“Oh, no.” Fanny shook her head in denial. “You can’t possibly think it’s Elaine.” Her words held an anguished appeal.
“It’s an option we need to rule out, at least. The victim fits your flatmate’s general description, but there are several other possibilities we’re exploring as well.” Seeing Gemma’s quick glance, he realized he’d had no time to tell her about the woman captured by the CCTV.
Fanny’s skin, pale when he had come in, had blanched to the color of parchment, but she asked steadily, “What do you need to do?”
“First, I need to show you a photo, an image captured by the closed-circuit security camera in the building across the street from the warehouse.” Gemma came to stand behind his chair as he opened his folder and took out a photocopy.
Fanny took it with a trembling hand, a pulse beating visibly in her slender throat. She stared at the photo for a long moment, then leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. “It’s not her,” she whispered. “That’s not Elaine. This woman’s much too young.”
“We had to be sure. But even if the woman in the photo isn’t Elaine, it doesn’t necessarily rule out Elaine as the victim. This woman entered the warehouse at least two hours before the fire. She may have left again by the door not covered by the security camera, and by the same logic, someone else may have entered.”
“But why would Elaine have been in this warehouse?”
“Do you have any idea if Elaine knew Michael Yarwood?” he countered.
“The MP?” Fanny looked startled. “No. Why would you think she did?”
“The warehouse where the body was found belongs to Yarwood. It was under renovation as luxury flats. If Elaine knew Yarwood, it’s possible she might have met him there.”
Fanny looked from Kincaid to Gemma. “I don’t understand.”
“We don’t either,” Gemma said gently, and from her tone Kincaid suspected she thought he was handling Fanny a little roughly. “Listen, Fanny,” Gemma went on. “The only way we can positively eliminate Elaine is to compare a sample of her DNA against the victim’s.”
“How can you get Elaine’s DNA?” Fanny asked. “I thought that was only from blood, or you know, from rape cases.”
“People leave traces of themselves behind all the time – in the bathroom, in the bedroom. If you’ll let me have a look, I’ll see what I can find,” Kincaid said.
“It can’t be Elaine,” Fanny protested. “That’s just not possible.” They all waited silently, giving her time to come to terms with the idea. After a few moments, she glanced at Winnie, as if for confirmation, before letting her breath out in a sigh. “Okay. Do whatever it is you have to do.”
“Good.” Kincaid gave her a reassuring smile. “Believe me, the sooner we get this done, the better for everyone. Now, I understand you don’t use the upstairs bathroom. Is that right?” When Fanny nodded assent, he turned to Gemma and Winnie. “Did either of you use the basin or throw anything away in the bathroom?”
Winnie shook her head as Gemma said, “I didn’t. But I think we both looked in the medicine cabinet, and I looked in the cupboard over the toilet.”
“Your hair should be fairly easy to rule out if you shed one or two in the basin.” He shot her an affectionate glance. “But I’ll try the tub first, as that way we can eliminate Winnie more easily. What about the bed? Did either of you turn back the sheets?”
Gemma gave Winnie a questioning look before answering for them both. “No.”
Kincaid turned back to Fanny. “Anyone else have access to the upstairs?”
“No. I can’t remember when anyone else has been up there, until Winnie and Gemma came yesterday. Elaine did the cleaning herself. I told her I’d pay someone to come in, but she always wanted to save me money.”
“Right, then. I’ll get started.”
As Kincaid climbed the stairs, he felt a profound sense of relief. It wasn’t just the suffocating atmosphere in the room, he realized – Fanny Liu herself had made him uncomfortable. He was accustomed to dealing with people suffering from the grief and shock that accompanied a tragedy. Was it her illness that put him off? Of course he felt sorry for her. But if forced, he’d have to admit his pity was tinged with revulsion.
Feeling a flush of shame at his reaction to someone handicapped, he stopped at the head of the stairs. For a moment, he imagined Gemma struck down with some unexpected and devastating disease, confined to a wheelchair. Would he respond the same way? The thought horrified him.
But Gemma would rail against fate – she would be cranky and cross and difficult, and she would find a way to get on with her life. It was not Fanny’s physical condition that bothered him, he realized, but the fact that she radiated neediness. The woman wore her vulnerability like a flag. If Elaine Holland had taken advantage of her, it would come as no surprise. But if Fanny Liu was the victim in that relationship, what had happened to Elaine Holland?
Gemma had to force herself not to follow Kincaid as he left the room. Her natural instinct was always for action. She wanted to be doing something, not sitting in the too-quiet room, watching as Fanny seemed to shrink before her eyes. It seemed to her that the woman’s flesh had melted away from her bones just since yesterday, and with Kincaid’s departure Fanny had sunk even further into herself, as if she’d used up all her energy reserves.
The creaking of Kincaid’s footsteps as he moved about above them was clearly audible. Gemma found herself straining for the next sound, willing him to hurry. Beside her, Winnie sat quietly, and Gemma envied her supportive patience. But then she’d never been much good at hand-holding, even as a constable – and fortunately, these days her job allowed her to delegate such things to those more suited for it.
Then Winnie’s phone rang, breaking the silence. After a murmured conversation, Winnie rang off and stood. “I’m sorry. I’ve got to run over to the church office for a bit. Fanny, I’ll be back as soon as I can.” She leaned down to give Fanny a brief hug, then said quietly to Gemma as she went out, “Stop in at the office before you go?”
Winnie’s departure seemed to have roused Fanny. She sat a little straighter in her chair and focused her dark gaze on Gemma. “I still don’t understand why Elaine would have been in a warehouse. It doesn’t make any sense.”
“Maybe she didn’t know Michael Yarwood, but could she have been meeting someone else?” suggested Gemma, quick to take advantage of the opening.
“Who? Elaine went to work and came home. She didn’t socialize.”
“Someone from work, then?”
“She didn’t really like anyone in her department. She never went along when the other women met at the pub, or got together for birthday lunches. They invited her, but she said they were cats, all of them, and she’d rather spend her time with…” Fanny faltered for the first time. “With me. And even if she had met someone, what happened to the other person? Why weren’t they burned in the fire?”
Gemma wasn’t about to tell her that, according to the pathologist, the woman in the warehouse had been brutally murdered and left to burn by her companion. Maybe by the time that information was made public and Fanny’s knowledge of it unavoidable, they’d have a positive ID on both murderer and victim. “We don’t know,” she said simply. She did, however, think it was time Fanny knew a little more about her flatmate. “Fanny, you said Elaine never went out. But when I was checking her room yesterday, I found a number of evening things.” When Fanny looked at her blankly, she elaborated. “You know, dressy outfits, high-heeled shoes… Did you ever see her wearing them?”