Barry Maitland: Silvermeadow

He took the phone and walked away, out of earshot.

She-it definitely was a she-was curiously resistant to their probing, as if unwilling to release her secrets. Her age for a start. Perhaps it was the effect of the prolonged wrapping in the heavy plastic, or simply the result of the brutal compression, but her crushed face appeared old, that of a wrinkled old woman, while some other parts of her body-a thigh, a breast-seemed undeniably juvenile. The juxtaposition was disturbing, and Brock found his eyes wandering backwards and forwards, trying to reconcile a span of sixty years in the one body. In the end the pathologist called for X-rays of the teeth, as the only sure guide, but made an informed guess based on the weight of her organs, especially the liver and the spleen, which of all the main organs experience the greatest growth during puberty, and which in both cases were close to the median weight for a fourteen-year-old of similar build.

How and when she died were also problematic. There were no wounds incompatible with the effects of the compactor, into which, the pathologist was fairly certain, she had been put after rigor mortis was well established. But this was only a guess, he explained, for who had any real evidence of what the relentless hydraulic forces of the machine could do to the joints of a human body, whether stiff with rigor or not? He could only estimate, too, that she had been dead for around seven days, which matched reasonably well with Cherry’s conjecture that, from her position in the cardboard mountain, she had probably been delivered to Number Three Shed four or five days before. Maybe. As for identity, the teeth would again most likely provide the most reliable evidence, apart from the Mexican silver ring. It struck Brock as obscene that this little trinket, completely unscathed, should now seem to contain more of her personality than anything else on the stainless-steel table.

When it was over, and they set off again for their meeting with Chief Superintendent Forbes, Brock thought he sensed a certain satisfaction in Lowry that he had kept the senior officer waiting for a couple of hours for so little additional information. But he felt happier. He had, in some way that he couldn’t quite define, made contact with the victim, seen what had to be seen. It was the true starting point, from which the axis of the investigation would extend.

The jackhammering was at full volume when they returned to the divisional station at Hornchurch Street. Lowry showed Brock to the fourth-floor conference room and departed. Forbes rose to his feet, smiling, as Brock walked in. This was a much more comfortable meeting room, with high-backed chairs and a long polished timber-board table. The noise was muffled in here, and Forbes waved Brock to a seat. ‘So, how was the PM?’ he asked.

‘Not as informative as I’d have liked. A fourteen-year-old girl, most probably, but nothing much more solid than that. Sorry to have held you up.’

Forbes waved a large hand dismissively. ‘Can’t stand autopsies. One was enough for me. Had she been interfered with?’

‘We’ll have to wait for the tests.’

‘Mmm. But nasty, you’d agree?’ He appeared keen to have Brock confirm this point.

‘Yes. Certainly that.’

‘A sticker, as my young colleagues would put it, eh?’

Brock nodded. A sticker, certainly.

‘Mmm.’ He seemed reassured. ‘Wouldn’t like it said that we’d overreacted.’

Perhaps that was what the insurance was for, protection against some sensitivity in the system to premature approaches to Area Major Investigation Pool Management.

‘And an interesting case?’

Again Brock nodded. Interesting indeed.

‘No chance of further bodies out there?’

‘They haven’t found any so far, but they’re less than halfway through searching.’

‘Ah. So tell me, have you been able to give my proposal any further thought?’

‘What exactly did you have in mind, sir? There’s no suggestion that North is connected to this other case.’

‘No, no. But it has occurred to me since we last spoke that we might be able to come to some arrangement that would suit both our purposes. You want to spend time at Silvermeadow in the hope of tracking North, but don’t want it to be apparent, and we need top-calibre people there to support our investigations into the murder of this girl. Now suppose I, or rather AMIP, were to make a request to the Yard for high-level assistance with this murder, and you and your team were nominated. That would give you a legitimate reason to be at Silvermeadow, and of course would be a bonus for us.’

‘You would want us to participate in your murder team?’

‘Oh, I think that would be essential, don’t you? Otherwise people would ask what you were doing there. And, given your… status, I imagine people would expect you to play a leading role, at least nominally, yes? And of course, I would express my delight that the Met had agreed to lend us someone so’-he hesitated, searching for the right word-‘distinguished,’ he said finally, rather lamely.

Brock was thinking that the insurance Forbes was seeking must be of a more ongoing nature if he wanted him effectively to take over one of his cases. But Brock wasn’t averse to that. He wanted to know what had happened to the crushed child he’d just seen dissected on the pathologist’s table.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I can see possibilities in that.’

‘Really?’ Forbes seemed almost taken aback at the success of his gambit. ‘Excellent, excellent. I’ll get it formalised right away. I take it you’re happy to work with DS Lowry? Well regarded. Sound. Local knowledge. An asset, undoubtedly.’

Brock noted the sudden abbreviation of Forbes’s sentences, and wondered if he might have some problem with this local asset.

‘I expect,’ Forbes added with a conciliatory smile, ‘that you’ll want to have your sergeant on the team?’

Brock nodded, acknowledging the etiquette in the balance of power. ‘Bren Gurney, yes. But I want him working on the North case. I’ll bring in someone else to back up the Vlasich inquiry.’

‘Fair enough. Anyone in mind?’

‘I’ve an excellent DS we could probably make available. Name of Kolla.’

‘And he is…?’

‘She.’

‘Ah. Yes, well, good idea. A dead girl-a woman DS should be an asset.’

What a pompous ass he was, Brock thought. ‘Her asset is that she’s a bloody good detective. We’ve got an excellent forensic liaison officer too, if that suits you. I wonder if I might make a couple of calls?’

‘Of course, of course.’ Forbes jumped to his feet, reached for the phone, which was sitting on a side cabinet, and hefted it, together with the three Metropolitan Police telephone directories, red, black and grey, across onto the table. He set the books down beside the phone, pointedly placing the black volume, covering headquarters branches, on top.

‘Be my guest. Just give me a shout when you’re finished,’ he said. ‘I’ll organise tea and biscuits. How do you take it?’

‘White no sugar, thanks,’ Brock said, and Forbes moved rapidly to the door.

Five minutes later there was a knock and a constable stepped in cautiously with a polystyrene cup.

‘The chief super asked me to tell you to ring him on this number when you’re finished, sir.’

Brock took the note she offered and lifted the cup as she left. Coffee, sweet. He grimaced.

His first phone call had reassured him that there was method behind Forbes’s manoeuvrings. There was a political climate to be appeased, and Forbes had probably acted wisely, both in terms of self-insurance and the greater good. Child murder, if that was what it was, was the number one priority of the day.

He put down the cup and rang a second number.