Sounds of Murder

Chapter 16

Chapter 16

She was nibbling--just nibbling, on another of Rocky's sandwich masterpieces. Every bite she took reminded her of her husband and the mounting number of lies she'd told him--or at least things she'd failed to tell him--in just the last twenty-four hours. It was now just after noon on Friday. The sandwich was a ham and cheese on some sort of Focacchio bread; it was delicious, but she felt guilty eating it. They'd had such a fight last night--and all for nothing. Rocky was mad because he loved her and was concerned for her welfare; she knew that.

But, she just couldn't make him understand her position. Pamela felt a sense of obligation towards Charlotte--not just because she'd found Charlotte's body, but also because she truly believed that the information on the disk might lead to the killer's identity and that she was uniquely qualified to figure it out.

Why did it have to be so hard? Why did doing something she felt was right have to cause this rift between her and her husband? Not just a rift, she thought. No, she'd deceived him-again. She should've never told him she'd made the copy of the disk. She should've just kept her mouth shut. He'd wanted her to dispose of it--then and there--last night. Luckily, she'd thought quickly and told him--lied to him--that the disk was in her office. She'd promised him that she'd destroy it today. Now here she sat, wondering if he sincerely believed that she meant to do it.

Of course, when she'd said all that to him last night, the disk had been in her purse all the time. It was still there now, although she was almost afraid to check. Maybe it had miraculously disappeared and all her worries would be over. Oh, my God, what was she thinking? If it were missing, that would be a catastrophe. Quickly, she reached over, grabbed her purse, and peeked inside. There, in its paper sleeve was the infamous disk--looking thoroughly benign. Taking a deep breath, she put her purse back. Calm down, she told herself, just think this through. She continued nibbling her sandwich.

She couldn't believe this much time had gone by and she still hadn't been able to examine the copied disk. It had been too risky to load it last night at home after what had happened when she'd tried to sneak a glance at the original disk on her home computer. Once she'd gotten Rocky and Angela off to school this morning and straightened up the house (so to speak), it was too late to examine the disk, and she'd had to go to class.

Her morning classes had drifted by as if she were in a hypnotic trance and now here she sat in her office alone for the first time since making the disk. Did she dare listen to the disk here in her office? What if someone came in? She desperately wanted to run it through her acoustic software program to see if there was anything unusual about the sounds on it. Surely, she could close down the program quickly if anyone showed up at her door.

She finished her sandwich and put the wrappings in the brown paper sack which she tossed in her waste basket. Then, taking her cup of tea over to her desk, she angled her monitor so only she could see her screen. Pulling the disk from her purse, she opened the CD drawer and inserted the disk. Pop, click. The computer uploaded the file and Pamela brought up her acoustic analysis program. The spectrograph wave of the two minutes or so of what she believed to be the sound of Charlotte Clark's murder appeared on the screen.

Adjusting the volume knob to the lowest possible level, she placed her cursor at the beginning of the sound wave and pressed play. The ghastly sound of choking floated from her built-in speakers, accompanied by the various bumps, knocks, and clicks. The sounds continued as the cursor flew over the visual output, built to what she would describe as a sort of crescendo, then abruptly ended.

Pamela speculated that Charlotte (or the killer) had inadvertently bumped the "record" toggle switch during their struggle and then bumped it off again as the struggle continued. With this scenario in mind, and placing the cursor back at the beginning of the sound wave, she played it again.