Читать книгу Death Brings Gold - Nicola Rocca - Страница 15

CHAPTER 8

When Dr Visconti made his entrance into the Autopsy Room, he noticed that Dr Parri had already prepared all the instruments on the small trolley.

He didn’t let her see that he was pleased with her. Clara Parri was the new (and only) junior medical physician, she had arrived with a prestigious CV and was eager to work with the best medical examiner in the whole of Northern Italy. And Dr Visconti, although the idea of having to babysit junior doctors didn’t sit well with him –he’d only done it once with another student before her – in the end had accepted it.

And now, after almost a month and a half of work, he was pleased with the young woman. He still hadn’t found any negative trait in her. She was beautiful, sophisticated, with a refined attitude and well-mannered –and these were the basics needed to work by his side. Moreover she was a quick learner. With her you didn’t need to say things twice – and this was also a basic requirement if you were to work with Umberto Visconti.

“Well done, Clara,” that was all he said.

She gave him a delicate smile and he had the impression that she was attracted by his charm. He smiled back, then with few words their work began.

Visconti moved near to the table where Raffaele Ghezzi was lying, the tag tied around the dead man’s big toe stating his name.

With a sharp look he covered the dead body from head to toe several times and in the meantime he was asking himself how many corpses he had seen throughout his career. He remembered the first one. He was still a junior doctor and the dead body belonged to an obese man, almost two hundred kilos. When the doctor had made an incision on that large abdomen, it had deflated and a sickening smell had filled the room. It had lingered on him for more than a week. Or at least that was his impression.

And since that day his life had been a series of dead people and autopsies. And the people, who initially had a name, a sex and an age, with the passing of time had become mere dummies to be sliced open and a skullcap to be removed.

And now Raffaele Ghezzi was also part of that miserable group.

Visconti allowed himself a smile – careful not to be seen by the girl – which reflected the satisfaction he had for his job.

He stretched an arm towards the small trolley and retrieved two rubber gloves.

He put them on, making sure that they were snug. Noticing that Clara was already wearing hers, he nodded at her and grabbed the scalpel.

The autopsy lasted a bit more than an hour and a half.

Visconti recorded that the victim had died of cardiorespiratory arrest.

“A strip of fabric or something similar was tightly wrapped around the neck obstructing the passage of cerebral impulses.”

Then, when the dissection was almost concluded, ,Clara, who was examining the dead man’s oral cavity, in a feeble voice interrupted the operation.

“Doctor, look here,” said the girl.

“What’s up?” asked the doctor, leaning forward.

“There,” she continued. “In his mouth. It looks like…”

Clara didn’t complete the sentence because she knew what it looked like.

The medical examiner moved a bit closer and with a torch illuminated the inside of the dead man’s mouth.

“There,” the girl exorted him, “under his tongue.”

Dr Visconti lifted the dead man’s tongue, as much as was necessary, in order to be able to take a better look at what Clara had seen.

“Yes,” he said. “You’re right, Clara. There’s something strange.”