Chimera (2 page)

Anderton said his goodbyes and left the cottage. Kate muttered a goodbye in response and turned her eyes back to the scene, barely comprehending it. She and Anderton had had a one night stand, several years ago, and she couldn’t avoid her powerful attraction to her boss. Nothing else had happened between them since, but Kate wondered – far too often for comfort – whether Anderton’s feelings for her were in the dim and distant past or, like hers for him, merely under the surface, waiting for the perfect chance to erupt again.

She sighed and made an effort to focus on what was happening in the here and now. After another half an hour, Stephen Smithfield came over, pulling off his gloves. “Hi, Kate, you still here?”

“Someone’s got to be.”

“What happened to Anderton?”

Kate shrugged. “He had to get back somewhere. Can you give me any more info on the body?”

Stephen nodded. “This is all very preliminary, you understand. You’ll have to wait for the PM for the details. But based on the clothing and the size and shape of the body, I would estimate that it’s a man, probably middle-aged. He’s been dead for several weeks. In fact, judging by the insect activity, we could be talking months.”

“He’s been here for months? Undiscovered?” Kate raised her eyebrows. “You’re sure about that?”

“Call it two months,” said Stephen. “But don’t quote me.”

“Cause of death?”

“Again, this is just ballpark. There’s no obvious signs of violence. No blunt instrument lying nearby, no ligatures, no knives. And you know we found those syringes. I think you’re looking at a natural death.”

“Well,” said Kate, “far be it from me to do myself out of a job, but let’s hope so.”

“If it turns out to be a heroin overdose, which is looking likely, we might be able to narrow down the time of death. Amazingly, you know, certain drugs can actually significantly affect the rate of larval development. Fascinating, really.”

“Is that right?” asked Kate, hiding a grimace. “Well, I’ll guess we’ll see what the PM throws up. Thanks, Stephen. I’m going to head off now.”

“Enjoy the rest of your evening,” said Stephen, without evident irony. Kate grinned to herself as she walked away. Techs were a little weird, you couldn’t get away from that. Nature of the job, she supposed. She pulled her jacket a little more firmly around herself – a chilly wind had suddenly sprung up – and made her way back to the main road.

Chapter Two

“Morning, team,” Anderton said, clearly in ebullient mood as he crashed into the office. “Hope there aren’t too many sore heads from the festivities last night. Kate, I know
you’ll
be all right. What’s the latest on our very, very dead body?”

Kate snapped her mouth shut in the middle of a yawn. Yes, she wasn’t hung over – she didn’t really drink – but she’d still only managed about four hours of sleep. Needless to say, Jay, Laura, Hannah and Dan had pounced on her the second she’d walked through the door of her house, wanting to know every gory detail. She’d not been able to tell them much but they had still insisted on staying up late into the night, hashing over the events of the evening and wondering who the poor man or woman had once been. Kate, conscious that the smell from the corpse had permeated her hair and clothes, had finally pleaded for mercy and jumped in the shower, only to find that Jay had drained the hot water tank in his own frantic ablutions. Eventually, she boiled the kettle and had a very unsatisfying strip wash in the bathroom before everyone eventually succumbed to weariness and she could finally get to bed.

She hauled herself into a straighter sitting position. “There’s no ID as yet – it seems likely that they’ll have to go off dental records, or even DNA, which means we’ll have to wait for the PM.”

“And that is taking place…?”

Kate fought back another yawn. “Tomorrow.”

“Fine. Hopefully we’ll have an answer then and we’ll also know whether we’re even taking on the case. If it’s an accidental death, nothing suspicious, then that’s not our department. God knows we’ve got enough to do without worrying about careless junkies.”

There were a few smothered grins at that but Kate was conscious of a twinge of annoyance. They didn’t yet know for certain whether this was a suspicious death, did they? For the first time, she wondered whether Anderton’s mind was completely on the job. He seemed, well, a trifle hasty to dismiss this case.

She realised Anderton was still speaking to her. “Kate, would you mind doing the PM tomorrow, seeing as you’re already involved with the case?”

Kate was all set to protest. She knew very well that it would probably be her ex-boyfriend, Andrew Stanton, conducting the post mortem and that would be rather awkward. On the other hand, nobody else seemed at all interested in taking this on. She should be responsible for it, if only to make sure that nothing was missed.

“Yes, I’ll do it,” she confirmed, with a small inner sigh. It might not be Andrew conducting the examination, after all.

Anderton nodded, apparently satisfied. “Anyone else got anything?”

Theo raised his hand. “We’ve done some preliminary interviews with the neighbours, not that there are really any neighbours to the cottages. There’s a few houses fairly nearby though, on the other side of the river, and we’ve had a couple of reports that the cottages were used by vagrants, homeless men. One in particular was spotted there several times a couple of months ago. Nothing hugely conclusive though, no names or anything.”

“Okay, fine. Thanks, Theo. Anyone else?” Silence fell across the room. Anderton shrugged. “Okay, well, let’s break it up. If anyone needs me, I’ll be in my office for the next hour.”

Everyone drifted back to their desks. Kate spent a moment conferring with Theo and getting a description of the man the ‘neighbours’ had mentioned. Armed with that information, she spent an hour scrolling through the records of the various homeless people who’d made it onto the database for one reason or another, before she stopped, annoyed with herself at not immediately realising that without knowing the age or the sex of the body they’d found there was no point in printing off any records for comparison. She’d just have to wait for the post mortem tomorrow before doing anything else. She swung her chair back from the desk a little, frustrated and a bit bored.

By this time it was lunchtime and she made her way to the canteen. Normally she ate with Olbeck, or occasionally with Theo and Jane, but today she didn’t feel much like being sociable. Having a house full of visitors meant that she was feeling the need for a bit of solitary peace and quiet. She bought a salad and a carton of orange juice and took it away from the hubbub of the canteen, deciding to eat it in the little park just over the road from the police station.

She passed through the main entrance and reception of the station on her way out and paused for a second by the main desk, checking she’d put her pass in her hand bag. There was a man standing by the front desk on the visitor’s side; a non-descript man, short and rather slender, and with the kind of thin moustache that hadn’t been fashionable since the 1940s. Kate only noticed him because of his air of nervousness and the way he was shifting from foot to foot.

“What was that again, sir?” asked Sergeant Brown, who was currently manning the reception desk.

“I
said
, I wish to report a robbery,” the little man replied. His voice was high with nerves, or perhaps naturally that way.

“Can you give me a few more details?” asked Sergeant Brown.

The little man hesitated for a second. “
Here
? Give you the details here and now?”

“Well, just so I can see how best we can help you—” began the sergeant, but the man made a sound that was almost a squeak and then began backing towards the door, shaking his head.

“I changed my mind – it doesn’t matter – I don’t… I changed my mind—” he stuttered and then turned and fled.

In the silence that followed, Kate and Sergeant Brown exchanged meaningful glances. Then, rolling his eyes to the ceiling, the good sergeant sat back down again and Kate smiled and made her way outside. On the steps, she caught sight of the little man, almost running, turning a corner down a side street before he scurried out of sight.

Kate had forgotten all about the incident by the time she returned from her lunch break. She checked her emails, noting with pleasure that she had one from her friend Stuart, once a colleague and now a private investigator, suggesting lunch next week. She replied to him in the affirmative and made a note in her diary. It would be good to have someone to run this latest case by, seeing as Olbeck wasn’t around.

The phone on Theo’s desk rang. Concentrating on her emails, Kate just about registered that he’d answered it. After a moment, the tone of his voice pierced her consciousness and she raised her head, looking across the desk to where he held the phone wedged between his ear and his shoulder, nodding and making notes.
 

Kate hesitated, listening. She couldn’t have put her finger on what exactly was being conveyed from the other end of the phone, but her copper’s sense was tingling. Something had happened.

She waited until Theo had put the phone down and raised her eyebrows questioningly at him across the desk.

Theo winced and stretched his neck. “What?”

“What was that? And you shouldn’t take a call with the phone like that, you’ll bugger your neck.”

“You’re telling me,” Theo said with feeling. “Anyway, it’s nothing much. Couple of bodies found but – wait a minute—” he cautioned as Kate tried to interject. “Doesn’t look suspicious at all. Common or garden overdose.”

Something about the phrase made Kate sit up a little. Who had said that? She remembered then – it had been Anderton, at the scene last night. And here it was again. More overdoses?

“So who was that?” she asked.

“Uniform. They’re just reporting.”

“
Two
bodies found?”

“Yeah, I know. That’s the only thing that’s a bit strange. Why are you so interested, anyway? Do you want to go and see?”

“Yes, actually, I do,” Kate said slowly. “Are you coming?”

Theo shook his head. “Nope, you can have this one. It’s probably nothing, anyway.”

“Well, maybe,” said Kate. She picked up her bag and said goodbye, rummaging for her car keys as she left the office.

Her al fresco lunch had done her good; she felt more awake. Kate lowered the car window to get the full benefit of the lovely weather. She hoped the Indian summer would continue for a good few weeks yet. She thought, with a touch of slightly malicious enjoyment, that it would be rather good if it held
right
up until Olbeck and Jeff touched down at Heathrow tonight and then broke into torrential rain. Then she’d have the pleasure of telling them what they’d missed whilst they were swanning around Barbados.

Chuckling to herself, Kate swung the car into a side street in the suburb of Arbuthon Green. She could clearly see which house she should be heading to – there was a uniformed officer standing outside, fending off enquiries from curious passers-by. Blue and white crime scene tape had been stretched over the front of the driveway. Kate parked the car and locked it. She showed her badge to the officer on guard and ducked under the tape. She didn’t recognise him but that wasn’t unusual; Abbeyford had recruited a lot of new personnel in the last year. The house itself was a charmless sixties box made of pale yellow brick with a red-tiled roof. The small front garden was badly overgrown, the white trumpet-shaped flowers of bindweed twining their way through the uncut privet hedge. The front door, covered in peeling pale blue paint, stood open. Kate poked her head tentatively around the frame. Through the cluttered hallway, she could see more officers standing in the living room, observing something that was currently out of her sight.

“Hello?” Kate walked further in. She recognised one of the uniformed officers, Sergeant Bill Osbourne, and shook his outstretched hand. “Hi, Bill. What have you got?”

Osbourne indicated with a nod of his head. “Two bodies. Not sure it’ll be for you, though, Kate. Looks pretty unsuspicious to me.”

Kate followed his gaze. The bodies of two young men sat opposite one another, in a rather eerie mirroring of each other’s posture. Both were sat upright but slumped, each with a tourniquet around their left arm and a syringe deeply embedded within the crook of their elbow. Both had their eyes closed, both were pale as milk, the skin of their faces already beginning to blotch with decay.

“Well,” said Kate. She bit her lip, pondering. “I have to say you’re probably right. Overdose.”

“Aye,” said Osbourne. “Pretty straightforward.”

“It’s a bit odd that they both died at the same time,” said Kate. “Isn’t it?”

Osbourne shrugged. “Not if the drug was unusually pure. If they shot up together at the same time, it would have been quick. Neither of them would have been aware of the other, I would have thought.”

“I suppose you’re right,” said Kate. “I guess there’s nothing else…” She looked about, hoping for inspiration. “A gas leak?”

Osbourne chuckled. “You’re clutching at straws, lass. The PM will confirm what we suspect, but I’d be stunned if it was anything other than a straightforward overdose.”

Kate sighed. “Yes, I’m sure you’re right.” She looked again at the bodies, feeling a queasy pity. “Who are they?”

Osbourne consulted his notebook. “Pete Hardew and Wayne Potter. Known addicts, petty criminals, no great loss to society.”

“Right.” There didn’t seem to be much more to say. “Well, I guess there’s not much point me hanging around then, is there? Could you let me know if anything surprising does turn up?”

“Aye, will do, Kate.”

“Thanks, Bill.” Kate said goodbye and turned to leave the fetid little room.