Free The Honest Folk of Guadeloupe by Timothy Williams

somewhere between eleven o’clock on Sunday night and one in the morning. This would be reasonable. I got back from France last night and didn’t get to see the girl until this morning.” He gestured with his thumb toward the grey metal door in the far wall, and beyond it to the morgue. “My colleague was not available.”
    “Why not?”
    Dr. Bouton shrugged. “Very strange when you recall time is of the essence in an autopsy. This will be mentioned in my report, you understand. More than three and a half days have elapsed since the presumed time of death. Absolutely imperative a body should be examined with speed. When a body dies, some cells live on. It’s their chemical activity that causes a stiffening of the muscles. By now …” He clicked his tongue in irritation. “By now there can be no sign of rigor mortis.”
    Anne Marie nodded.
    “I’d go along with Docteur Malavoy.”
    Malavoy had got up from his stool and approached the others in silence. He said nothing and did not offer to shake hands. He was wearing a black bowtie.
    “Between eleven Sunday night and one in the morning of Monday?”
    Dr. Bouton smiled magnanimously. “Give or take twelve hours.”
    “And livor mortis?”
    “Always in a hurry,
madame le juge
.” There was irritation in his urbane voice. He stood up and went to the wall-phone. “Bring me number two, Léopold. I’ll be starting the autopsy in five minutes.” As he placed the receiver back in its cradle, he said over his shoulder, “Postmortem lividity appears to coincide with the photos I have.”
    “Which means?”
    “The body, once it was abandoned, was not moved.”
    “When was the body abandoned?”
    “At death—or soon after.”
    “And the dogs the fisherman saw pulling at the corpse?”
    Again the blank look—the clever schoolboy amazed at his teacher’s obtuseness. “I wasn’t aware of tooth bites indicating the intervention of a dog.”
    “The fisherman was lying?” She glanced at Lafitte who stood with his hip against a wall table, near a camera. The camera had elongated bellows and was attached to a sliding steel rod. Lafitte stood with his arms crossed, a notebook in one hand, a ballpoint pen in the other. Like Anne Marie, he was not dressed for the chill air of the laboratory. His face had acquired a yellowish tinge in the bright neon light.
    Lafitte caught her glance and wrote something in his notebook.
    “Wouldn’t dogs have altered the position of the corpse?”
    “Understand,
madame le juge
, that I’ve no more than glanced at the cadaver. In a few minutes, while taking a much closer look …”
    “In your opinion, once the body fell to the ground, it remained there until it was discovered?”
    “An opinion,
madame
, based on little more than the ME’s preliminary report and a superficial glance. A superficial glance at the body and at the
in situ
photographs.”
    Dr. Bouton was interrupted by the arrival of a young assistant. Léopold wore a lab coat that set off the dark skin and regular features of his boyish face. His hair was cut flat, to resemble the deck of an aircraft carrier. He walked with a spring in his step. He shook hands with Anne Marie and Lafitte cheerfully, a twinkle in his eye, and then crossed the room and opened the door to the morgue.
    Dr. Bouton went to the sink and scrubbed his hands before putting on his white coat and the round cap.
    Anne Marie glanced through the open door, down the long walls of stainless steel lockers. She bit her lip. Each locker was large enough to contain a wheeled stretcher.
    “Sure you wouldn’t care for some medicine?”
    “Docteur Bouton, I’d like all samples you take signed and countersigned. If there’s going to be a trial, I don’t want our work thrown out for the lack of a signature. And perhaps I could sign the
procès verbal
now.”
    “Something to drink? We’re going to be here for a least an hour … if not longer.” He added smugly, “I like to do a thorough job.”