Page 40 (1/2)

"Alanced at her, then back at the street "No You’re not crazy You saw so You didn’t wreck the house all by yourself You didn’t just iine that the intruder looked like Bruno Frye

I’ll ad at first But now I know you aren’t confused"

"Buta walking dead man? Isn’t that too much to accept?"

"It’s just as difficult to accept the other theory--that two unassociatedfrom the same unique set of delusions, both obsessed with a psychotic fear of vampires, attacked you in one week In fact, I think it’s a little easier to believe that Frye is soht what?"

"Insanity"

He smiled "Insanity isn’t like the coh--or a kiss"

"Haven’t you heard of a ’shared psychosis’?"

Braking for a traffic light, he said, "Shared psychosis? Isn’t that a social welfare prograed lunatics who can’t afford psychoses of their own?"

"Jokes at a time like this?"

"Especially at a time like this"

"What about mass hysteria?"

"It’s not one of my favorite pasti here"

"No Impossible," he said "There’s only two of us That’s not enough to lad you’re here I’d hate to be fighting this thing alone"

"You’ll never be alone again"

She put one hand on his shoulder

They reached the ue at quarter past eleven

At the coroner’s office, Hilary and Tony learned from the secretary that the chief medical examiner had not performed the autopsy on the body of Bruno Frye Last Thursday and Friday, he had been in San Francisco on a speaking engagement The autopsy had been left to an assistant, another doctor on the ME’s staff

That bit of news gave Hilary hope that there would be a sirave Perhaps the assistant assigned to the job had been a slacker, a lazy man who, free of his boss’s constant supervision, had skipped the autopsy and filed a false report

That hope was dashed when shedoctor in question He was in his early thirties, a handsoht blond curls He was friendly, energetic, bright, and obviously too interested in his work and too dedicated to it to do less than a perfect job

Goldfield escorted them to a small conference rooarette sular table that was covered with half a dozen es of lab reports, and computer print-outs

"Sure" Goldfield said "I remember that one Bruno GrahamnoGunther Bruno Gunther Frye

Two stab wounds, one of them just a little worse than superficial, the other very deep and fatal

Some of the best developed abdominal muscles I’ve ever seen" He blinked at Hilary and said, "Oh yes You’re the woman whostabbed him"

"Self-defense," Tony said

"I don’t doubt that for a second," Goldfield assured hihly unlikely that Miss Thoainst that e

He’d have brushed her away as easily as one of us ain "According to the crime report and the newspaper accounts that I read, Frye attacked you without realizing you were carrying a knife"

"That’s right He thought I was unar the disparity in body sizes, that’s the only way you could have taken hi seriously injured yourself I mean, the biceps and triceps and forearo, he could have entered body building competitions with considerable success You were damned lucky, Miss Thomas

If you hadn’t surprised him, he could have broken you in half Almost literally in half And easily, too" He shook his head, still impressed with Frye’s body "What was it you wanted to ask ed "It seems rather pointless now that we’re here"

Goldfield looked fro smile of curiosity on his handsoree with Hilary It seems pointlessnow that we’veso somber and mysterious," Goldfield said pleasantly "You prickedlike this"

"Well," Tony said, "we came here to find out if there actually had been an autopsy"

Goldfield didn’t understand "But you knew that before you asked to see nes, the ME’s secretary, must have told you"

"We wanted to hear it froet it"

"We knew that an autopsy report had been filed," Tony said "But we didn’t know for certain that the work had been done"

"But now that we’ve met you," Hilary said quickly, "we have no doubt about it"

Goldfield cocked his head "You ht I filed a fake report without bothering to cut him open?" He didn’t seeht be an outside chance of it," Tony ad shot"

"Not in this ME’s jurisdiction," Goldfield said "He’s a tough old SOB He keeps us in line If one of us didn’t do his job, the old man would crucify him" It was obvious froreatly admired the chief medical examiner

Hilary said, "Then there’s no doubt in your aped at her as if she had just asked him to stand on his head and recite a poem "Dead?

Why, of course he was dead!"

"You did a complete autopsy?" Tony asked

"Yes I cut hiht for a second or two, then said, "No It wasn’t a complete autopsy in the sense you probably mean Not a medical school dissection of every part of the body It was an extre And ere short-handed

Anyway, there wasn’t any need to open Frye all the way up The stab wound in the lower abdomen was decisive No reason to open his chest and have a look at his heart Nothing to be gained by weighing a lot of organs and poking around in his craniuh exterior examination, and then I opened the tounds further, to establish the extent of the dae and to be certain that at least one of them had been the cause of death If he hadn’t been stabbed in your house, while attacking youif the circuht have doneto be any criht in the case Besides, I am absolutely positive that the abdominal wound killed him"