Denise Mina: Slip of the Knife

She gave up trying to get her head around the fact of death. She developed the mental trick of pretending that Con had gone away on a long, happy trip, that she would see him again one day and everything would be better, he’d be tumor free, the regret and all the space between them gone. It was later that she realized her mother used exactly the same mental trick but called the destination heaven.

Blane glanced nervously out at the misty Green and cursed under his breath as he pressed the hissing intercom again. Kilburnie looked at Paddy, blank faced until her training kicked in: her face softened and she reached supportively for Paddy’s arm, retreating when she saw the snarl on her face.

Paddy thought she was coming over too hard. “Did he leave a note?”

Blane looked puzzled. “Who?”

“Terry. Did he leave a note saying why?”

Blane’s jaw dropped in realization. “No, no, sorry. He didn’t do it to himself.”

Kilburnie stole a pinch of Paddy’s elbow. “He was murdered.”

“You’re shitting me?”

“Oh yes, definitely. There were tire marks at the side of the road but no car around and we haven’t found the weapon. He was naked and we never found his clothes. He was murdered.”

“Terry was naked ?”

Blane nodded. “Stark, bollock naked.”

She knew it had to be murder: even if the gun wasn’t missing, Terry wouldn’t want to be found naked. He was a bit pudgy, had some fat around his arse, and was ashamed. He wanted the lights off before he would undress in front of her. It was one of the things she’d liked about him. “But who’d want to kill Terry Hewitt?”

Blane leaned in confidentially. “They said it looks like an IRA assassination.”

Paddy reeled on her heels. “Get fucked!”

He nodded, excited, knowing the implications. “‘All the hallmarks.’ That’s what they said.”

“No one’d authorize that in Scotland. We’re neutral. And Terry had nothing to do with Ireland.”

“Well,” he said, “I’m sure they’ll tell us in the press statement. They usually do that, don’t they?”

Kilburnie leaned back, getting between them, pointedly clearing her throat, reminding Blane of the need for discretion. Chastened, he turned back to the door, his shoulder met by Kilburnie’s, forming a wall against Paddy. He pressed the buzzer a third time. “Well, that’s what they told us,” he said, defending himself to Kilburnie.

“It can’t be.” Paddy addressed their backs. “He was a journalist. Even the Americans wouldn’t stand for that.”

The intercom crackled: “Yeah?”

Blane leaned in. “PCs Blane and Kilburnie from Pitt Street. Expected here for an ID.”

The door buzzed and fell open an inch, letting out a jab of sharp lemon. Paddy had visited the city mortuary several times and the smell didn’t get any less alarming. She took a deep breath before stepping into the dark hall.

Blane made sure the door was shut tight behind them.

Inside, the lobby was softly lit. A bleary-eyed security guard sat stiffly at the desk, the appointments book in front of him suspiciously flattened. As Blane and Kilburnie showed him their warrant cards and signed in, Paddy moved to the side and spotted the edge of a pillow on his lap.

Blane smiled at the guard, saying his name twice in the course of a bland hello. Police officers liked to say people’s names. Made them feel connected. He introduced Paddy but the security guard didn’t react to her name. Not a Daily News reader.

Blane gave up trying to chat and nodded Kilburnie and Paddy down the corridor to a set of doors with ABSOLUTELY NO ENTRY painted on them. Through the doors, after a long landing, narrow stone steps led down into the bowels of the building and a warren of white-tiled corridors.

Kilburnie turned back to Paddy at the bottom of the stairs. “About the IRA-that’s just a canteen rumor.”

Paddy nodded. “Understood.”

“It shouldn’t go in the paper or anything. Could scare people. Cause friction.”

“I’m sure it’ll be fine,” said Paddy vaguely, itching to get to the office now.

“Now, this…” Kilburnie pointed down the corridor. “I’m here to support you. Are you sure you’re all right?”

“Fine,” said Paddy sharply.

She saw Kilburnie flinch at her coldness. Paddy could have faked a bit of trauma, but that wasn’t supposed to be the point. The incessant attempts to prompt her emotions were getting on her tits.

Ahead of them, sheet-plastic abattoir doors glowed yellow from the light behind them and a radio hummed, muffled by the scratched, leathery material. Kilburnie reached out with both hands and pushed them open. The smell hit Paddy’s nose like a spiteful slap. Rancid meat and the afterburn of alcohol. She forced herself to take breaths in and out. She’d made herself dizzy in the mortuary once before by not breathing in enough.

The bizarre tableau they walked in on stopped them dead. Kilburnie gasped, afraid again no doubt.

Standing alone against a wall of glinting stainless steel was an elf dressed in green scrubs, face mask hinged off one ear. Her hands hung by her sides, turned towards them, like Jesus welcoming sinners in a painting. The wild brown hair was blunt cut above her shoulders. She smiled stiffly, eyes open a little too wide. She’d heard them coming down the stairs, probably heard the buzzer and the doors. Her welcoming stance had gone stale.

“Hello.” The odd little woman refreshed her smile. She was young, her skin perfect, her figure unformed, as if she was still waiting for puberty to hit.

Blane frowned. “John about?”

The mortuary elf looked Paddy over, smart in a black wraparound work dress and platform orange-suede trainers. “He’s having a kip in the back.”

All three of them considered the possibility that this tiny woman had risen from the Green, broken in for some sick reason, and beaten John to death.

She touched a hand to her chest. “Aoife McGaffry,” she said, her Northern Irish accent thick and warm. “I’m the new pathologist.”

Blane smiled. “Oh, I thought you were a nutter. What are you doing here at this time on a Saturday night?”

Aoife stepped back, welcoming them into the big room. “We’re backed up.”

“Old Graham Wilson had a heart attack a week ago,” Blane explained to Paddy. “They’ve been storing everyone they can until the new Path started.”

Paddy had never met Graham Wilson but she’d seen him giving evidence at the High Court a couple of times. He was disheveled, looked as if he’d just been woken up, wore a crumpled three-piece suit and pince-nez.

“Died on the job,” said Aoife. “Not ‘on the job’ as in mid- coitus,” she corrected herself, “but ‘on the job’ here.” She pointed at the floor in front of her. “Again, not in midcoitus.”

It was supposed to be a joke but Blane flinched.

Aoife McGaffry winced. Police officers might snigger at the nightie someone was wearing when they were told of a loved one’s death, they might make jokes about Head and Shoulders at the scene of car crashes, but, apparently, there were bounds of decency and the suggestion that a colleague had died in the course of a necrophiliac orgy wasn’t funny. Paddy liked Aoife immediately.

“I’m Paddy Meehan.” She stepped forward and put out her hand.

Aoife smiled at the outstretched hand. “You wouldn’t thank me for shaking it. It’d take ye a week to get the smell out.” She twisted around to look behind her. “Tend to go a bit ripe if they’re left for a week.”

“I’m here to identify someone…”

Behind her Blane barked, “SMR Ref 2372/90,” reading from his notebook.

Aoife listened, dismissed him with a blink, and looked at Paddy again, shedding all her awkwardness now she was in her professional role. “And is this someone close to you?”