***
It was fortunate that it was the weekend and the usual heavy traffic in the area of Little Venice was moderated. The closure of the bridge over the canal at the closest point to where the body had been found would not present a problem, although it would need a few officers to redirect the traffic over the Harrow Road bridge not far away.
‘You know what we’re looking for here,’ Gordon Windsor said, his team of twenty gathered around him. They stood on the road closest to Jim Parson’s houseboat. Larry thought the small, balding man looked like Napoleon giving his officers their orders. ‘We’ve checked around the houseboat down below, and we know the body, or what remained of it, did not enter the water at that point,’ Windsor said.
‘Where should we start looking?’ one of his investigation team asked.
‘Upstream, no more than three hundred yards. You’ve all been briefed. What we’re looking for are signs of a body being placed in the river: blood, disturbance of the canal bank, cigarette ends; but mainly blood.’
‘It could have been in a bag, and the body was removed from the bag over the water,’ one of the assembled group said.
‘That’s always a possibility, but if they brought the body in a bag, it would have dropped blood. If they had thrown the bag into the water, then where is it? The water moves slowly, and if it was plastic, then it should be close by. Any more questions?’
No one put their hand up, and they all moved off to their nominated locations: ten police on either side of the canal. The first group was at the junction of Delamere Terrace and Chichester Road, the other at Bloomfield Road. Access on the Delamere side was through gates along the canal edge, although there were iron railings elsewhere if someone wanted to pass a body over them. On the other bank, a brick wall separated the road from the canal, and it was high enough to dissuade anyone from climbing over.
Slow and steady was the order of the day, and both teams moved slowly forward; the occasional houseboat occupant sticking their head out, wondering what was going on. The police, ever polite, asked them to stay where they were, at least until they had been given the all clear. Most had complied; some had moaned and taken no notice. One who had been particularly obstructive had to be reminded that interfering with a police investigation was an offence. The police officer involved made a note in his diary, adding the comment high on drugs, suspected marijuana, in case the man took it further. Some of the boats were gently rocking with the occupants indulging in early morning lovemaking. That’s what I should be doing, Constable Reading thought, his feet cold and his mood distinctly downbeat as he searched in the undergrowth next to one of the boats. One owner on the Delamere Terrace side prepared ten piping hot cups of tea which was much appreciated. So far, there had been no rain, and the chance of success was looking good, so much so, that Windsor had phoned Isaac with an update.
***
‘They’re still after your blood,’ Richard Goddard said. He sat in a leather chair behind his desk in his third-floor office at Challis Street Police Station.
Isaac sat on the other side of the desk, not sure as to the mood of the meeting. Sure, Goddard had been polite on his entering, shaking his hand warmly, but Isaac knew the detective chief superintendent had felt the heat as much as he had in the previous case. After so many years of working with the DCS, Isaac was still not sure how the man would react if the cards were played by their superiors: would he throw him to the wolves, or would he support him. Isaac wanted to think the best of a man who outside of the office he regarded as a friend, but…
‘I remain optimistic that we’ll wrap up the Regent’s Canal case soon enough,’ Isaac said, although he realised that he was saying it for the audience.
‘Optimistic you may be, but you’ve no identity, no motive, and certainly no suspects. How do you progress on this one?’
‘The only identifier is a tattoo on the man’s shoulder.’
‘Ten a penny,’ Goddard replied.
‘We’re looking into its significance. It could just have been tattooed after a drunken night out, or it could be a gang’s mark.’
‘You know this one will be lapped up by the media?’ Goddard reminded Isaac.
‘Yes,’ Isaac said. Even now, he had noticed on Facebook and Twitter that the body in the canal was ranking. The news organisations were not fully onto it yet, although Larry had phoned earlier to say that a television crew was out at the canal, and they were being kept at a distance. Some of the houseboat occupants, principally Jim Parsons, had been on talkback radio recounting his tale; no doubt receiving some payment for his time.
Isaac remembered in his early days in the force, before the advent of social media, that it had been easier. Now everyone wanted a result immediately, and there were plenty of armchair critics, or critics on buses, on the train, or in the office with a smartphone, updating on recent events, offering advice on how they would do it. And, of course, passing judgement if there wasn’t instant gratification, but this was a murder case with a dead man, not frivolous entertainment for the masses. Isaac imagined the blood and gore, the state of mind of a person who could commit such an atrocity. And if
