Sally wasn’t afraid of dead bodies and was incredibly curious so before she went out to the street to flag down the emergency services, she thought that she would take a look at the body and see if she could establish why it was lying in that place. She found two plastic bags in her pockets that she always kept there to clear up any mess JoJo left when they were on a walk. She had already touched the body in a few places and wanted to keep her fingerprints off the lifeless victim as much as possible. She had nothing at all to hide but knew that not all police investigations found the guilty party. She called JoJo over and the dog for the first time that night did as she was told.
“JoJo sit. JoJo stay. Good girl,” Sally said now in a voice that was clear she meant business. JoJo wouldn’t mess with her now.
Sally put the bags on her hands and touched various parts of the body. She wanted to find out if there was anything obvious that would allow her to give the police or ambulance service something to go on. She started with the two most obvious places – the head and the chest. The head wasn’t showing any signs of damage. Often a blow to the head would cause something to distort, either inwards or outwards, and the signs were pretty obvious. Sally had been trained in basic first aid a few times in the past with her employers and knew some rudimentary things about the human body. She was confident that she would be able to determine if something noticeable was apparent. Then she went to the chest. Blows here could leave tell-tale signs too. There was a piece of paper on the chest that might have been covering a puncture hole or other wound so Sally removed it and put it in her pocket so she could see what was going on. She checked the chest and found nothing obvious there either. The sound of sirens in the distance was becoming louder so Sally called for her pet and the two of them made their slow progress to the street again. Sally stood between two cars looking one way and then the other to see the flashing lights that would mean some sort of help was on the way. She could then unburden herself of what had happened and get on with her life. That was what she told herself anyway. The reality was that Sally didn’t let things go easily.
The sirens came from both ends of the street. At first from the left, she saw a string blue light at a height and knew instinctively through the drizzle and darkness that this was an ambulance. She stepped out half way into the road to flag it down and point them in the right direction. She glanced over her shoulder and saw a police car only a few yards behind in the race to reach her first. The police officer in the front was looking left and right to see if there was a safe place to park the car but none presented itself. So, he backed up a little to give the ambulance crew all the space they needed and got out some tape to make sure the area was sealed as best it could be. The sirens and flashing lights were bound to alert others in the neighbourhood to the fact that something was going on and he wanted to get some sort of control before the detectives arrived and started asking questions.
As he finished the rudimentary barrier between the area of attention and the rest of the street, the policeman saw someone talking to the ambulance crew who were looking deep into the wooded area on the other side of the street to him. He didn’t want anyone inside the area so crossed the road and approached. As he did, the woman finished talking to the paramedics and stepped toe to toe with him.
“Nobody is allowed in here, can you please step outside,” the policeman asked in as firm a voice as he could manage while still trying to maintain calm. He had received a warning about the way he spoke to people about a year earlier and had since tried to add some niceties to his speech. It wasn’t always evident.
“I was just letting the ambulance guys know where I found the body. Is there a problem?” Sally replied. She wanted to help and knew that they all had a difficult job to do.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t realise it was you who had called it in. You are soaked through. Do you want to sit in the back of the car while they do their work?” the policeman could feel another complaint coming on so added helpfulness in droves at this point.
“That would be good,” Sally said while looking up at the sky. The light rain was forming a sheen across her face and it had already penetrated her jacket to reach the clothes underneath. She continued as they walked towards the police car, lights now off, “Would you like to know what happened?”
“If you feel up to it.”
“Yes, I’m fine.”
Sally and JoJo followed the police officer to the car, and she told him all that she had seen. It took far longer than she had anticipated because he wrote down everything that happened word for word and asked her to read it back. By the time she was finished Sally was ready for bed, but the police officer had been asked to keep her there for a little while longer. Someone called Detective Augustine Boyle would soon be there and he wanted to talk to her.
When Augustine arrived, the body was being loaded into the ambulance. He looked at the two paramedics and one shook their head to let him know the news. Sally was sat in the back of the police car to the left of him and saw the motion from the paramedic. She was sure that the body was just that, but wanted someone else to make the final decision. She looked into the distance and wondered if the veneer of rain was going to cease that night. JoJo was curled up beside her and looked as though she wouldn’t stir again that night. Sally wanted to do the same.
“Good evening, I’m Detective Augustine Boyle. I know you have given a full statement, but I’d like to ask a few questions if that is alright. Then we’ll make sure you get home safely and out of the rain. Is that OK?”
Sally looked up and saw the detective smiling down at her. He had obviously dealt with things like this before. She wasn’t squeamish and was able to look over the body before returning to the road but this was something completely different. It was as though he was enjoying this. She imagined him taking the call while sat at home and rushing out to see who had been murdered now. But his demeanour was so welcoming and calm that she couldn’t help but like him instantly.
“Only if you’re not too long,” Sally said with a wink, “I have a bed to get to.”
“You’ll be there before you know it,” replied the handsome detective. Sally didn’t want to go over the statement for a third time, but was willing to answer any questions the detective had. He was probably better to look at than anything she would find on television at that time of night.
“How did you end up all the way in there,” Augustine asked while pointing at an arbitrary point in the distance that he thought would signify the location of the body.
“I followed my dog,” Sally motioned in her own way to the seat beside her. Augustine had taken his position in the passenger seat at the front of the car and was looking over the back corner of the seat to Sally who was sat in the rear seat behind the driver. He hadn’t noticed the dog curled up asleep until Sally had nodded her head in that direction.
“So, he found the body?”
“Yes, he darted off in there and when I found him he was over the person. I checked their pulse and called for you guys – and the ambulance. I knew they were dead, I just thought there might be a slight chance with medical science that if they had been there only a few hours…” Sally stopped talking and started to cry. She had felt her voice breaking when speaking to the detective and thought for the first time about this as a human being rather than a body. She looked at the detective through the tears and wondered what she must have looked like. Out for far too long in the drizzle and now crying. She knew that she would be quite some sight.
“It is OK. Take your time. I only have another one or two questions for now. I just want to get a few details,” the kind detective spoke softly and slowly like he had all the time in the world. Sally thought that inside he must be raring to find out what had happened to the person she discovered. She could see he was ready to speak again.
“Did you see anything else around the body, on the floor? Take your time. It is important that we get this right.” Augustine Boyle asked in a deliberate tone. He wanted to
make sure that the state of the body taken by the paramedics was the one that she saw when she arrived at the scene. Boyle had sent the police officer that was comforting Sally when he arrived into the undergrowth to see if there was anything else left around. A murder weapon would be a great start to this investigation, even if Boyle was going to hand it over to someone else very soon. It didn’t fit the pattern of the murderer that his team were chasing and that was now seen as the highest priority in the town at the time. If this didn’t fit the pattern, then he could pass it off onto someone else. He would be much happier passing the body over with a good chance of solving the case. Although many of his fellow detectives had given up on Augustine Boyle as someone who only ever took on helpless cases, he hadn’t given up on them.
“There was just a clearing in the woods and the body in the middle of it. My dog was there first. She just stood on the body until I got there,” Sally looked the kind detective straight in the eye as she spoke. She wanted to look for clues to see if he had any idea what had happened. She was pretty good at working out what people were thinking, but she hadn’t come across anyone like this man before. He would make a great poker player, she thought. She had no idea that he struggled to keep his cards close to his chest.
“Thank you Sally. You have been very patient with us. I can see the police officer approaching. He has been to the scene. I have one more question and then I need to speak to him for a minute or so. The we’ll get you home – is that alright?” Augustine explained in a manner that made Sally think he would make a great father. She had rarely seen such a display of patience in a man. If only there were more like him out there.
“Yes, detective. That’s fine.”
“Oh, Sally. That wasn’t the last question, you know, where I said, ‘is that alright?’ There is one more question to do with what you found.” Augustine was playing with her a little. He wanted her at ease.
“I understand.”
“Now you were walking in this neighbourhood for the first time, according to what you have told the police officer. That’s fine. And he said that you were a little scared about the neighbourhood and what the people were like around here. That’s fine too. But when you started to walk into the woods, did you notice if anyone could see you? Do you think that someone in one of these houses or in a passing car could have seen you walk through? Was it like you were being watched?” Augustine Boyle wanted to know what it might be like for Sally, and thus the killer, to walk into the wooded area for the first time. He had already decided that the body in the ambulance hadn’t ended up there of natural causes or by her own hand. Augustine wanted to know if there was the feeling of being watched, the potential of being seen. If Sally felt it then the killer might have felt it too. If there was a chance the killer could have been seen them he could put some of his resources into
“Quite the opposite, detective. It felt as though not a soul in the world could see me. I felt creeped out by the neighbourhood until I walked into the woods. Then I felt as though nobody could touch me.”
Augustine Boyle thanked he for her time and then asked if she minded waiting a few seconds while he spoke to the police officer. Sally could hear parts of their conversation but nothing of sufficient clarity to piece together what she had seen. Sally was determined to find out what was going on with the body. She had never seen a dead body before and she was intrigued to find out what had brought it there. JoJo had opened a door in Sally’s mind that would never be closed again until she knew what had happened to the woman in the woods. The detective popped his head into the rear of the car and thanked her for his time. He then left and the police officer jumped in the front. He took her home so she could get some rest. But Sally couldn’t sleep. As she heard the faint snores of JoJo elsewhere in her home, she laid in her bed and thought of all the diverse and unusual ways the body could have made the journey from human to corpse. It took all night.
12
Augustine followed the ambulance to the hospital where the body of the woman was due to be given a post mortem and assessed for the cause of death. He much preferred Electra to do this for two main reasons. Firstly, he didn’t get on with dead bodies. He didn’t want another to visit him in his dreams. And he also didn’t like the smells that accompanied them. In the wide open it was bad enough. But in the confined space of the post mortem room and with the body likely being cut open, he was going to find those smells even tougher to deal with. Secondly, Electra was the best in his team, the best he knew, at picking up those little signals that turned an observation of something mundane into a vital part of any investigation.
But he was on duty at that time and he didn’t want to wake Electra for a post mortem on a body that they would be handing over in the morning anyway. It was now 2 in the morning and the coroner was there from a previous post mortem. He, like Augustine, didn’t see the point in handing it all over to someone else so stayed on to complete the job. Augustine got ready and followed the lead of the coroner in putting large swabs of Vaseline over his nostrils. It hadn’t made much difference in the past but it felt better that he was taking some steps to deal with the situation. The feeling that he was exerting control over the state of affairs was comforting.
He watched intently as the coroner worked on the body. He worked diligently as though he had plenty of time and it wasn’t 2 in the morning. Augustine watched his face more than his hands to keep his mind off what was going on and to see if there were any body language clues to go with the written report he would have in his own hands later. But there was nothing. The woman seemed for all intents and purposes a normal member of society, a retired lawyer no less, and the cause of death was a single puncture wound to the heart. Augustine thanked the coroner, took the report and made a few notes himself. He was sure whoever took the case from him wouldn’t thank him in the slightest, but he wanted to give over as much as he could.
Augustine was only around an hour from the end of his shift, so he decided that a quick visit to the wooded area might help him get a better idea of what had happened. He couldn’t decide whether the victim had been killed there or carried there after death. The post mortem gave up no clues in this area, except for the fact that she had been dead for approximately 2 months. He drove the empty streets that always greeted the emergency services at that time of day and looked for the road that had been down earlier that night. The streets were narrow and all looked the same in the daylight, let alone the dark but Augustine slowed when he was in the right part of town and looked along the tops of the houses to spot the tall oaks that gave away the location of the woodland. It took him a few minutes of driving up and down and then a few minutes more to find somewhere to park. Augustine took a torch from the boot of his car and headed back to the woods. He had no idea what he was looking for, but the feeling of being all alone and hidden from the outside world was going to be a good start. He wanted to wind down from work and prepare for a sleep when he got home. Boyle took his mind off the immediate situation, which before entering the woods was one of trepidation. In the same way that Sally had described, the atmosphere in the neighbourhood was one that made you feel like something menacing was about to happen. Even when all the residents were in their homes and asleep, the place could have been only a few seconds from everything kicking off at any moment. To take his mind off it, Augustine tried to remember the name of the woman who had been found here. He had only heard it in passing once, said by the coroner as he got the fingerprint report through from the computer in the post mortem room.
Harriet, no, Hope, nah
Augustine stepped into the first few yards of the woods. He looked forwards then stopped, turned around and looked back. The first signs of dawn were in the air and he decided that the torch would bring attention that he didn’t need. He walked a few backward steps, all the while looking up at the surrounding homes to see if he could have been seen.
Heather, nope, Holly, no
Then Augustine turned back around and relocated the c
learing in the centre of the woods. He had to make it that far to see if there were any clues left behind. There was only going to be one post mortem, but plenty of chances to check this out. She had been there long enough. What difference would a few hours make?
Hazel, I don’t think so, Hannah, never
Augustine reached the middle of the woods and looked at the clearing. It was shaded by the biggest oak tree in the woods, but he could still make out the cleared piece of ground. Augustine wanted to know if it was a natural clearing or one that had been made by hand.
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