‘Gently,’ Comrie told them softly. ‘Scrape away the last of the soil until the coffin lid is exposed. Do not rush at this stage.’
Ten minutes later, they could see fully exposed oak and Winter rattled off a further series of photographs, documenting the first sight of the coffin in nineteen years. Dr Comrie instructed the officers to fix ropes to the rings on the lid and they were at long last ready to raise Barbie from the grave.
Winter’s eyes scanned the tent and he knew, beyond doubt, none of them was feeling what he was. Rachel was probably the closest but even she was consumed by expectancy rather than the more primeval urge that had a grip on Winter. Nothing could drag him from that spot until he saw Barbie emerge. He couldn’t help but think that his mother, the woman who had lost her life because of his stupidity, had been only a few years older than Barbie when she died. He knew it wasn’t the time to think about it and tried to squeeze the comparison from his mind, forcing himself to remain in the moment.
After such a long and backbreaking effort, it took only seconds for the coffin to be raised fully and laid out on the canvas sheeting that surrounded the hole. Winter’s senses were on full alert as Comrie, calm and dignified, had the officers remove the screw that held down the lid. Addison and Croy, as the senior officers present, took a place on either side of the coffin and constables stood at either end, their hands poised to remove the cover. Winter strode forward forcefully, straight in front of a cop he could hear cursing behind him. His shutter finger was itching like a gunfighter’s, his nerves jumping and heart thumping.
For a split second, the base of the coffin disappeared from Winter’s viewfinder and it took him that moment to realise it had been caused by the lid passing through his sights. And, suddenly, there she was.
Barbie.
Winter’s mind and finger were a blur as he raced off shot after shot. She filled his frame — her broken bones, her gaping smile.
‘Enough,’ Comrie instructed. ‘This isn’t a red carpet. She isn’t some kind of film star.’
Speak for yourself, Winter thought.
CHAPTER 44
Barbie’s coffin had been carried from Brig o’ Turk cemetery and placed, with as much solemnity as the situation demanded and as much decorum as it allowed, into the back of a waiting hearse. By then, it was nearly noon and a large crowd of curious locals had gathered at the gates, trying to uncover the reason for the rare drama that had visited their sleepy village.
Few, if any, of them had known that Barbie rested there in the first place but soon enough they all knew she had departed. If Professor Fairweather did her job, if Rachel did hers and if Winter and Danny could help with their own brand of amateur assistance, then it was to be hoped that Barbie would never return to Brig o’ Turk. Instead, she could be buried properly at a place that suited whatever remained of her family when they were found.
Rachel had followed the hearse, first into Stirling, where Dr Comrie carried out the procedural necessities before signing Barbie over to the pastoral care of Kirsten Fairweather, then on the road to Dundee in the wake of the professor’s procession.
In terms of practical use, there was no real point in Narey being there when Barbie arrived in Dundee but she felt the need. Fairweather was going to do the clever stuff in terms of finding out who Barbie actually was.
When she got to the Centre for Anatomy and Human Identification, Narey had to freeze under the ever-hostile stare of the steel-haired Annabelle. Rather than give Kirsty’s formidable receptionist the pleasure of turning her to stone, Narey phoned Julia Corrieri to get an update from Glasgow, safe in the knowledge it would annoy the receptionist.
‘Hi Sarge. Good drive?’
‘The road is covered in snow and ice, there were constant flurries on the windscreen, making it almost impossible to see, we were following a hearse, which meant we pissed off every nutter who wanted to drive at a hundred miles an hour despite the conditions, and therefore we were treated to gestures of finger abuse every two minutes. So, yes, a great drive. What have you been doing?’
‘Um, well this morning I was at Peter Bradley’s mother’s house in East Kilbride.’
‘Any use?’
‘Not a whole lot, Sarge. Sorry. Margaret, the mum, was a nice enough woman but she said she hadn’t spoken to Bradley in years.’
‘Did you believe her?’
‘Yes. She seemed really worried at first when I said I was there about her son. I think she thought I was going to tell her he was dead. When I said I was trying to find him, she was so relieved she’d have told me anything I wanted.’
‘So when did she last hear from him?’
‘She said she used to get a Christmas card from him every year but they stopped without explanation in 2004. There would be a different postmark on them every year, all over Scotland and down into England.’
‘Did you get a note of the postmarks?’
Anyone else, providing they had indeed done their job properly, might have been insulted by the question but not Corrieri. Instead she was quietly pleased to have the chance to show her thoroughness. Narey heard the rustle of paper as Julia opened her ever-present notebook.
‘Inverness, December 1999. Dumfries, 2000. Kendall, 2001. Oban, 2002. Aberdeen, 2003. I’ve already contacted the relevant forces in case Bradley has cropped up on their books but nothing back so far.’
‘Okay, good. What did she tell you about Bradley?’
‘Well, she’s his mum so nothing bad. Said that he’d always been “a lively lad”. That was the nearest thing to criticism she wanted to offer. Said he was the life and soul, liked by everyone, no real enemies. I asked her if he had a bit of a temper and she immediately said no. She said it too quickly if you ask me and made me think it wasn’t the truth.’
‘What about the gypsy traveller link? Had she heard about it?’
‘Yes, Sarge. It was all she knew though. She’d heard it the same way others had and nothing more. He hadn’t told her he was getting married or moving away with the travellers. All she knew was that the Christmas cards were signed “Peter and Gaby”.’
‘The gypsy bride?’
‘She assumes so. So do I.’
‘Any friends who might know where he is?’
‘Margaret Bradley said she’d spoken to all the ones she knew and they were as much in the dark as she was. They’d known Peter was seeing someone before he left but none of them had met her and had heard nothing from him since.’
‘So where does that leave us?’
Corrieri sounded apologetic. ‘No further forward. Sorry.’
‘Don’t apologise, Julia. You did well. Anyway, we’re inches forward even if it’s only in things we don’t know. At least we now know we don’t know them. Okay, I’ve got to go. We’re about to start here.’
The outer door had opened and Kirsten Fairweather emerged, smiling grimly. Her blonde hair was tied back in a ponytail and she had quickly changed into jeans, a hooded sweatshirt and trainers since her drive north with Barbie’s body.
‘Rachel, I know speed is of the essence for you so I’m not going to stand on ceremony; instead I propose to begin the facial recon right away. Seeing as you’re here, you’re welcome to sit in on it.’
‘I’d like that. It would be good to see how the process works. And, well, to be honest, it just feels like the right thing to do. The first step in bringing her back, hopefully.’
Kirsten smiled, more warmly this time.
‘Having seen the skull, I’m confident we will. We’ll need to do some mirroring work of the shattered part of the cranium but that won’t be a problem.’ Kirsten paused thoughtfully. ‘We’re always told you should disassociate and feel no personal connection to the subjects and I’m sure police officers are told the same. But I think I always do at least as good a job if I do feel a connection. And I feel one here.’