The Silent Girl (10 page)

“I’m looking at those hairs right now,” said criminalist Erin Volchko. “And I’ll be damned if I can identify what they are.”

It took a moment for Jane to shift her focus to what Erin was talking about. “You mean those hairs from the victim’s clothing?”

“Yes. The ME’s office sent over two strands yesterday. One was plucked off the dead woman’s sleeve, the other from her leggings. They have similar morphology and color, so they’re probably from the same source.”

Jane felt Tam watching her as she asked: “Are these hairs real or synthetic?”

“These aren’t manufactured. They’re definitely organic.”

“So are they human?”

“I’m not sure.”

J
ANE SQUINTED INTO THE MICROSCOPE’S EYEPIECE, TRYING TO MAKE
out some distinguishing feature, but what she saw through the lens looked scarcely different from all the other hairs that she’d seen over the years. She moved aside to let Tam have a peek.

“What you’re seeing on that slide is a guard hair,” said Erin. “Guard hairs function as an animal’s outer coat.”

“And that’s different from fur?” asked Tam.

“Yes, it is. Fur is from the inner coat, and it provides insulation. Humans don’t have fur.”

“So if this is a hair, what does it come from?”

“It might be easier,” said Erin, “to tell you what it doesn’t come from. The pigmentation is consistent throughout the shaft length, so we know it’s an animal whose hair has the same color from root to tip. There are no coronal scales, which eliminates rodents and bats.”

Tam looked up from the microscope. “What are coronal scales?”

“Scales are structures that make up the cuticle—the outside of the hair, like the scales of a fish. The patterns in which the scales line up are characteristic of certain animal families.”

“And you said that coronal scales are on rodents.”

She nodded. “This hair lacks spinous scales as well, which tells us it didn’t come from a cat, a mink, or a seal.”

“Are we going down the whole list of animal species?” asked Jane.

“To some extent, this is a process of elimination.”

“And so far you’ve eliminated rats, bats, and cats.”

“Correct.”

“Great,” muttered Jane. “We can cross Batman and Catwoman off our list of suspects.”

Sighing, Erin pulled off her glasses and massaged the bridge of her nose. “Detective Rizzoli, I’m just explaining how difficult it is to identify an animal hair using only light microscopy. These morphologic clues help me eliminate some animal groups, but this specimen isn’t like anything I’ve encountered in this lab.”

“What else can you eliminate?” asked Tam.

“If it were deer or caribou, the root would be wineglass-shaped, and the hair would be coarser. So it’s not in the deer family. The color argues against raccoon or beaver, and it’s too coarse for rabbit or chinchilla. If I were to go by the shape of the root, the diameter, and the scale pattern, I’d say it’s most similar to human hair.”

“Then why couldn’t it be human?” asked Jane.

“Take another look in the microscope.”

Jane bent down to peer into the eyepiece. “What am I supposed to focus on?”

“Notice how it’s fairly straight, not kinked like a sexual hair from the pubic or underarm regions.”

“Making this a head hair?”

“That’s what I thought at first. That this was a human head hair. Now focus on the medulla, the central core of the strand. It’s like a channel running down the length of the hair. There’s something very strange about this specimen.”

“Can you be more specific?”

“The medullary index. It’s the ratio between the diameter of the medulla and the diameter of the hair. I’ve looked at countless human
specimens and I’ve never seen a medulla this wide in a head hair. In humans, the normal index is less than a third. This is more than half the diameter of the strand. It’s not just a channel, it’s a huge, honking pipe.”

Jane straightened and looked at Erin. “Could it be some kind of medical condition? A genetic abnormality?”

“None that I know of.”

“Then what is this hair?” asked Tam.

Erin took a deep breath, as though trying to find the right words. “In almost every other way, this looks human. But it’s not.”

Jane’s startled laugh cut through the silence. “What are we talking about here? Sasquatch?”

“I’m guessing it’s some sort of nonhuman primate. A species I can’t identify with microscopy. There are no epithelial cells attached, so the only DNA we can look at would be mitochondrial.”

“It would take forever to get those results,” said Tam.

“So there’s one more test I’m thinking about,” said Erin. “I found a scientific article out of India, about electrophoretic analysis of hair keratin. They have a huge problem with the illegal fur trade, and they use this test to identify the furs of exotic species.”

“Which labs can run that test?”

“There are several wildlife labs in the US I can contact. It may turn out to be the quickest way to identify the species.” Erin looked at the microscope. “One way or another, I’m going to find out what this hairy creature is.”

R
ETIRED DETECTIVE
H
ANK BUCKHOLZ
looked like a man who’d fought a long, hard war with devil alcohol and had finally surrendered to the inevitable. Jane found him in his usual spot, sitting at the bar in J. P. Doyle’s, staring into a glass of scotch. It wasn’t even five
PM
yet, but by the looks of him Buckholz had already gotten a good head start for the evening, and when he stood up to greet her, she noticed his unsteady handshake and watery eyes. But eight years of retirement could not break old habits, and he still dressed like a
detective, in a blazer and oxford shirt, even if that shirt was frayed around the collar.

It was still early for the usual crowd at Doyle’s, a favorite hangout for Boston PD cops. With one wave, Buckholz was able to catch the bartender’s attention. “Her drink’s on me,” he announced, pointing to Jane. “What would you like, Detective?”

“I’m good, thanks,” said Jane.

“Come on. Don’t make an old cop drink alone.”

She nodded to the bartender. “Sam Adams lager.”

“And a refill for me,” added Buckholz.

“You want to move to a table, Hank?” asked Jane.

“Naw, I like it right here. This is my stool. Always has been. Besides,” he added, glancing around at the nearly empty room, “who’s here to listen in? This is such an old case, no one’s paying attention anymore. Except for maybe the family.”

“And you.”

“Yeah, well, it’s hard to let go, you know? All these years later, the ones I never closed, they still keep me up at night. The Charlotte Dion case especially, because it ticked me off when her father hired a PI to follow up on it. Implication being I’m a lousy cop.” He grunted and took a gulp of scotch. “All that money he wasted, just to prove that I didn’t miss anything.”

“So the PI never got anywhere, either?”

“Nope. That girl just plain vanished. No witnesses, no evidence except her backpack, left in the alley. Nineteen years ago, we didn’t have nearly as many surveillance cameras around to catch anything. Whoever snatched her did it quick and clean. Had to be a spur-of-the-moment thing.”

“How do you figure that?”

“It was a school field trip. She went to this fancy boarding school, the Bolton Academy, out past Framingham. Thirty kids came into the city on a private bus to walk the Freedom Trail. Their stop at Faneuil Hall was a last-minute decision. Teacher told me the kids got hungry, so that’s where they went for lunch. I’m thinking the perp spotted
Charlotte and just moved in.” He shook his head. “Talk about a high-profile snatch. Patrick Dion’s a venture capitalist and he was in London when it happened. Flew home on his own private jet. Considering who he was, and his net worth, I expected there’d be a ransom demand. But it never came. Charlotte just dropped off the face of the earth. No clues, no body. Nothing.”

“Her mother was killed in the Red Phoenix restaurant just a month before that.”

“Yeah, I know. Rotten luck in that family.” He sipped his scotch. “Money can’t stop the Grim Reaper.”

“You think that’s all it was? Rotten luck?”

“Lou Ingersoll and I talked and talked about it. We couldn’t see a way to tie the two events together, and we looked at it every which way. Custody fight over Charlotte? Nasty divorce? Money?”

“Nothing?”

Buckholz shook his head. “I’ve gone through a divorce myself, and I still hate the bitch. But Patrick Dion, he and his ex-wife stayed friends. He even got along with her new husband.”

“Even though Arthur ran off with Patrick’s wife?”

He laughed. “Yeah, can you figure? They started off two happy families. Patrick, Dina, and Charlotte. Arthur, Barbara, and their son, Mark. Both kids attended that snooty Bolton Academy, which is how the families met. They started having dinners together. Then Arthur hooks up with Patrick’s wife, and everyone gets divorced. Arthur marries Dina, Patrick gets custody of twelve-year-old Charlotte, and they all go on being friends. It’s unnatural, I tell ya.” He set down his glass. “The normal thing would’ve been to hate each other.”

“Are you sure they didn’t?”

“I guess it’s possible they hid it. It’s possible that five years after their divorce, Patrick Dion stalked his ex-wife and her husband to that restaurant and shot them in a fit of rage. But Mark Mallory swore to me that everyone was friendly. And he lost his own father in that shooting.”

“What about Mark’s mother? Was she hunky-dory about losing her husband to another woman?”

“I never got a chance to talk with Barbara Mallory. She had a stroke a year before the shooting. The day Charlotte vanished, Barbara was in a rehab hospital. She died a month later. Yet another bad-luck family.” He waved at the bartender. “Hey, I need another one here.”

“Um, did you drive, Hank?” asked Jane, frowning at his empty glass.

“It’s okay. I promise, this’ll be my last.”

The bartender set another scotch on the counter and Buckholz just stared at it, as though its mere presence was enough to satisfy him for the moment. “So that’s the story in a nutshell,” he said. “Charlotte Dion was seventeen, blond, and gorgeous. When she wasn’t attending that boarding school, she lived with her rich daddy. She had everything going for her, and then—poof. She’s snatched off a street. We just haven’t found her remains yet.” He picked up the scotch, his hand now steady. “Hell of a thing, life.”

“And death.”

He laughed and took a sip. “So true.”

“You have any thoughts about the other girl who vanished? Laura Fang?”

“That was Sedlak’s case, rest his soul. But I did review it, because of the Red Phoenix connection. Didn’t find anything to make me think the abductions were related. I think Charlotte was a spontaneous spot and snatch. Laura, she was a different case. It happened right after school got out and she was walking home. One of her schoolmates saw Laura voluntarily climb into someone’s car, like she knew the driver. But no one got a license plate and the girl was never seen again. So that’s another body that’s never been found.” He stared at the bottles lined up on the other side of the counter. “Makes you wonder just how many skeletons are piled up in the woods, in the landfills. Millions of people missing in this country. All those bones.
I can accept the fact I’m gonna die someday, as long as there’s a nice marker to tell the world it’s me buried there. But to never be found? To end up hidden under some weeds? That’s like you never even existed.” He shuddered. “Anyway, that’s the Charlotte Dion case in a nutshell. Does that help any?”

“I don’t know. Right now, it’s just one piece of a very confusing puzzle.” Jane waved to the bartender. “Let me have the tab.”

“No way,” said Buckholz.

“You just did me a favor, telling me about Charlotte.”

“I’m here all the time anyway. This seat, this bar. You know where to find me.” He looked down at her ringing cell phone. “I see you’re a girl in demand. Lucky you.”

“Depends who’s calling.” She answered her phone. “Detective Rizzoli.”

“I’m sorry to have to make this call.” It was a man’s voice, and he did indeed sound reluctant to be talking to her. “I believe you’re Detective Tam’s supervisor?”

“Yes, we work together.”

“I’m calling on behalf of all the victims’ families. We’d prefer not to deal with Detective Tam anymore. He’s managed to upset everyone, especially poor Mary Gilmore. After all these years, why are we being subjected to these questions again?”

Jane massaged her head, dreading the talk she would need to have with her younger colleague.
You are a public servant. Which means you must not piss off the public
. “I’m sorry, sir,” she said. “I didn’t catch your name.”

“Patrick Dion.”

She straightened. Looked at Buckholz, who was following the conversation with keen interest. Once a cop, always a cop. “Dina Mallory was your ex-wife?” she said.

“Yes. And it’s painful, being reminded of how she died.”

“I understand it’s difficult for you, Mr. Dion. But Detective Tam needs to ask these questions.”