B006U13W The Flight (Jenny Cooper 4) nodrm (32 page)

‘Oh, that is disappointing.’ She couldn’t let it end here. She needed to get to Nuala’s tray. ‘I don’t suppose you could just double-check for me?’

‘I don’t think we’ll have made a mistake.’

‘Please?’ Jenny implored. ‘Just so I can reassure her that I did everything I could.’

‘I can’t break the seals on any evidence bags, Mrs Cooper.’

‘Of course not—’ She held his gaze until his frown dissolved.

‘All right, I’ll have a quick look for you.’ He got up from behind the desk. ‘I’ll have to ask you to stay here, though.’

‘Fine,’ Jenny said. ‘Thank you.’

As Knight moved off across the linoleum floor towards the staircase, Jenny slipped off her shoes. Her heart beat hard against her ribs as he neared the top of the second flight and disappeared into the cabin above. Hearing his heavy footsteps passing directly overhead, she tiptoed away from her chair along the row of trays towards the letter C. She heard him stop and pull open a tray. Jenny reached the furthest rack in the cabin – it began with
Clark, Samuel (M).
Damn! She slipped through the doorway into the next cabin, alive to every tiny movement on the floor above, and spotted
Casey, Nuala (F)
on the bottom tray of the nearest rack. Glancing through the mesh she could see a bag containing a small black suitcase on top of which was another holding items of clothing. Close to the front were two other much smaller bags, one containing what appeared to be a wash bag, and in another beneath it, a wallet. The tray was too heavy to pull out without making a noise, but there was gap of about five inches between the top edge and the bottom of the one above. She reached a shaky hand through and touched the bag containing the wash bag. She heard Knight cough and shove a tray back into a rack.

Jenny quickly pulled out the wash bag and stuffed it into her right-hand coat pocket. Knight was moving back towards the stairs as she reached in again and closed her fingers around the wallet. She thrust it into the left-hand pocket and dashed silently back through the doorway and across the central cabin, overtaking Knight’s footsteps and arriving at her chair a moment before his foot hit the first tread on the way down. She smoothed her pocket flaps, slipped on her shoes and took a deep breath, all at once.

Knight reached the turn in the stairs. ‘No sign of a necklace, I’m afraid.’

‘Never mind. I’m so sorry to have troubled you,’ Jenny said. She got up from her chair, her heart still racing. ‘I expect it’s in the case. I’ll explain to them. You’ve no idea when the phone data might be available?’

‘It’ll take a few weeks to process them all,’ Knight said. ‘We’ll keep them posted.’

‘You’re doing a great job.’ Jenny heard herself say. ‘I’m sure all the families are very grateful.’

The five paces to the door felt like five hundred. She stepped outside into a sheet of drizzle knowing that she had just done something from which there would be no way back.

J
ENNY HAD INTENDED TO KEEP
her meeting with Dr Kerr in the staff canteen brief, fearing that any moment DC Knight would discover what she had taken and come after her, but she was out of luck and was forced to listen to the story of his day. Together with an American pathologist flown in especially for the task, he had spent most of it conducting a second post-mortem on the body of a wealthy New York investment banker. The dead man had two separate life insurance policies, each worth many millions, one of which excluded liability in the event of death being caused by ‘physical trauma suffered in a civil aviation accident’. Lawyers had advised that if the man could be proved to have died from a heart attack before the plane struck the water, the family had a good legal case against the insurance company, who were refusing to honour their policy. When no evidence of a coronary could be found, the other pathologist had suggested that they look again.

Dr Kerr lowered his voice and leaned across the table. ‘Do you know what he said to me?’

‘I’ve no idea.’

‘“If we look hard enough we might even find 100,000 dollars each.” Can you believe that?’ His astonishment was quaint.

‘I hope you did,’ Jenny said. ‘Offers like that don’t get made in a mortuary every day.’

He looked genuinely shocked.

‘I’m
joking
,’ Jenny said, but he didn’t seem persuaded.

‘You wanted to talk about Nuala Casey,’ Dr Kerr said, changing the subject.

‘Yes. You detected signs of lymphoma which you said were probably asymptomatic.’

‘That’s right. It was in the very early stages.’

‘She was a pilot. She had frequent medicals. You can’t fly if you’re in anything less than excellent health. If anyone would have been alive to symptoms, it would have been her.’

‘It’s possible she was feeling a little below par. I think I’ve read that some patients can suffer symptoms similar to depression before anything manifests physically.’

‘And if you’re a person unfamiliar with psychological symptoms, that could be quite disturbing.’

‘I have no insight into her mental condition, Jenny.’

‘No, of course not.’

It was intriguing, nonetheless. She had learned enough through her own experience to know that suffering from unwanted thoughts could lead one to behave in unusual ways. If Nuala was ever going to take a risk she might not otherwise have done, the period at the end of her life was it. Separated from Michael and having denied herself the possibility of motherhood, she would already have been in a deeply negative state of mind.

‘You said you know a friend of hers—’ Dr Kerr ventured.

‘More of an acquaintance,’ Jenny said offhandedly, instinctively wanting to keep Michael’s identity a secret.

‘Is that all?’

‘There is just one other thing. I don’t suppose you could take another look at Amy Patterson for me.’

‘For you? It’s not your case, Mrs Cooper.’

‘But she was with Brogan until the end.’ It was Jenny’s turn to speak in a whisper. ‘This is strictly confidential—’

Dr Kerr gave a guarded nod.

‘You found flash burns on Brogan’s face. I’ve got forensic evidence that there was some sort of explosion after he entered the water – there’s chemical residue on his lifejacket. I can’t get hold of her lifejacket or clothing to run similar tests – don’t ask me to explain – but if you could have a look at the areas of her body that might have been out of the water, I’d be grateful.’

‘What sort of residue?’

‘I think you might be better off not knowing,’ Jenny said, ‘but if you find anything worth swabbing –’ she dipped into her jacket pocket and pushed one of Forenox’s business cards across the table – ‘you can book it in under my account. The guy handling it’s called Ravi Achari. And tell him if he leaks any more results, I’ll put a bomb under him.’

Jenny left the D-Mort and headed back towards Bristol in the gathering dusk. She was desperate to examine the contents of the two evidence bags, but had decided to act on a plan which, although it would do nothing to protect her, would ensure the continuity of any valuable evidence the bags contained.

She arrived at her Jamaica Street offices shortly before five, hoping that Alison would have taken the opportunity to leave early. She hadn’t. Jenny felt the leaden atmosphere even before she stepped through the door.

Alison appeared in the doorway of the corridor leading to the kitchenette pointedly drying up one of the several cups Jenny had allowed to accumulate on her desk. ‘DS Fuller would like you to give her a statement by tomorrow morning.’

‘Fine. Though I’m not sure how it helps anyone.’

‘The dead woman’s husband might not agree.’ Alison turned back into the kitchenette and thumped the cup on the drainer. There was more clanking of crockery – her way of making Jenny feel as guilty as an ungrateful child.

‘You spoke to him?’

‘Of course.’

She was determined not to make this easy.

‘How was he?’

‘Pretty much as you’d expect.’ Alison reappeared and marched across the room to her desk, where she proceed to shuffle her papers into orderly piles.

‘Did he have any idea?’ Jenny asked.

‘He had been worried that she might have been seeing someone, but he’d never dared ask. I get the impression he worshipped her . . . That was probably the problem. No woman likes a doormat.’

‘He didn’t know about her lover?’

‘Not a clue. He’d noticed she’d been a little subdued lately, that’s all.’ Her desk tidied, she turned to face Jenny. ‘I left him the photographs.’

‘Do you think that was a good idea?’

‘Yes, I do, as a matter of fact. I think one thing this sorry episode has taught me is that everyone’s better off hearing the truth, no matter how painful it is.’

Jenny looked at her, trying to fathom the subtext. When Alison was being particularly cryptic she was usually talking about herself.

‘You mean you and your husband—’

‘No, Mrs Cooper,’ she snapped back. ‘I was thinking more about Mrs Patterson and her ridiculous notions. Everyone knows she’s working you like a puppet – it’s all over CID. And they also know how much trouble you’re in with the Ministry. You’ll struggle to find anyone who rates your chances of surviving. They’re taking bets on how long you’ll last – the smart money’s on less than a week.’

‘I’m surprised it’s that long,’ Jenny said, and headed for her room.

‘Don’t you think someone should go and talk to the photographer’s wife?’ Alison called after her. ‘The poor woman deserves to know what was going on.’

Jenny stopped at the door and took a deep breath. ‘I’ll call by on my way home.’

‘Best not,’ Alison said. ‘You seem a bit preoccupied. I don’t think you’d be much comfort.’ She grabbed her coat from the peg and went.

Listening to Alison’s heavy footsteps along the hallway, it felt like a parting of the ways. They had weathered many quarrels, but there was a darkness to Alison’s current mood that Jenny had never witnessed before. Her natural instinct was to chase after her to try to patch things up, but with two bags of stolen evidence in her pockets it seemed a futile, even a dishonest gesture. It was as if Alison had somehow intuited that Jenny had finally put herself beyond the pale and was furious with her.

With her office door securely locked and the blinds drawn shut, Jenny placed the two bags on her desk and took out her cellphone. Switching it to video mode, she sandwiched it between two piles of books, making sure she had a clear picture of the bags and the area in which she was about to work.

She spoke out loud, stating the time and date, and describing her actions as she performed them. It was vital for the continuity of evidence that the film showed the unsealing of the bags and their precise contents. Without such a record, any evidence the bags contained could never be proved in a manner that would satisfy a court.

‘These are two evidence bags that I have today removed from the evidence and effects store at the disaster mortuary for the purposes of my inquiry,’ Jenny began in a dry forensic tone. ‘They were removed from the tray containing the effects of the female passenger Nuala Casey. One contains a brown leather wallet, the other what appears to be a black fabric wash bag bearing the Ransome Airways logo. I will examine the wash bag first.’

She took a pair of scissors from her desk-tidy and snipped through the plastic cable tie which sealed the neck of the bag shut. She pulled the wash bag out. It had the same musty smell that had pervaded the evidence and effects store. The fabric was stained with salt residue from the brackish water of the estuary.

‘I am now unzipping the bag, which is damp to the touch. There are a number of items inside.’ She proceeded to remove them one by one. ‘A toothbrush, travel toothpaste, skin fresheners, a sanitary towel and a small tablet of soap bearing the name of the Cavendish Hotel, Fleetcombe, Berkshire.’ She checked the inside for any pockets or gaps in the lining. There were none. Continuing to describe her actions, she repeated the process in reverse order before sealing the evidence bag securely with Scotch tape.

She turned to the second bag and resumed her dictation. ‘This is a plain brown fold-over wallet, also still slightly damp.’ She opened it. ‘In the pockets on the right there are two credit cards – one Mastercard, one Visa – and what I assume to be a bank debit card. On the left we have a driver’s licence, Heathrow airside ID, a gym membership card and a loyalty card for a coffee shop.’ She turned the wallet on its side. ‘I’m looking into a pocket running the length of the wallet, which contains a number of pieces of paper, all water-damaged.’ She brought them out, separated them from one another and spread them across the desk. There were more than twenty. ‘I can see these are mostly receipts from shop tills and ATMs.’ She went through them one by one. They dated back to mid-December, and contained nothing more remarkable than records of visits to high street stores and sandwich shops; on 24 December, however, she found something bigger. ‘This is a receipt from Linden Electronics for an Oregon GPS device costing £499.’ She assumed it related to the gadget Nuala had stowed in her flight case.

There were several receipts from Christmas Eve and Christmas Day itself from Heathrow and Dubai airports, then none until 29 December. On that day Nuala had evidently filled up her car at a petrol station close to her flat and travelled out to the Cavendish Hotel, where at shortly before ten a.m. she paid for a half-day session in the spa. There followed a few more run-of-the-mill receipts from the first week of January, and Jenny found herself beginning to lose heart: she had taken one of the greatest risks of her career for no benefit whatever. She pulled apart three pieces of paper that had been folded together. The first was for a taxi fare. It was dated 9 January, the day of the plane crash. The second was for a return journey on the Heathrow Express bought at six a.m., and the third was a ticket issued by the Paddington Station left-luggage office five minutes later.

Jenny felt a rush of excitement. She tried not to let it sound in her voice as she concluded her commentary. ‘I am placing all the receipts back in the wallet except the left-luggage ticket, which I will now take to the office at Paddington Station.’ She held it up close to the camera so that every detail could be recorded. ‘I will inform Nuala Casey’s next of kin immediately her items of luggage have been retrieved.’