Reprobates (7 page)

‘
How gross,’ Vicky said.

Eugene Regis gave her a blinking sideways glance.

‘These,’ Professor Stow said, indicating points at each side of the deceased’s neck, ‘are the carotid arteries which carry oxygen rich blood from the heart to the brain. When compressed in such circumstances as hanging, or strangulation there is a sudden loss of oxygen. We can also see a little interest from the canal life who have been at his lips, eyelids and ears.’ He continued the external examination in silence. ‘Okay,’ he said pushing his glasses further up the bridge of his nose. ‘Let’s open him up.’

The group took a step forward and then leaned back at the smell from the gases that emerged when the incision was made and the gastric emptying began. Professor Stow weighed the organs.

‘His heart shows signs of cadaveric spasm which isn’t surprising since we can already see his fist tightly clutching the grasses that surrounded him underwater, in a desperate attempt no doubt to free himself of his snare. In my opinion the decedent, or deceased person if you prefer, was in a state of profound lactic acidosis at the time of death and this was a consequence of the violent struggle, and went into rigor mortis immediately.’

Vicky looked across at Dylan and gave him a knowing nod. He had suggested the same to her at the scene.

Professor Stow continued to visually examine each internal organ and after checking the precise weight of each he instructed the mortuary assistant to put them back inside the chest cavity and sew him up. The stitches were large as if his trunk was a mail bag and Vicky flinched at every one. Much to the amusement it seemed of Eugene Regis.

‘
Not particularly neat, but sufficient to stop things falling back out,’ said Stow with a little cough. ‘Autoerotic is a collective term for this type of sexual fetish. People say the rush is very powerful and as addictive as cocaine. I am satisfied that he was alive when he entered the water.’

‘
How do we know that?’ asked Vicky bending closer to the dead body.

‘
Froth in the mouth is a clue. But if we look at what they call diatoms under the microscope, it shows they’ve travelled to the liver, brain, kidneys etcetera in the blood stream. If he were dead when entering the water these minute little blighters get no further than the lungs. Nothing for you to worry your pretty little head about. We see it regularly, don’t we?’ Stow asked with a glance at Mr Regis who nodded, just the once. ‘My findings agree with you, Dylan. The man in my opinion stripped off, tied his feet to the stones to weigh himself down and either jumped or lowered himself into the water. He then masturbated and when he’d ejaculated, he intended to free himself by cutting the rope. But in his excitement he dropped the goddamned scissors. They were his escape mechanism, you see and that part of his plan failed. So he drowned.’

‘
Men are so weird!’ Vicky said seriously. Five sets of eyes looked at her.

‘
Present company excepted, of course,’ she said quickly.

‘I
’m sure as you progress in your service, dear, you will see that although the majority of cases such as these are men, be assured there are a lot of women out there who involve themselves in strange eroticism in some shape or form. “Nowt as queer as folk,” as they say in Yorkshire and this one falls into that weird category of those who have accidently killed themselves practicing bondage, whipping, hanging, even having sex with animals. The male’s erection can remain afterwards because of cadaveric spasm but that’s the undertakers’ problem not mine, thank the Lord,’ he said. His eyes went up to the ceiling. ‘Now, we must fly, mustn’t we Mr Regis? We’ve a busy day ahead. I’ll do my report for the Coroner in due course.’

The group left the examination room and headed towards the office.

‘I’ll flower this one up and use it at one of my after dinner speeches. Brings a whole new meaning to enjoying Britain’s waterways,’ Professor Stow whispered to Dylan with a subdued belly laugh, as they walked together down the corridor.

Eugene and Vicky walked behind.

‘You’re not from around here are you?’ asked Vicky.

‘No, York.
’

‘
You staying over?’

‘Yes.
’

‘
Near here?’

‘
The Waterfront Lodge in Brighouse.’

‘
Oh, the food in their restaurant is amazing,’ Vicky said. ‘And I happen to know Prego is Dylan and his wife’s favourite spot too. I might see you in there for a drink one night?’

‘
You two not an item then?’

‘
Me and Dylan?’ Vicky chuckled. ‘No, he’s my boss.’

‘Well, maybe you
’d like to join me for dinner one night?’

‘
Dinner as in dinnertime or dinner as in Dinner?’ she said with a furrowed brow.

‘
Evening meal,’ he said. ‘Here’s my card. Ring me,’ he said.

‘I will,
’ she said holding his gaze a little longer. ‘Old Stow, how’s he doing?’ she said.

‘He
’s good. You can’t beat experience and it shows in there, doesn’t it?’ Mr Regis smiled. ‘But don’t tell him I said that. I like to keep them on their toes.’ His eyes appeared to dance mischievously and he looked even more handsome to Vicky when she could see his face.

***

Vicky was grinning from ear to ear. ‘What you got to smile about?’ Dylan asked.

‘
Just got myself a date.’

‘
A date? Who with Regis?’

Vicky nodded.

‘I can’t leave you alone for two minutes can I?’

‘
Well, you’ve either got it or you haven’t.’

‘
Well, don’t go upsetting him. I want to keep my job,’ said Professor Stow seriously.

‘
I don’t think there is any fear of that,’ she whispered.

***

Dylan was sitting in his office chair talking on the telephone to Sergeant Megnicks. He was updating her with the post-mortem results. ‘It’ll be a straight forward report for the Coroner now,’ he concluded.

Vicky put a warm drink on his desk.
‘Multicoloured paperclips? Now, what does that tell you?’ she asked Lisa as she fingered the items in Dylan’s desk tidy.

‘
What was wrong with the old silver ones?’ he asked as he put the phone down on its cradle.

‘Not my idea, sir,
’ Lisa grinned as she eyed Vicky who sat innocently nibbling a biscuit.

‘I
’m not “into” pain, and if you were that observant then you would see there are no luminous green ones,’ he said. ‘Now, let’s find out who our John Doe is. Goodness knows what else we’re going to uncover with this investigation.’

‘
I feel sorry for the family. How the hell do we, you, tell them that their nearest and dearest has died in a filthy canal... and like that?’

‘We
’ll cross that bridge when we find out who he is and if he has any family. He could be divorced, live alone, not have any kids,’ said Dylan slurping the skin off the top of his hot milky coffee. ‘Nice, thanks,’ he said, raising his mug in the air. ‘If he does they’ll have to be told how he died. Otherwise it is going to be an even bigger shock to them at the Inquest.’

‘
I hate to think what the headline will be in the local rag.’

‘
Well you can be sure they won’t pull any punches and dependant on who he is and what his profession was. That could also fuel the storyline and its place in the newspaper. But bear in mind what Professor Stow told you, no matter how unpleasant it is to hear, you will go to some hangings that to all intent and purpose look like a suicide. There will be no evidence at all suggesting why the person killed themselves in that particular way. I’ve been to some where I know the immediate family have sanitised the scene, removing all evidence of paraphilic activities to save embarrassment, before they called the emergency services. But they will never admit it.’

‘
Really? They would rather their death be classed as suicide instead of misadventure? You’d think they’d be too shocked to act so quickly, wouldn’t you?’

‘
In some cases I’m sure they know about the fetish but choose not to face up to the consequences. Come on we’ve got work to do, can’t be hanging around drinking coffee. Places to go. People to see,’ he said standing up he drained his cup.

‘
Ha, ha, funny... or not. I used to think my ex was weird when I copped his private collection of porn movies but with hindsight I guess he was quite normal.’

‘
They all start somewhere,’ said Dylan. Vicky opened Dylan’s office door to leave.

‘Sir,
’ Lisa shouted from her work station. ‘Paul Robinson is at Kirsty Gallagher’s house and is asking if you could join him?’

‘
Tell him I’m on my way,’ he said plucking his jacket from the back of his chair.

***

Dylan’s first impressions on entering 14, Bankfield Terrace was that it was a very neat little house. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary, or appeared to have been disturbed.

‘
I thought you might want to come and see what we’ve found,’ Paul said as he met him at the bottom of the steps. Paul like Dylan was wearing protective clothing. He followed him back up the stairs. ‘I’ve called CSI out.’

The pair entered the bathroom
. ‘First. There are two toothbrushes. Which suggests to me that she had someone staying. If that’s so we should get DNA, right?’

Dylan nodded.

‘Next, the bedroom.’

Dylan followed close behind.

‘Two things here.’ Paul pulled back the old, worn and slightly frayed around the edges duvet. ‘Here we have a brand new bottom sheet. Can you see all the creases in it where it’s been folded around the cardboard packaging?’

Dylan was about to speak but Paul held up his hand.
‘I know what you’re going to say, “so she doesn’t iron the bottom sheet, so what.” But there is no sign of a dirty sheet in the wash bin, or washing machine and no cardboard in the bin.’

‘Dustbin?
’ asked Dylan.

‘
Checked. All the bins inside are completely empty and recently cleaned out with some sort of disinfectant, which is mighty strange, don’t you think? Also, here, there’s an empty bedside drawer at the far side of the bed,’ he said. ‘Something just doesn’t feel right.’

‘
Anything else?’

‘
Not at the moment, but I’m hoping the neighbours might be able to answer some of our questions when we speak to them.’

Paul followed Dylan down the steps to the small lounge area where Kirsty had been found. Dylan stood with his back to the chimney breast.

He looked around. Soaking up the atmosphere in the room. To his right was a single armchair and a television on a glass stand. The floor was highly polished.

‘
I want to see the photograph of her, taken in situ, before she was taken to the mortuary. She was found in the chair. The question is did she die there, or was she placed there afterwards? It’s nice, this beech flooring,’ Dylan said, stooping down to touch it. His eyes were immediately drawn to the gas fire.

‘
Paul, we may have an answer, look,’ he said pointing to the pipe. ‘It’s not capped properly. Either that or it’s been tampered with. We’re lucky there hasn’t been a gas explosion. Has the gas and electric been turned off?’

Paul was down on his haunches beside him.
‘Yes, it was turned off as a matter of course before the house was secured.’ His eyes followed the wall of the chimney stack. ‘There are traces of soot and a definite discolouration on the wall above.’

‘
Could she have died from carbon monoxide poisoning do you think?’

‘
And was it an accident, or not?’ asked Paul.

There was a noise in the street outside and both men looked up at the window, then back at each other.

‘The window. It’s been taped up,’ said Dylan rising from his haunches. ‘Possible chance for prints on the tape.’

‘
Do you think someone was trying to get rid of her body so that it couldn’t be proved that her death was murder?’ asked Paul.

‘
In an attempt to do the perfect murder?’ asked Dylan.

‘
Do you think there is such a thing?’

‘
No, some just take longer to detect than others,’ Dylan said. ‘We’ll discuss it with the Crime Scene Investigators when they arrive. We might need Forensic here sooner rather than later. I want house-to-house enquiries and let’s get some urgency into the actions of her telephone usage.’

‘
That’s another thing. We haven’t quite turned the house upside down yet, but there’s no obvious sign yet of a mobile phone. You’d think she’d have one, wouldn’t you? Doesn’t everyone these days?’

‘
Find out from the uniform that attended the scene if they can help and have a word with Ned when he comes on duty. He was the night detective. See if there is anything else they can tell us. We need to find the significant other in her life and dig deep into her background, then we might find a motive,’ said Dylan.