Read Online Death Dance by Linda Fairstein - Free Book Online Page B

her."
    Each piece of evidence was bagged separately, to prevent the
transfer of any substance—even microscopic
amounts—from one item to another. It was collected in
ordinary brown paper, so that surfaces damp from blood or water would
dry out, rather than mildew in the plastic. In a second bag, then, were
two strands of ribbon.
    "The shoe landed underneath her body. We'll have to study the
pattern of the blood to see exactly how it spattered or dripped. Those
ribbons were used to tie her hands behind her back. Much easier to toss
her into the pit without her able to struggle or resist. I'm actually
surprised there's no gag."
    "That's 'cause this monster's turned off now. Sounded like a
fleet of 747s on takeoff when we got here," Mike said. "Would have
drowned out anything."
    Mercer's gloved hand reached for the smaller bag. He removed
the two pieces of ribbon, an ivory white satin that matched the color
of the pointe shoes exactly, and examined them. The ends that had been
sewn onto the shoe had been ripped off. He sniffed at the ribbons.
    "Smells like mint, don't they?" he said, extending his hand to
me.
    "Yeah. Could be flavored dental floss. The girls are each
responsible for their own shoes—breaking them in, coating the
toes with resin, sewing on the ribbons," I said. The class that I took
on Saturdays had several of American Ballet Theater's soloists in it.
They often relaxed between sessions, stretched against the wall below
the barres and covered in their leg warmers, preparing some of the
dozens of shoes they danced through every season for the week's
performances.
    "Floss?" Kestenbaum asked. "We'll have the lab test to make
sure."
    "That's the latest thing in the studio—it's replaced
old-fashioned thread 'cause it's stronger and thicker."
    A small manila envelope was the third package Kestenbaum
handed Mike. "Looks like your victim pulled a tuft of these oat of
somebody's head."
    There were eight or ten strands of hair, white and silky.
"Were they in her hand?" I asked.
    "Not when she landed. Hard to say, after being bounced against
the walls on her way down. A few were clinging to the tulle skirt in
the back, so they may have been in her fist before she got banged
around."
    "Will you be able to do mitochondrial DNA?" It was a much
slower process used for human hair—and a different
one—than that used with body fluids, and still more
controversial in regard to acceptance in the courtroom,
    "If she didn't get these out by the root, then, yes, we'll
have to do mito. We'll send them down to the FBI overnight." This form
of testing could be done when the entire root of the hair was not
available for traditional nuclear DNA work, using just the shaft that
often rubbed or sloughed off against clothing or other surfaces.
    "Where'd this come from?" Mike asked, removing a small black
object from the last envelope.
    "Not to worry. Hal got a picture before I moved it. It was
likely to fall out when they picked up the body," the pathologist said.
"It was caught in the netting of the skirt. Most likely an artifact of
some sort that she picked up during the drop to her death. I didn't
want to leave it behind because some defense attorney will end up
seeing it in the photos and accuse me of throwing it away. I don't know
what it is."
    "You've been spending too much time under the microscope. You
need to give your brain a rest and work with your hands every now and
then," Mike said. "Never saw a bent twenty in your life?"
    I leaned over for a look. It was a nail, bent at a
ninety-degree angle in the middle.
    "They're everywhere here. Go back to the design shop, they're
probably what hinges every piece of scenery you see. When workers put
the different panels of plywood together, after they've moved them onto
the stage, they hammer 'em in place using these little suckers to hold
them. I bet there's more bent twenties in the Met than there are peanut
shells at Yankee Stadium."
    "You getting ideas?" Mercer asked.
    "Tell the