‘How long did he live at Claremont Road?’
‘On and off for a good few months, possibly about a year. He took up with a woman in North London somewhere and then returned — kept a girl in the room so I believe. Really it was J.J. that handled it; I had more important issues to work on.’
‘Alright, we’ll go back and have another chat with Dunwoodie, because you see there is a little more to it. .’
‘Oh?’
‘Yes, the girl you mentioned. .’
‘Yes?’
‘Well, she is also deceased.’
‘Oh, my, what has been going on at that house?’
‘That’s what we want to know; also the other tenants are in custody and won’t be going anywhere soon. So, what do you know of the girl?’
‘Nothing about her. I heard that she was living with him but I have no interest in employees’ private lives. The purpose of the people in the ancillary properties is to keep the squatters out and do some occasional unskilled work. Like I said, I am a businessman and I am focused on other issues. If that is all. .’
Vicary and Brunnie stood. ‘Yes, that is all. . for now.’
‘For now?’ Pilcher also stood.
‘We never know what might develop, so yes, “for now”.’ Vicary smiled and walked to the door. He then turned and said, ‘Oh, just one thing. .’
‘Yes?’
‘When “Irish Mickey” Dalkeith died, face down in the snow on Hampstead Heath, he had no food in his stomach, yet the pathologist said he was well-nourished.’
‘So?’
‘So, a well-nourished man with no food in his stomach is a puzzle.’
‘It is?’
‘It suggests that he had been starved of food for a day or two before he died.’
‘Dare say it might suggest that.’
‘Well, it might mean something, it might not. Very early days yet and we’re in no hurry, but we are very dogged, eh, DC Brunnie?’
‘We are that, sir.’ Brunnie smiled at Pilcher. ‘Just as dogged as dogged can be. We don’t give up easily.’
‘But you know, he did us a favour,’ Vicary continued.
‘Oh?’ Pilcher seemed attentive, more so than hitherto, thought Vicary.
‘Yes, you know, he fell down right on top of a shallow grave. Might just be a coincidence, but as one of our constables said, it might also be that he was leading us there, right to the grave. . a young adult female, quite short, about five feet tall, been there a few years. . ten to fifteen years buried, something like that.’
Pilcher paled. His brow furrowed.
‘You don’t know anything about that?’
‘No!’ His reply was aggressive, defensive.
‘We’ll find out who she was soon enough, and all roads will lead to Rome. If there is a connection between the late “Irish Mickey” Dalkeith and the deceased woman who lay concealed under his dead body, we’ll find out. Well, we’ll say good day, Mr Pilcher. Thank you for your time.’
Driving back to central London, Vicary asked Brunnie what he thought of Pilcher.
‘A nasty.’ Brunnie glanced to his left as the car slid by the wealth of north-west Surrey, ‘too hard to be a stockbroker, like Durham E-wing hard; too ready to get rid of us and too frightened when you mentioned the fact that Dalkeith had died as if leading us to the shallow grave. Frankly, it would not surprise me one little bit if Pilcher was an alias and that he is well known to us under a different handle.’
‘Yes.’ Vicary smiled but kept looking straight ahead. ‘My feelings exactly. We need to find out just who he is — pick that up, will you?’
‘Yes, boss, I’ll get right on it. My curiosity is well aroused, very well up.’
For the second time that day John Shaftoe considered a corpse which lay upon the stainless steel dissecting table in the pathology laboratory of the London Hospital, although, on the second occasion, he had no need to adjust the height of the microphone which was attached to the anglepoise arm above the table. ‘Did you have a good lunch, Billy?’ He grinned at his nervous assistant, who he thought was looking more than usually pale and unwell.
‘It was OK, sir. Usual hospital canteen food but it filled the gap.’
‘Good. So, two in one day, not bad. . once did four in one day. I needed my sleep at the end of that day, I can tell you.’
‘Yes, sir,’ Button whimpered.
‘Well. . let’s press on.’ Shaftoe spoke clearly for the benefit of the microphone. ‘The deceased is a frail-looking, undernourished person of the female sex. She is of Northern European or Caucasian racial extraction. Her age is as yet to be determined, but she is young and post-pubescent, and probably in her early teenage years.’ He paused. ‘Immediately obvious is the extensive bruising to the neck, which is indicative of strangulation. I also note ligature marks to her wrists.’ He pulled up the eyelids, one at a time. ‘Petechial haemorrhaging is noted, which further indicates that she was strangled. Care to look?’ Shaftoe turned to Ainsclough who was observing the post-mortem for the police.
‘Yes, sir.’ Ainsclough, clad from head to toe in the requisite green paper coveralls, stepped from the side of the theatre to the dissecting table and stood beside, and slightly behind, Shaftoe.
‘Little black dots in the whites of the eyes. . see? Blood spots, sometimes, if not black, they have a reddish hue, always a good indication of strangulation or asphyxiation, but we have to be careful not to jump to conclusions because such can also occur naturally, in the event of a brain haemorrhage, for instance, so this, in itself, is not conclusive proof of murder.’
‘I see, sir.’
‘But taken together, with the bruising to the neck, I think I am on safe ground to state, unless I find anything to the contrary, that this young girl was murdered by manual strangulation, as opposed to being strangled by use of a ligature.’
‘So murder, in that case, sir?’
‘Yes. Murder most foul.’
‘Thank you, sir.’ Ainsclough retreated to the wall of the laboratory where he once again stood in deferential silence.
‘So the deceased, who regrettably had a short life, was also short in life in terms of her stature. Can you pass the tape measure, please, Billy?’
Billy Button picked up a yellow retractable metal tape-measure from the bench close to the dissecting table and handed it to Shaftoe, who extended the tape from the head to the balls of the feet of the corpse. ‘Four feet ten inches tall or one hundred and forty-seven centimetres in her cotton socks, poor thing. God rest her.’ Shaftoe took a metal file and scraped under the fingernails of the deceased, and deposited the detritus thereunder into a self-sealing cellophane sachet. ‘She might have clawed at her attacker’s face and captured his. . or her. . DNA. Might. . might, but the ligature marks on her wrists indicate that she was restrained peri-mortem, so we’ll have to wait and see what forensics can tell us. How old do you think she is, Billy?’
Button shrugged. ‘Not old, sir.’ Button looked at the thin, wasted frame, the ribs, the thin waist, the painfully thin legs which protruded under the starched white towel that had been placed over her middle, the tiny feet. ‘I see what you mean about being fortunate, sir.’
‘Yes, it’s all a matter of context, Billy, all a matter of context.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘So we crack on, we continue. I will avoid damaging the face; she still has to be identified. Any ideas yet, Mr Ainsclough?’
‘None as yet, sir. We’re trawling through the missing persons reports, but she may be from outside London, as many young people are. If that is the situation here, she will only be registered as a mis per locally, that is local to her home.’
‘I see. Well, her hands are undamaged. I’ll cut them off and send them to the forensic laboratory together with her nail scrapings. They can lift her fingerprints. She might have a record. She might be known to you.’
‘Thank you, sir.’
‘So, now we’ll see what she had for her last meal. . but, flat tummy, wasted, drawn looks, indicate little intestinal gas, which further indicates a recent time of death. I anticipate an empty stomach, she is close to anorexic.’