Peter James - You Are Dead

‘Yes,’ she shouted back, grinning at Glenn almost mischievously. ‘Nice to see you again, Detective Inspector.’

‘And you too, Siobhan, how are you?’ Glenn said.

‘Well, a little bird told me you two gentlemen haven’t come to a children’s playground to have a go on the swings, nor the slide or roundabout — and you don’t look like you’re dressed for a windsurfing lesson!’

Glenn cocked his head sideways, and Grace noticed the chemistry between them. ‘Very astute,’ Branson said. ‘You could be a detective.’

She laughed. ‘So do I have to wait for a press conference to find out what’s going on here, or can I get a scoop on the dead body unearthed by workmen last night?’

‘Well, at this point,’ Roy Grace said, ‘you appear to know as much as we do.’

‘Is it male or female? Do you know the age? How long has he or she been here?’ She pointed. ‘You have a fairly big CSI presence and a Home Office Pathologist, and I understand you have a forensic archaeologist in there, too. So, I would say, you are spending serious money at a time of major budget cuts for the police, which means you have a crime scene you consider worth investigating. We’re not talking historical relics, are we?’

She was smart, Grace had to concede, and he had to stop himself grinning back at her. Not only was she attractive, she had an infectious smile.

Glenn Branson jerked a thumb at his colleague and best friend. ‘I hope that comment isn’t referring to this old relic here?’ He grinned at Grace. ‘Sorry, old-timer.’

‘Very witty,’ Grace retorted.

The reporter smiled. ‘I won’t print that,’ she said.

There was something about the reporter that Roy Grace warmed to. She seemed a lot more sincere than many journalists he had encountered. And hell, she had made the effort to get here early and was well-informed. She deserved at least a titbit.

‘DI Branson will be holding a press conference, Siobhan, as soon as we have sufficient information. What I can tell you so far is that workmen digging up this path yesterday exposed human remains, which have been tentatively identified as female. We don’t know the age and we don’t know how long they have been here — other than that they pre-date this path, which was laid approximately twenty years ago by the Council. I hope to have more information as the day progresses.’

‘Any chance I could have a quick peek inside the tent?’

Glenn Branson gave Roy a quizzical look.

‘I’m afraid not at this stage,’ Grace replied.

‘Is there a Coroner’s Officer attending?’

‘You mean there’s something you don’t know?’ Glenn teased her.

She grinned back. ‘Yes. I am just a rookie, sir.’

‘Philip Keay is on his way. But I don’t think he’ll have anything for you. I think you’re going to have to wait for the press conference.’

She shrugged. ‘OK. I’ll just hang around for a while, if it’s OK with you guys?’

‘It’s a public park,’ Glenn said. ‘Feel free. But I tell you what, if I wanted a good story, I’d go and doorstep Norman Cook. Ask Fatboy Slim how our local rock star feels having a crime scene outside his café.’

Her face lit up. ‘You’re right! That’s exactly what I’ll do. Thank you!’

‘Let me know if you need an agent,’ Glenn replied. ‘My terms are very reasonable.’

She turned back to Roy Grace. ‘Separately, is there any news on the misper from last night, Logan Somerville? Operation Haywain?’

Grace stared at her, momentarily thrown by her knowledge. Her predecessor had been fired from the Argus for illegal phone tapping, after constantly coming up with information the police had not yet released. Was she doing the same now? Or did she have a source within the police? He had just come from the first briefing, and was due to head over to the car park where Logan Somerville had apparently disappeared, as soon as he had checked out the situation here. He was guarded in his reply.

‘What information do you have?’ he asked her.

‘I heard she had broken off her engagement with her boyfriend recently. Does that make her disappearance suspicious? I understand there is a manhunt underway.’

Grace clocked that piece of information about the engagement to his memory bank. ‘We are in the process of gathering information at this point,’ he said. ‘The Press Office will be able to update you later this morning. But so you know, we have every available officer and PCSO out looking for Ms Somerville, and they’ve been looking through the night.’

‘Thank you, Detective Superintendent.’

‘I have your mobile number,’ Glenn Branson said. ‘I’ll call you if there are any developments.’

She thanked him and headed off across the Lagoon.

As they ducked under the tape, they were greeted by Dave Green, also fully suited in protective clothing.

‘How’s it going?’ Grace asked.

‘We’ve found a cigarette butt with the remains,’ he said. ‘I’m sending it off for analysis. But that’s all I’m sending so far.’

As they sat down inside the changing-room tent, and pulled on their protective oversuits, Grace said to Branson, ‘Are you a bit sweet on that Argus reporter?’

‘Just trying to cultivate the local press — like you always taught me.’ He gave him a mischievous grin.

‘There’s a big difference between cultivate and shag , mate, OK?’

‘Yeah, there’s a lot more vowels in cultivate. ’

‘Just don’t go there,’ Grace said. ‘I’m serious. If you’re ambitious, keep the press at arm’s length — not at dick’s length. Also think about your kids. It’s not that long since their mother died.’

‘Yeah, but plenty long enough since she kicked me out and brought in a new bloke as their substitute dad,’ Branson said grimly. The DI, struggling to pull his suit over his hips, gave his friend a sideways glance. ‘You’ve recently married one of the most beautiful women on the planet. I never put you down for someone with penis envy.’

‘Sod you!’

‘You’ve got to admit Siobhan’s well tasty.’

‘So was the apple on the tree in Genesis.’

Friday 12 December

Dr Edward Crisp was a short, toned man, with a bald dome and neat, greying hair at his temples. He wore fashionably modern glasses that were too big for his face, giving him a quizzical expression, as if he were peering out at the world through goggles.

A fastidious dresser, he was attired today in a hand-made charcoal suit from Brighton society tailor Gresham Blake, a pale blue shirt and a pink silk tie, both from Jermyn Street, and shiny black Chelsea boots from Crockett and Jones in London’s Burlington Arcade. His scruffy black and white dog, Smut, which most of his patients were fond of, slept beside his desk on a cushion inside a wire-framed basket.

Although the modern trend for family doctors was to work with a group in a medical centre, he preferred to work alone, in the same office he had occupied for over twenty-five years. It was a spacious, imposing consulting room on the ground floor of a rather ugly Victorian terrace, close to Church Road in Hove, with a tiny adjoining room for his secretary, Jenni Acton. She was fifty-seven, unmarried, and had worked for him with slavish devotion for twenty years.

The room, as did his immaculate outfit, reflected his particular passion for neatness and order. His qualifications hung in a row, uniformly framed and uniformly impressive. In addition to being a general practitioner, he held qualifications in immunology from the Pasteur Institute in Paris, homeopathy, Chinese medicine and acupuncture, as well as being a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons. He had in fact qualified as a surgeon before deciding that working as a family doctor with an exclusive private practice suited him better. And his legion of private patients were glad about that, because he was widely liked and popular, to the extent that his list had been closed for many years, and he would only take on new patients by very special criteria.