by Grace Monroe
Bancho was there, of course. ‘What have you found?’ he said.
Mihaela’s naked body was laid out on the cold metal gurney. The sight of it wiped the smile off my face. I recognized her from the babushka’s photograph – just. Her skin, which had been creamy white, was now greyish-green, and the freckles on her face were gone. Cruelly, her eyes were open – and looked like black pools of pain. Her long red hair was spread out, the ends hanging over the edge of the gurney, knotted together and stained black with blood. Most pathologists cover the cadavers with a crisp white linen sheet, but, even with the dead, Patch’s bedside manner is lacking. I suppose if the body had been covered, the mess might have shocked me more.
‘These purple bruises …’ He pointed to marks on her face and neck, and then looked at me. It was his way of keeping my mind off my heaving stomach.
‘Those marks indicate she was alive at that point?’ I ventured.
‘Correct – she has a cocktail of drugs inside her including benzodiazepine. It’s a hypnotic that would have allowed him to torture her for up to five hours. It relaxed her muscles so she couldn’t fight back – but she would have felt everything.’
‘And that’s the same as the other victims?’ Bancho asked, and Patch nodded at him.
My eyes scanned down the body at all the purple bruises. ‘She was alive while all that was done.’ Patch nodded again.
‘Her throat was cut – and her tongue has been pulled out by the root. It’s taken some doing … so again he’s used a serrated knife, but his intention is to make it look torn,’ Patch said, barely looking up as he took scrapings from beneath Mihaela’s nails. Her hands were manicured, the red polish was chipped, and, as the pathologist handled the fingers, the skin became baggy. After a period of time, skin slips in the direction of gravity – Patch calls it ‘de-gloving’ and it was what was happening now. ‘The skin was removed from her left knee, as if she had been kneeling on it too long,’ he told us.
‘It’s your fucking sicko client’s signature, Brodie,’ muttered Bancho. ‘He takes young redheaded girls, drugs them, strips them … fillets them …’ He stopped to hold his breath and control his heaving stomach, and, shaking his head, looked over again to Patch who was following his own strict procedure. His routine ensured that he missed nothing; now he was collecting samples of hair. A clump came away on a two-inch-square piece of scalp. It looked like a ghastly divot of grass. Undisturbed, he said: ‘It’s nasty the way he sews their eyes … she’ll go to her grave that way – the skin’s too delicate to remove his handiwork.’
I didn’t comment on the purple bruising round her sockets. Patch placed her hair on an instrument tray; his gloved hands were covered in what closely resembled faecal matter, as he walked decisively up to the bloodied stumps that passed as ankles.
‘He hacked the feet off, ante mortem.’ He pointed to some more purple bruising.
‘What about DNA?’ I asked.
‘We have DNA samples but they are no good without a suspect.’
Bancho said, smugly looking towards me, ‘But now we have Thomas Foster – everything has changed.’
Patch snorted and walked over to a gurney that was covered by a sheet. Bancho followed him, so I fell into step – this was Patch’s domain and even the police didn’t take liberties here. Bancho waited for Patch to reveal to me what was under the sheet. With the flourish of a magician he pulled it off. Luckily, he didn’t shout ‘abracadabra’. I was expecting another dead girl, but what I got was a pig. It’s incredible how big they are – the surprise was clear on my face.
‘Pig skin is the closest you can get to human skin. I’ve been experimenting on what kind of knife made the marks.
‘I have a whole collection here, everything from bread knives to military issue. But I can’t find anything that comes close and that’s extremely unusual.’
He poked about the dead sow, indicating markings on the skin. I felt sick. I dreaded that one day I’d end up on Patch’s table, naked and vulnerable, with pathology assistants laughing at my body, just like anyone else’s. Sometimes I cursed myself that I spent so much of my living time with Patch. I had no doubt that he would do my autopsy himself if he outlived me. His strict Wee Free upbringing means he believes the body is a shell, and he would be the one to carve up my shell if he could. He’d see it as his duty – both to me and God. Perhaps that’s why I get upset when I’m in here; I look to see the soul of the deceased and it’s just not there.
‘Come over here,’ said Patch, walking to a side table near Mihaela’s body. He picked up a pair of feet and waved them about like a bargain hunter in a shoe shop.
‘Can anybody spot what’s wrong?’ he asked. ‘Simple question. Simple answer.’
Bancho looked blank. The condition his stomach was in he couldn’t risk getting any closer. His reaction stoked my courage. I moved towards Patch. I stopped short of touching the feet, ignoring the smell as best I could. I got in close.
He was right. It was simple.
‘Two left feet,’ I said. ‘They’re two left feet.’
This was no eureka moment.
Somewhere out there was a dead girl we hadn’t found yet.
Chapter Thirty-One
Pathology Department, Edinburgh Royal Infirmary
Wednesday 26 December, 2.45 p.m.
The coffee was strong and black, just the way I liked it. Patch had been worried about the look of Duncan Bancho and he’d taken his tea break early to allow the detective inspector to get his shit together, although Patch phrased it slightly differently.
Elvis’s Home for the Holidays CD crooned in the background in Patch’s messy office. Reports were littered across the table, forensic textbooks, one on entomology – that one gave me the creeps when I borrowed it and I’d never look at a fly in the same way again.
DI Bancho’s face turned a shade of grey as we returned to the lab. We went back to the gurney where Katya Waleski had been laid out by the pathology assistant, standing exactly where we were before. Patch was at the head of the cadaver within reach of his microphone; Bancho was about ten feet away, standing opposite me. Katya, unsurprisingly, remained where she was. Her eyes were closed. Her face and body were battered, but at least she had both feet.
‘Katya Waleski, twenty-two years of age, found at the bottom of the Castle Rock.’ Patch spoke in a monotone into his microphone. It might have been inappropriate but I chose to interrupt. ‘Thomas Foster doesn’t deny he was with her when she fell off the battlements at the castle.’
Bancho’s anger or an improvement in his hangover allowed him to creep closer. He looked at Katya then pointed his finger at me, as he shouted: ‘It was freezing cold! Who the fuck has sex in the middle of a snowstorm?’
‘More vigorous men than you, Duncan,’ I told him. ‘And, anyway, the snow hadn’t started then.’
‘If I may interrupt …’ Thankfully Patch had switched off the microphone when the childish bickering had started. The look he gave me suggested that I had presumed too much on our friendship. He was right. If it had been any other pathologist I would have bitten my tongue.
‘The toxicology reports show that the young woman had consumed a cocktail of drugs. The main drug in her system was ecstasy. But it’s a higher strength than normal, and it’s already been responsible for at least one fatal overdose in the city.’
‘Did she have any benzodiazepine?’ Bancho asked, turning to look at me.
‘No.’
Bancho’s face fell. He quickly rearranged his features and stared straight through me. Katya’s toxicology report was different to the Ripper victims’ – and my next thought was Moses. He was the biggest supplier of ecstasy in Edinburgh. He might not have sold her the tablet himself, but he was probably responsible. The potency of the drug on the street had increased and he had a new chemist. Guilt by association made me want to fight harder for Thomas; I was too lenient on Moses and the Dark Angels at the best of times.
‘Ecstasy increases
your temperature,’ I said, ‘so when Katya Waleski was out on the battlements she wouldn’t have felt cold in the same way as we would. We don’t know, I haven’t asked, because at the time I saw him in the cells of the Sheriff Court, I had no idea drugs were involved. But if Thomas had taken the drug too, which is likely, he wouldn’t react in the same way either.’ I was anxious to distinguish Katya from Mihaela; if I could do that, then Thomas had a chance of being released from Saughton Prison before the trial.
‘Thomas Foster has admitted he was there when the girl fell,’ Bancho said as our eyes locked. ‘He ran away. He’s only admitting something because we received a tip-off and a photograph from an anonymous witness who claims to have seen the whole thing. That’s the only reason Thomas Foster was identified and has confessed to anything. If he was innocent, why did he leg it?’
Katya lay on her cold slab, impervious to the arguments raging over her naked body. How quickly one becomes immune to the dead. Throwing my hands in the air I asked Bancho: ‘What are you going to charge him with? Being a coward?’
‘No … but he is going down for the murders of all these girls.’ He tapped his breast pocket where he carried photographs of the victims around with him. The strain was affecting his judgement. Patch was ignoring us and quietly, patiently, proceeding with his work, humming along with Elvis to ‘Silent Night’.
‘Your client did tell you the girl was a prostitute?’ Patch asked as he rolled Katya onto her side, revealing a network of healed crisscross whip marks. ‘This sort of pattern is indicative of girls who work the sadomasochistic market. Are you sure Kailash doesn’t know her?’ Momentarily, I was lost for words; my mouth opened and closed like a fish. Even although I knew full well what my mother did for a living, I was a little surprised at his blunt tone. It was an emotional conflict from out of the blue – I wanted to defend Kailash but I know what she is. Patch went on: ‘Before you say anything, I think you should be aware these marks did not come from abuse in the accepted sense – she is too well cared for. Her teeth are lovely, her hands are manicured. No doubt about it, she was a whore, and a high-end one at that, and these marks are likely to be from her job rather than anything else.’
Bancho clenched his lips together in what passed for a smile.
‘Before you look too smug, Duncan, there’s a problem with your case,’ Patch said.
‘She doesn’t have red hair!’ I exclaimed, feeling a surge of relief.
‘Never heard of wigs, Brodie?’ Bancho asked. Katya had short dark locks and her pubic hair matched the top of her head, but the DI walked to the table where her clothes were lying and picked up a plastic evidence bag. Inside was a curly, long auburn wig. ‘She was a prostitute who wore a red wig. Hardly rocket science – but, unfortunately for her, she fooled your client into thinking she was his type. Are you blind, stupid, or just greedy for his father’s money?’
Patch scratched the purple port-wine stain on his face which gave him his name; he was a man of infinite patience, which was why he was so good at his job – but that patience was running out.
‘If I may be allowed to speak in my own lab – the colour of her hair was not the problem I was referring to.’ His voice was raised and it silenced us. ‘The girl died of natural causes.’ He held his hand up, no doubt to stop DI Bancho saying that my client had pushed her, and continued: ‘She died of an acute myocardial infarction.’
‘Shit, Patch,’ I said. ‘She was only twenty-two – how likely is that?’
‘In layman’s terms, a massive heart attack induced by ecstasy killed her outright,’ he said in reply.
‘A heart attack would make you lose your balance and fall.’ I looked Patch directly in the eye, nodding, asking for him to agree with me.
‘I don’t believe it for a second,’ said Bancho. If white foam had started gushing out of his mouth, I wouldn’t have been surprised. ‘Thomas Foster is the Ripper. I know it. Look at that – how do you explain that?’ He seemed to have completely recovered from his hangover-induced aversion to cadavers – quite against protocol he was tapping Katya’s naked breast. ‘How do you explain that then, Professor?’ he asked again.
Beneath the grime and bruising, something was written in red.
‘It’s red lipstick – probably her own, although I’m waiting for confirmation.’ Patch held Bancho’s eyes.
‘Not the material – the content! Tell her what it says!’ He leant on the mortuary slab but Patch didn’t follow anyone’s orders. Stubbornly, he turned his back and walked away. I read it myself. It was difficult but I spoke aloud once I had deciphered the words.
‘More will die?’
Shaken, but unbowed, I whispered to Bancho defiantly: ‘What are you going to do – charge Thomas with vandalism or desecration?’ I picked up my gear, waved to Patch and moved away.
‘Where was her bag found?’ I shouted at Bancho. He didn’t answer me, so I knew it was beside her body at the bottom of the rocks. This day was over – I had a Fat Boy waiting for a ride. I should have guessed that Bancho wouldn’t leave it there. I heard his footsteps charging after me. It was pointless to walk faster; he was running and I wasn’t going to start a race. He grabbed me by my shoulder, pulling me round to face him. I was glad that I had a leather jacket on.
‘Police brutality?’ I shrugged him away. He pushed me against the wall.
‘I know we’ve had our differences, Brodie …’ he said, his eyes locked into mine.
‘That’s the understatement of the year,’ I replied.
He sighed and leaned against the wall beside me, sliding down until he sat on the ground. ‘Please … don’t do it … don’t have him released. I know in my gut that he’s the Ripper, Brodie. More girls will die if you get him out.’
I joined him on the floor, placing my helmet between my legs. ‘You have to understand, Duncan, that my job is not to decide who is guilty or innocent. I only go on the facts – and the fact is that you have nothing to pin Thomas Foster to those other deaths, and in the case of Katya Waleski, it looks like whoever gave us the tip-off witnessed a nasty accident.’
‘He’s the Ripper – I know it, and when I get the DNA results I’ll prove it!’ He held his head in his hands.
‘You’ve made this personal, Duncan. Stand back from it and it’ll be easier.’
He tapped his breast pocket again. ‘Of course it’s fucking personal, Brodie. I never understand people who say it’s not.’
‘You’re too close. You’re not the first cop to make a mistake. What about Wearside Jack? The inspector made the same mistake you’re making now.’ Bancho said nothing, but I could tell he was listening – it was, after all, his greatest fear. ‘Remember the seventies? The Yorkshire Ripper case? The detective in charge was like you – blind. He had the real killer questioned several times and released because he didn’t have a Wearside accent. Turned out Wearside Jack was a hoaxer – thirteen women were murdered because of that mistake. The inspector had to take early retirement; he was disgraced; he died young. Do you want that to happen to you?’ I picked up my helmet and walked away. Without turning, I whispered: ‘Release Thomas Foster.’
I saw Bancho’s reflection in the glass. Still sitting on the floor he held his arm up in defiance and gave me the finger.
It was better than seeing his tears.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Cumberland Street, Edinburgh
Wednesday 26 December, 4 p.m.
The smell of an autopsy always stayed in my hair and nostrils for the rest of the day but I was too exhausted to shower. My half of the house, the half Louisa doesn’t stray into, was cold and lonely when I returned. Her half of the house is immaculate, even anal. I go there sometimes to think – or to breathe. Today I didn’t want to think. It was all too tiring and depressing. I popped a couple of paracetamol, hoping they would shift the pounding in my head. Switching on the heater, I raked through my drawers searching for my favourite red flannelette pyjamas. I flopped onto the bed with an almost e
mpty selection box – only the caramel was left; not my favourite but it would do. The wind howled against the window as I pulled the duvet up around my ears and dipped a piece of chocolate into a mug of hot steaming tea. It would go some way to restoring my spirits.
Switching the television on, I was careful to keep it on mute. I didn’t want the Ripper case invading my bedroom any more than I could help it. The news channel was on and, sure enough, footage of me speaking to Adie Foster on Christmas Eve was being played. It seemed a lifetime ago. The picture switched to St Giles’ where a reporter was standing on the pavement doing a piece to camera. I turned it over and broke off two bits of chocolate to dip in my mug. I kept The Simpsons on mute while I dialled 1571 to get my messages; a computer-generated voice answered me. You have no new messages. No surprise. And one saved message. My fingers stopped fumbling around for chocolate. That was strange. I pressed to hear the message.
Saved message … message received … twenty-sixth December, at two fifteen p.m.
Connie’s clear voice spoke out at me. A smile crossed my lips.
‘Hi – it’s me. You’re probably out in the Corvette – that car is to die for, anyway, I told the girls on the football team what I’m doing on New Year’s Day and they are sooooooo green. I said that we could take some of them to the match – we can, can’t we? I mean there’s no point in doing something as fabby as this if your friends don’t see you. You could take me in the convertible! Mum or Malcolm could give the girls a lift. Oh, by the way, I also said you’d take them for pizza – bye! Love you!’
Connie was presenting me with a fait accompli – she’d arranged everything so that if I changed her plans I’d be the wicked big sister. I didn’t mind. She’d cheered me up. At least someone wanted to spend time with me – oh God, I was getting maudlin. I needed more chocolate. I had to accept that I also needed to go to Saughton Prison to see Thomas Foster in light of the autopsy findings.