“Do you ever keep intradepartmental memos in your directory?”
“In word processing, a subdirectory.”
“Same password to access those documents?”
“Yes.”
“And in word processing you would store autopsy reports and other documents pertaining to cases?”
“I would. But at the time my directory was broken into there wasn’t anything sensitive on file that I can think of.”
“But whoever broke in didn’t necessarily know that.”
“Obviously not,” I said.
“What about Ronnie Waddell’s autopsy report, Kay? When your directory was broken into, was his report in the computer?”
“It would have been. He was executed Monday, December thirteenth. The break-in occurred late on the afternoon of Thursday, December sixteenth, while I was doing Eddie Heath’s post and Susan was upstairs in my office, supposedly resting on the couch after the formalin spill.”
“Perplexing.”
He frowned. “Assuming Susan is the one who went into your directory, why would she be interested in Waddell’s autopsy report – if that’s what this is all about? She was present during his autopsy. What could she have read in your report that she wouldn’t have already known?”
“Nothing I can think of.”
“Well, let me rephrase that. What pertaining to his autopsy would she not have learned from being present the night his body was brought to the morgue? Or maybe I’d better say the night a body was brought to the morgue, since we’re no longer so sure this individual was Waddell,” he added grimly.
“She wouldn’t have had access to lab reports,” I said. “But the lab work wouldn’t have been completed by the time my directory was broken into. Tox and HIV screens, for example, take weeks.”
“And Susan would have known that.”
“Certainly.”
“So would your administrator.”
“Absolutely.”
“There must be something else,” he said.
There was, but as it came to mind I could not imagine the significance.
“Waddell – or whoever the inmate was – had an envelope in the back pocket of his jeans that he wanted buried with him. Fielding wouldn’t have opened this envelope until he had gone upstairs with his paperwork after the post.”
“So Susan couldn’t have known what was inside the envelope while she was in the morgue that night?”
Wesley asked with interest.
“That’s right. She couldn’t have.”
“And was there anything of significance inside this envelope?”
“There was nothing inside but several receipts for food and tolls.”
Wesley frowned. “Receipts,” he repeated. “What in God’s name would he have been doing with those? Do you have them here?”
“They’re in his file.”
I got out the photocopies. “The dates are all the same, November thirtieth.”
“Which should have been about the time Waddell was transported from Mecklenburg to Richmond.”
“That’s right. He was transported fifteen days before his execution,” I said.
“We need to run down the codes on these receipts, see what locations we get. This may be important. Very important, in light of what we’re contemplating.”
“That Waddell is alive?”
“Yes. That somehow a switch was made and he was released. Maybe the man who went to the chair wanted these receipts in his pocket when he died because he was trying to tell us something.”
“Where would he have gotten them?”
“Perhaps during the transport from Mecklenburg to Richmond, which would have been an ideal time to pull something,” Wesley replied. “Maybe two men were transported, Waddell and someone else.”
“You’re suggesting they stopped for food?”
“Guards aren’t supposed to stop for anything while transporting a death row inmate. But if some conspiracy were involved, anything could have happened. Maybe they stopped and got take-out food, and it was during this interval that Waddell was freed. Then the other inmate was taken onto Richmond and put in Waddell’s cell. Think about it. How would any of the guards or anybody else at Spring Street have any way of knowing the inmate brought in wasn’t Waddell?”
“He might say he wasn’t, but that doesn’t mean that anyone would have listened.”
“I suspect they wouldn’t have listened.”
“What about Waddell’s mother?”
I asked. “Supposedly, she had a contact visit with him hours before the execution. Certainly, she would know B the inmate she saw was not her son.”
“We need to verify that the contact visit occurred .But whether it did or didn’t, it would have been to Mrs. Waddell’s benefit to go along with any scheme. I don’t imagine she wanted her son to die.”