Luke Delaney - The Keeper

Canning shook his head. ‘No, there was too much bleeding from the wound for it to be post-mortem, although it was inflicted very close to the time of death, which was about twenty-four hours ago. Perhaps your killer wanted to knock her senseless before committing the terrible deed.’

The image of the faceless man standing behind Karen Green in a dark forest raced into Sean’s mind, the blunt, heavy object being raised above his shoulder and then brought down hard on the back of her head, pitching her forward to the soft, wet ground. ‘Any signs of sexual assault?’

‘Numerous,’ Canning answered, ‘and probably committed over a period of time — a few days at least. She has semen in her vagina, upper and lower, as well as her anus. Both vagina and anus show extensive bruising consistent with non-consensual intercourse and there are signs of some tearing at the entrance to her anus that are consistent with the same. It would appear you are looking for a rather unpleasant individual.’

‘That much I already know,’ said Sean.

‘Just as you knew I would soon have a female body recovered in woodland to examine.’ Canning locked eyes with Sean, waiting for him to blink first. ‘I reckon it would take a sharper scalpel than mine to dissect that brain of yours.’

‘I’m not as insightful as you think,’ Sean confessed. ‘This isn’t the woman I was expecting to find.’

Canning raised an eyebrow. ‘Then am I to expect more ladies of the forest?’

‘At this stage, all we can do is hope for the best and be prepared for the worst.’

Eager to conclude the autopsy and get back to the office, Sean directed Canning’s attention back to the body on the table. ‘When I had a cursory look at the scene, I saw a tattoo on the underside of her right forearm — a phoenix, I think.’

‘You mean this?’ Canning rotated her forearm to expose the garish little picture. ‘Not a tattoo, Inspector — a transfer. Common enough, but not usually found on an adult. Did she have any children?’

‘No.’

‘Perhaps she worked with children, a nursery or infant teacher?’

‘No,’ Sean repeated. ‘Children weren’t a part of her life.’

‘Then you have another mystery on your hands.’

Sean thought for a moment. ‘She was about to go travelling, to Australia and possibly beyond. Maybe she wanted to appear more exotic, but didn’t have the courage to get the real thing?’

‘That I wouldn’t know, Inspector. Conjecture is your field of expertise, not mine.’

Sean took a long hard look at the body, noting the injuries he’d already observed when he’d first seen her lying in the woods — the split lip showing signs of healing, the grazing and bruising on her fingers and knee — none of which required Canning’s skill to explain. But there were other bruises too, more clear now her flesh had been cleaned: small, round injuries that looked as if they had tiny burns at their centres.

‘What are these?’ he asked, his finger hovering over the strange marks. ‘They look like bruises with burns in the centre.’

‘I’ve been trying to fathom out what those are,’ said Canning. ‘Almost like cigarette burns surrounded by a cylindrical bruise. I’ll have to run some simulation tests and see if I can reproduce the effect, find out what caused them.’

Sean pointed to a square-shaped bruise that also showed signs of burning. ‘Any ideas what made that mark?’

‘It’s an older injury,’ Canning explained, ‘at least a week or so. I’ve seen it before, although not very often.’

‘Then you know what it is?’

‘That, Inspector, if I’m not mistaken, is an injury caused by a stun-gun.’

‘Caused at the same time as she was abducted?’

‘More or less — best as I can tell.’

‘So that’s how he incapacitates them: as soon as they open the door, he hits them with the stun-gun and then goes to the chloroform?’

‘It’s quite possible,’ Canning agreed. ‘Will that narrow the field for you? The sale and ownership of such an item in this country is highly restricted.’

‘I doubt he obtained it legally — probably picked it up on the Continent and smuggled it into the country, but we’ll check. Anything else for me, other than the superficial stuff? Anything I can use straight away?’

‘Well …’ Canning began, pricking Sean’s interest, ‘when I was swabbing the body I could smell traces of cosmetics. I took a closer look and, although it’s too early to say, I believe she had recently applied both cream and perfume to her body. Looking at the general state of her, I would say she hasn’t been allowed to bathe for several days, which is why the traces remain, but still, cosmetics of this type generally don’t stick around for more than four or five days. I noticed the police report said she’d been missing for eight to nine days, which means-’

Sean cut across him, his head flooding with thoughts and images that made almost perfect sense, yet contradicted so much. ‘Which means they were applied while she was being held captive. He made her put them on.’

‘Or he put them on her,’ Canning offered.

‘No, I don’t think so,’ Sean dismissed the suggestion. ‘Clearly she didn’t have access to washing facilities for at least the last few days, but if the cream and perfume aren’t fresh it could mean that round about the same time he stopped allowing her to wash he also stopped giving her them to use.’

Canning opened his mouth to speak but Sean raised a hand to silence him, his fickle brain dangling the answers tantalizingly close before snatching them away. He slowed his mind, relaxing and concentrating at the same time, clearing the fog of a thousand unrelated thoughts to allow the answers to come.

‘He treated her well at first,’ he began, ‘gave her food and water, somewhere to wash. She was special to him, so special he gave her body cream and even perfume, as if she was his, his lover, but then something changed. Something changed and she became nothing to him, nothing more than a problem to be removed. He didn’t feed her any more, or allow her to wash or even wear clothes, and there was no more pampering with cosmetics, just rape and torture. And when he couldn’t stand the sight of her any more he took her into the woods and killed her like a farmer would kill an old sheep dog that couldn’t earn its keep, without feeling or remorse. And then he left her cold and unclothed in the woods and went back to the woman he’d taken to replace her. He went back to Louise Russell and the cycle started all over again. But who did Karen Green replace? Or was she the one you coveted above all others, the one you fantasized about for years before taking her?’ He froze for a few seconds, then turned back to Canning. ‘The swabs you took from her body, with the cream and perfume samples — can I take them with me?’

‘Why would you want to do that?’ Canning asked, perplexed by the break with procedure.

‘I need to know if she’s the one that triggered his behaviour.’

‘How will the swabs help you know if she was the one who caused him to behave in this extreme way?’

‘Not caused,’ Sean corrected him, ‘triggered. The cause of his behaviour has its roots deep in his past. God only knows what’s happened to him during his life to make him what he is now, to make an angry boy grow into a dangerous man. Maybe Karen Green showed him some kindness or affection that drew him to her, but he misinterpreted her, made more of it than there was and so she pushed him away. He couldn’t handle the rejection, so he did something about it. He did this. If the swabs contain cream and perfume that we also find at her house, then I’ll know they were hers and therefore that she could well be the one he’s always coveted. But if they’re not, then he made her use them because he was trying to make her someone else.’