separation to collect something from the body’s hair with a pair of tweezers and held it up to his plastic goggles.

‘Thought you’d got away, didn’t you,’ he said through a charcoal-filter face mask. The technician dissected each body and laid out the organs before the pathologist arrived. Collecting insect specimens on the job was a bonus.

‘Hi Gilbert, is Jeff Sales around?’ Anya almost shouted through her hand.

‘No one here but me and Ruby. They found her in a deck chair on her roof. And judging by these maggots, she’s been working on her tan for quite a while.’ Gilbert used the tweezers to transfer an insect from the woman’s eye to a jar containing a small amount of organic material. A second, ethanol-filled jar sat sealed on the bench beside the table.

‘Hey, did you hear about the intern who certified her?’

Gilbert said, as though telling the first line in a joke. ‘Threw up for half an hour outside Cas.’

According to hospital tradition, the most junior doctor was sent to certify bodies. She’d always remember climbing into the van and unzipping a body bag for the first time. A junior constable claimed the vagrant found floating in a local river had been there only a few hours, not two weeks as was later determined. One of the nurses offered a hospital stethoscope, but Anya had insisted on using her new Littmans Cardiology brand to listen for a heartbeat. When it sank through the chest wall, her initiation had begun.

‘Any idea where Jeff might be? I am supposed to meet him here.’

‘I don’t need him until I’m done weighing the organs.’

Outside the autopsy suite, out of habit, Anya washed her hands in the corridor sink. Jeff Sales arrived wearing scrubs and white gumboots.

‘What’s with the spotlights? Looks like a solarium in there,’

Anya said.

‘Impressive, aren’t they?’ Jeff grinned. ‘They’ve only been in 58

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a couple of weeks.’ He rubbed his hands together. ‘A real coup, considering we didn’t pay for them.’

‘Don’t tell me there’s a benefactor,’ Anya said.

‘No, the show put them in.’ The interruption of a television crew filming a crime series based on a female pathologist was the talk of the hospital.

‘Weren’t the fluorescent lights bright enough?’

‘On the contrary, they thought it was too light. Apparently, the viewing public expects morgues to be dark and gloomy.’

The reality was vastly different. Western Sydney had windows just below the ceiling to let in as much natural light as possible without attracting voyeurs.

‘They blackened the windows and only filmed once they’d installed the overhead spotlights. When they finished, they left the lights in place.’

‘Just in case you ever want to grow hydroponics,’ Anya joked.

‘We all know the dead have never been a priority for hospital funding,’ Jeff said, ushering Anya to the female change room. ‘I’ll get changed and meet you in the histology room.

Sorry about the rush but I’ve got a plane to catch in a few hours. I’m presenting a paper at the Montreal conference, then the kids will join us for a holiday.’

Organizing time off was difficult enough, Anya knew. With two pathologists from the same department in the household, joint holidays were almost impossible to arrange. No wonder Jeff seemed so excited.

‘Fatima Deab, wasn’t it?’

‘Yes.’

In the histology lab, he bent over the computer terminal and typed in the name and identification number. ‘Microbiology is back but there’s no histology report in the file. Must be in the “to do” pile.’ He walked over to the large sliding cabinet and removed the specimens mounted on slides. ‘No rush once the coroner ruled the death routine on the basis of the initial PM report.’ He took a slide out of its cardboard container. ‘But KATHRYN FOX

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since you’re here, we might as well look at these and put them to bed.’

‘Can we start with the vulva?’ she asked, taking a notebook from her briefcase.

‘I remember this one. On gross examination, the blisters were everywhere around the genitals. Given it was clearly an OD, we may not have noticed if she hadn’t shaved the region.’

He peered down the microscope. ‘Okay, well, the features are typical of herpes simplex infection. There are your typical intranuclear inclusions, ballooning of cells and intra-epithelial vesicle formation.’

‘Much inflammation?’ Anya asked without looking up.

‘Relatively sparse, as you’d expect. The swab came back positive for herpes simplex type two.’

‘Do you remember if she had a cold sore at the time of her death?’

She had read of women with genital herpes who denied any sexual contacts. She could only surmise that they had accidentally infected themselves by touching both the cold sore and their own genitalia.

‘Up to eighty percent of genital infections are caused by type two. She didn’t need to have a cold sore. And I don’t recall seeing one on her face.’

‘I know, but the question of sexual contact could be a problem for the family.’

Jeff was sympathetic but always pragmatic. ‘Common things occur commonly, right? Herpes is common, adolescents commonly have sex. And if she was a drug user, her immune system was probably suppressed. You know the old adage, if it’s yellow and it quacks . . .’

‘Definitely no sign of sexual interference?’ she said, hoping for Fatima’s sake.

‘None, but you wouldn’t necessarily see any. As you know, it’s pretty unusual to see signs of trauma even after a rape.’ He looked across at Anya. ‘Don’t tell me the family want proof she was a virgin?’

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‘I’m sure they would if there was a way of proving it. What about Hep B and C, or HIV?’

‘All negative. We ran them before the postmortem.’ Jeff removed the slide and replaced it in its protective case. ‘What’s next?’

‘Well, the rest is likely to be normal, but –’

‘I know, for thoroughness, let’s go through them.’ He sat reviewing the slides of blood, heart and brain. As he continued reporting, Alf Carney, the acting director, entered the room.

‘What do you think you’re doing?’ he demanded.

Jeff stood up to introduce Anya, but was quickly interrupted.

‘I know who she is. What does she think she’s doing here, behind my back?’

‘Excuse me? I’m not here behind anyone’s back,’ Anya said, stepping forward to meet his eye.

‘I didn’t see a written request for you to access any of our material.’

‘I told her not to bother with formalities,’ Jeff interjected.

‘Well, you don’t have the authority.’ Carney stabbed his index finger in Sales’s direction. ‘I am the one who grants or denies access to information protected by this office.’

Anya felt her face flush. ‘The Royal College of Pathologists of Australasia has a policy relating to second opinions. A request to review material in a case by a bona fide expert in the area must not be refused.’

‘I’m familiar with the policy. That access is only granted as long as it won’t interfere with the functioning of the coroner in the case of a homicide, or confidential aspects of a police inquiry.’

‘In practice, we’ve never refused a request,’ Jeff offered.

‘Besides, the coroner has already ruled this case a drug overdose.’

‘This case is marked as a possible homicide,’ Carney said before turning to Anya. ‘I want you to leave now. You may send a written request and I’ll review it as I see fit.’

Anya had heard that Alf Carney could be difficult. Rumor had it, he was even more so after a current affairs television program questioned his findings in relation to a number of cases.

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She decided that an argument right now would be futile. Carney was still acting head of Western Forensics for another six months, until the permanent director returned from a sabbati-cal working with the International War Crimes Tribunal.

Besides, she had the information she needed. She did, though, wonder why he’d become so defensive about another pathologist looking at the case.

She picked up her briefcase, thanked Jeff for his courtesy and left.

Back in the car, along the M2 tollway, Anya’s mobile rang. She slowed and pulled over.

‘Anya, Jeff Sales. Sorry about the trouble earlier. Alf ’s under a bit of pressure with two of his cases being reopened. I tried to keep you away from him.’ Anya heard crackling; the line was breaking up.

‘I’m about to board the plane but I thought you should know. I finished going through those slides and it’s probably nothing, but the lung tissue wasn’t entirely normal.’

‘In what way?’

‘Fibers. Masses of fibers were embedded in the lung tissue.’

The signal was interrupted. ‘Don’t know what the chances are, but –’

‘Can you describe them?’

‘They’re unlike anything I’ve seen before. Looked like –’

His voice dropped out. The phone crackled before it cut in again.

‘. . . small hourglass shapes.’

The line went dead.

10

Anya studied the computer screen. On the desk lay the remainder of a half-eaten Lean Cuisine, forgotten when she downloaded the files. Jeff Sales had scanned the slides before he’d left for the airport and sent them attached to an e-mail.

What a gem. She owed him one.

In the quiet of her office, she stared at the fibers. Why had there been two cases with similar findings in such a short space of time? The postmortems on Clare Matthews and Fatima Deab had been conducted at different centers, so the specimens couldn’t have been from the same person, and merely mis-labeled. The odds of two young women inhaling the same fibers would have to be low, but how low? If it was a new fiber used in buildings, was this the start of an epidemic? She searched the Web and failed to find a match for the hourglass fibers. Histopathology sites showed the usual asbestos, but no variants. A Medline search didn’t help either. There were no journal articles of lung disease caused by anything resembling what Jeff had found.

The Central Sydney Public Health Unit and the Western Area branch Web sites didn’t contain any warnings or press releases apart from the usual advice about Legionnella infection.