by David Mark
The forensics van is parked halfway down, opposite the passageway that leads to the centuries-old drinking den Ye Olde White Harte.
On the other side of the narrow road an archway leads into a courtyard of overflowing dustbins and various kinds of grime. The paving slabs are greasy and the rubbish bags have spilled their contents down the back of the giant bins and into the gutters. Pizza boxes, empty lager cans and the insides of toilet rolls turn to mush beneath the blue-bagged feet of the police officers who mill around awaiting instructions.
The victim’s flat is upstairs. It’s a one-bedroomed mezzanine affair; the floor carpeted with discarded clothes, unopened letters and plates that look like an artist’s palette: blobs of red slowly scabbing over on their cheap white surfaces.
In the bathroom, the tenant stares up, sightlessly. There is vomit in her mouth and on her chin. The curved bruise on her throat reveals the horror of her final moments. She has been strangled between the porcelain rim and the plastic seat of her toilet. Somebody pressed the seat down on the back of her neck and didn’t let go until she had choked on her own puke. Then they lifted her arms and scalped her armpits, before emptying a full bottle of bleach onto her corpse.
She was an ‘alternative’ girl, in life. Tattoos, piercings and thick eye make-up. Petite. Maybe 5 foot, at a push. Her hair is shaved around her studded left ear and long and black everywhere else. She was wearing a little black vest and a pair of purple knickers when she died, showing off elaborate ink around her skinny thighs and sharp shoulder blades, which rise from her pale skin like shark’s fins. Her feet are dirty and her toenails need cutting. She has cheap string bracelets around her thin wrists. Her fingernails look expensive; pink and black with tiny diamante sparkles. There are calluses on her fingertips. The ring finger on her right hand is missing, sliced off below the second knuckle. There is a hole in the linoleum floor, among the blood and bleach, that seems to indicate where the digit was severed; a knife going through the skin and gristle and bone with one sharp, practised push.
‘Jesus,’ says Pharaoh. ‘That’s bloody horrible.’
She raises a hand to her face and takes a whiff of the blue plastic glove. It stinks like a condom but is a damn sight better than the stench of rotting flesh, blood and chemicals that has been trapped in this poxy little bathroom since a killer closed the door.
She turns back to McAvoy, who is hovering in the doorway and making the place look even smaller than it already is. He’s wearing the same white coveralls and blue plastic shoe-bags as everybody else, but somehow his make him look like a statue, while everybody else’s make them look like bewildered ghosts.
‘Are you coming in here?’ she asks, testily.
‘Is there room?’
‘Would I ask if there bloody wasn’t?’
McAvoy sidles back into the bathroom.
‘A good few days,’ says McAvoy as Pharaoh stands up and turns to face him.
Pharaoh feels like spitting. Her hair is still wet from the shower and her clothes smell of hastily applied perfume and the cigarettes she chain-smoked on the drive over. She’s never cried over a corpse before but she spotted a couple of uniforms with red eyes as she pulled up on the cobbles outside and pushed her way under the police tape and past the forensics officers and made her way to the great sad island of composure at the centre of it all; busy directing operations in his low Scottish grumble and apologising every time he stepped on somebody’s toes.
‘This is her place?’ asks Pharaoh. ‘We’re sure?’
McAvoy nods. ‘Ava Delaney. Twenty-one. Lived here five months. No computer or phone that we can find. Neighbour thinks she’s got family in Warwickshire but can’t be sure. Likes to play her music loud and there’s usually a smell of cannabis wafting around the flat entrance.’
Pharaoh looks at the corpse again. ‘Pretty one,’ she says, pursing her lips. ‘Fuck, I need air.’
The pair push back out into the tiny flat and into the corridor. McAvoy follows her down the stairs and out into the little courtyard, where she instantly unzips her coveralls and fishes out one of her black cigarettes.
‘Nice day off?’ asks Pharaoh, through a cloud of smoke. ‘Up until now, I mean? You take Roisin and the kids for a picnic . . . Sandwiches, lemonade, Hannah Kelly’s body . . .’
‘It’s not a day off when you’re on call,’ he says, bristling slightly. ‘And we weren’t looking for her body, that would be sick. It’s just somewhere nice.’
‘Don’t correct me,’ she says, kicking him on the shin and giving him a smile. ‘You’ve got your obsessions, I’ve got mine. Is Roisin cursing me?’
‘Not your fault,’ says McAvoy, looking at the pattern on the brickwork and refusing to meet her eye. ‘And it’s your day off, if you remember. Have you eaten properly? And have you made that appointment for your back? You can’t put it off, you need to take care of yourself.’
Pharaoh holds up a hand. Ash tumbles onto her biker jacket. She wipes it away, as far as the hem of her knee-length black dress.
‘Sophia went to a party last night,’ she says, with her eyes closed. ‘Boys galore. I only found out when I saw her in a picture on Facebook. I shouldn’t have been looking. Made a right tit of myself. She’s not talking to me.’
McAvoy plays with the zip of his coverall. Tugs at the patch of hair beneath his lower lip. He loves Pharaoh’s girls. They each contain something of her spirit. They’re strong and feisty, independent and fearless. They love his own children and think Roisin is the coolest grown-up on the planet. Roisin reckons they need a dad, and a good telling-off, but has no intention of volunteering her husband for either job.
‘She’s a good girl,’ he tells her, trying to find something helpful to say. ‘It’s just a phase. You’re a good mum. I can talk to Sophia, though I don’t know what good I’d be. Maybe Roisin—’
Pharaoh gives a bark of laughter. ‘Yeah, that would do my self-confidence a power of good. Christ, I’m a mess, Aector.’
McAvoy looks at her. He considers telling her she’s wrong. He’d love nothing more than to tell her she looks a million dollars and she’s everything from his hero to his best friend. He doesn’t. Just colours slightly and looks away. He looks at this horrible little courtyard and wonders at the lives of the people who call it home. Wonders if these are palaces and sanctuaries to some, and cells to others. Wonders when people stopped using the words ‘slum’ and ‘hovel’ and replaced them with words like ‘bijou’ and “compact”. Wonders if he’s being a snob. He never had money when he lived at home on the croft. Had no need for it when his stepdad sent him off to boarding school aged ten. He shared a squalid house in Edinburgh with a couple of fellow psychology students when he was briefly at university, had a room in the house of a copper’s widow when he was a young uniformed constable, and only got himself somewhere vaguely presentable when Roisin and Fin entered his life. He spent a whole summer living in a hotel room a couple of years ago, crying himself to sleep. He makes a mental note to keep those memories at the forefront of his thoughts. To remember the pain and isolation of living in a place made smaller by the weight of loneliness and the sense of having somehow failed.
‘Tell me about Ava,’ says Pharaoh, placing a hand on his arm. ‘Boyfriend?’
McAvoy looks at her hand. Stubby nails and a wedding ring. Short, plump fingers and a dozen bangles, disappearing into her jacket. Soft, tanned skin.
‘Ben has been chatting to her downstairs neighbour,’ he says, rubbing his face so he has an excuse to dislodge her arm. ‘Nice girl. Romanian. Antoaneta Osmochescu. Don’t ask me to repeat that, please. She speaks wonderful English. Works in a freight office at the docks. She’s been for a few coffees with Ava now and again. Apparently Ava wasn’t seeing anybody steady but Antoaneta has seen a few people come and go from the flat.’
McAvoy points in the direction of the front door, where a shapeless wraith in a white suit is dusting the grimy wood for prints while two uniformed constables start p
lacing cigarette butts into clear plastic bags, neatly labelling each one and grumbling at the enormity of the task.
‘There’s no intercom, you see,’ he says. ‘Can’t buzz yourself up. So most people just give out the code to the door and people can let themselves in, if they’re expected. A lot of people seem to have had Ava’s code.’
Pharaoh makes a clicking noise with her tongue, as if mentally compiling a list of a thousand different things that are wrong with today’s world.
‘Work?’ she asks.
‘We found payslips from Rocky’s, the clothes shop in Princes’ Quay. We’ve put a call in to their manager but no answer yet. Probably enjoying the bank holiday.’
Pharaoh nods. She turns away, looking at the overflowing bins and the soggy cigarette butts; the damp brick and clogged, loose gutters. She seems about to speak when her phone vibrates. She grumbles a little and looks at the incoming message. Gives a puzzled sort of laugh then puts it away. For a moment, it looks as though a blush is rising in her cheeks, but she manages to suppress it.
‘Keyholder?’ she asks.
‘One of the landlords. She had two. They let the place through an agency. He came to talk to her about overdue rent. Bit of an erratic payer, but he said she was no better or worse than anybody else. He shouldn’t really have let himself in but she’d been ignoring his calls and texts for a week. He’s got the number of a bloke she gave him when she moved in as sort of a guarantor. He’s contacted him a couple of times but got nowhere. Jez Gavan, he’s called. Lives up on Ings. Record going back years.’
‘Nicely played,’ she says, approvingly. ‘First stop for you and me, I think. It’s also pretty clear she has a phone. What’s the wifi hub for this building? Did she have an account?’
‘Got a broadband account that comes up as “Avascave” and which is still working, so she must have paid the bills. And according to her landlord she was a formidable texter,’ says McAvoy. ‘Not backwards in telling people what she thought. He showed me some of her messages explaining that she’d been going through a difficult time and would appreciate his empathy and patience and that she intended to make recompense.’
The two share a look.
‘Recompense?’
‘That was her word. All correctly spelled. She was a clever girl. Plenty of books in the apartment too. Poetry. Art critiques. A few crime novels.’
Pharaoh nods and waves a hand at the bins. ‘We’re bagging this up, yes? Every last scrap. If the person who did this is as thick as most murderers he’ll have dumped the phone in the first bin he saw.’
McAvoy cocks his head and gives her a look. ‘He?’
Pharaoh opens her palms, indicating that it’s bloody obvious.
‘That’s a murder that screams “hate”,’ she says, gesturing back towards the apartment. ‘That much hate comes from love, or at least some obsessive version of it. It’s a man.’
‘What happened to your rule about foregone conclusions?’ asks McAvoy, and is only half keeping it light.
‘I’m having one of those days. Maybe it’s because I picked my daughter up from a party full of boys,’ says Pharaoh, through gritted teeth. ‘And every problem in my life seems to have been caused by somebody with a penis.’
McAvoy looks hurt but can find no way of expressing it that would not lead to a blush so intense he could lose his eyebrows.
‘But you’re probably right,’ says Pharaoh, resignedly. ‘We rule nothing out. We need to know her. Family. Friends. Need her bloody phone more than anything else. Is Dan pinging it?’
‘Getting the paperwork now,’ says McAvoy. He has a sudden mental picture of the technical wizard, with his glasses and baseball shoes and his utter, all-consuming lust for Pharaoh. ‘I told him it meant a lot to you.’
Pharaoh rolls her eyes but nods in approval. McAvoy has loosened up a lot these past couple of years. There was a time when he would have allowed his request to be processed in the correct and orderly fashion and wait his turn like everybody else. Under Pharaoh’s supervision, he has learned to gently push his way to the front of the queue, using charm, persuasion and if necessary by looming over people until they get uncomfortable and will do anything to make him go away. He still fills in the forms in triplicate in case one gets lost, and blushes hugely if reproached, but he is not above using Dan’s feelings for Pharaoh to speed things up. Pharaoh reckons he’s finally becoming a proper copper, but she knows he has no real idea what that means. He just can’t fathom a world in which there could be any excusable delay in hunting down a young girl’s killer.
Pharaoh is about to suggest they go and talk to Ava’s Romanian neighbour for themselves, when she hears her name. She turns and sees the figure striding towards them and lets out a groan that she makes no attempt to hide.
‘Adam,’ she says, with a sigh. ‘You’re back with us?’
Adam Jackson-Savannah is a Home Office pathologist who has just returned from a three-year placement at an American university. Pharaoh can’t remember which one but feels sure he’ll drop it into conversation within the next ten seconds. He’s a tall, white-haired specimen in frameless glasses and a grey suit. His time in the sun has not improved his complexion. He remains deathly pale with a rash of pimples and blotches that runs down one cheek and onto his neck. The story goes that he was licked by a dog once and suffered an allergic reaction that has never cleared up. Add to this his watery eyes and thin, bloodless lips, and Pharaoh has always felt him well suited to the morgue. She would not hold his appearance against him were it not for his absolute incompetence and willingness to turn a blind eye to the occasional acts of corruption and downright evil committed by her predecessor.
‘Yale’s loss is Humberside’s gain,’ he says, and his lips form a tight, prissy pout as he speaks.
‘Gene not available?’ asks Pharaoh, in a voice that suggests she would be happier allowing a toddler with a scalpel to perform the examinations.
‘Dr Woodmansey is on holiday,’ he says primly, with a little turn of his head that suggests he finds the other man’s dereliction of duty unconscionable. ‘So you have me. And I have you. A shame for both of us, I’m sure.’
Pharaoh laughs and nods. ‘The civil service has a short memory. I don’t.’
‘I was exonerated,’ says Jackson-Savannah, with a sigh. ‘A full inquiry concluded that there should be no stain on my record.’
‘No, they found the evidence was inconclusive,’ says Pharaoh. ‘That’s not the same thing. You ballsed up on a very important investigation, there’s no mistaking that. I just don’t know whether you did it because you’re crap, or ’cause Doug Roper told you what to put on the report.’
McAvoy stiffens at the mention of the former head of CID. His involvement in the corrupt copper’s demise has left him a marked man in some quarters. Roper was popular. His clean-up rate was immaculate and the media loved him. McAvoy tried to expose him, only to be left with scars to his body and career.
‘I still receive a birthday card from Doug,’ says Jackson-Savannah, like a teenage girl showing off a signed photograph from her favourite boy band. ‘He’s doing well. Consultancy work, I believe. That’s where the money is. Still a young man. Still with very much to offer. A great shame he left without the fanfare he deserved.’
Pharaoh licks her teeth and looks up at McAvoy. ‘Do you know Dr Jackson-Savannah?’ she asks.
‘I’ve heard of him,’ says McAvoy, with the cold glare that Pharaoh has instructed him to practise at home in front of a mirror. ‘Interesting CV.’
‘I won’t hold the past against you,’ says Pharaoh, staring at Jackson-Savannah. ‘We all make mistakes. You’ve made yours. But I warn you, it would be a mistake of fucking epic proportions to presume I run my investigations like Doug Roper. I don’t want to tell you what to put in your report. I don’t want corners cutting. I want a cause of death and a time of death and I want your every finding to be completely bloody bullet-proof.’
Jackson-Savannah pulls
a face, growing cross at the very suggestion that he might not oblige. He is about to speak when Pharaoh jabs her thumb at the figure to her left, who is standing bolt upright and looking at him with a thoughtful intensity, like a child wondering whether to keep watching the ant squirm under the heat of the magnifying glass, or kill it quickly with a rock.
‘The man beside me is Detective Sergeant Aector McAvoy,’ she says brightly. ‘You’ve probably heard of him. He doesn’t like you. I can see that in his eyes. And McAvoy likes everybody. Thinks the best of them. I’ve only ever seen him respond this way to people who said mean things about his wife, and Robert Mugabe. So I’d do your best not to upset him. The girl’s called Ava. And you’re going to be very, very respectful with her body.’
Pharaoh is about to speak again when her phone vibrates. She sighs and takes the call. She looks puzzled for a second then tells the caller she has no idea why they think she would be interested. Informs them of her rank and advises them to piss off. Then she hangs up. Composes herself. Turns away. Stubs her cigarette out on the brick and deposits the butt in her leather jacket.
From the street comes the sound of more cars arriving. More hails and hellos from officers who know this is going to be a long night. McAvoy hears his own name, and Pharaoh’s. Hears grunts and jeers and wonders if they are from his colleagues or the drunks who are gathering at the end of Bowlalley Lane and craning their necks for a glimpse of dead flesh.
Jackson-Savannah looks about to protest but finds McAvoy still staring, hard, at the side of his head. He turns and bustles away towards the front door.