CHAPTER 3: Portraiture

Because I spent many childhood years in the cutthroat world of a ballet studio, and because I work in the old-boy world of forensics, I took Karne's question as a challenge. He wanted to know why a person might want skin from hands? Well, I'd tell him.

That's a reasonable recap of the feelings that I took with me to the airport on my way to Washington for my vacation. I'd put two homicide psych books into my bag—one borrowed from Chad and the other from a bemused McLynn—along with a textbook on the history of forensic science. I'd also printed a few journal articles on hands just for good measure. As soon as I sat down I whipped out my first book on killers and applied myself to the task.

That lasted all of five minutes. Before I could get past the first page of my chosen chapter a loud man in a tight suit levered himself into the seat beside me and took up all the real estate on our shared arm rest. He prodded and shoved and grunted until his briefcase was under the seat in front of him, then turned to me with an expectant look on his face. I brought my book closer to my nose and regulated my breathing as though I were hiding in a deer blind.

No good. The man unleashed a broadside of information about his life as a traveling salesman, and there was no peace in row twenty-two for the rest of the flight. It was a slight consolation that the reedy young man on the other side of the salesman got dragged into the fray as well, but it wasn't enough to keep a horrible mood from settling on me.

I took the Metro to the city in a stupor, and I can barely recall getting checked in to my hotel. As I stood in the shower trying to wash the annoyance off, I pondered hands. I think of them in terms of life, sure, but there are other ways to think of them. The development of hand transplants hit the news not long ago. And what about fingerprinting? Transmission of infectious disease?

But those were things about hands in general. I replayed the information from Karne in my mind as I dressed for dinner. I was in the elevator headed toward the hotel bar when it hit me: each skin had been embroidered in an individual design.

I let the word rattle in my brain: individual. I sat in a corner of the bar where I could watch people walking down the sidewalk, and I thought about Roman graves. Individual. I'd put away half my mint julep—oh don't laugh—and had reviewed the ways I knew to mark the inmate of a gravesite before I rattled back around to one of my first thoughts. Fingerprinting: the hand is individual, and linked to identity. But not after death.

No, I'd puzzled through enough sets of bones to know that one hand looks a lot like another unless there's a disease process or significant injury. That's what makes it like most human body parts. Nearly everybody's got them. But hands and feet, when they have skin, are like faces. We can recognize them.

So we mark them. We cut our hair differently. We wear makeup. We wear jewelry. We tell everyone looking at us: this is mine. I am distinct.

But that's not right, either. I'd seen too many signet rings and guild symbols—not to mention mass produced jewelry—to believe that the markers were all about individuality. Maybe the specific combination was. But decoration is as much about culture as a whole as it is about personality.

I was running myself into the ground. I needed Karne. I was also finishing a strong drink on an empty stomach, and I was starting to feel it. I took out my phone and stared for a moment at his name in my contact list. I calculated the time difference. I flipped the phone shut and stowed it again.

After I'd eaten half of my dinner I came to a decision. I'd make the research about the cultural material my job. I'd look up the designs on Karne's tapestry and the images of the saints. I'd try to find the sources for the embroidered scenes. Karne could look at the ways this case was like any other. I'd look at the ways it wasn't.

I knew I needed those pictures of the embroidery to do this well. I'd been smart enough to bring my laptop with me, but not enough to scan the photos Karne had before I left home. I resolved to email Karne and ask for them before I went to bed, and to email my old dissertation advisor about getting access to the GW libraries while I was in Washington.

I still have the email I sent Karne, and his response.

Karne:

Please send me the photographs of the embroidery. I have an idea.

-- AC

Connell:

I am pleased Newman did not hold your attention, but I must remind you that you are on vacation. You are not accomplishing your stated objective. Nevertheless I have attached the photographs you requested.

I have also attached a tracing of the embroidered images, and of tattooed markings I've discovered beneath the stitching. I presume you'd prefer not to look at the skin again.

Karne

I opened the tracing files as soon as I received them, and printed them in the hotel business center as soon as I was dressed for the day. Karne had made combined images, with both the lines of the tattoos and the embroidered scenes. He'd also separated the two.

Though the images embroidered on top of the skin seemed familiar, the tattoos did not. They seemed either crude or old. The edges of the lines were hazy and stretched, and the initial designs were very simple. I wanted to privilege them because they were beneath the other designs, and they were done during life. Karne had laughed at me before for wanting the attributes of the victim to mean something in relation to the crime, but I suppose it never fazed me. My gut told me these marks came first, and would help explain the embroidery. I looked for patterns.

One mark was repeated on three of the images, and I copied it onto a fresh sheet of paper. It was two horizontal parallel lines crossed by a hash mark, much like the mathematical symbol. I imagined it couldn't have been a reference to that—what would be unequal to what?—but it was tempting to think so. I shoved my sketch into my bag and set off for a breakfast meeting with my old advisor. I hoped he'd have some thoughts.

Thanks are due (again!) to J.A. Lowell for pointing out my nasty typo. I'd like to blame it on the broken wrist, but that'd be a big lie. I'm fortunate to have attentive readers. While I'm jawing, here: I hope the pace isn't too slow. I'm a bit worried about it.

--E