When she had finished, Dr. Galway left her assistants to sew up, removed her surgical gown and gloves, washed and invited Banks into her office. A family photograph was the only personal item on her tidy desk, and on the wall opposite hung a framed print of Rembrandt’s “The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp.”

She must have seen him staring at the picture because she said, “Some people think it’s a bit gruesome, but I could stare at it for hours. I once went to The Hague for a weekend specially to see the original canvas.” She crossed her legs and leaned back in her chair. “Anatomy lessons were real social events back in the seventeenth century, you know. Even the general public were allowed in if they paid an entrance fee.”

“Executions were public back then, too,” said Banks.

Dr. Galway nodded. “Yes. I sometimes get the impression there’s quite a few people around who wouldn’t mind watching them on television these days. But enough of that. What can I tell you from the post-mortem? Well, there’ll be a full report in due time, of course, and I don’t like preliminary reports, but I’ll tell you what I know. Externally, at any rate, the boy’s organs were in excellent shape. His aorta and pancreas were punctured by a four-inch knife blade, and the bleeding from the aorta was, I’d say, the immediate cause of death.”

“Dr. Burns said at the scene that one of the thrusts might have pierced or punctured his right ventricle.”

Dr. Galway shook her head. “I can see how he might have thought that at the scene,” she said. “I’ve seen the photographs, and the body was in a very awkward position to examine. But it was definitely the punctured aorta that caused death.”

“What about that hypostasis you suspected earlier?”

“It is present, to a small degree, exactly where you would expect it to be if he’d been lying on his back.”

“Can you give me a better idea of how long, now that you’ve opened him up?”

Dr. Galway tilted her head. “You don’t give up easily, do you.”

Banks smiled. “Not in my job description.”

“From what I could see—in my judgment, and based on previous experience—I’d narrow it to an hour, an hour and a half at the most.”

That meant the boy had probably died between half past nine and ten o’clock. Banks would have guessed at a later time simply because it was darker then, but if he had been killed inside, the darkness wouldn’t matter. “Thank you, Doctor. So whoever killed him had maybe an hour to an hour and a half to get him from wherever he died to the spot where he was found. How long would it have taken for death to occur after his injuries?”

“Hard to say. Almost anything can happen with stab wounds. You’d be surprised how often they’re not even fatal. In this case, though, he would probably have survived long enough to feel the life ebbing out of him, poor lad. There was quite a lot of blood, as you saw, and there would have been plenty at the scene, too, but even so, a lot of the bleeding was internal. It often is. The wound closes when the knife is pulled out. Unless you hit a lung, of course, then there’s usually bloody spray from the mouth. Whether he could have been saved is a moot point. Personally, I doubt it. A pierced aorta is about as serious a wound as it gets, and even if a good doctor had opened him up immediately, survival would have been doubtful, at best. Whether the intent was to kill or not, I’m afraid that’s for the courts to decide. I have no idea what happened, what the killer had in mind. It’s rare that anyone knows how to use a knife properly, the way a commando might, for example, or someone skilled in close hand-to-hand combat.” She gestured with a pencil. “Most people just thrust away and hope for the best. It looks like that’s what happened in this case.”