Summon Up the Blood (5 page)

However, the victim had been found face down, so it would not have been surprising if the blood had gathered at the front of each organ. This was not the case. Internal hypostases were in fact located at the tops of the organs, apparently in defiance of gravity.

However, Bugsby’s external examination had already noted abrasions around the ankles, which were consistent with rope tearing the skin.

A picture was emerging. It seemed the victim had been strung up by the ankles while the blood was allowed to drain from the wound in his neck. The absence of blood on his clothes indicated that he was naked when he was killed, whereas the absence of blood on his body suggested that he had been washed after his death.

The skin was bruised as well as torn at the ankle. His wrists bore similar marks. Quinn believed this meant the victim had been alive when he was bound. Whether he had also been alive when he was strung up was another question.

One thing was beyond question: his circulatory system was devoid of blood. Upon opening, the pulmonary artery and the vena cava were found to be entirely empty, as was every vein to which the persistent doctor took his scalpel. The heart too. The instances of internal hypostasis were the only evidence of blood remaining inside the body.

According to the report, the wholesale exsanguination of the corpse made it more difficult to ascertain an accurate time of death. In Dr Bugsby’s opinion, the absence of blood would delay the process of putrefaction, making the body seem better preserved than it would otherwise be. All he could say with any certainty was that the victim had been dead long enough to be drained of all his blood.

Dr Bugsby also addressed the issue of the victim’s anus, which he described as smooth, enlarged and ‘destitute of
rugae
’. Such an appearance, he declared, was consistent with an addiction to unnatural practices. Seminal discharge inside the rectum, as well as fresh lacerations of the rectal wall, indicated that the victim had recently indulged in his addiction.

The file shed no light on the identity of the victim. It seemed to Quinn that so far no serious attempts had been made in that direction. Judging from the collated police reports, only the most perfunctory local enquiries had been made, a handful of arbitrary interviews. The wording on the cover of the file was a judgement more than a description, and one that seemed designed to discourage too much zeal in the prosecution of the case, the implication being that he was no great loss. Good riddance, in other words.

A list of the victim’s effects contained only one item: a silver cigarette case.

F
ollowing Sergeant Salt’s example, Quinn knocked on Inspector Langdon’s door and opened it without waiting for a reply.

‘Solved it?’

Quinn ignored Langdon’s facetious greeting. ‘The file mentioned a cigarette case. Found on the body. I would like to see it.’

‘I shall see that Sergeant Salt brings it to you.’

‘I will need to take it away with me.’

‘Provided you sign for it, I can see no objection.’

‘Yes, of course.’

‘Small items like that have a habit of going missing.’

Quinn gave Langdon a steady stare. The man seemed to be impugning his honesty. ‘I hope it has not gone missing already.’

A minuscule spasm of amusement quivered on Langdon’s lips. Evidently he enjoyed these games far more than Quinn did. ‘Will there be anything else?’

‘Whatever crimes he may be guilty of, he did not deserve to die like that.’

Langdon’s expression was ambivalent. He made no comment.

‘I will be taking the file away too. Our priority is to identify the body.’ Quinn remembered Sir Edward’s wish to keep the details of the case out of the newspapers, and yet the press could be a useful tool in gathering information. Quinn inadvertently voiced his thoughts. ‘It would help if we were able to release a photograph of the dead man to the newspapers.’

Langdon smirked. ‘Which one would you use?’

‘One of his face, naturally. Inspector Langdon, does this case amuse you?’

‘Gallows humour, my friend. Have you never heard of it?’

‘I have heard of it but I don’t appreciate it.’

‘No. I imagine not.’

‘I think we owe it to the deceased – to all deceased – to treat them with respect and seriousness.’

‘Do you, now?’

‘Yes.’

‘So. You have sympathy for his type, do you?’ Langdon’s tone was unmistakable.

‘For the dead, you mean?’

‘You know what I mean. Queers.’

‘We cannot say for certain . . .’

‘Oh, come now. You saw the photographs, I’m sure. You read the doctor’s report. He was addicted to unnatural practices. Does that not disgust you?’

‘I have to set aside such feelings. Besides, the law does not punish his crimes by death, let alone by such a death as he suffered. Indeed, the severest penalty under law is the birch.’

‘What is your point?’

‘My point being that the law recognizes that the crimes perpetrated against him – which may include kidnap, indecent assault, torture, as well as murder – are far more heinous than any offences he may have committed. Which, as far as we can tell, are limited to allowing his own person to be used unnaturally by other men for their sexual gratification. It is a crime against himself, if it is against anyone. Therefore, even once we have put his offences into the balance, the scale of transgression is still weighted heavily towards his murderer. We are duty-bound to investigate his death.’

‘Well,’ said Langdon, after considering Quinn for a long time. ‘I can see they have found the right man for this job.’

Quinn resisted the temptation to respond to Langdon’s innuendo. ‘Please don’t trouble yourself about the cigarette case. I shall speak to Sergeant Salt myself.’ He did not miss the flicker of panic across Langdon’s face.

‘A cigarette case, you say?’ Sergeant Salt’s eyebrows descended into a dark, perplexed V.

‘Yes,’ said Quinn. ‘It is mentioned in the file. The victim’s sole effect.’

The sergeant gripped the edge of his mahogany desk, as if this new information threatened to overturn the fabric of his universe. ‘In that case, it will be in the evidence room.’

‘I need to see it. Be so good as to fetch it for me.’

Salt hesitated to let go of the desk. ‘What does it look like?’

‘I have no idea. Other than I presume it shares certain features in common with most every other cigarette case. However, I haven’t seen it. Surely you have some record of it? An evidential log book? It should be a simple matter to locate it.’

‘Oh, yes. I should be able to put my hand on it.’ At last Salt lifted a hand away from the desk, only to place it down again, flat on the surface.

‘Then please do.’

This seemed a surprising suggestion to Salt, though eventually he began to move away from the desk. He kept Quinn fixed for as long as possible with a sidelong glance.

Quinn read the public notices as he waited for Salt to return. There was nothing he had not read before, in countless other police stations across the capital. Rewards offered, information requested, missing persons sought. Greying and dog-eared, they signified a world of mundane crime: forlorn, lacklustre, pathetically unimaginative. They spoke of lives lived on the edge of misery.

And yet, somehow, they absorbed him.

By the time he had read every last one of them, he realized that Salt had been gone an ominously long time.

The door to the street opened and a stunted bundle of a woman shuffled in. Her clothes were dusty and old, but otherwise respectable. She could have been aged anywhere between sixty and eighty. She walked with a rolling, arthritic limp. Bad hips, Quinn speculated. A powerful unwashed smell came off her.

She did not look at Quinn but walked straight up to the desk and pushed down the bell. She then sank on to a seat at the edge of the room with a sigh of relief.

Now he had her face to read, and it was equally absorbing as the public notices. It was covered by the same grey patina of melancholy.

He wondered what her story was; what succession of moments had made up her life and led her to this police station.

He suddenly found it unutterably sad to think that someone might have committed a crime against her, however trivial.

‘Bad news, sir.’ It was Salt, back at last. ‘The
h-item
you requested cannot be found at present.’

‘How can that be?’

‘It is not where it ought to be. I am at a loss to explain it. However, I might add, I have not yet given up ’ope.’

‘It is a piece of material evidence. Its loss is a severe setback in the investigation. It does not reflect well on this station.’

‘I’m sure it will turn up, sir. It’s probably just misplaced. Someone ’as no doubt taken it, believing it to be . . .’

‘Believing it to be what, exactly?’

‘Superfluous. It’s just a cigarette case, after all. All it proves is that the fellow smoked.’

‘There might have been an inscription in it.’

‘Good heavens, sir! I believe there was! How did you know?’

‘Did you make a note of this inscription?’

‘Myself, sir, no.’

‘Did anyone?’

‘I do not believe it was thought necessary. No one here could make head nor tail of it. And I suppose the i-scription was there for anyone to read on the cigarette case itself, if they had so wanted to.’

‘But the cigarette case has now gone missing.’

‘Gone missing, yes. That’s a very good way of putting it.’

At that point, Inspector Langdon emerged from the inner door to join Salt behind the counter. Quinn could not miss the flash of silver in his hand. ‘Is this what you are looking for?’

‘Good heavens, sir!’ cried Sergeant Salt, his amazement rather overdone, or so it seemed to Quinn. ‘You’ve found it!’ To Quinn, he added: ‘What did I tell you, sir? I knew it would turn up.’

Quinn took the cigarette case from Langdon. ‘Remarkable.’

‘I cannot understand how you failed to find it, Salt,’ said Langdon. He was watching Quinn closely as he spoke. ‘It was exactly where it was supposed to be.’

‘I must have been looking in the wrong place, sir.’

‘Yes, that must be it. That or we will have to get your eyes examined by an ophthalmologist.’

‘There’s nothing wrong with my eyes, sir.’

Quinn felt compelled to cut short the music hall act. ‘I see that it is empty. Can you confirm that it was empty when it was found?’

‘Of course. What are you suggesting?’

‘I merely wondered if whoever took the case may not also have smoked the cigarettes.’ Quinn held Langdon’s gaze.

‘No one took the case,’ insisted Langdon. ‘It was where it should be all the time.’

Quinn gave an exaggerated nod. ‘I think you had better attend to this lady now, Sergeant. She has been waiting rather a long time.’

‘Ole Janet? Don’t you worry about Ole Janet, sir! She comes in every day. Mostlys just to get out of the rain.’

‘She rang the bell. She must have something she wishes to talk to you about.’

‘Yes, an’ I heard it a thousand times already. I i-spect she just wants to tell us about her cat. Her cat went missing, you see, sir. And she comes in every day to tell us it’s still missing. I’m afraid we’ve got too much on our plate to go looking for missing moggies.’

‘When did she first report the cat missing?’

‘You’re going to solve that mystery too, are you?’ said Langford.

‘Not much point looking into that, sir,’ advised Sergeant Salt. ‘The beast is dead, if you ask me. I tole her so but she wasn’t having any of it. It was all she had in the world, you see, sir. Very sad, I don’t doubt, but what can you do about it? It’s the Jews what done it, I reckon. It’s the Jews what had them all.’

‘What are you talking about, Sergeant Salt?’ demanded Quinn.

‘The Jews what came over from Russia. The local cats started going missing after that. We found a lot of them dead. Very nasty business. I reckon it’s a Jew what’s killed your queer, sir. Either that or a Chinky. You should see the knives some of them Chinkies have. I saw a Chinky cook chase after a fellow with a meat cleaver once.’

Quinn nodded in distracted agreement. In truth, he was scarcely attending to what Salt was saying. He had released the fastener on the cigarette case.

Quinn felt a dark, furtive excitement. He had glanced inside the cigarette case and read the inscription.

He closed the lid on it quickly, reluctant to bring it up with Langdon and Salt. It was too important. Indeed, his instinct was to get the cigarette case out of there as quickly as possible. They did not deserve to share in its secrets. The fools had had it in their possession and failed to appreciate it for what it was.

No one here could make head nor tail of it
, Salt had said.

There was no doubt in Quinn’s mind that it had come from the murderer.

More than that, he had the sense that through it the murderer was communicating directly with him. Directly and personally. Quinn was convinced that he alone was capable of understanding the words inscribed inside the lid, in the sense that the murderer meant them.

To handle the object was to communicate with hands that had bound and slaughtered another human being. Quinn discovered that his heart beat with a more savage, a fiercer throb at the cold touch of the metal. As a detective, he was aware of all the modern developments in crime detection, of which Sir Edward was an enthusiastic proponent. He knew how important it was to handle any piece of evidence as little as possible, in order not to contaminate any fingerprints that might be found on it. But the strange magnetism of the cigarette case was too powerful for his fingers to resist.

Quinn affected an air of indifference. ‘I believe I have everything I need for now. I see no necessity to take up any more of your time. Good day, gentlemen.’

His eagerness to be gone did not go unnoticed by Inspector Langdon. It seemed the man set himself to oppose Quinn in everything. ‘One moment, Inspector Quinn. You are forgetting the necessaries.’

For one startling moment, Quinn thought Langdon was soliciting a bribe. But he made an entry in a ledger book and pushed it across the counter for Quinn to sign. ‘A formality, you understand. But I must insist on it. I saw the way you were looking at that cigarette case. If we don’t watch out, you’ll have it for your private collection, I’m sure.’ The tone was one of forced jocularity, tinged with resentment. Quinn was left in little doubt that Langdon had entertained similar plans for the object, now thwarted.