“John Soames went missing for hours,” the coroner told the gathered. “His radio had died; he couldn"t be reached. His supervisor, Fred Francis, found him at dawn the next morning, at the scene of the long defunct Our Lady of Mercy Hospital, as dead as his radio, sitting upright behind the steering wheel of his security vehicle. The ignition was still on, but the car had run out of gas. Soames was soaking wet from the top of his head to the soles of his squishy Oxfords and, despite being completely dressed, including coat, hat, and gloves, was all but frozen solid.” The coroner cleared his throat. “I had to thaw him out before I could do the autopsy.”
“Did he have any injuries?” Clayton asked.
“No obvious trauma.”
The sheriff nodded. “So he died of exposure?”
“That"s why you"re the sher
