The body was removed from both containers and placed face up on the dissection table. The clothing was soaked, soiled and rotting. There was a thin yellow blouse, a white brassiere, a dark blue cotton skirt, one white sandal with a medium heel.

There was a gold chain around the neck, a Timex digital watch on the left wrist, a wedding band and a ring with a small diamond on the third finger, left hand, and a white metal ring containing a red stone on the index finger of the right hand.

When all items had been removed from the body it was subjected to close examination for distinguishing marks and characteristics. It was a female, one hundred and fifty-five centimeters in height, small-boned, fair complexion, pale blonde hair, impossible to determine what color the eyes had been. Approximately forty percent of the little finger on the right hand missing, with scar tissue indicating it had happened a long time ago. Decedent's age estimated to be between twenty and forty years.

Left side of face badly damaged, but impossible to tell if it was an injury prior to death or the result of the fall into the well. The body, in general, was in an advanced stage of decomposition, and so there was difficulty in determining what trauma had caused the death if, indeed, death had come as the result of an injury. Dr. Ludeker noted for the record that the body was not as badly decomposed as one might anticipate for a body which had been out of doors in the summer months at this latitude. Dr. Johnson said that the temperature at the bottom of a deep well might stay at about fifty-four degrees Fahrenheit, and apparently the well had been covered until the recent storm blew some of the boards off the top of it. That kept the body from the flies and the consequent destruction by maggots.

They were on close examination able to detect the existence of an appendix scar, and what had been a ridge of scar tissue across the top of the left foot. As was the practice, Dr. Ludeker examined the arms and legs carefully to determine whether he thought he might through tissue examination find any trace of needle tracks indicating some possibility of addiction or diabetes. But the condition of the tissues made any such search useless.

The body was then opened and the organs of the abdomen and chest examined in methodical fashion. They proved to be in normal condition, allowing for the state of decomposition and the resultant postmortem changes. There had been such degeneration of the soft tissues of the body it was impossible to determine whether the woman had been the victim of a sexual assault prior to death. The heart and the brain showed on close examination no indications of trauma. Small tissue samples from the reasonably stabilized areas of various organs were labeled and set aside for laboratory analysis.

It was not until they dissected the neck that they began to suspect a possible cause of death. They discovered that the crico id cartilage, which is the ringlike structure of cartilage below the thyroid, was broken in two places. Neither doctor had ever observed this injury in a person as young as the decedent appeared to be. In the young the crico id has enough elasticity to be able to withstand a considerable pressure. Once the crico id has been broken, has been dented inward like a dent in a Ping-Pong ball, the victim will die of strangulation in a very few minutes. In a body recently smothered or strangled it is possible to find pinpoint hemorrhages in the whites of the eyes, far back under the lids. But she had been too long dead to provide this confirmation. Closeup color photographs were taken by Dr. Johnson of the broken crico id and the tissues of the throat. In re-examining the tissues of the throat they could not find any evidence of the way the force had been used to break the crico id They reassembled the body, using large curved needles and a coarse thread rather than the customary staples to hold the edges of the incisions together, placed it in the metal case and rolled it on a stretcher into the cold room where the attendant would place it in storage and label the locker door.

After they had gone into the annex and showered and changed, they were surprised to find Lieutenant Coombs and Sergeant Slovik of the State Bureau of Investigation in the waiting room. It was quarter to midnight.

"What have we got, George?" Coombs asked Ludeker.

"So far it looks like death by strangulation. Busted crico id

No other physical indications of strangulation."

"Manual strangulation?"

"We talked about that. When the stuff got thrown in the well, the edge of, say, the typewriter case catching her just right. No chance. That would have given us tissue damage

2Z5.

massive enough so that we could see it. But if somebody wrapped their hands around the throat, we'd probably be unable to see any evidence of that. Our guess, and it's just a guess, is that somebody rested a big beefy forearm across the little lady's throat, probably to shut her up while raping her."

"Evidence of rape?"

"Not after three months."

"Doctors, I want to spare her husband the chore of a physical identification, and the State's Attorney's office says we can do it this way. Mike here was with me when we questioned Owen about distinguishing marks. I've got the list. What did you come up with?"

"Nearly half the little finger right hand missing. Scar on her left instep looks like she dropped a cleaver on it. Appendix scar."

"Perfect! Any jewelry he can look at?"

"Three rings, a necklace and a digital watch. I locked them up in there. They're soaking in alcohol."

"The watch too?"

"Yep. Fabric strap. Damned thing was running. Two minutes fast."

"Not anymore, it isn't," Coombs said.

"I'll look forward to getting the written report and the pictures. And send the jewelry over in a plastic sack. He can look at it when we run it up there tomorrow."

"And the body is that of a woman in her early thirties?"

"That fits closely enough. You won't get the report until Monday late," Ludeker said.

"I know. Right now it just turned Friday. That's okay. We're going to have to move fast and good on this thing. When she was missing, it wasn't much of a story. But this is going to bring the media into Lakemore like an army. And the cause of death "Is not news until the State's Attorney says it is," Johnson said, smiling.

"See, Lieutenant? I'm learning." He stopped smiling, shook his head.

"I don't want to talk about this one anyway. Ever. Once upon a time that was a fine-looking little woman. Bums that get knifed in an alley, I can handle. All the time, working on this one, I keep thinking what a hell of a waste. Hope you guys catch him."

When the first red edge of the sun rim showed between two gentle hills in the east, Roy Owen and Peggy Moon had turned around and they were heading back toward the motel, walking briskly along the edge of the paved surface. She was glad he had talked so much to her about Lindy and Janie and his relationship to both of them and their relationship to each other.

It made her feel as if they were moving more irreversibly into a relationship of their own. At times he had stopped, frowning, groping for the right way to say something. All he had wanted from her was the occasional murmur of understanding.

Finally they were so close to the motel he could look across the fields and see, above the trees that concealed the distant dirt road, the portion of barn roof.

"I've walked along that road half a dozen times," he said. He stopped, hands on his hips.

"Right by her. I can see that barn roof from my window. She probably looked out that window and noticed it. Damn him! Whoever it was, damn him to hell.

Thrown away like trash. Like a run-over animal. Chunked her in there and threw her stuff down. Three summer months down a deep well. Thank God I didn't have to identify her.

What I told them about her matched up. That's what they came here at two this morning to tell me."

He started walking again suddenly, and she had to take several running steps to catch up and walk beside him. Though she was a few inches taller than he, it pleased her that in their walks their stride seemed to match perfectly.

"When are you going to call her mother?"

"Soon as we get back. I don't want her to hear it on the news.

And I want her to keep Janie home and keep the news turned off. Then I'll have to call the office. And then find some way to make the arrangements that have to be made. We agreed a couple of years ago that we'd both like to be cremated. So I don't have to wonder about that. I guess the thing to do would be to get it done here, when they release the body, and then take the ashes up there and have a memorial service. There's no point in her mother and Janie coming down here."

"No point at all."

"They wanted to know what kind of a purse she carried. I said I didn't have any idea. They couldn't find it."

"Kind of a white canvas shoulder bag with brown leather trim and a brass latch."

"I'll tell Lieutenant Coombs. Thanks."

They know that already. It's in their file. I described all her stuff, back when she had been reported missing."

They're going to bring me an inventory of everything that was... with her. And her jewelry to identify."

"She always wore that heavy gold chain every time I saw her."

"I gave it to her on our fifth anniversary. I was afraid somebody might snatch it off her in New York, but she said it was too big to look real. They're bringing it and her rings and watch to me to identify."

Today?"