Blindsight

“I usually check the eyes,” Laurie said. She studied Lou. The last thing she wanted was for him to pass out and hit his head on the concrete floor. That had happened to a visitor once before.

“Continue,” Lou urged. “I’m fine.”

Laurie shrugged. Then she put her thumb and index finger on Duncan ’s eyelids and drew them up.

Lou gasped and turned away.

For a moment even Laurie was taken aback. The eyes were gone! The pulpy red sockets were filled with pink-stained wads of gauze. It gave the corpse a ghastly appearance.

“Okay!” Lou said. “You got me. You set me up and you got me. I’ll have to give you that.” He turned back to Laurie. The bit of facial skin visible between his mask and his hood was blanched. “Let me guess: this was some sort of initiation ordeal for the rookie.”

Laurie let out a short, nervous laugh. “I’m sorry, Lou,” she said. “I’d forgotten the eyes had been taken. Truly. This was the case where the family was insistent that the deceased’s wishes to be an organ donor be honored. If the eyes can be harvested within twelve hours, they often can be used if there are no other contraindications. Occasionally it can even be longer than twelve hours if the body is chilled.”

“I don’t mind being the butt of a joke,” Lou said.

“But it wasn’t a joke,” Laurie insisted. “I’m sorry. Honest. I’d been called on this case yesterday. With everything else that’s happened, I’d forgotten. I just remembered this was a case where the victim took the cocaine IV. Let’s see if we can find the injection site.”

Laurie rotated Duncan ’s right arm palm up so she could examine its volar surface. Vinnie did the same with the left arm.

“Here it is,” Laurie exclaimed, pointing to a minute puncture wound over one of the veins in front of the elbow area.

“I didn’t know cocaine could be mainlined,” Lou said.

“It’s taken into the body just about every way you can imagine and some you can’t,” Laurie said. “IV is not common, but it’s done.” As she spoke, her mind took her back to the night before she found Shelly dead in his bedroom. He’d just come home from Yale, and Laurie was in his room, eager to hear about college. His open Dopp kit was on his bed.

“What’s this?” Laurie questioned. She held up a pack of condoms.

“Give me that,” Shelly shouted, clearly peeved to have his baby sister find such a thing in his shaving kit.

Laurie giggled as Shelly snatched the contraceptives from her hand. While Shelly was busy burying them in his top bureau drawer, Laurie looked into the Dopp kit to see what else she could find. But what she saw was more disturbing than interesting. Touching it ever so gingerly, Laurie lifted a 10 cc syringe from the bag. It was the needle she was to see the following day.

“What is this?” she demanded.

Shelly came over and tried to grab the needle, but Laurie evaded him.

“You got this from Daddy’s office, didn’t you?” Laurie demanded.

“Give me that or you are in serious trouble,” Shelly snapped. He trapped her against the wall.

Laurie gripped the needle in both hands behind her back. Having grown up in New York City, she knew what it meant when a fellow teenager had a needle.

“Are you shooting up?” Laurie asked.

Shelly overpowered her and got the needle. He took it over to his bureau and hid it with his condoms. Then he turned back to his sister, who hadn’t moved.

“I’ve tried it a couple of times,” Shelly said. “It’s called speedball. A lot of the guys at school do it. It’s no big deal. But I don’t want you to say anything to Mom or Dad. If you do, I’ll never talk to you again. You understand? Never.”

Laurie’s momentary reverie was cut short by the booming voice of Calvin Washington. “What the hell is going on here?” he yelled. “Why haven’t you even started this case? I came in here to see if you found anything we can hang our hats on and you haven’t even started. Get busy.”

Laurie sprang into action. She completed her external examination, noting only a few ecchymotic bruises on Duncan ’s upper arms in addition to her other findings. Then she took a scalpel and expertly made the traditional Y-shaped incision from the points of the shoulders down to the pubis. With Vinnie helping, she worked silently and quickly removing the breastbone and exposing the internal organs.

Lou tried to stay out of the way. “I’m sorry if I’ve slowed you down,” he said when Laurie paused, allowing Vinnie to organize the specimen bottles.

“No problem,” Laurie said. “When we do DePasquale I’ll explain a bit more. I just want to get Andrews finished. If Calvin really gets mad there could be trouble.”

“I understand,” Lou said. “Would you rather I leave?”

“No, not at all,” Laurie said. “Just don’t get your feelings hurt when I ignore you for a while.”