“Anything catch your eye, Mr. Dawson?”

“Not yet.”

“Measurements, Obodai?” Biney said.

“She weighs fifty-two kilos, and measures one hundred and seventy-three centimeters long, sir.”

“Mm-hm. Thank you. No stab or puncture wounds that I can see so far. Nor contusions, or ecchymoses. No evidence for fractures of the skull or long bones…” He checked her fingers. “She kept her nails short-they look clean, but get clippings later, Obodai, would you?”

“Very good, sir.”

“Roll her up?”

Obodai smoothly and expertly turned Gladys’s body on its side so Biney could look at her back.

“Ah, Inspector Dawson, take a look. Here we see blanching at the shoulders and buttocks, indicating that she was lying on her back for some time postmortem. The weight of her body compresses the blood vessels in the areas in contact with the ground, preventing accumulation of blood there. I still see no wounds of any kind. The posterior scalp’s clear of contusions or hematomas. Interesting.”

“Let her back down, Doctor?” Obodai said.

“Yes, please. And we’ll put her on the head block now and open the skull.”

Obodai lifted the body at the shoulders and slid the wooden block underneath it. As he did that and Gladys’s neck became slightly more exposed, Biney seemed to notice something. He went closer and peered at her chin.

Dawson followed his lead. “What do you see, Dr. Biney?”

“It looks like an abrasion,” he said, with a tinge of excitement in his voice. “I’ve seen it before, in another case. The victim is being strangled, she lowers her chin to protect her neck and gets a bruise from the assailant’s hands. Strangling someone is not as easy as people think.”

“Strangling,” Dawson echoed.

“Indeed. Change of plan, Obodai.”

“Dissect the neck, sir?”

“Yes, let’s postpone the skull for the moment.”

“Very good. Your scalpel, sir.”

Dr. Biney began at Gladys’s chin and made a long, clean incision straight down the middle to the sternal notch. There was very little subcutaneous fat, and the muscle layer popped into view after minimal dissection.

“Do I see subtle hemorrhages in the soft tissues around the right sternomastoid,” Biney said, “or do my eyes deceive? I don’t want to be premature, but I think we may have something here.”

He continued carefully with short, precise incisions with the scalpel, peeling away the layers covering the larynx.

“Ah.”

“What is it, Dr. Biney?”

“Fractured thyroid cartilage. Gracious. Do you see it, Inspector Dawson? Let me show you. This is the thyroid cartilage. It looks like a roof we’re viewing from above. This is one side of the roof sloping up, this is the other, and where they meet is the prominence everyone knows as the Adam’s apple. We can’t see them, but the vocal cords are behind the cartilage-underneath the roof, so to speak. Got it?”

“Got it.”

“Look at the left side of the cartilage here. It looks smooth. When I poke it, it moves in one piece. Now look at the right. I depress it firmly, and what happens?”

“It bends in the middle.”

“Yes. Why?”

“Because it’s cracked.”

“Ten points. There you have it. Fracture of the thyroid cartilage.”

“Besides strangulation, is there any other possible cause of a thyroid cartilage fracture?”

“There are-such as falling against something and striking the front of the neck,” Biney said. “The armrest of a chair, for instance. Another would be a karate chop to the neck. But fractures of the larynx in circumstances like this mostly result from strangulation, and my finding of perilaryngeal focal hemorrhage-in other words, bruising-is consistent with this. I wonder if the hyoid bone was damaged as well.”

He returned to Gladys’s neck and moved upward from the thyroid cartilage to the apex of the throat.

“Dissecting around the hyoid bone now,” he said. “It’s a much harder structure to fracture because it’s protected behind the lower jaw.”

A few minutes later, Dr. Biney said, “It’s intact. No fracture. But, there’s swelling and hemorrhage around it. Again, consistent with considerable force applied to the neck over some sustained period.”

Dawson gazed at Dr. Biney, and their eyes met. It was, quite frankly, breathtaking.

“What you’re saying is-”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying, Mr. Dawson. In the case of Gladys Mensah, the cause of death is asphyxiation by strangulation. Manner of death is homicide.”

10

VICTORIA TYPED UP THE official autopsy report in no time at all and gave Dawson a copy.

“Would you like to meet my wife and have some lunch before you set off to Ho?” Dr. Biney suggested as he saw Dawson out. “We have a place on the water and a floating gazebo on the river, and my wife makes an exquisite grilled tilapia.”

It was certainly tempting, but Dawson declined with thanks. “I should get to Ho without delay,” he explained.

“Very well-perhaps another time. You are always welcome.”

They exchanged calling cards as they continued on to Dawson’s car.

Just as he was about to open the door, Dawson thought of something. “You know a lot of people, Dr. Biney. Would you mind taking a look at this?”

He dug into his pocket and fished out the gold watch he had confiscated from Daramani. “Stolen item, seems it belongs to a doctor. Do you know this name?”

Biney looked at the engraving on the back plate. “Good gracious,” he said in surprise. “I most certainly do know this fellow. He and I were classmates in med school and we’re still in touch.”

“Any idea where he lives or works?”

“In Accra. As a matter of fact, I have to be in Accra in two weeks and I can see to it personally that he gets it back-if that’s okay with you, that is.”

“It’s a million times better than okay. A huge relief, really-one less thing to do.”

“Consider it done, then.”

“Thank you, Doctor. For everything.”

“You’re most welcome, Inspector Dawson. If there’s anything I can help you with, please don’t hesitate to call. Good luck, and drive safely.”

To get to Ketanu from Akosombo, Dawson went south again to Atimpoku and took the Adomi Bridge across the Volta River. He fiddled with the radio dial until he found a station playing hip-life music-something to keep him company for the hour-long journey. Much of that time was taken up by slowing at police checkpoints. Togo, Ghana’s neighboring country, was not far away, and as Dawson knew only too well, the Volta Region was a hub for illicit drugs going back and forth across the border.

No drug-sniffing dogs at the checkpoints, thank goodness. Dawson had a little marijuana on him, and though his CID badge would get him easily past the human police, nosy canines were another matter altogether.

Traffic was light up to Ketanu. Along the road, pedestrians trudged between one town and the next, and not for the first time, Dawson marveled at the stamina of even small children carrying firewood or buckets of water on their heads.

By the time he reached Juapong, he was good and hungry and kept thinking about Dr. Biney’s alluring invitation to dine on grilled tilapia. Dawson would have to settle for something gastronomically simpler, and he pulled over to buy golden-roasted plantain and groundnuts from a roadside trader.

On the way again, Dawson noticed how the vegetation began to change from open bush with isolated skyscraper trees to denser semi-deciduous forest, but that in turn gave way to buildings as Dawson approached Ketanu. He passed a sign announcing YOU ARE ENTERING KETANU and slowed down over the brain-rattling speed strips.

If Ketanu had been an impressionist painting, it would have been dots and daubs of tan and brown. Buildings were a cream color or darker, and the rusted tin roofs exactly matched the color of the ground. Tro-tros and taxis plied the streets, and shops and trading kiosks lined the roadside with entertaining appellations like Nothing but Prayer Electrical Goods and the God Is Great Hair Clinic. Dawson loved these names.