Lake of Sorrows

Catherine Friel pushed through the door, wearing a rubber apron over her lab coat and pulling on a pair of latex gloves. “Sorry to keep you waiting. Let’s get started now, will we?” She pressed the button on her tiny tape recorder and began to describe the deceased in a calm, measured voice: “The body is that of a normally developed white male of slender build. Difficult to ascertain age because of the condition of the body.” She lifted first one arm, then the other, then each leg in turn. “There is no rigidity, and no visible lividity, but the body is quite dark brown in color from deposition in a bog. The left hand is desiccated and partially skeletonized. The exposed bone is somewhat decalcified, and adipocere seems firmly established throughout. The exposed skin is darkened from contact with peat, but remains remarkably elastic. Deceased is wearing a wristwatch with a metal band on the left forearm.” She gingerly removed the corroded watch and bagged it. “The deceased is clean-shaven and the hair on the scalp appears black and wavy. There’s a slightly reddish tint to all the body hair, which I think we can assume is from immersion in the bog.” She looked up at Nora, who nodded her concurrence. “There’s no visible evidence of congestion in the face, and the skin discoloration prevents observation of any possible cyanosis.” Dr. Friel set down the recorder and carefully lifted each closed eyelid, examining the surface of the eyes with a magnifying glass. “The irides appear blue, and the pupils are fixed and equal. There are no foreign bodies or contact lenses. There’s noticeable focal petechial hemorrhaging in both eyes.” The small blood spots were one of the typical signs of asphyxia or strangulation.

Dr. Friel concentrated on the man’s head and neck, marking off his external wounds with her measuring scalpel. “There’s an incised wound on the left lateral area of neck, four centimeters in length. We’ll have to do a dissection to describe the wound path and see whether it’s severed any major vessels. I don’t know if you can see this…” She handed Nora her magnifying glass. “There’s horizontal bruising just above the gash. A pretty definite ligature mark; see how it continues around the back of the neck? A rising peak in the back usually indicates a suspension point. That’s one way we can tell the difference between an actual hanging and a rearward strangulation.” She cut the leather cord from around the dead man’s neck, bagged and labeled it, then gently opened his mouth and pointed a small torch inside to peer at the teeth and gums, which were only slightly discolored and clotted with peat. “There’s some dental work. Gold crown on the first molar, lower right—and the first upper left bicuspid is missing. No visible injuries to the gums, cheeks, or lips. Looks like he got a mouthful of bog water at some point, though—we’ll be able to tell more about that after we have a look at the lungs and the airways.” She lifted and examined each arm in turn. “The hands and arms appear to have sustained a few defensive wounds. The right hand seems to be in fairly good shape; we might be able to get a decent set of prints.”

Nora looked up to see Detective Ward standing at the door, and after a moment Dr. Friel noticed him as well. “It’s all right, Liam, come in.” He joined them at the table. “I’m afraid cause of death isn’t going to be very straightforward,” Dr. Friel continued. “There’s a lot going on here, and it may take a bit of time to work it all out. I’m finished with his effects, if you wanted to take them. I was just about to ask Dr. Gavin if there was anything she could see, given her previous experience, that might give us a better idea about how long this man was in the bog.”

Nora felt slightly discomfited by such deference; the “previous experience” to which Dr. Friel referred consisted of exactly one nonpreserved specimen. Ward ventured a question. “What exactly causes the discoloration?”

“The bog environment triggers what’s known as a Maillard reaction.” Ward looked blank, so Nora tried to explain: “In simple terms, it’s a common protein-sugar reaction—the same chemical process that causes food to turn brown, actually. Some of the recent research using piglets has demonstrated pretty marked discoloration after a couple of years. So, in other words, I don’t know if we can tell very much from coloration alone.” She looked closely at the dead man’s shoulder through the magnifying glass. “It’ll be interesting when the larger incisions are made to see how deeply the color has penetrated the cutaneous and subcutaneous layers. The brown color doesn’t seem quite as rich or well-established as in the older remains I’ve seen, but I’ve not seen that many bog bodies—to be honest, no one has, and they’re all slightly different, depending on the particular environment.”