River of Souls (27 page)

There’s hardly anyone around, just a few couples strolling home from a night out. With luck they’re too drunk or distracted to remember him loitering on the bridge. He turns his attention back to his task and pulls his binoculars from his pocket. He knows the building like the back of his hand, but he checks the location of the security points once more, and where the CCTV cameras are positioned. Anyone could approach the building; no security cordon to keep pedestrians away. It still amazes him how easy it would be to blow the building sky-high.

He feels satisfied as he walks back towards Waterloo. In the station car park he drops into the driver’s seat of his car. He might be giving in to paranoia, but he’s too nervous to return to his flat. There’s a possibility that the police might be waiting there, ready to question him. He will drive there at daybreak and check whether it’s safe to enter. Tonight he will rest here. He takes a pillow from the back seat and tries to get comfortable, but soon a man’s voice disturbs him.

‘You can’t sleep here. You’ll have to move on.’ A security guard peers at him through the glass, face gleaming with rain and anger.

The man opens the window and presses a bank note into his hand. ‘Will this cover it?’

‘All right, mate, but make sure you’re away by eight tomorrow.’

‘I’ll be gone long before then.’

The guard leaves him in peace, and the man’s eyes finally close. The river’s song is the last sound he hears as he slips into unconsciousness.

37

Will answered the door when I reached my mother’s flat on Saturday morning, his face tense with strain.

‘I didn’t know you were here,’ I said, smiling.

‘I came over last night.’

‘You don’t have to do everything, you know.’ His body stiffened in my arms as I embraced him.

‘I said I’d sort this out, remember?’ His scowl was deep enough to silence me.

Despite his foul mood, it was clear that Will had attended to Mum’s every need. She was reclining on her sofa against a mound of cushions, and gave her usual cool nod when I greeted her.

‘There was no need to come, darling. Will’s been the perfect nurse.’

‘I wanted to see how you are.’

She looked disgruntled. ‘I had a fall, Alice. It could happen to anyone.’

Under her bravado she seemed frailer than before. The tremor in her right hand made her fingers twitch uncontrollably, the bruise on her forehead turning every colour of the rainbow. But it was clear she was enjoying her newfound power. She picked up her coffee cup and waved it at Will.

‘Could I have a refill, darling?’

I watched with amazement as my brother loped into the kitchen. A few weeks ago he could barely mention her name, and now he was at her beck and call. Mum waited until he was out of earshot before launching her attack.

‘You’re not in my good books,’ she murmured.

‘Why’s that?’

Her grey eyes had frosted over. ‘You know how worried I’ve been, but you never said a word. Why didn’t you tell me he’d recovered?’

‘Bipolar disorder’s cyclical. It never goes away.’

She rolled her eyes. ‘Anyone can see he’s well again. You can be so thoughtless sometimes.’

I had to count to ten, but managed not to snap. If she chose to ignore Will’s condition, that was her concern, but professional experience reminded me that one missed dose of chlorpromazine could send his mood on a manic rollercoaster ride. When Will returned, he was exuding so much suppressed rage that anyone in their right mind would have cleared the room.

‘You forgot the biscuits, darling.’

He gritted his teeth. ‘I’m not your slave, Mum.’

‘Why don’t I get them?’ I suggested.

‘Stay where you are,’ Will said, glowering. ‘I’m handling this.’

A look of amusement crossed Mum’s face as he stalked out of the room. I’d forgotten how much she loved the drama of conflict. Before Dad’s violence ran out of control she had stage-managed their rows, as if she was starring in a biopic about Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. Will looked slightly calmer when he returned with a plate of digestives. Maybe he’d called Nina from the kitchen to discuss coping strategies. He passed me a crumpled piece of paper.

‘This is what I’ve arranged,’ he said quietly.

The list covered all of Mum’s requirements. He’d booked a health visitor, and an agency was providing an assistant to shop, cook and clean. He’d even contracted a specialist company to install a stair-lift.

‘I can’t believe how much you’ve done, Will.’

My thanks didn’t reach him. He sat on the edge of his chair, hands locked together as if he was trying not to punch something. When my mother spoke again, she sounded completely relaxed.

‘I did most of it. All your brother had to do was make the calls.’

Her ingratitude must have been the final straw. The next thing I saw was the side table bouncing off the wall, a black pool of coffee soaking into her cream wool carpet. He’d vanished in the time it took to blink, followed by the front door crashing. I felt like congratulating my mother on goading him to breaking point, but her hands were fluttering in her lap like caged birds. One-upmanship against someone so frail would have been cruel, even though it was the perfect moment to remind her that Will’s condition was permanent. I kept my mouth shut and spent the next half-hour swabbing the carpet with diluted bleach.

Mum’s new assistant arrived at two p.m., a no-nonsense Croatian woman called Elise who wore a blue overall and a look of fierce determination. She set to work scouring the bathroom immediately, intent on exterminating every germ. By the time I put on my coat, my mother looked exhausted, and it was clear that the conflict had hit home.

‘I won’t see him for months, will I?’ Her voice quaked.

‘Why not send him a text, thanking him for his help?’ My suggestion fell on deaf ears – when I leant down to kiss her goodbye, she turned her head away.

I arrived at the mortuary fifteen minutes early, feeling uncomfortable about seeing Burns. I had decided to ignore last night’s debacle and put it down to the stress we were both under, but there was no sign of him as the assistant scribbled my name in his attendance book. The familiar odour of disinfectant and formaldehyde hung in the air as I entered Lindstrop’s theatre, to find her already studying Julian Speller’s corpse.

‘You’re early, Dr Quentin,’ she murmured. ‘A lesser crime than being late, in my estimation.’ She looked the same as before, rotund with florid skin, grey curls scraped back from her face. ‘Are you developing a fascination with pathology?’

‘Not exactly, but the details help me understand the killer’s approach.’

‘Quite so.’ Lindstrop’s shrewd eyes met mine. ‘Every wound enlightens us, if we’re paying attention.’ She turned away to check her instruments; lines of saws, probes and scalpels, arranged on a metal tray.

Burns arrived at the exact moment when the autopsy was due to begin. He gave me a sheepish look, as if he was still smarting from the slap I’d delivered.

Lindstrop pointed at the clock. ‘By the skin of your teeth, Inspector.’

‘The traffic’s shite out there. Cut me some slack.’

‘Slack isn’t available when I’ve sacrificed eighteen holes to be here.’

‘I know you, Fiona. You’d rather chop people up than walk round the fairway.’

She gave a snort of laughter then turned away. Their intimacy reminded me that Burns must have spent countless afternoons watching murder victims being sliced apart. He gave me a tense smile before I focused my attention on the procedure.

The pathologist began by taking an inventory of the marks on Speller’s body, muttering into her microphone. I forced myself to study the man’s injuries. Even in death his youth was evident from his slim build and taut skin. Pronounced biceps and chest muscles proved that he’d made regular trips to the gym; there was a peppering of black hair across his chest. Now that the ropes around his wrists had been removed I could see the raw depth of his wounds. Lindstrop was peering at his scalp, parting his dark hair with her gloved hands.

‘A twenty-millimetre-wide occlusion and bone fragmentation to the central crown.’

Speller’s facial injuries were worse than I remembered, a mass of exposed muscle and bone. His broken jaw hung at a grotesque angle, revealing a grin of perfect white teeth. The sandwich I’d eaten for lunch shifted in my stomach, and I had to lean against the wall to steady myself.

‘Are you okay?’ Burns was peering down at me.

‘I’m fine.’ His concern had triggered a childish impulse to slap him again.

By now Lindstrop was doing unspeakable things to Speller’s body, but I was determined to keep my eyes open. I watched her remove his lungs, liver and heart without once looking away.

‘Tragic,’ she said quietly, as she placed the organs in a weighing dish. ‘Transplant patients would give anything for a perfect heart like this.’

The procedure took an hour and a half. Only brute determination stopped me from keeling over. Lindstrop wore a thoughtful expression as she dumped her scalpels into a steriliser.

‘What do you want to know?’ she glanced from Burns’s face to mine.

‘A cause of death, if you’ve got one,’ he said.

‘Drowning. He was alive when he hit the river, like the others.’ She held up a vial full of the brown liquid she’d emptied from his lungs. ‘But there’s something else you should know.’ She pressed a forefinger against the corpse’s forearm, leaving a deep indentation. ‘This level of skin saturation means he was underwater for at least twenty-four hours.’

‘And the wrist wounds?’

‘Rope fibres have chafed through the epidermis into soft tissue.’ Lindstrop’s frown deepened. ‘I’d say he cut himself to the bone trying to get free.’

‘What about his face?’

‘Same as the priest. He made a circular incision round the hairline, from temple to jaw, then wrenched upwards. But this time he did it posthumously.’ She gazed down at the victim. ‘He cut out the eyeballs too. The optic nerves were severed cleanly; he’d have needed a sharp knife or a scalpel.’

Burns groaned. ‘I shouldn’t have asked.’

We were about to leave when Lindstrop pointed out some narrow cuts on the victim’s shins. ‘What do you think these are?’

‘I dread to think,’ he muttered.

‘Care to hazard a guess, Dr Quentin?’

‘Rat bites. If he was tied up in dirty, shallow water, he’d have been powerless to keep them away.’

‘Excellent.’ She shot me a look of admiration. ‘You’re welcome in my theatre, any time you like.’

On the way out I peered down at the sharp piece of flint that had been tied around Speller’s neck, then took a photo with my phone. It looked antique, but I would need to ask Hugh Lister to identify it.

Burns gazed at the pavement in silence when we got outside. We seemed to have reached a tacit agreement not to mention what had happened the night before, but his shoulders were raised as if he expected another blow.

‘That was pretty conclusive, wasn’t it?’ I said. ‘Speller was tied up by the river, where the rats could get at him at low tide. He knew he was drowning, so he fought hard to free himself.’

‘Jesus, what a way to go.’

The rain had stopped, but the clouds still looked ominous. Burns’s hands were buried deep in his pockets, gloom emanating from every pore. I was furious with him, so I don’t know what made me reach up and kiss his cheek as we said goodbye. Maybe the gesture was inspired by sympathy as well as desire. He looked stunned as I pulled away, as though I was a constant source of confusion.

The double whammy of visiting my mother then witnessing the autopsy had left me desperate for a boost, so I called at Morocco Street. Lola gave me a tight hug, then reclined on her chaise longue.

‘Shouldn’t you be in labour right now?’ I asked.

‘Tell me about it. They’ll have to induce me soon.’ She gave her stomach a gentle pat. ‘He’s too lazy to stir his bones.’

‘Who can blame him? He’s got peace, quiet and a private Jacuzzi.’

Lola giggled, then her cat-like eyes focused on me. ‘How’s the historian?’