Authors: Lee Weeks
‘Doctor Harding?’
A blonde-haired woman in a white forensic suit was kneeling beside the remains of the woman, which were bloated and blackened by the water. The woman’s head was inside a polythene bag. She
had wounds as big as teacups that had eaten into her body.
Doctor Harding looked up and nodded. She didn’t smile. She wasn’t one for automatic gestures of politeness. ‘Willis . . .’ She handed Ebony a pair of gloves. ‘Help
me with the body.’ A police photographer moved around and between them in the small tent as he took pictures of the body.
Carter spoke from behind his scarf. ‘How old do you put her, Doc?’
‘Mid-twenties.’
‘Any birthmarks, operation scars? Anything that might help us to identify her?’
‘There’s a tattoo running up the outside of her left ankle.’ Harding turned the victim’s left leg over. ‘I think it’s something written in Norse. I saw
something like it once before, on a bald-headed man. That time it turned out to be an ancient proverb meaning:
A cleaved head no longer plots
.’
‘Yeah,’ said Carter. ‘I remember that guy – had it around his crown, didn’t he? Drug dealer from Croydon, came up to deal with the Turks on Caledonian Road. It
proved to be a perfect guideline for someone to cut the top of his head off like a boiled egg. Let’s see if our mermaid shows up anywhere on the system.’
‘Yes, Guv,’ said the photographer.
‘Whoever she was, she’s definitely undernourished,’ said Harding.
‘How long’s she been in the water?’ asked Carter.
‘A few months, at least. She went in when the water was warmer. Decomposition started but then slowed right down.’
Carter hovered nearer and looked directly down over the body at the plastic bag covering her head. ‘Her face looks like something from a waxworks horror museum,’ he observed. He
moved closer. ‘It looks like it’s made of cheese.’
The photographer stood where Carter had been to take his shots of the head. Carter pulled back.
Harding nodded. ‘It’s called adipocere – the absence of oxygen and plenty of moisture inside the bag have caused the fats from her face and her brain matter to fuse, turning
her face into soap.’
‘Prostitute maybe?’ asked Carter. ‘A client went too far: got carried away with the bag, and killed her by accident then dumped her here?’
‘Pretty risky getting undressed in the middle of King’s Cross,’ Harding answered as she turned the woman’s head towards Ebony and searched for the best place to begin
cutting open the bag.
‘People enjoy taking risks,’ Carter disagreed. ‘Might have been a warm summer evening. Maybe this was an experimental sex session gone wrong – he asphyxiates her and then
dumps her body straight into the water.’
Harding decided on an entry place for her scalpel and Ebony held the plastic out, away from the woman’s face, whilst the doctor slit down the centre of the bag and peeled it back gently.
She finished cutting the bag through. Ebony moved the clumped strands of dark auburn hair away from the woman’s face and neck for Harding to get a better look. She splayed them out,
medusa-like.
‘Except . . .’ She turned the head to one side – ‘she wasn’t asphyxiated; she was strangled and the bag was an afterthought. Someone used huge force too; they
crushed her windpipe, and broke the vertebrae in her neck, snapping her spinal column – usual injuries we see in someone who’s hanged themselves, but there are no rope lesions. But
there’s a necklace, protected by the plastic,’ Harding added as she worked a chain loose that was embedded in the flesh of the neck and eased it free. Turning it till she found the
clasp, she pulled two rings around with it, threaded onto the chain. The photographer leant over the body whilst Ebony rested the rings on her open palm so that they could be photographed. Harding
undid the chain and handed it to Ebony to bag up. Ebony showed Carter the rings as she did so.
‘Two very different types, aren’t they?’ he said.
‘Of rings, Guv? Yes, I think one is an antique, maybe worth something. Think the other one is cheap.’
‘Anything else on her?’ asked Carter.
‘Not that I can see,’ answered Harding.
‘She look British to you?’ asked Carter. ‘What about the hair? Red hair is very popular with Eastern European women. We have a lot of those living in London.’
‘Yeah, but this wasn’t dyed,’ answered Harding. ‘Celtic, maybe.’
Ebony was still kneeling beside the body, studying the woman’s face. Carter stood back and watched. He was marvelling how Ebony could get that close to the smell and not seem to notice
it.
‘What is it, Ebb?’
‘She’s got make-up on.’
Harding rubbed the woman’s cheek with a swab of cotton wool and looked at the resulting red stain on it.
‘You’re right. Must have been industrial-strength to survive this.’
‘There are remnants of blue eye-shadow,’ said Ebony. ‘She’s even got some sort of black eyelashes painted above her eyes. It’s as if she were going to a
party.’
‘Dressed as what? A pantomime dame?’
Harding looked down the length of the woman’s body. ‘She’s had a tough life, whoever she is. The fish have capitalized on the decayed flesh.’ She stopped at the largest
of the wounds on the woman’s thigh. ‘But all this tissue destruction wasn’t done in the water.’
‘Could you walk around with that kind of open wound?’ asked Willis.
Harding shook her head in response. ‘Can’t see how.’ She parted the frayed flesh and opened the edges of one of the wounds on the woman’s left thigh; the bone was
visible.
‘What can have caused so many different sites of infection, and so deep?’ Carter asked as he took photos of the injuries with his phone. Willis helped Harding to turn the body on its
side.
‘I think these wounds started as ulcers.’ Harding turned the victim’s arms at the elbows to take a look. ‘No obvious needle marks but these large open wounds might have
started with skin-popping – injecting contaminated heroin under the skin.’
‘If she’s got that kind of drug abuse history we might find her fingerprints on file or she might be known at the needle exchange. We’ll check it out.’ Carter said as he
moved back from the body. Ebony continued her fascinated examination of the woman’s face. Harding stood to allow the photographer better access.
‘Can you do the post mortem examination today?’ Carter had seen enough. He felt the need to get out of the confines of the tent. He wanted to breathe in something other than the
putrid flesh of a body that had been at the bottom of the canal for months. Carter knew Willis would be happy to stay another hour or two. She came alive around the dead.
‘Yes. This afternoon. I’ll give you a call when we’re ready to start.’
‘Thanks.’ They left Harding in the tent.
‘The tattoo’s got to mean something to someone, Ebb,’ said Carter as he and Willis stepped back over the crime scene tape and walked back towards the detectives’ pool
car: a black BMW. ‘We’ll get Harding to take a biopsy. The inks used might help us narrow it down to certain tattooists. Did you ask the canal man if he’d seen anything
suspicious? He might have seen someone coming to try it for a location. Did you get a statement from him?’
Ebony nodded. ‘Yes, but nothing suspicious.’
Carter pushed past a journalist who called out ‘Excuse me, mate?’ as he passed.
‘Christ – no – you can’t have a frigging interview.’ Carter squared up to him. ‘If you vultures don’t get out of the way I’ll do you for
obstructing a police investigation. And I’m not your frigging mate – got it? MOVE.’
The reporter backed off with two hands in the air in a mock show of compliance.
‘Just doing our job.’
Ebony looked across at Carter as he shook his head, annoyed. They’d worked together for a year. She knew him well. She knew he’d be cross because the reporter was right and, on most
days, Carter would have chatted to the journalists, got them on his side. But today Carter was somewhere dark in his own head. He looked across at her and shook his head, exasperated.
‘Sorry.’
‘You all right, Guv?’
‘Yeah. Sorry – got a lot going on at the moment, Ebb.’
‘Guv?’
She raised her eyes towards the car to show where they’d left it and to show Carter that he was going in the opposite direction.
‘I know, I know,’ he snapped irritably.
Carter got into the driver’s seat and waited till Willis shut her passenger door and then reversed at speed, almost hitting the photographer who had just stepped off the kerb to get a
photo of them leaving. Willis stayed quiet. She looked across at him. She’d worked with him long enough to know he’d tell her in his own time. She was waiting for him to calm down and
get back to what he was good at. Carter was the best ‘people person’ she knew. Today was an ‘off’ day.
‘You want me to attend the post mortem on my own, Guv? It’s no problem.’
‘What, and let you have all the fun?’ He smiled gratefully. ‘No, I’ll be all right, Ebb. Nothing like the smell of a post mortem to get things in perspective.’
After the black BMW had passed him on the bridge, the man turned back to look at the white tent below. The fog was just beginning to thin and he could see it shine bright in
the wisps of white. He smiled to himself. He was breathless. Something told him today was the day she would finally rise through the dark water to reveal herself to the world – reborn. And
the game would begin again.
Tracy Collins was still in her dressing gown watching telly while she got ready for work. She was on a late shift today. She worked on a cosmetics counter at Simmons department
store on Holloway Road. Because Christmas opening hours had just begun, her shift started at two today and would go on until nine.
Her husband Steve had left for work already so Tracy didn’t have to bother about anything other than putting on her face for work. She liked the noise of the television to keep her company
while she got ready. She listened to the news as she wandered in and out of the bathroom between applying layers of make-up.
‘
Damn
.’
It all seemed to be going so well then she dropped an eyelash just as she was about to glue it into place. Tracy knelt on the lino and tried to pick it up between her finger and thumb but her
acrylic nails were too thick at their ends. Instead she licked the pad of her forefinger and pressed it down on the lash. She stood back up and deposited it on the side of the sink, stopping to
listen to the reporter on the telly in the other room.
‘Today a woman’s body was found beneath the ice in the Regent’s Canal at King’s Cross.’ Tracy walked back into the lounge, looking at the TV screen – at the
image of the fog and the frozen canal. ‘Police are not yet able to identify the woman and are treating her death as suspicious. They are appealing for any witnesses and anyone with any
information to come forward and ring the number on the screen.’
Tracy moved closer to the screen to get a better look at the canal and the crime scene tent. She knew the area well. She’d had many walks along the canal. She knew that exact spot. As she
swung her head in disbelief and squinted at the images of the crime scene tent she caught a glimpse of an Italian-looking detective with immaculate black shiny hair and a stripy scarf pulled up
around his chin. Then, a few seconds later, she saw a blonde-haired woman in a white forensic suit emerging from the tent. Just as she was absorbed with watching the report the phone rang and made
Tracy jump. She ran and grabbed it from the bathroom where she’d left it on top of the toilet cistern.
Her heart thumped as she looked at the number on the screen.
‘Yes?’ she said abruptly.
She hadn’t meant to sound so jumpy. The news, the disturbance to her routine had done it. She was jittery.
‘Is it a bad time?’ It was a woman’s voice on the other end of the line.
‘No. Sorry. You just caught me, that’s all. I’m getting ready for work.’ She closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
‘Is it still okay for today?’ the woman asked.
‘Yes. Yes, of course.’ Tracy said, her voice metre swinging too high. ‘I’m looking forward to it. But – I’m sorry – I don’t have long. It will
just have to be a quick chat today. You do understand? It’s Christmas opening hours and we’re going to be really busy in the shop.’
‘Yeah. You said before.’
‘Oh sorry . . . of course . . . I’m just nervous. Are you still bringing your son with you – Jackson, isn’t it?’
‘I don’t have a choice. He only goes to school in the mornings.’
‘And you know where it is?’
‘Yes.’
‘That’s fine, as I said, there’s a Christmas Fayre just around the corner from me. We can meet there by Santa’s Grotto.’
‘Okay. See you there.’
‘But I don’t know what you look like.’
‘I’ll know you,’ the woman answered.
‘Oh . . . all right. Well, I’ll see you at four then. I’m looking forward it.’ Tracy was just about to ask her how she would know
her
when the phone went dead.
‘Hello? Danielle?’ Tracy looked at the phone in her hand for a few seconds. Had she handled that well? Had she come across okay? She sighed and set about saving the number: new
contact.
Tracy felt butterflies in her stomach. Some of it was guilt. She hadn’t told Steve what she was up to. She didn’t know why but it didn’t seem a good idea; not until she was
sure what would come of it. She went back into the bathroom and applied fresh glue to the eyelash on the side of the sink. As she waited for her hand to stop shaking she looked at her reflection.
Danielle must have come into Simmons and seen Tracy behind the counter. What had she thought? She always tried to make a good impression and to look her best. Had she looked okay that day? She must
have, she supposed, otherwise Danielle wouldn’t want to see her, let alone bring her son.
Tracy paused, eyelash on her finger, and looked into her reflection. She felt old suddenly. She looked at herself and frowned. Thirty-six wasn’t old. Deep inside she was still the same
girl she used to be. She still wore the same make-up she’d worn as a teenager. Her hair was dyed to keep it looking vibrant. Her skirts were longer now. But inside she was the same girl
who’d got pregnant at fifteen.