him the obvious target for comments of the aren't-policemen-looking-younger-these-days variety. Pensioners adored him. Thorne wasn't sure. Holland's father had been in the force and, in Thorne's experience, that was rarely without problems. He doesn't even move like a copper, he thought. Coppers don't skip down hills like mountain goats. Coppers move like.., ambulances.
'Cup of tea, sir?'
OK, perhaps he'd been a bit naive. There was always tea.
'No. Tell me about this witness.'
'Right, don't get too excited.'
Thorne's heart sank. It was obviously not going to be earth shattering.
'We've got a vague physical description, not a lot.'
'How vague?'
'Height, build, a dark car. The witness, George Hammond…'
That fucking notebook again. He wanted to ram it up the cocky little gobshite's arse.
'… was at the top of the path a hundred yards further up the main road. He thought the bloke was chucking a bag of rubbish over.'
That was what Thorne had already worked out. He must have pulled up and heaved the body over the railings. She might just as well have been a bag of rubbish.
'And that's it? Height and build?'
'There's a bit more on the car. He says he thinks it was a nice one. Expensive.'
Thorne nodded slowly. Witnesses. Another thing he'd had to become resigned to. Even the more perceptive ones gave conflicting accounts of the same event.
'Mr. Hammond's eyesight isn't brilliant, sir. He's an old man. He was only out walking his dog. We've got him in the car.'
'Hang about, those railings are six feet high. How big did he say he was?'
'Six two, six three. She's not a big girl, sir.'
Thorne squinted into the lights. 'Right, I'll have a word with the optically challenged Mr. Hammond in a minute. Let's get this over with.'
Phil Hendricks was crouched over the body, his ponytail secured beneath his distinctive yellow shower cap. The scientists had finished their scraping and taping, and Hendricks was taking his turn. Thorne watched the all- too familiar routine as the pathologist took temperature readings and conducted what, until the body was removed, would be a cursory examination. Every minute or so he would heave himself on to his haunches with a grunt, and mumble into his small tape-recorder. As always, each tedious detail of the entire procedure was being immortalised on film by the police cameraman. Thorne always wondered about those characters. Some of them seemed to fancy themselves as film-makers – he'd actually had to bollock one once for shouting, 'That's a wrap.' Some had a disturbing glint in their eye that said, 'You ought to come round to my place and have a look at some of the footage I'll be showing the lads at Christmas.' He couldn't help wondering if they were all waiting to be headhunted by some avaricious TV company eager for more mindless docu-soaps. Maybe he was being too harsh. He was too harsh about Holland as well. Perhaps it was just the perfectly pressed chinos and loafers he didn't like. Maybe it was just that Holland was a young DC eager to please. Hadn't he been like that? Fifteen years ago. Heading for a fall.
Hendricks began to pack away his gear and looked up at Thorne. It was a look that had passed between them on many occasions. To the untrained eye this 'handing over of responsibility' might have seemed as casual as two pool players exchanging a cue. Pathologists were supposed to be colder than any of them but despite the Mancunian's flippant, nasal tones and dark sense of humour, Thorne knew what Hendricks was feeling. He'd watched him crying into his pint often enough. Thorne had never reciprocated.
'He's getting a tad fucking casual, if you ask me.'
Hendricks began fiddling with one of his many earrings. Eight the last time Thorne had counted. The thick glasses gave him an air of studiousness but the earrings, not to mention the discreet but famous tattoos and the penchant for extravagant headgear, marked him out as unconventional to say the least. Thorne had known the gregarious goth pathologist for five years. He was ten years his junior and horribly efficient; Thorne liked him enormously.
'I didn't, but thanks for the observation.'
'No wonder you're touchy, mate. Two-one at home to Bradford?'
'Robbed.'
'Course you were.'
Thorne's neck was still horribly stiff. He dropped his head back and gazed up into a. clear night sky. He could make out the Plough. He always looked for it: it was the only constellation he knew by sight. 'So, it's him, then, is it?'
'I'll know for sure by the morning. I think so. But what's she doing here? That's a hell of a busy road. He might easily have been seen.'
'He was. By Mr. Magoo, unfortunately. Anyway, I don't think he was here very long. He just stopped and chucked her out.'
Hendricks moved aside and Thorne looked down at the woman who in a few hours would be identified as Helen Theresa Doyle. She was just a girl. Eighteen, nineteen. Her blouse was pulled up, revealing a pierced bellybutton. She was wearing large hoop earrings. Her skirt was torn, revealing a nasty gash at the top of her leg. Hendricks clicked his bag shut. 'I think the wound's from where she got caught on the railings as the bastard hoisted her over the top.'
Something caught Thorne's eye and he glanced to his right. Standing twenty or so feet away, staring straight at him, was a small fox. A vixen, he guessed. She stood completely still, watching the strange activity. They were on her territory. Thorne felt a peculiar pang of shame. He'd heard farmers and pro-hunt lobbyists ranting about the savagery of these animals when they killed, but he doubted that a creature killing to feed itself and its young could enjoy it. Bloodlust fed off a particular kind of intelligence. There was a shout from the top of the hill and the fox prepared to bolt but relaxed again. Thorne could not take his eyes from the animal as it stared into the artificially lit reality of a warped kind of human bloodlust. Of a genuine brutality. Half a minute passed before the fox sniffed the ground, its curiosity satisfied, and trotted away.
Thorne glanced at Hendricks. He'd been watching too. Thorne took a deep breath and turned back to the gift. Conflicting emotions.
He felt revulsion at the sight of the body, anger at the waste. Sympathy for the relatives, and terror at the thought of having to confront them, their rage and grief. But he also felt the buzz.
The rush of the crime scene. The first crime scene. The thing that might smash the investigation wide open might be under their noses, waiting, asking to be found. If it was there, he'd find it.
Her body…
There were leaves in her long brown hair. Her eyes were open. Thorne could see that she had a nice figure. He tried to get the thought out of his mind.
'He's always taken a bit of time before, ain't he?' mused Hendricks. 'Nice and easy. Taken the trouble to lay them down like they'd stroked out watching telly or cooking dinner. He didn't really seem to care this time. Bit of a rush job.'
Thorne looked at him, asking the question.
'An hour or two at the most. She's not even cold yet.'
Thorne bent down and took the girl's hand. Hendricks pulled off his shower cap then snapped off his rubber gloves, releasing a small puff of talcum powder. As Thorne leaned forward to close the girl's eyes, the hum of the generator filled his head. Hendricks's voice seemed to be coming from a long way away.
'I can still smell the carbolic.'
Anne Coburn sat in the dark room at the end of a horrible day that by rights should have ended three hours earlier. The papers were forever banging on about the intolerable hours worked by junior doctors but senior ones didn't exactly have it easy. A meeting with the administrator that should have taken an hour, and lasted three, had given her a headache that was only just starting to abate. It had raged through two lectures, a consultation round, an argument with the registrar and a mountain of paperwork. And David was still on the warpath…
She sat back in the chair and massaged her temples.
