Born in a Burial Gown

by Mike Craven

  Still, Fluke much preferred working away from the main team, so the arrangement suited them both.

  ‘She was under a foot of mud so couldn’t be seen either. Even when looking directly in,’ Towler said.

  ‘So how did—?’

  ‘And she’s only been in there six hours.’

  ‘What? How’d you know that?’ Fluke asked, taking Towler’s bait. He could’ve done without the melodramatic puzzle but he let it go.

  ‘We have a witness. They left a note.’

  Fluke impatiently pressed the assistance button above his bed until the ward nurse came over to see him. ‘I need to go, nurse,’ he said, standing up and sorting out his things. ‘It’s nearly finished anyway,’ he added, pointing at the bag of blood that was clearly not empty.

  ‘Marion,’ she replied automatically. ‘Do I call you ‘patient’? And you’re not going anywhere. I’ve got a bag of plasma in the fridge for you.’

  Plasma? Fuck that. Plasma took longer than blood to go through.

  After five minutes of argument and counter-argument, Fluke was defeated. He sat back down, grinning sheepishly at the man in the bed opposite who’d been following their exchange. As soon as the nurse left the room, Fluke stood back up. He couldn’t afford to wait. The first few hours were the ‘golden hours’: witnesses remembered things clearly, forensic evidence was at its freshest and easiest to detect. Alibis weren’t yet fully formed.

  He checked that he couldn’t be seen from the corridor before removing the cannula from the back of his hand, just like he’d seen doctors do countless times. He didn’t have a cotton swab so he used a tissue to stem the flow of blood from the wound it left. He looked for somewhere safe to dispose of the needle. He settled with simply wrapping it in his hanky and putting it in his rucksack.

  He knew he’d stepped over an unseen line in hospital etiquette and would be in trouble with Doctor Cooper later. She’d probably be on the phone before he’d even reached the car park but that was nothing compared to the trouble he’d be in if anyone at work ever found out where he’d actually been. Arriving two hours late to your own crime scene was unexplainable. Anyway, he didn’t want to see Doctor Cooper. Every time he saw her, it triggered another bout of insomnia. He’d been lying to her about his side effects for over a year and the guilt was keeping him awake. He knew she only wanted what was best for him but the truth had to stay hidden. And the truth was that five months ago, he’d involved her in a crime. A crime she didn’t even know about.

  He hoisted his rucksack onto his shoulders, avoided the disapproving stare of the man opposite and walked out of the ward.

  The more he went to hospital the more it seemed to tire him. Physically, he was getting stronger and stronger as each day passed but every time he had an appointment, he came out feeling weary. It didn’t seem to matter how much he’d rested or how healthily he’d eaten, like a badly earthed battery, the hospital seemed to drain him of energy.

  He put it down to being so sick of hospitals that even being in one tired him. Or perhaps Doctor Cooper had been right and he had needed the blood. He put it out of his mind and was out of Carlisle and on the A595 driving west in under five minutes. The thermometer in his car showed 5ºC. It was biting outside. The trees were bare, their dead leaves long dispersed in the strong winter winds. Brown, rotten vegetation littered the verge. The countryside on the wane. A few evergreens were still battling the elements but everything else was waiting for spring. He turned the heater up.

  His mobile rang and the caller ID displayed the ward’s number. Fluke pressed the decline button. He’d deal with the fall-out later.

  A layer of fog descended the further west he drove. Thick and white. It wasn’t raining yet, but it was going to. He hoped proper forensic practices had been followed. He didn’t want evidence being washed away before he got there. Chambers had the main SOCO team working the robbery so he knew he’d get whoever was left. It didn’t matter, when it came to crime scenes, he preferred to be in total control. The crime scene managers didn’t like having their autonomy removed but he didn’t care. His case, his rules.

  The drive would take at least another forty-five minutes, and without any details of the crime to think about, Fluke searched through the car’s mp3 player for some music with a bit of pace and energy. He selected the Clash’s second album, Give ’Em Enough Rope, and turned up the volume. FMIT were responsible for investigating the most serious crimes committed across Cumbria, and when the county was the third largest in the UK, if you didn’t like driving, you were in the wrong job.

  An hour after leaving Carlisle, he arrived at the rendezvous point. Towler had set it up on some hardstanding between the main building site and the smaller site where the body had obviously been discovered. It was where all the yellow earth-moving vehicles were parked, which all building sites seemed to need, their enormous tyres thick with dark mud. It was also full of police vehicles, marked and unmarked, some still with their flashing lights on. He was obviously one of the last to arrive.

  Whenever possible, Fluke used rendezvous points out of sight of the crime scene to ensure everyone was fully focused on what he was saying, rather than rubbernecking at the site. Towler knew that and Fluke nodded appreciatively as he saw the site’s own security fences made the scene self-contained. People were milling round, waiting to start. Most of them had white forensic suits on and from a distance it looked like a convention of Scottish sunbathers.

  Fluke got out of his car and stretched. A lone seagull circled overhead, screeching like a half-skinned cat. A uniformed policeman was eating a sandwich and throwing parts of the crust to the gull. Fluke watched as it dived down to catch the last bit. With no more food, it lazily gained height then headed off in the direction of Whitehaven Harbour. Fluke could smell the sea coming off the inland breeze. It reminded him of Plymouth and his time with the Marines.

  Matt Towler, a foot taller than everyone else, was speaking to a group of suited forensic staff. He saw Fluke, broke away from the group and walked over. Fluke could tell his friend was worried, and when something worried Towler, a veteran of a gulf war, Sierra Leone and three tours of Northern Ireland, he also worried. Although FMIT officers weren’t officially paired up, Fluke and Towler invariably ended up working together. Barely hidden disdain of anyone below their own high standards, barrack-room sarcasm and a willingness to work twenty hours a day, seven days a week when needed meant other detectives weren’t exactly falling over themselves to join them. It was something Fluke cultivated rather than tried to rectify.

  ‘You okay, Ave?’ Towler asked.

  ‘Fine,’ Fluke replied. ‘Tell me about this note,’ he said, as they walked towards the scene. The ground was cold and slippery and threatening to sprain his ankles. They struggled to the outer cordon and stopped.

  Towler handed him a plastic evidence bag. It had a piece of paper inside.

  Fluke read it.

  Look in the secund whole from the door. sum1 has put a boddy in there

  It was written on stationery with the same building company logo as the signs on the fences surrounding the site. He turned it over. There was nothing on the back.

  The witness appeared to have used whatever had been to hand.

  ‘Not exactly Shakespeare is it?’ Towler said. ‘It was by the kettle in the site office.’

  The poor spelling didn’t necessarily indicate age. Fluke knew the average criminal had the reading age of an eight-year-old and he already had a theory about who’d left the note. He didn’t know the person but suspected he knew the type.

  Fluke looked at the site office and its proximity to the crime scene, easily identifiable by the forensic tent. ‘Who was first on scene?’

  ‘Dunno. But Don Holland was managing it when I got here.’

  Fluke could see Chief Inspector Holland talking to a group of uniformed officers. They’d never really got on, although neither of them really knew why. Fluke walked over.

  ‘Chief Inspect
or!’ he called out, as he approached.

  Holland looked up, said something to the group that caused them to laugh, and sauntered over. ‘What’s up, Fluke? Don’t tell me, you’ve found something to complain about already. I would say that under three minutes is a record for you but we both know I’d be lying.’

  Holland laughed at his own joke. Fluke didn’t join in. ‘Who set up the cordons?’

  ‘Remember who you’re speaking to, Fluke,’ Holland said.

  ‘I know exactly who I’m speaking to, Chief Inspector,’ Fluke replied. ‘Who set up the cordons?’

  ‘I did. Why? It’s all correct.’

  Fluke could feel himself getting angry. ‘Why’s the site office not in the inner cordon?’

  Holland was about to respond but saw the evidence bag Fluke was carrying and realised his mistake. The office was also a crime scene and should have been cordoned off and access controlled. ‘Shit.’

  ‘I’m giving you five minutes to reset it, and in the meantime get those giggling idiots off my fucking crime scene!’ Fluke shouted, pointing at the officers Holland had been holding court with. ‘Don’t they teach contamination control on the chief inspector’s course anymore?’ The raised voices had caused them all to look over. Jesus, he thought, any chance of footprint evidence had all but disappeared. Compromised crime scenes ruined cases. Defence solicitors drove tanks through them.

  ‘Now look here, Fluke. I will not be spoken—’

  ‘I haven’t got time, Chief Inspector,’ Fluke interrupted. ‘Just get it fucking sorted.’ For a second, he thought Holland was going to stand his ground. He stared at Fluke, nostrils flaring and lips white with anger. Eventually, he turned his back and left without saying anything. He didn’t really have a choice; Fluke had him over a barrel.

  ‘Useless wanker,’ Towler said, as Holland walked off.

  There was no point reliving mistakes. Fluke needed to move on. ‘Who found the note?’

  Towler pointed towards a grey-haired man talking to a police officer. ‘The Clerk of Works, Christian Dunn, spotted it soon as he got in. Always has a brew first thing.’

  Fluke asked, ‘What’d he do?’

  ‘Had a look, saw nothing, but as it was due to be filled today, he got in with a shovel and found it.’

  ‘The body?’

  ‘No, the golf travel bag,’ Towler replied. ‘He opened it, saw her face and called 999.’

  Fluke knew what they were. The big bags used when transporting golf clubs abroad. They had to be big enough to fit a normal golf bag in them. The perfect way to transport a body surreptitiously. ‘Let’s go and have a word with him then,’ he said.

  Normally when Fluke spoke to members of the public who’d discovered a body they were on the verge of a breakdown. At the very least, they were in shock. If Fluke were pressed, he’d have described Christian Dunn as irritated.

  He looked up as they walked over. ‘Is this him? This the boss man, like?’ Mr Dunn said to the officer with him. He strode towards them, indignation all over his face. He was small man, closer to sixty than fifty, with a weathered face. Clearly someone who spent most of his time outdoors.

  Fluke held out his hand but Dunn ignored it.

  ‘You the boss man? When can I get back to work?’ he asked, without preamble. He pronounced work as ‘wuk’. ‘It’s putting me right off my schedule, this is. I’ve nine tons of concrete coming within the hour. I need you to move that lassie.’

  His understanding of personal space was about as well-developed as his awareness of volume control. Dunn wasn’t exactly shouting but Fluke could feel himself leaning back anyway. Ten minutes with him and he’d be reaching for headache pills.

  ‘This is a murder investigation. The site’s shut down, Mr Dunn,’ Fluke replied.

  Dunn looked at him blankly. ‘My gaffer doesn’t pay me to sit on me arse all day with concrete getting hard in the mixer.’

  ‘I’m sorr—’

  ‘What she want to throw herself down there for anyway?’ Dunn interrupted. ‘I know it’s sad an’ all that, but it’s selfish. If she wants to kill herself, why can’t she do it away from my building site.’

  It was Fluke’s turn to look blank. The idiot thought it was a suicide? She was in a bag and covered in mud.

  Dunn wasn’t finished. ‘Look, I know you lads ’ave a job to do but my concrete’s going in that hole whether you like it or not.’

  Fluke didn’t really know how to respond to that. Fortunately Towler did.

  ‘Listen, you little tit, this site’s gonna be closed for days. This is a murder investigation. If you go anywhere near that hole, I’ll arrest you.’

  Dunn stepped back in the face of Towler’s aggressive outburst. ‘I’m telling my gaffer about this. You’ll be hearing from Mr Johnson today, don’t you worry about that. It’s putting me right off my schedule this is,’ he muttered, avoiding meeting Towler’s eye.

  ‘Look, Mr Dunn, we’ll be as fast as we can but it’ll go faster if you tell me everything I need to know,’ Fluke said.

  ‘How fast?’

  ‘Maybe an hour,’ Fluke lied. He saw Towler smirk as Dunn looked at his watch.

  ‘What do you want to know?’ he said.

  ‘Tell me about the hole and the office.’

  Dunn explained that the holes were all due to filled with concrete and rubble, part of the foundations for the new outpatient wing.

  ‘Did anyone have a key to the site office other than you, Mr Dunn?’ Fluke asked.

  For the first time, Dunn looked uncomfortable rather than angry. Shifty even.

  ‘No. Why should anyone else have a key? I’m the gaffer,’ he mumbled.

  ‘So you’re the only one with access to it?’

  He mumbled something again. Fluke failed to catch it.

  ‘Speak up, please!’ Towler barked.

  ‘I’m the only one who can get in,’ Dunn said, in a clearer voice.

  ‘You sure?’ Fluke asked. He stared at Dunn. He knew something about the office, he was sure of it.

  Dunn broke eye contact first, said he was sure, then stumbled off.

  ‘You want to bring him in?’ Towler asked.

  Fluke thought about it. ‘Nah. We’ll wait and see. He’s not exactly going anywhere. Not when he has to “wuk”.’

  ‘Jesus, if it’d been filled in today, I doubt the body would ever have been found,’ Towler said, as they watched Dunn walk off, muttering to himself.

  ‘Not in our lifetime anyway,’ Fluke agreed.

  ‘You wanna go and have a look?’

  ‘Yeah, I’ll have a quick gander but I’m not getting in just yet,’ he said. ‘I want to clear the site office first. Sooner we get that done sooner it can be processed. We’ll have to wait for the pathologist before we can move the body. May as well let SOCO do something.’ Fluke, like a lot of older detectives, refused to call SOCO by their new name, CSI, believing it was one more unwelcome American influence. They were Scenes of Crime Officers and always would be.

  As they walked towards the foundation hole, he saw Don Holland standing outside the hastily rearranged tape. He was glaring at Fluke and mouthed ‘fuck you’ when he caught his eye. Fluke ignored him.

  ‘He won’t forget that, Ave,’ said Towler, nodding towards Holland. ‘You humiliated him. He’ll be after you now.’

  ‘Yeah?’ Fluke replied. ‘Well, he’ll have to get in the queue. I think they have T-shirts.’

  ‘I had a quick look, just to make sure we weren’t pressing the button for a fucking mannequin or something.’ Towler said, changing the subject. ‘There’s always some fuckwit fancying themselves as Wilt.’

  Fluke allowed himself a small smile. It was true. Up and down the country there’d been a spate of shop dummies being thrown down building site holes after Tom Sharpe’s Wilt had been published. ‘And?’

  ‘It’s fresh. I’m guessing less than twenty-four hours.’

  ‘Any obvious cause of death?’

  ‘Nope, and I didn�
��t want to open the bag any further.’

  Fluke didn’t respond.

  ‘I know we don’t jump to conclusions, Ave, but it looks well planned,’ he added, cautiously.

  Towler was right, it was dangerous to form opinions too quickly but Fluke was getting a bad feeling. There was something about it that just sounded professional, nothing tangible, but it was there. It was a miracle the body had even been discovered.

  ‘’Course, it could just be a fucking nutter who killed his wife and didn’t want to sit at home in his underpants talking to her till she smelt like cheese,’ Towler said, grinning.

  Fluke smiled but said nothing.

  Chapter 3

  After being met by Sean Rogers, the crime scene manager, they donned forensic suits and followed him down the route organised by the first officers at the scene, to ensure as much evidence as possible was left undisturbed.

  Fluke turned and reviewed where he was. It offered him the chance to get his bearings, a sense of scale and to assess the work that had taken place before he’d arrived. Murder investigations started with the first officer on the scene, and other than Holland neglecting to treat the office as a crime scene, everything else was satisfactory. Luckily, the building site was self-contained so there weren’t going to be any egress or access problems later.

  After entering the inner cordon, Fluke continued down the immediate route to the crime scene. As they got nearer, it was marked out with footboards, designed to keep any ground evidence closer to the scene intact. They’d been put in properly, which wasn’t always the case. Fluke had been to one crime scene on the side of a hill when the footboards were at an angle and he’d fallen off, much to everyone’s amusement.

  Although it wasn’t raining at the site, SOCO had erected a large forensic tent. Fluke entered and looked down into the hole. It was about six feet across, roundish, and at least ten feet deep with steep sides. Fluke could see the excavation scars the digger had made. The mud was thick clay, too dark to see the bottom.