avoid any serious discussions that would expose what an utter phony I was. I'm good at that.
Checking the next box, I asked, "Where's the maid?"
"In the kitchen. Name's Juanita Perez. Young, about twenty. Hispanic, and very Catholic, probably illegal, and at the moment, extremely distraught."
"I'll bet." I mean, I arrived at this apartment anticipating a corpse, and yet, between the malignant stench and the sight, I was still appalled. Juanita expected perhaps a messy apartment, but not a dead client, definitely not one in his vulgar condition, and for sure not a green card inspection.
I tried to imagine the moment she entered the bedroom, lured, perhaps, by the odor, lugging her cleaning bucket and possibly a duster or some other tool of her trade. She opened the bedroom door, stepped inside, and bingo--a man, totally naked, lying on his back, utterly exposed with the sheets rumpled around his feet. On the bedside table was a full glass of water, and discarded on the floor by the bed was a pile of unfolded garments: black socks, white boxers, dog-eared brown oxfords, a cheap gray two-piece business suit, white polyester shirt, and a really ugly necktie--it had little birds flying on green and brown stripes. His sartorial tastes aside, it looked like the same outfit Cliff wore to the office the day before. For the watchful observer this is a clue of sorts.
Also, nearly beneath the bed with only a corner sticking out, was a worn and scuffed tan leather valise, which for reasons I'll explain later, you can bet I kept a close eye on.
In fact, I edged my way over, gingerly placed a foot on that valise, and pressed down. The contents felt hard and flat--a thick notebook, or maybe a laptop computer. I then nudged the valise farther under the bed and, to distract Ms. Tran, pointed at the pile of clothes and observed, "He undressed in a hurry."
"Well . . . I'll bet messing up his clothes was the least of his worries."
I nodded. Behaviorally, I knew this to be partially consistent with suicide, and partially not. Those about to launch themselves off the cliff of oblivion focus on the here and now, with perhaps a thought to eternity, totally indifferent about tomorrow, because there is no tomorrow.
But neither are suicidal people usually in a careless rush. They are, for once, masters of their own destiny, their own fate. Some wrestle with temptation, others indulge the moment. Whatever stew of miseries brought them to this point is about to be erased, banished-- forever. A calm sets in, a moment of contemplation, perhaps. Some compose an informative or angry or apologetic note; many become surprisingly detached, methodical, ritualistic.
A psychiatrist friend once explained all this to me, further mentioning that the precise method of suicide often exposes a great deal about the victim's mood and mind-state.
Dead men tell no tales, as our pirate friends liked to say. But they often do leave road maps.
A common and I suppose reasonable impulse is to arrange a painless ending, or at least a swift one. But how they do it, that's what matters.
Scarring, scalding, or defacing their own bodies is often verboten; thus the popularity of overdosing, poisoning, carbon monoxide, or a plastic bag over the head--methods that leave the departed vessel intact, which matters for some reason. Some turn their final act into a public spectacle, flinging themselves off high buildings into busy thoroughfares, or rounding up an audience by calling the cops. Others take the opposite approach, finding an isolated spot to erase all evidence of their existence, anonymously leaping off tall bridges into deep waters, or presetting a fire to incinerate their corpse.
Unfortunately, we were in a bar, the shrink was a she, I was three sheets to the wind, and I was more interested in her 38D than her PhD. I am often ashamed by own pigginess, but anyway, I understood this: Suicide is like performance art. For the investigator, if you know how to read the signs, it's like a message from the dead. The victim is communicating something.
Again, I tried peeking around the hefty forensic examiner's shoulder and asked myself, what message was this guy sending, deliberately or otherwise?
His head rested on a pillow that was soaked with dried blood and brain matter, and about two inches from his left ear rested his left hand, in which a Glock 9mm pistol was gripped. His forefinger was still inside the trigger guard, and a silencer was screwed to