Page 21 of The Bone Code
Klopp was right. Remnants of ligament and cartilage lingered at the major joints, and a swath of putrefied skin and muscle overlay the left tarsals and metatarsals.
“Looks like we’ve got some fibers stuck to the underside of the zygomatic.”
Before I could respond, Klopp had picked up forceps and beguntweezing threads from the back of the right cheekbone. I marked a vial and handed it to him.
When he returned it, sealed, I held it up to the light.
“I think these are hairs,” I said.
“Might be,” he agreed, squinting at the vial, then shaking his head. “Don’t folks do the damnedest things?”
The hairs, short and curly, were dark at the roots, cotton-candy-pink throughout the shafts.
I snapped a shot, then made a note on my form.
“This one’s smaller than the one over there.” Klopp stated the obvious. “Herrin had it pegged as a kid. I’m not so sure. Too bad we’ve got no teeth for aging.”
I didn’t respond. My eyes were roving over the bones. The cranial sutures. I picked up a clavicle. The skull. An innominate—one of the fused bones of the pelvis.
“Looks like the left foot got twisted backward, then held in place inside the plastic,” Klopp went on.
“This one went into the container first. Then she”—I indicated AF21-986—“was forced in on top of her. That positioning provided some protection.”
For the first time that day, Vislosky spoke. “She?”
I nodded.
“How do you know?” Klopp asked.
“Mostly the pelvis.”
“Show me.” Klopp circled the table.
Vislosky strode over to us.
Crap.
Mine was going to be a very long day. Not in the mood for an anatomy lesson, I decided to skim through it quickly.
While rotating the innominate of AF21-986, I described features, using common terminology and profoundly oversimplifying. “Broad, flaring hip area on the upper portion. Long pubic element and wide subpubic angle in front. Broad sciatic notch.” I demonstrated the breadth of the last by inserting and wiggling my thumb.
“You can tell from just that bone?” Vislosky sounded grudgingly interested.
I swapped the pelvis for the cranium. “The skull’s also important. Note the smooth muscle attachments, small mastoid processes and brow ridges, and sharp upper orbital margins.” Pointing to each.
“Any thoughts on age?” Klopp asked.
“They’re both young,” I said.
“How young?” Vislosky asked.
I retrieved the innominate and pointed to the pubic symphysis, the point at which that pelvic half would have met its counterpart in life. “See how rippled this surface looks? That tells me young.”
I turned the bone to show the curving upper rim of the hip blade.
“Rippled,” Klopp said.
“Bingo,” I said. “A crest of bone fuses onto that surface between the ages of fifteen and twenty-two in girls. These are very broad and very rough estimates. Anyway, it’s not there.”
