Michael Robotham - Shatter

‘Saw you on the TV,’ he grunts. ‘Could’ve told you she was gonna jump. I could see it coming.’

I don’t answer. It won’t make any difference. He’s not going to stop.

‘Tell me this, eh? If people are going to top themselves, why don’t they have the decency to do it somewhere private, instead of blocking traffic and costing taxpayers money?’

‘She was obviously very troubled,’ I mumble.

‘Gutless, you mean.’

‘It takes a lot of courage to jump off a bridge.’

‘Courage,’ he scoffs.

I glance at Gina. ‘And it takes even more courage to ask for help.’

She looks away.

Mid morning I call Bristol Police Headquarters and ask for Sergeant Abernathy. The rain has finally stopped. I can see a patch of blue above the tree-line and the faint traces of a rainbow.

Gravel and phlegm down the phone: ‘What do you want, Professor?’

‘I apologise for yesterday- leaving so suddenly. I wasn’t feeling well.’

‘Must be catching.’

Abernathy doesn’t like me. He thinks I’m unprofessional or inept. I’ve met coppers like him before- warrior types who think they’re separate from normal society, above it.

‘We need a statement,’ he says. ‘There’ll be an inquest.’

‘You’ve identified her?’

‘Not yet.’

There’s a pause. My silence irritates him.

‘In case it escaped your attention, Professor, she wasn’t wearing any clothes, which means she wasn’t carrying any identification.’

‘Of course. I understand. It’s just-.’

‘What?’

‘I thought somebody would have reported her missing by now. She was so well groomed: her hair, her eyebrows, her bikini-line; her fingernails were manicured. She spent time and money on herself. She’s likely to have friends, a job, people who care about her.’

Abernathy must be taking notes. I can hear him scribbling. ‘What else can you tell me?’

‘She had a Caesarean scar, which means children. Given her age, they’re probably school age by now. Primary or secondary.’

‘Did she say anything to you?’

‘She was talking to someone on a mobile phone- pleading with them.’

‘Pleading for what?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘And that’s all she said?’

‘She said I wouldn’t understand.’

‘Well, she got that much right.’

This case annoys Abernathy because it isn’t straightforward. Until he has a name, he can’t gather the required statements and hand it over to the coroner.

‘When do you want me to come in?’

‘Today.’

‘Can’t it wait?’

‘If I’m working Saturday, so can you.’

Avon and Somerset Police Headquarters is in Portishead on the Severn Estuary, nine miles west of Bristol. The architects and planners were perhaps labouring under the misapprehension that if they built a police headquarters a long way from the crime-ridden pockets of inner-city Bristol, the perpetrators might relocate and join them. If we build it- they will come.

The skies have cleared, but the fields are still flooded and fence posts stick out of the brackish water like the masts of sunken ships. On the outskirts of Saltford, on the Bath Road, I see a dozen cows huddling on an island of grass surrounded by water. A broken bale of hay is scattered beneath their hooves.

Elsewhere waves of water, mud and debris are trapped against fences, trees and bridges. Thousands of farm animals have drowned and machinery lies abandoned on low ground, caked in mud like tarnished bronze sculptures.

Abernathy has a civilian secretary, a small grey woman whose clothes are more colourful than her personality. She rises grudgingly from her chair and ushers me into his office.

The sergeant, a large, freckled man, is seated at a desk. His sleeves are buttoned down and starched resolutely with a sharp crease running from his wrists to his shoulders.

He speaks in a low rumble. ‘I take it you can write your own statement.’ A foolscap pad is pushed towards me.

I glance down at his desk and notice a dozen manila folders and bundles of photographs. It’s remarkable how much paperwork has been generated in such a short space of time. One of the files is marked ‘Post Mortem’.

‘Do you mind if I take a look?’

Abernathy glances at me like I’m a nosebleed and slides it over.

AVON amp; SOMERSET CORONER

Post-Mortem Report No: DX-56 312

Date and time of death: 28/09/2007. 1707 hours.

The body is that of a well-developed, well-nourished Caucasian female. The irises are brown. The corneas are clear. The pupils are fixed and dilated.

The body is cool to the touch and there is posterior lividity and partial rigidity. There are no tattoos, deformities or amputations. The victim has a linear 5” surgical scar on her abdomen at the bikini line, indicating a prior Caesarean section.

Her right and left earlobes are pierced. Her hair is approximately sixteen inches in length, brown, with a wave. Her teeth are natural and in good condition. Her fingernails are short, neatly rounded with polish present. Pink polish is also present on her toenails.

The abdomen and back show evidence of significant soft tissue abrasions and heavy bruising caused by blunt force trauma. These markings are consistent with an impact such as a fall.

The external and internal genitalia show no evidence of sexual assault or penetration.

The facts have a stark cruelty about them. A human being with a lifetime of experiences is labelled like a piece of furniture in a catalogue. The pathologist has weighed her organs, examined her stomach contents, taken tissue samples and tested her blood. There is no privacy in death.

‘What about the toxicology report?’ I ask.

‘It won’t be ready until Monday,’ he says. ‘You thinking drugs?’

‘It’s possible.’

Abernathy is on the way to saying something and changes his mind. He takes a satellite map from a cardboard tube and unrolls it across his desk. Clifton Suspension Bridge is at the centre, flattened of its perspective until it appears to be lying on top of the water instead of seventy-five metres above it.

‘This is Leigh Woods,’ he says, pointing to an expanse of dark green on the western side of Avon Gorge. ‘At 13.40 on Friday afternoon a man walking his dog on the Ashton Nature Reserve saw a near-naked woman in a yellow raincoat. When he approached her, the woman ran away. She was talking on a mobile and he thought it might be some sort of TV stunt.

‘A second sighting was made at 15.45. A delivery driver for a dry cleaning firm saw a fully naked woman walking along Rownham Hill Road near St Mary’s Road.

‘A CCTV camera on the western approach of the bridge picked her up at 16.02. She must have walked along Bridge Road from Leigh Woods.’

The details are like markers on a timeline, dividing the afternoon into gaps that can’t be accounted for. Two hours and half a mile separated the first and second sightings.

The sergeant flicks through the CCTV images so quickly it appears as if the woman is moving in juddering slow motion. Raindrops have smeared the lens, blurring the edges of each print, but her nakedness couldn’t be sharper.

The final photographs show her body lying on the deck of a flat bottomed boat. Albino white. Tinged with lividity around her buttocks and her flattened breasts. The only discernible colour is the red of her lipstick and the smeared letters on her stomach.

‘Did you recover her mobile?’

‘Lost in the river.’

‘What about her shoes?’

‘Jimmy Choos. Expensive but re-heeled.’

The photographs are tossed aside. The sergeant shows little sympathy for the woman. She is a problem to be solved and he wants an explanation- not for peace of mind or out of professional curiositybut because something about the case disturbs him.