by Ford,P. F.
‘This doesn’t make sense at all,’ said Slater. ‘It has to be kids.’
‘There’s something else. When I got here earlier I just missed someone leaving by the back gate.’
‘Did you see who it was?’
‘No, sorry,’ Jolly said, sighing. ‘Whoever it was had a head start. By the time I got to the gate they’d had plenty of time to get away.’
‘Never mind, Jane,’ said Slater, with an ironic smile. ‘Welcome to the world of sod’s law.’
‘But it’s not all bad news,’ said Jolly, perking up. ‘There was a nice, fresh footprint just inside the gate. They’ve made a cast of it, so at least we’ve got something. And I thought it might be a good idea to make a list of all the car registration numbers that were out in the street at the time. It’s a long shot, but I’ll do a check when I get back. Maybe I’ll get lucky and find one that doesn’t belong to a resident.’
‘Now that’s smart thinking,’ said Slater, approvingly.
Chapter Six
Slater was busy staring into space when the phone extension on his desk began to ring.
‘Chief Smurf here,’ said a familiar voice in his ear. It was Ian Becks, Tinton’s forensic wizard.
‘Ha! So even you admit those new suits make you look like smurfs,’ Slater said, laughing down the phone.
‘I’ll have you know they’re the very latest thing,’ replied Becks. ‘Very high-tech, no fibre shed-’
‘Yes,’ interrupted Slater, ‘and extremely smurf-like. You’ve just admitted it.’
‘Only because I know you lot aren’t going to stop taking the piss. It doesn’t mean I agree with you. Anyway, I didn’t call to ask your opinion about the new suits. I have some news for you about the break-in at Canal Street.’
‘Ah! Right,’ said Slater. ‘I’m all ears.’
‘Okay,’ said Becks. ‘First of all, the footprint we found out in the garden is from a man’s size ten trainer.’
‘So it could be teenagers?’
‘Well, it’s possible there were kids in the garden and Jolly disturbed them. But I’m pretty sure it wasn’t kids who broke in just to trash the place. It might be someone trying to make us think it was kids, but this person was too careful for that, but then in another way they weren’t careful enough.’
‘Don’t tell me you’ve actually got some evidence this time,’ said Slater.
‘Oh, yes indeed. We have fingerprints.’ Becks sounded proud.
‘Have you managed to match them to any of our regular house breaking guys?’ asked Slater, optimistically.
‘It’s definitely not one of our regulars.’
‘Why not?’
‘I won’t bore you with the science,’ said Becks. ‘But going by the ridge density, the prints we have are those of a woman, and none of our regulars are women.’
‘A woman?’ repeated Slater, in surprise. ‘They’re not Jane Jolly’s, are they?’
‘Wow!’ said Becks, his voice heavy with sarcasm. ‘We’re so thick down here we didn’t think to check.’
‘Err, I’m sorry.’ Slater knew the way he questioned every finding irritated Becks but he couldn’t help himself. He just liked to be thorough. ‘Of course you would have checked. I was just thinking out loud.’
‘Apology accepted. We’ve only found three sets of prints in the whole house. Of course, Mr Winter’s prints are everywhere, and we’ve found the milkman’s in the kitchen, but that’s consistent with him calling in two or three times a week for a cup of tea. But then there’s this third set we can’t account for. They’re in the kitchen and the living room and, weirdly, the face of that grandfather clock is covered in them.’
‘So, do you think it was a woman who broke in and stole the picture from the living room?’ asked Slater.
‘Speculation is your job, mate,’ said Becks. ‘We smurfs just do the clever science stuff. It’s up to you to work out if it’s relevant to your enquiries.’
‘Yeah, right. Thanks, Becksy.’
‘However,’ continued Becks, ‘I will offer a couple of pointers. For a start, you need to remember there hasn’t actually been a break-in. Whoever was in that house had a key to get in.’
‘You can be so pedantic at times,’ said Slater.
‘That’s the scientist in me.’
‘You said a couple of pointers,’ Slater reminded him.
‘Oh yeah. If I was a gambling man, I might put my money on something odd going on in that house.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘We found some tiny paint flecks and dust particles on the old guy’s desk. The paint is from the PC in the room and the dust is the sort that collects inside a PC.’
‘Is there a point to this?’ asked Slater, his patience wearing thin. Becks liked to go all round the houses rather than coming straight to the point.
‘Well, the thing is, the PC lives on the floor so for the paint and dust to get on the desk it would have to be lifted up there and opened up.’
‘So, you’ve done that, and?’
‘We found there was no hard drive in the PC, and the insides have been effectively destroyed.’
‘What’s the use of a PC with no hard disk?’ asked Slater. ‘And why would you keep a PC that didn’t work?’
‘It’s been removed and destroyed very recently,’ said Becks. ‘I’d guess within the last week or two.’
‘Could it have been an accident?’ asked Slater, immediately wishing he hadn’t asked such a stupid question.
‘You can’t accidentally remove a hard disk,’ said Becks, slowly and patiently, as if he were explaining something really complicated to an idiot.
‘But why would anyone do that?’ said Slater, thinking aloud.
‘I can only think of two reasons. First off, you might take it out for repairs or replacement, but then why would you smash up the rest of the computer? However, if there was some information on that computer that you wanted suppressed…’
He left the sentence unfinished and there was a silence as Slater considered the implications of this latest find.
‘But this was just a little old man,’ he said eventually.
‘I’m just putting forward a couple of ideas,’ said Becks. ‘I have no idea if they’re right or wrong, that’s your job.’
‘And it was all put back together?’ asked Slater.
‘Oh yes. You couldn’t tell from just looking at it. If we hadn’t been called in I don’t suppose anyone would have realised unless they’d tried to use it.’
‘Do you think an old guy could do that?’
‘If he knew what he was doing, yes,’ said Becks. ‘But why would he want to? And if he really wanted to destroy his PC, why would he keep it there? Why not just get rid of it?’
Slater’s mind was racing away with him now, and he was wondering what on earth was going on. What at first had seemed to be a sad case of accidental death had suddenly opened up a can of worms.
‘Are you still there?’ asked Becks.
‘Err, yes. Sorry,’ said Slater. ‘My brain’s gone into overdrive.’
‘So you think it’s important, then?’ said Becks, sounding very satisfied with himself.
‘I don’t know,’ mused Slater. ‘I thought we had a simple accidental death followed by the trashing of an empty house. Now I’m not sure what to think. Why is it you manage to complicate things so often?’
‘Smurfy’s law?’ Becks laughed uproariously at his own joke. ‘You’d get bored if it was all straightforward. I’m here to ensure a regular supply of spanners get thrown into the works. It keeps you lot on your toes and stops your brains from rotting.’
‘Right, yes. Thanks for that,’ said Slater, his mind racing off again. ‘Can you be more exact about when it happened?’
‘Sorry mate, you’ve already had my best guess. What’s your point?’
‘Whoever trashed that house last night didn’t care how much mess they made. Does it seem likely that same person would take the tr
ouble to destroy the PC and then put it back together?’
‘It does seem unlikely, doesn’t it? Why not just smash it up like so much of the other stuff was?’
‘Exactly,’ agreed Slater. ‘When do I get the full report, Ian?’
‘I’ll send it through before the end of the day. I’ll bring it up the three flights of stairs myself. I could do with the exercise.’
Slater put the phone in its cradle, but kept his hand on it. He was getting a bad feeling about this. What if Jolly had been right and he’d been too quick to put Mr Winter’s death down to an accident? He raised the phone back to his ear and began tapping in another number.
‘I must admit I was a bit surprised by your call,’ said Dr Eamon Murphy, the resident pathologist at Tinton hospital, as he led Slater into the morgue. ‘When I did the post-mortem I was under the impression there was nothing suspicious and it was an unfortunate accident. Under those circumstances there was no reason to send you a copy of the report.’
‘You’re quite right. We all thought it was an accident,’ said Slater. ‘And that may well be the case still, but there are one or two things that have happened since that make me think we should maybe look again just to be sure.’
Dr Murphy looked doubtful.
‘You do realise this man’s been cremated, don’t you?’ he said, his voice clipped. ‘So if you’re not happy with my results, you can’t have another PM to prove me wrong.’
‘Honestly,’ Slater said, trying to pacify the doctor, ‘I haven’t even seen the PM results, and I’m not here to challenge you. I trust your findings, I just want to see if it’s possible to put another interpretation on them. I mean, you were looking for evidence of a fall, right?’
Murphy still looked a little doubtful but he led Slater over to a desk where a stack of folders leaned precariously towards the edge.
‘There it is on top.’ Murphy pointed to the folders. ‘Help yourself.’
‘Can you talk me through it?’ asked Slater.
‘I suppose that might be quicker.’
Murphy picked up a report, turned to face Slater, and began to read.
‘There’s not much too it really,’ he said, scanning the pages. ‘There was a contusion to the back of his head, which was consistent with hitting his head when he fell backwards. He had a broken rib that could also have been consistent with a fall. When I went inside, I found he’d had a heart attack which was brought on by the fall.’
‘Is that it?’ asked Slater.
‘That’s enough to confirm his accidental death,’ said Murphy, curtly. ‘And that’s what I was asked to do.’
‘How bad was this contusion?’
‘Bad enough to cause a blood clot at the back of his head.’
‘Would that have killed him?’
‘Untreated it probably would have, eventually,’ said Murphy.
‘Wouldn’t it take more than a fall to cause that?’ asked Slater.
‘What exactly are you getting at?’
‘Were there any other bruises?’
‘Well yes,’ said Murphy. ‘Of course there were, but this was an old man. Old people often bruise very easily.’
‘Where were these bruises?’ Slater felt like he was wading through treacle.
Murphy sighed heavily and thumbed through the report.
‘There were bruises to the forearms and shoulders and, of course, there was a huge bruise where the rib was broken,’ he said, closing the report.
‘Were these old bruises?’ asked Slater.
This time, Murphy tutted loudly as he reopened the report.
‘No,’ he said. ‘They were very recent and hardly showed on the skin surface. I assumed they would have been caused by the fall.’
Slater felt a familiar tingle.
‘Suppose I was an old man, and I discovered someone had broken into my house, and then this someone turned on me and tried to punch me in the face. So I put my hands up to protect myself.’ He raised his arms as if to defend himself. ‘Would those punches bruise my forearms?’
‘Err, yes. I suppose they would,’ Murphy said, looking uneasy.
‘What if my attacker then punched me, or maybe even kicked me, in the ribs? I’m old and slow so my arms are still up to protect my head. Could that kick break one of my ribs?’
‘Easily,’ said Murphy. ‘Old bones are brittle bones.’
‘And then, while I’m gasping with pain from my broken rib, my attacker grabs my shoulders and shoves me back out of his way. Would I hit my head hard enough to cause a blood clot?’
‘But I was told it was accidental death from a fall,’ Murphy said, defensively. ‘I’ve been rushed off my feet here. And anyway, I’m not a forensic pathologist.’
‘Whoa, slow down, doc,’ said Slater. ‘I’m not blaming you. You found what you were asked to find. I’m just offering an alternative means by which those injuries could have occurred. And I might be wrong.’
‘But I should have seen that possibility too. I should have been pointing it out to you, not the other way round.’
Slater thought the pathologist was right, but he didn’t feel rubbing it in was going to achieve anything, so he said nothing. Murphy turned back to his desk and Slater thought their discussion was over, when the doctor turned round again, holding something in his hands.
‘In view of what you’ve just said, you’d better have this.’ He handed a clear plastic bag to Slater.
‘What’s this?’ Slater asked, holding up the bag and peering at it. Inside was a scrap of paper with some numbers written in biro.
‘I didn’t report it to anyone, because it didn’t seem important,’ said Murphy. ‘When he was brought in, his right hand was clenched into a fist. When I opened his hand, this dropped out. Is it important?’
‘Your guess is as good as mine.’ Slater sighed and studied the piece of paper for a moment.
‘Any suggestions?’ he asked, turning to Murphy and indicating the bag.
‘Well, you’re the detective.’
‘Yeah,’ agreed Slater, ‘but that doesn’t mean you’re not allowed an opinion.’
‘But I’m not qualified-’ began Murphy.
‘I’m not asking you to solve the case,’ interrupted Slater. ‘And you won’t get fired if you’re wrong.’
He placed the bag down flat on the desk in front of them.
‘Come on, Eamon,’ he said, encouragingly. ‘You must have an opinion, right?’
‘Well,’ said the pathologist, reluctantly, ‘now we’ve decided there was a struggle it changes everything doesn’t it? So how about during that struggle, our victim was holding a sheet of paper in his hand. His attacker pushed him away and snatched the sheet of paper, but didn’t get all of it.’
He pointed to the edges of the paper.
‘If you look here, you can see it’s been torn.’
‘That adds up,’ agreed Slater. ‘I wonder what the numbers mean,’ he added, thinking aloud.
‘It’s not the complete sequence,’ said Murphy. ‘If you look to the left side you can see there’s half a digit missing. It could be a three, or maybe an eight. And it’s quite possible there are more digits missing from the right side. There’s no way to tell.’
‘So it could be a phone number or a bank account number,’ Slater mused.
‘Not my field I’m afraid,’ said Murphy, with a wry smile.
‘It’s not mine either,’ said Slater, ‘but it could prove to be a key piece of evidence. Well done for holding onto it, Eamon.’
‘You need to get this to the Chief Smurf,’ said Murphy. ‘This is more his field. He’ll figure it out for you.’
‘Ha!’ Slater smiled broadly. ‘So you’ve seen the new suits, too.’
Chapter Seven
Slater thought his boss, DCI Bob Murray, seemed to have aged noticeably over the last couple of months, and he looked particularly tired today. Murray had never been one to complain, but Slater knew he was getting sick and tired of having to spend all
his time playing politics and balancing budgets. It went with the job, of course, and anyone achieving such a rank these days knew what they were letting themselves in for, but it wasn’t like that when Murray had made his way up through the ranks. Slater knew he found it frustrating spending almost all his time filling forms – he would have been frustrated, too.
There had been a whisper that Murray had expressed an interest in the latest round of voluntary redundancies, but Slater didn’t know if it was true. He found it hard to imagine Murray anywhere else but behind his desk.
‘So,’ growled Murray. ‘What the bloody hell’s going on at Canal Street?’
‘It’s beginning to look as if Mr Winter may have been murdered for something on his computer,’ said Slater.
‘Do we have any idea what it’s all about?’
‘No, Guv. I’m afraid not,’ said Slater. ‘Whatever it was must have been on the hard disk.’
‘So why come back and trash the place?’
‘I don’t think it was the same person,’ said Slater. ‘I think the night he was killed he disturbed someone, probably a man, who then took the hard disk from the PC. This time we’ve got some fingerprints, and Becks is sure they’re a woman’s. We’ve also got a size ten footprint, and we might get lucky identifying his car.’
‘How many women do you know with size ten feet?’ snorted Murray.
‘Yeah,’ said Slater. ‘I know. It doesn’t add up really, does it? Maybe there’s a man and a woman working together.’
Murray swore quietly.
‘This is just what we don’t need right now,’ he said bitterly. ‘We haven’t exactly been covering ourselves in glory recently, and now you tell me we might have a murder on our hands. And if we have, we’ve given the murderer two weeks’ start. Oh, and we’ve also allowed the victim to be cremated. Wonderful.’
Slater bridled at the criticism, but he chose not to respond to it. He could only guess at the kind of pressure the old man was under. If Murray was in this sort of mood, it would be better to ride the storm carefully, not go into battle.