Gay Longworth - Dead Alone

‘Right,’ said Jessie, trawling her memory for correct procedure. ‘Fry, get on to Heathrow, get an exclusion order and get that thing out of here.’

‘On what grounds?’

‘On the grounds that its propellers are disturbing a murder scene!’

‘With all due respect, ma’am , you don’t know that it is a murder scene –’

‘And you don’t know that it isn’t.’ She faced Fry full on and lowered her voice to a whisper. ‘Unless there is something you aren’t telling me?’

He shook his head. She smelled a rat, but there was nothing she could do about it now.

Jessie watched the helicopter withdraw to the limits of the exclusion order. The tide was rising, and she’d been denied a Home Office pathologist. News was out about the circus she was whipping up on the banks of the Thames. Mark was probably somewhere watching her hang herself and Jones was nowhere to be found.

‘Ma’am, the pathologist has arrived,’ said DC Fry. Her reluctant shadow.

A smart, auburn-haired woman held out her hand. She looked almost too delicate for the job, but her handshake was firm and her boots were caked in mud from previous grisly expeditions. ‘Sally Grimes,’ said the pathologist.

Jessie turned back to DC Fry. ‘I want those rowers filling out PDFs.’

Fry looked horrified at the amount of paperwork Jessie was accruing, but kept his mouth shut. The two women walked out to the skeleton. The water level was rising. ‘PDFs?’ queried Sally Grimes.

‘Personal description forms,’ Jessie said, ducking under the tarpaulin. ‘They describe themselves on it for the Holmes database back at the station.’

‘I know what they are. I was wondering why you were using them.’

‘Because I haven’t got a clue who this person is, or why they ended up here, and I’ve got to start somewhere.’

‘Bodies from the river are usually just picked up and matched to missing persons.’

Jessie studied the pale-skinned woman. ‘I was told you weren’t an investigative pathologist?’

‘I’m not. Yet. So what do you think you’ve got here?’

‘No idea, to be honest. I suspect I’ve been set up with a dud call by my fellow DI, who thinks I need bringing down several pegs. I thought I’d get him back by going by the book, give them the classroom detective they are waiting for.’

The police helicopter made another pass, its shadow gliding over the milky-white tarpaulin. It was getting hot under the plastic.

‘With bells on,’ said Sally.

Jessie shrugged. She wouldn’t admit she was wrong to call out the police helicopter. Not yet.

‘So they sent me and not a Home Office pathologist, because they don’t think you have anything,’ said Sally.

‘Like I said, I’ve been set up. Thing is, while I’ve been here, something about this skeleton has been bugging me.’

Sally smiled conspiratorially at Jessie. ‘Well, let’s see if we can find something to wipe the smile off your fellow DIs’ faces. What’s been bugging you?’

‘The smell.’

‘It is aromatic, I agree.’

‘I don’t mean the river smell. There’s something else. I only noticed it when the tarpaulin went up. It isn’t organic. In fact, it’s almost like bleach.’

Sally got down on her knees in the mud and smelled the bones. Jessie made a mental note to buy the woman a drink. The pathologist repeated the action at two more locations on the skeleton, nodded quietly to herself, and stood up. From her bag she took a swab and ran it along the exposed clavicle, then another down the fibula.

‘I’m not touching this until I’ve sent these to the lab.’

‘What is it?’

‘This corpse is too clean and too intact to have been here for years, and too decomposed to have died recently, unless someone has taken a cleaning fluid to it. How far would your DI go to make you look a fool?’

Jessie couldn’t answer that. She was too new on the scene to know. ‘He doesn’t like me.’

‘Would he get a freshly preserved lab skeleton, place it here and call you out to get you fired?’

Jessie’s face collapsed in panic. ‘A lab skeleton?’

Sally nodded. ‘I’m pretty sure these bones have been treated.’ They emerged from the tent. Sally arched backwards, stretching her spine. Jessie was too distraught to speak. ‘The undertakers are here. Let them bring the remains to the hospital. We’ll wait for the results on these swabs, see what we’ve got. If your DI has borrowed this from a medical college, we’ve got him. If he didn’t, then we’ll do a PM tomorrow and find out what we are dealing with. Okay?’

No, she was not okay. She had danced right into Mark Ward’s trap.

‘Tell all the undertakers to wear protective clothing,’ said Sally.

Jessie lifted her head. ‘Why protective clothing?’

‘The smell could be a cleaning agent mixed with formaldehyde, but it could be worse. We don’t know and it isn’t worth taking the risk. Plastic gloves will protect them from germs, not acids.’

‘Acid?’

‘It’s possible. Acid is still used as a way to make people disappear. No skull means no dental records. These bones are virtually unidentifiable.’ Sally touched Jessie’s arm. ‘For what it’s worth, I think you did the right thing. Leaving it to the undertakers to pick up without examining it first could have got someone hurt.’

‘You think so?’

‘Yes. Something is not right here. Stick to your guns, Detective. Whoever this dead woman is, she did not end up here by accident.’

‘So it’s a woman?’

‘Yes. But that’s all we know.’

The two women made their way laboriously up the bank. The mud sucked at their boots. Jessie looked back at the staked-out area. Already the furthest two poles were being licked by the rising water.

‘We going?’ said DC Fry hopefully.

‘Once you’ve checked that lot have picked up everything and photographed everything. I’m making you exhibits officer, don’t let me down.’

‘Come on, ma’am. You’re not still going through with this?’

‘Through with what , Fry?’

He did not answer her. Not directly. ‘It’s just … I thought you were doing something special with DCI Jones.’

There was no point in saying anything. Jessie left him smirking. Fry sat so neatly in Mark Ward’s pocket she kept forgetting he was there.

PC Ahmet was still taking the rowers’ statements. ‘Can you stay here, guard the site until it is completely covered in water, then be back here when the tide falls?’ said Jessie.

‘Would overtime commence at the appropriate time?’

‘Of course.’

‘Then I accept your request.’

‘Thanks. Here’s my card – if anything strange happens or anyone comes asking questions, take their details, get a PDF and call me. Only me. Got it?’

‘Yes, ma’am.’

‘Thanks, PC Ahmet. You’ve been great.’

Clare Mills stood at her father’s grave and listened to the belching buses trundle by. Cars hooted, mopeds buzzed and boys swore loudly. Not a very peaceful resting place, Whitechapel. She knelt down and swept away dead leaves. Here lies Trevor Mills. Loving husband and father. Born May 13th , 1933. Died April 27th , 1978. RIP . When Clare had first found the plot, she’d been angry that it didn’t say murdered. ‘Died’ implied that her father had something to do with his own death. He’d had a bad heart, weak genes, hadn’t eaten his greens, or had fallen at work. Drowned. Clare watched a drunk urinate against a once majestic headstone. The angel’s head was missing. Vandalism was a great leveller.

She looked back at the small flat square of stone under which her father’s bones lay. ‘Good news, Dad,’ she said quietly to herself. ‘The police are finally taking us seriously. I’m going to find Frank.’ Her mother was in Woolwich burial ground. Another almighty disaster in a life coloured by other people’s mistakes. Even in death, they couldn’t be together. Clare always felt bad that she visited her father more often than her mother. She felt guilty whenever she walked into Woolwich and saw the fresh yellow roses that Irene had dutifully brought. Irene had been her Mum’s best friend. It was Irene’s family who took Veronica in when her mother had run off. In a way, Irene was Clare’s only real friend too, if she thought about it. Irene never said she left the flowers. Clare knew that it still hurt her to talk about it. Irene missed her friend as much as Clare missed her mother, they were united by that common denominator. It was their foundation. Irene had been with her all through the search for Frank. Given her valuable clues and held her when, again, they came to nothing.