‘No chance of a conviction in Belgium, either,’ Hougardy said. He had to admit to enjoying himself away from his office in Brussels. Even Bridget had made the trip across the Thames, one of the few occasions that her routine varied from Challis Street to home and back. Both she and Wendy were making a night of it: a few too many drinks, a couple of sore heads in the morning.
‘We’ll bring in Frost in the morning, lay it on heavy. He’ll have the indomitable Edward Sharman with him,’ Emily said, jubilant about how she had handled herself during the interview with Caxton. Outside the pub a river mist was closing in, a clear sign that the search for O’Grady would be called off.
Gordon Windsor and his team had concluded their work on the boat and were now back on their side of the river. The bullet recovered was with Forensics, although it would only reveal the calibre, not the make of the gun and who had fired the shot. Even so, breaking Caxton had been a good result. The car taken to Brussels had yielded nothing more of interest, only that off-roaders were a breed unto themselves in that they could take perfectly good machinery and subject it to so much abuse.
In the pub, Hougardy talked, his accent endearing him to the police officers and the other patrons in the pub. He was a hit, and he appreciated the warm welcome afforded him.
It was eleven in the evening, and the team were on their last drinks. Downstream from Greenwich, an elderly couple were walking their dog along the shore. They spotted a dead dolphin, not seen often in the lower reaches of the Thames, but with the cleaner water of the last few years, not unknown. The man, more agile than his wife, who was relegated to using a walking stick, followed his dog down to the rotting carcass. It was covered in seaweed and slime, and it was neither pleasant to look at nor to smell. Albert Gravelly, a retired bus driver, forty-two years with the same company and never an accident, took the stick that the dog always carried in its mouth. Looking at the carcass again, the moonlight reflecting off it, Gravelly prodded it with the stick. It was not what a man with a weak constitution needed. He shouted to his wife who was sitting on a bench ten yards away. ‘You had better phone the police,’ he said.
Albert Gravelly, a man who had seen many things over the years, especially on the late-night shift, had never seen what his dog had wanted to sniff. He took the stick and threw it for the dog as he walked back to his wife.
Chapter 33
‘You’d never make a sailor out of Caxton,’ Hougardy said. The full team from the pub were present at the site where O’Grady had washed up, all except Bridget who had left, not to go home, but to update her records in Challis Street. A former lover had accused her of being a workaholic, but she knew she wasn’t. She was just a person who enjoyed her job, and if the others in Homicide were out and dealing with an unexpected development, she would have felt guilty just going home.
The crime scene investigators were on the scene, floodlights had been installed, and a generator was up on the path above. The Gravellys, both in their eighties, had been taken back to their small cottage, the dog barking in the back seat of the police car. Larry and Wendy were taking their statements. They had found the body or, more correctly, the dog had, and apart from that, there wasn’t much more they could say.
Gordon Windsor and his team attempted to place a crime scene tent around the body, although a wind was blowing, and it was very exposed. In the end, a decision was made to move the body to a more sheltered position. A thorough check was completed in the immediate vicinity first.
Five uniforms had come over from Challis Street, another four from Greenwich Police Station. They were moving up and down from the crime scene looking for further evidence, although that was deemed unlikely, as the body recovered was fully clothed.
‘Not much of a sailor?’ Emily reminded Hougardy of his earlier comment.
‘If he had wanted the body to remain undiscovered, he’d have made sure to weigh him down, tie him off to prevent him floating to the surface. There’s still a piece of rope attached to the body, a sloppy knot.’
‘Are you into sailing?’
‘When I was younger. The man had tied a granny knot, not a reef. Not that either is ideal if he wanted the body to stay submerged. Are we assuming the man had been tied to the anchor?’
‘We are.’
‘Under the water, there are currents that ebb and flow, some colder than others. And knots are subjected to that movement, and they and the rope are buffeted. Some will loosen, some will stay in place, even tighten, and others will eventually unravel. That is what has happened here.’
‘He’s right,’ Windsor said. ‘The condition of the body indicates that it has been submerged, and not just floating on the surface. Also, the man had been shot three times, one of them in the head, area of the brain. There are signs that crabs have been on the body, but not many, as the body has not started serious decomposition yet.’
‘Murder?’ Emily said.
‘Three bullets, one in the head, it seems likely,’ Windsor said. ‘We’re not staying here any longer. The body will be taken back to Pathology. Isaac, you can go and annoy them later on this morning.’
***
Gary Frost, updated by his source, could only see the noose tightening. If it hadn’t been for Ralph Lawrence, none of this would have happened.
