by Joy Ellis
‘Oh shit! Not again.’ The voice was groggy with sleep.
‘Sorry, babe, but I’ve really got to go.’ Kate wrestled in the half-light with the twisted arm of her jacket.
‘No shower, huh? Must be yet another big one?’ David pushed the duvet from his broad shoulders, sat up and yawned.
‘Looks like it.’ Kate walked across the shadowy room to the bed. ‘You get back to sleep. I’ll ring you later.’ She leant over and brushed her lips across his forehead. ‘Promise.’
‘Mm, I’ve heard that before.’ With a grunt, he slid back down into the bed and closed his eyes.
For a moment Kate felt anger rising. For God’s sake, a body had been found at the same time that they had a kid missing! Worse than that, it was the daughter of one of their own civilian staff, and David was put out by his precious sleep being disturbed.
She picked up her keys from the dressing table and calmed herself. She was being unfair. After all, David knew nothing about the missing girl or the body on the beach, and anyway, it wasn’t just that. It was the fact that big cases always took her away from him and from their sons, Marcus and Eddie. And David, as house husband, a role that he was clearly becoming disillusioned with, would be left as per usual to cope with everything that the home and two teenage boys could throw at him. Kate shook her head sadly. And those boys could be a handful when they felt like it.
‘I will ring.’ She said softly, then slipped through the door and out onto the landing, where she silently prayed that she would not get so caught up with work that David’s call would be forgotten.., again.
First light was a weak, watery and dismal affair, but Kate decided that the chilly grey dawn was probably more suited to the scene that met her, than one of Mother Nature’s more dazzling performances. She gazed around, trying for a moment or two not to see the very thing that she had come there for.
To call it a beach was being generous. Dawnsmere was a bleak spot; a narrow strip of sand and dunes sandwiched between the wild marsh and the cold and uninviting waters of the Wash. But even so, it held a strange beauty, even if that beauty was a lonely and austere one. The thing that always struck Kate about these long stretches of fenland coast-line was the absence of almost anything human. There were no colourful beach huts, no deck-chairs, no café and no amusements. There was just the landscape and the sea, and right now, if you chose to ignore the presence of the police and their sad find, it seemed almost primeval
Gathering herself, Kate silently ordered the mother in her to retreat to a safe distance, and requested only the seasoned police officer to remain.
The dead girl lay on her side, her bloated face half buried in the wet, mud-coloured sand. Her clothes clung around her like drab rags and her feet were bare. Kate stared at the slender narrow ankles and saw scratches and cuts etched deep into the pale skin.
She looked closer and frowned. There were bruises too, lots of them.
Kate tried not to get ahead of herself. Foul play was always her first thought, but just being submersed in water could cause massive injuries to the body. She knew only too well that the tides could buffet an unfortunate soul against rocks and submerged debris, inflicting all manner of trauma to frail human skin.
Kate reached into her pocket and removed a photograph. The picture showed a slim youngster with shoulder-length light brown hair. A girl with laughing green eyes, a narrow, delicately boned nose and a wide, if somewhat toothy, smile.
She stared back down at the lifeless tangle of clothes and un-naturally white flesh and shook her head. It could be Shauna Kelly, but it would take more than a happy snap to identify her. Kate heaved in a long sigh; because as their missing girl had no tattoos, scars or other identifying marks, they would have to resort to dental records, unless one of the distraught parents insisted on seeing her, and frankly Kate would walk over hot coals to prevent that happening.
She looked at the body, trying to make some kind of positive connection with the smiling girl in the photo, but apart from similar length hair, there was nothing to recognise.
‘Wicked waste. Poor little kid.’ A uniformed officer was standing a little way away, viciously stabbing the toe of his boot over and over into the wet sand.
Kate recognised the man as being one of the mess room jokers, a right laugh-a-minute maestro under normal conditions. But this wasn’t normal, and the man was visibly upset by the girl’s death.
He looked at Kate and hung his head, ‘Sorry, ma’am. Got three girls of my own.’
He didn’t need to say any more.
Kate threw him a small smile, followed by a life-line. ‘Do me a favour, constable? Go check as to whether DS Summerhill has arrived yet.’
The man nodded animatedly, straightened up and loped away from the scene, relief oozing from every pore.
Left alone with the girl, Kate wondered, not for the first time, how they coped with so much death. Dead adults were bad enough; babies were beyond devastating; and children tore her heart out, but teenagers affected her in a different way altogether. And she didn’t think she felt like that just because of Marcus and Eddie. There seemed to be so much loss attached to juveniles. They had nearly made it. Almost become what they were intended to be. All that potential was suddenly gone; their untapped talents wiped out in the blink of an eye and their fantastic young dreams stolen for ever.
‘What did you dream of?’ She asked the dead girl at her feet. ‘What was your highest aspiration?’
The light breeze off the sea rippled the shallow puddles of water that surrounded the girl, making her sodden clothes move slightly. Just for a moment, in the poor light, it gave the body a deceitful impression of life.
Kate shivered, and then thankfully voices echoed across the narrow dune-edged beach and dragged her away from her sombre thoughts.
Jon Summerhill was hurrying towards her, reluctantly accompanied by the county’s forensic pathologist, Tommy Thorne. Thorne was an irritable man with an acerbic tongue and, for some unknown reason, an undisguised dislike for police officers. It was easy to see why his attitude had earned him the nickname of Prickles, although some of the officers who had bequeathed him the label still argued over its exact derivation. The fact that his surname was Thorne didn’t seem to come into it, and Kate had noticed that people often put a heavy accent on the first syllable.
She quashed a smile as she saw him trudging across the sea-soaked strand towards her, because actually she was very glad he was there. He may be a miserable old sod, but he was undeniably good at his job, and deaths by drowning were notoriously difficult to get right. Even when you knew for sure that someone had drowned, you were still left with the same questions. Fell? Jumped? Pushed?
Jon arrived a few steps ahead of the pathologist. He had obviously left home as swiftly as she had. His eyes were still bleary, and a shadow of unshaven skin darkened his face. ‘Is it her?’ He breathed.
Kate shook her head. ‘Maybe, but.., take a look for yourself. I certainly don’t know.’ She turned to Thorne and nodded a greeting. ‘Glad you’re the one to turn out on this, Tommy. By the look of it, I’m going to need your help with this.’
‘You always need my help, and you, DCI Reynard, may be happy that I’m chilling my bollocks off on the edge of the North Sea at five in the morning, but I’m damn sure I’m not.’ Thorne glowered at her for a moment, then stepped towards the dead girl. ‘The jungle drums tell me that she may belong to one of our people?’
Kate caught a distinct softening in his tone. ‘It could be. We have been looking for a runaway for the last three days. Shauna Kelly, fourteen year old daughter of Liz Kelly, a civilian who works in the Control Room.’
‘The age is probably similar,’ murmured Thorne, kneeling down and gently inspecting his new charge, ‘but I’ll have to get her back to the morgue before I can tell you anything constructive.’ He stood up. ‘And even then, you know what it’s like with these cases, it’s almost impossible to determine the manner of death from a post-mortem.
Maybe the lungs and the sinuses will turn up something, but our best bet will be a complete toxicological analysis.’ His eyebrows knitted together fiercely. ‘So don’t rush me, okay? And before you say anything, I’m fully aware it’s a priority.’ He beckoned to a Soco who waited tentatively on the edge of the dunes. ‘Get off your arse, sunshine, and come and do some bloody work!’ He turned back to Kate. ‘We’ll get her photographed and shipped out ASAP. It’s the best I can do.’ He gave a shrug and puffed out his cheeks. ‘Frankly right now I know little more than you. She’s dead, and it didn’t happen in the last few hours. She’s been in the water for a little while.’ He drew in a whistling breath and stared hard at Kate. ‘Sorry, but I’m passing the buck back to you, DCI Reynard. You need to discover the circumstances behind this child’s death, and then we’ll try to tie it in with my findings.’
‘I need to know who she is before I can do that.’ said Kate grimly.
‘Well, surely it’s easy enough to either confirm or eliminate Shauna Kelly? Bring in the next of kin to identify her, or failing that, dental records. Simple. Now, as I’m thoroughly pissed off with the bloody dawn chorus on the sodding marsh, I’m going home for some breakfast. And good luck. Because I think you’re going to need it.’
Kate and Jon watched the man as he stomped back up the beach.
‘I’d hate to be that cantankerous.’ whispered Jon. ‘He’s the crabbiest bloke I’ve ever met.’
‘Maybe it’s his way of coping.’ Kate frowned. ‘I’ve never known him any different, but there’s something kind about him too.’
‘Kind? I must have blinked and missed that.’ Jon gave a little snort. ‘And it’s hardly kind to suggest a parent being subjected to identifying a body that’s been dragging along the bottom of the Wash for days!’
‘I think that comment was for show. If you get the chance, watch the way he conducts a post-mortem. Precision, and complete respect for the body. He may act the Grinch, but I’m willing to bet there’s a softer side in there somewhere.’
Jon didn’t answer.
They walked together to a quiet spot further up the beach. It was a little way away from the blue-lights and the gathering uniforms, and Kate sat on a low stone wall that edged the dunes. ‘Look at that.’ She said softly, pointing out over the silvery mercurial waters of the Wash. ‘How can something so beautiful be a back drop to what we have just seen down on the water’s edge? Something so horrible, so pathetic and degraded?’
Jon stared out at the brightening sea. ‘I guess that’s just how it is. Life, I mean.’
‘What do you know about the tides along this stretch, Jon?’ Kate asked suddenly.
He sucked on his bottom lip. ‘Not much, but I know a man who does. Jack Archer, he’s in an old people’s place just outside your village. He lived way out on the marsh for most of his life; his dad and his grand-dad were eel-catchers. A real web-foot, if ever there was one. Social Services moved him off the marsh when he took ill and there was no one to look after him. He knows these Fens better than anyone.’
‘Go see him, Jon. Tell him the exact spot where the girl washed up, and ask him if he could give us an idea of what part of the coast she went in from. If he knows the tides and the currents that well, he might be able to help us.’
‘Okay. He’s in his eighties, but I reckon he’ll still be an early riser. I’ll grab a shower, then go round and see him as soon as it’s properly light.’
Kate sat unmoving, and took in the breathtaking sight of the liquid gold sun breaking through the misty marble grey sky and reflecting across the water. ‘This place is something else, isn’t it? If it weren’t for that poor kid lying on the beach, this would be magical.’
‘It’s still magical.’ said Jon. ‘And let’s consider it a blessing that we have her back from the deep; whoever she is.’
Kate looked at Jon and lowered her voice. There was no one close, but she needed to be careful. ‘Is there anything about this spot, Jon? Can you pick up anything about the dead girl?’
‘Sorry, ma’am. I’ve been hoping to sense something from the moment I got out of my car, but there’s nothing, I’m afraid.’ He took a deep gulp of the ozone-laden air. ‘But if we can locate the spot where she went into the water, then that might be different. There are bound to be emotional vibrations of whatever terrors she suffered left behind there.’
‘But nothing here? Not even when you were close to her body?’
Jon shrugged. ‘Not a thing.’
Kate sighed, and stood up. ‘Right, well, if we have no help from your alternative sources, I guess we’d better get back to base and do some good old-fashioned police work.’
She took one last glance back to the beach, but was glad to see that the girl was no longer visible. A group of police and scene of crime officers were working around her now, and soon she would be lifted up from the cold, wet sand and taken back to Tommy’s mortuary, where hopefully she would see fit to give up her secrets to the one man who was ready and prepared to listen to her silent story.
CHAPTER TWO
Kate was up to her neck in reports when Jon got back from seeing Jack Archer. ‘Waste of time?’ she queried, noting his unusually serious expression.
‘No, far from it. He’s a great old guy. Really helpful.’ Jon placed two beakers of coffee on her desk, then reached back and pushed her office door closed.
‘So why the mardy face?’
‘Oh nothing, ma’am. It’s just the thought of that young kid dying like that.’
Kate closed the file that she was working on and pointed to a chair. ‘Sit.’ She reached across and helped herself to one of the coffees and a handful of sugar sachets. As she tore open the tiny packets and shook them into her drink, she looked at him thoughtfully. Jon was not classically good-looking. He was too pale to be hunky, and his ancestry was clearly something of a mixture. Although he was as English as a Skegness chip shop, there was definitely a hint of something Oriental, or maybe Slav, about his features. And whatever it was, it was something that was very attractive. Even his dress sense was unorthodox. Black or grey jackets or sweatshirts over white T-shirts which, when added to his rough-cut, raven black, hair, gave him an edgy Matrix kind of look.
‘Why has this one hit you so hard, my friend? You’ve seen your fair share of death before.’
Jon shifted uncomfortably. ‘Oh, it’s silly really, but it’s the anniversary of my sister’s death, and I had my dad on the phone earlier. My mother always has problems around this time of year.’
Kate’s eyes widened. ‘I never knew that you had a sister.’
‘Isabel. She was adopted before I was born. Usual story, no babies for years, they adopt and hey-presto, a natural child comes along.’
‘How did she die? If you don’t mind me asking?’
‘Teenage suicide. She was sixteen.’
Kate gasped. ‘Jon! I’m so sorry. You never said.’
‘Not the kind of cheery little thing you throw into a conversation, I guess. And there were circumstances around her death that…’ Jon shrugged. ‘I don’t talk about her often. Anyway, my dad likes to take mother out to lunch on the anniversary, and he asked if they could call in for few minutes on the way to the restaurant.’
‘Why not go with them? I’ll cover for you.’
‘No, ma’am. I’d rather not.’ He inhaled. ‘And I really think I should bring you up to speed on my meeting with Jack Archer.’
Kate watched as he opened out a dog-eared map of the coastline. It was clear he felt he’d said enough, and she decided to respect that wish.
‘The upshot of it is; Jack thinks that the girl went into the water around this area here.’ He stamped his finger firmly on the map. ‘Allenby Creek. The tides, the currents and the recent light winds all make this the most likely spot, unless she fell from a boat. And we have to hope that isn’t the case.’
‘Allenby Creek? That’s a remote spot, isn’t it?’
Jon stared at the map. ‘It’s on th
e borders of our patch and Harlan Marsh. And yes, that area is all farmland and wild salt-marsh.’
‘Come to think of it, I remember it from when I was a kid. There used to be one accessible beach there. It was close to the old Seal Sanctuary at Hurn Point.’
‘Mm..,’ Jon’s slender finger moved slowly along the coast. ‘…I see where you mean. Shall I ask uniform to go check it out for us?’
‘We should go ourselves.’ Kate gnawed on her bottom lip. ‘But no, you’re right. You need to be around here at lunchtime, and I need to get these reports on the Jamie Durham murder up to the super, so we’d be wasting valuable time.’ She lifted her desk phone. ‘I’ll see if the Duty Sergeant could get a crew over there to take a look around, maybe ask some questions of the locals.’
After a few words, Kate replaced the phone in its cradle and sat back in her chair. ‘Right, that’s sorted. Now, while I get these out of the way..,’ she indicated to the small mountain of paper work cluttering up her desk, ‘…maybe you’d chase up Rosie and Scott. See how they are doing tracing Shauna Kelly’s last known movements?’
‘I’m on it.’ Jon stood up, and then paused. ‘I suppose you haven’t had any more information in about Jamie Durham’s missing murder weapon, have you, ma’am?’
‘Believe me, if I had, you’d be the first to know.’ Kate’s face drew up into an angry mask. The murder of the young local lad by a drug-addict had got to all of them. It should have been so simple, but everything had gone against them as they tried to prove the drug addict’s guilt. ‘Every man jack in this station knows exactly who butchered that poor lad, but if we don’t find that damned knife soon, I can see that bastard Cullen Payne walking free, can’t you?’
‘Sadly I can.’ Jon growled. ‘Now that would be a travesty if ever there was one.’
‘Agreed,’ murmured Kate and she watched Jon intently as he closed the door.
He had had a look on his face that she’d seen before. It wasn’t bitterness, but it was something like that; a kind of internal rage against the injustice of a bad man literally getting away with murder. It was hard to analyse, but it worried her. It worried her a lot.