‘The cause of death?’ Isaac asked.
‘I’d have thought having your head cut off would have been as good a way as any,’ Windsor replied.
‘Dead before decapitation?’
‘Pathology may be able to tell you, but I can’t be more precise. I’d say after death, but don’t quote me on that.’
‘Any injuries to the body?’
‘None that I can see.’
‘Murder?’
‘It hardly seems to be an accident, does it?’
The two people integral to the discovery could not help with the details about the body; one was walking her dog, the other was asleep. Both Isaac and Larry stayed at the crime scene for two hours before returning to Challis Street. The uniforms had commenced interviewing people walking past, and Wendy Gladstone, Isaac’s sergeant, would conduct a door-to-door later in the day down Warwick Crescent and then up Delamere Terrace, although it was a long shot. Unless the team knew how long the body had been in the water, and the flow of the water in the canal, it would not be possible to ascertain where the body had entered it. It was believed, not certain, that what had been found at the rear of the houseboat had come from upstream, but where? DCI Isaac Cook and his Homicide team needed to meet.
***
Detective Chief Superintendent Goddard put his head round the door of Isaac’s office to give the obligatory words of encouragement before leaving. ‘I’ve total confidence in the team, hopeful of an early result, keep up the good work.’
Isaac could only reflect on the insincerity of the man. Goddard had always been his mentor, but now the man’s political manoeuvring, his attempts to ingratiate himself with the commissioner of the London Metropolitan Police, his ability to suck up to politicians had started to grate.
Sure, on the previous case with little progress on catching the killer he had held on to Isaac for as long as he could, but in the end he had been dumped as the SIO and supplanted by a downright miserable sod of a man by the name of Seth Caddick. Isaac knew that if he hadn’t played his hunch right and arrested the serial killer, he would no longer be at Challis Street. Almost certainly out of London, maybe a remote station in the country or demoted.
Mid-morning, the key members of his team gathered in Isaac’s office: Larry Hill, his DI, Sergeant Wendy Gladstone and Constable Bridget Halloran, the department’s case prosecution officer. ‘An update, sir?’ Wendy asked.
‘I’ve already started work on the paperwork,’ Bridget said.
‘This is what we have,’ Isaac said. ‘At 6.05 a.m. a body was discovered in Regent’s Canal at Maida Vale. The woman who found it was walking her dog.’
‘And the woman now?’ Wendy asked.
‘Once she’d given her statement, she was taken home. Also, the owner of a houseboat gave a statement as the body was wedged under the rear of his boat. There is no suspicion attached to either person.’
‘Any indication as to how long the body had been there?’
‘According to Gordon Windsor, the condition of the remains indicate that it had not been in the water for long so we must assume it had drifted down the canal. As for a more precise time? That’s up to Pathology, but it may prove difficult.’
‘Why?’ Bridget asked.
‘The body had been dismembered, and there is no head.’
Both Wendy and Bridget looked shocked.
‘Murder?’ Wendy asked after clearing her throat.
‘That would be the logical conclusion. Gordon Windsor assumes it would have been a blow to the head or a bullet, but with no head, there’s no way to prove it.’
‘How do we establish the identity?’ Wendy asked.
‘DNA may help, or at least it may give us an approximation of its background: Anglo-Saxon, Asian.’
‘African?’ Bridget suggested.
‘The body’s white.’
‘Where do we go from here?’ Wendy asked.
‘Missing persons. You and Larry can do some checking. In the meantime, we need someone who understands river flows, especially the Regent’s Canal. Camden Lock is about three miles downstream, there are no locks upstream, at least none that should affect the flow. We need to put together some names of possible victims, and hope Pathology is able to do some reconstruction analysis: height, age, ethnicity.’
‘Long shot, sir,’ Wendy added.
‘Agreed, but let’s go with what we have.’
‘We’re dealing with savages here,’ Larry said.
‘That’s understood, unless there was a reason for concealing the identity.’
‘It’s still savage, and if the body’s not been there for long, then maybe he’s not been missed yet.’
‘Regardless, we have a murder case. No easier, no harder than our previous cases, and we managed to solve all of those. We’ll solve this one, I’m sure of it,’ Isaac said.
He had to admit he was becoming tired of the endless succession of murders. London crime figures, especially murders, were down, yet his area of London was continuing to accumulate the numbers. True, he knew that he and his team had solved them all, even when the odds were not stacked in their favour, and when others within the Met were looking for them to fail, or at least, him. Not that it concerned him unduly. He knew how it worked, although it was a distraction. The best he could do was to get on with it and prove to his doubters that they were wrong.
***
Larry observed prior to entering the Canal and River Trust’s building located next to Westbourne Terrace Road Bridge on the western side of the canal at Little Venice that the water flow was negligible.
Once inside, George Ashburton, one of the Trust’s employees, confirmed his observation. ‘Minimal. Just enough to keep the water flowing towards the Thames, although if there’s a lot of water upstream, then it’ll flow a little faster.’
‘If an object was thrown in the water, let’s say within the last twenty-four
