Body Line (2 page)

‘Ah, yes, tea. I’m glad they got their priorities right,’ Atherton said.

‘—and phoned for the peelers and the ambulance. Well, they didn’t have a key, and the girl was in a dressing gown so she hadn’t one either, so there wasn’t much else they could do. Anyway, the ambulance got here first and took her to Charing Cross.’

‘Was she conscious?’

‘Oh yeah. I don’t think she was bad hurt, from what they said. But she was in rag order from the shock, you know?’

‘We’ll have to interview her ASAP,’ Slider said. ‘She could be a suspect or an accomplice. You’d better ring the factory, get them to send someone to sit with her,’ he said to Atherton. ‘She shouldn’t be left alone. I might as well have a quick look at the scene now I’m here. There’s Freddie arriving, if I’m not much mistaken,’ he added, seeing a grey Jaguar XJ6 pull up beyond the barrier.

It was indeed Freddie Cameron, the forensic pathologist, well bundled-up in a camel cashmere overcoat and navy scarf, his face looking lean and brown from his ‘summer’ holiday in California. He never went away in June, July or August because that’s when his garden was at its best. He had an – to Slider – incomprehensible passion for dahlias.

‘You’d better go back to the Firmans,’ Slider said, breaking Connolly’s heart. ‘Since you’ve got a relationship with them. Get their statement down while it’s still fresh in their minds. Anything they saw or heard, however trivial. Everything the girl said. And find out everything they know about the victim – where does he work, what are his interests, who does he see, is he in financial or woman trouble?’

‘Righty-oh, sir,’ Connolly said glumly.

‘You’ll see all you’ll want to see in the photographs,’ Slider reassured her. ‘It won’t be pretty.’

‘I need to see it for myself, but,’ Connolly grumbled. ‘How’ll I learn?’

Slider turned away. ‘Freddie! Good holiday? You’re looking brown.’

‘My dear boy, this is rust! They’re having freak rainstorms over there. It was just like home.’

‘Not beach weather, then?’

‘I went whale watching, and Martha read seven books.’ Cameron paused a moment to consider the memory. ‘Not all at once, you understand. Sequentially.’

While Cameron went in, Slider had a word with PC Dave Bright, who had been the first officer on the scene, and was now keeping the log at the door. He was the citizen’s dream copper, big and burly, unflappably good-tempered, but with a core of steel that made villains think twice about lipping him.

‘Had to break the door in,’ he told Slider, with a gesture towards the splintered frame. ‘The neighbours didn’t have a spare key. Said they weren’t that friendly with the man.’

‘It hadn’t been tampered with already?’

‘No, sir. Looked perfectly all right. But it was only on the Yale – not deadlocked.’

‘So the killer didn’t break in,’ Slider said.

‘No, sir. I did a quick check before I called it in, and there was no sign of a break-in. All the doors and windows at the back were locked. Upstairs windows were locked except the French windows of the main bedroom, but that was where the young lady went out, apparently.’

‘All locked up, even though he was at home. A careful citizen.’

‘Yes, sir. So maybe he let chummy in, and chummy let himself out the same way.’

‘What time was this?’

‘Working it back, sir, it must have been about half past six or thereabouts. The 999 call came in at a quarter to seven, and I got here just after seven.’

‘On your own?’ Atherton said. ‘To a firearms shout?’

‘There wasn’t any mention of shooting,’ Bright said. ‘Whether it was the young lady or the old people who weren’t clear, I don’t know. All I was told was that there was a suspicion of foul play and no one had a key. As it was, the victim was there alone and anyone else was long gone. So it worked out all right,’ he said with a shrug.

‘Six thirty in the morning,’ Atherton said to Slider as they clothed up. ‘And on a weekday. Most people would be busy getting dressed or in the shower. Except for the high-flyers at numbers one and four, who’d have left for work at six.’

‘You’re supposing they’re high-flyers.’

‘Must be. Do you know what the mortgage payments would be on a house like this?’

‘It was a good time to choose,’ Slider said. ‘No one passing by to see anyone arriving or leaving.’

‘Even if anyone saw, they wouldn’t notice. Who notices someone coming out of a house, unless they’re acting suspiciously?’

‘Or covered in blood,’ Slider said. But he wasn’t hopeful. There wasn’t so much as a drip on the doorstep or the least smear on the door frame. Besides, shooting was not the murder method of choice for crimes of passion; which, together with the lack of a break-in, made it look like something more deliberate – and the deliberate didn’t dabble in their victim’s fluid emissions. Still, he checked himself, there was no sense in ruling things out beforehand. As he always told his firm, facts first, theories afterwards.

Deceased was in the doorway between the hall and the sitting-room on the right, lying face down, which was probably just as well because he had been shot in the back of the head. He looked to be about five ten, and was dressed in dark trousers, white shirt, shoes and socks.

‘So he wasn’t woken by someone ringing the bell,’ Slider said. ‘He was up and dressed already.’

‘Nice shoes,’ said Atherton. ‘Italian. See the feather stamped on the sole? That’s Amedeo Testoni. Knock you back twelve hundred a pair. I like a man who spends on his footwear.’

‘As against which he’s wearing a gold ring, and has diamond cufflinks,’ said Slider, who had a thing about men wearing jewellery. ‘I don’t think you could have been friends.’

Not much else could be told about the victim, except that what could be seen of his hair was thick and dark and shiny. There was a messy tangle of blood and shattered bone which marked the entry wound, blood pooling under the head, and an unspeakable porridge of brain, blood and tissue on the carpet ahead of him, in the direction the bullet had taken. Slider averted his eyes for a moment while he swallowed and took a settling deep breath.

‘I’ll bet that was a hundred-pound haircut,’ Atherton mourned. ‘What a waste!’ They all had their different ways of coping.

Freddie Cameron, kneeling beside the body, looked up. ‘I take it you’re not interested in time of death?’

‘Unless it’s not compatible with all the high-jinks at six thirty,’ said Slider.

‘Six thirty’s all right, from the warmth of the body and the condition of the blood. So, what can I tell you? He was shot in the back of the head, as you see. A single shot at close range, probably no more than eight inches away – you see the gas-rebound splitting, and the localized scorching. He was upright at the time, as you’ll see from the blood and tissue distribution. The bullet will be somewhere over there, probably embedded in the wall.’

‘He’s not far from the front door,’ Slider observed. ‘He could have let the person in, and then they shot him as he led the way into the sitting-room.’

‘That’s your province, not mine,’ Freddie said. ‘Sounds depressingly professional.’

‘
Could
be a vengeful lover or husband,’ Slider said, keeping an open mind. ‘If it was someone he knew well enough to let in . . .’

‘Well, either way, I’d say it was a 9mm or .38 pistol wot dunnit,’ Freddie said. ‘The 9mm is the most commonly used handgun this side of the Atlantic, and consequently the most numerous and easiest to get hold of.’

‘There’s lotsa blood,’ Atherton observed.

‘He was lotsa hurt,’ Freddie said. ‘A high velocity bullet causing complete ejection of the brain will have destroyed most of his face. I hope identification isn’t going to be a problem?’

‘We’re assuming he’s the householder,’ Slider said. ‘A Doctor David Rogers.’

‘Don’t think I know him,’ Freddie said. ‘I’ll take the fingerprints for you, anyway, just in case. There probably won’t be much chance of comparing dental records. I’m ready to turn him over now – where’s the photographer?’

Slider had no wish to see this part. ‘I’ll have a quick look round, get the lie of the place, see if there’s a photograph of the good doctor,’ he said. ‘Call me if there’s anything significant.’

The sitting-room was expensively-furnished, with no sign of any interference. There were modern paintings on the wall, a large flat-screen television, DVD and sound equipment, silver candlesticks and an antique clock on the mantel, all untouched. Not a standard burglary, then. Slider noted a leather-topped kneehole desk in one fireplace alcove – it had the air of a decorative feature, but it could be the place to look for personal papers, perhaps. The fingerprints team were busy dusting everything and another forensic pair were on their knees marking all the blood and tissue spatters, so Slider did not go in. He could see all he wanted from here, for now. What struck him most was that the antique furniture looked like repro. The buttoned leather sofa and armchairs were modern, too. Everything was new-looking, immaculate, and curiously lifeless, like the lounge section of an expensive hotel suite. It only wanted an oversized flower arrangement and a leather-bound room-service menu. There was no personal clutter lying around, either. It was a room in which it was impossible to imagine anyone doing anything other than having a large whisky and watching the television for ten minutes before going to bed. Well, perhaps that was all the doctor had done. Didn’t they all work impossible hours, these consultants? He was assuming he was a consultant, to afford a house like this.

Bob Bailey, the Crime Scene Manager, conducted them upstairs and showed them the master bedroom, again furnished in modern luxury style with a deep-pile carpet and concealed lighting. The super-king-sized bed had the covers thrown back, and there were dark-blue silk pyjamas carelessly dropped on the floor at one side. The French windows on to the balcony stood open, the wind blowing the voile curtains about like an advert for Fry’s Turkish Delight. On the balcony were two lollipop bay trees in silver-painted pots, one at either end. Apart from the bed there was an empire chaise longue and two matching chairs in striped silk, and two Louis XV bow fronted chests of drawers – all repro. And an unnecessary number of mirrors.

‘Cheerfully vulgar,’ Atherton remarked. ‘It’s what our Aussie cousins would call a sheila-trap.’

Bob Bailey gestured to the two doors, one either side of the bed, and said, ‘Bathroom through there and dressing-room through there. I’d rather you didn’t go in. We’re still fingerprinting. There’s nothing much to see except that the drawers in the dressing-room are all pulled out, same as in here.’

All the drawers in the bedside cabinets and the chests were open – an expert opens the bottom one first and leaves it open to save time – but there was no evidence of rifling, nothing thrown out on the floor.

‘Looks as though whoever it was was looking for something specific,’ Slider said.

‘We’ve got a nice foot imprint or two,’ Bailey said, gesturing to the marked places on the floor. ‘Benefit of a thick carpet like this. Bigger than the victim’s, so let’s assume they’re chummy’s.’

‘Anything in the bathroom? Bathroom cabinet?’

‘Door closed and no sign of disturbance,’ said Bailey. ‘We’ll collect the contents and send them to you, in case they’re significant, but it doesn’t look as though drugs were the object. Otherwise – damp towels, wet shower-tray, damp toothbrush. All the normal signs of getting ready in the morning.’

The other room on this floor was set up as a study, with a desk bearing a computer. The drawers of the desk were also standing open, but again, there was no sign of rifling. And on the top floor were two more bedrooms and a bathroom, minimally furnished and untouched.

‘Don’t think he even went up there,’ said Bailey. ‘No footmarks at all on the stairs – just hoover tracks. Looks as if no one’s been up there since the cleaner last called.’

‘Interesting,’ said Slider. ‘They were looking for something they were sure couldn’t be upstairs.’

‘Or downstairs,’ Bailey said. ‘The desk drawers in the sitting-room were closed.’

‘Maybe they were disturbed before they had to chance to look further,’ Atherton said. ‘Who’s to say they knew what rooms were up there?’

‘Well, thanks, Bob,’ Slider said. ‘Let me know when we can come back for a closer look. What I really want most urgently is a photograph of the good doctor, since we’re not likely to get a mugshot.’

‘No difficulty there,’ Bailey said. He gestured towards one of the chests, where there was an assembly of photographs in matching silver frames. ‘Most of them are of the same man so I’m guessing it’s him.’

‘I guess too. The sort of person to have matching silver frames would be bound to keep lots of pictures of himself around,’ Atherton said. ‘I bet he had a monogrammed wallet as well.’

Bailey grinned. ‘How did you know? In his jacket, hanging on the dumb valet in the dressing-room. I’ll let you have it as soon as we’re done fingerprinting, but there’s money and credit cards in it – doesn’t look as though it’s been disturbed.’

‘A very selective intruder,’ Slider said.

Bailey brought him some of the photographs, and he chose one of a man wearing nothing but swimming trunks standing in the sunshine on a dock somewhere, smiling directly at the camera, with a motor yacht moored up just behind him. He was very tanned, with a hairless chest, and not in bad shape, reasonably muscled arms, just a little sly bulging to either side above the elastic of the trunks. Slider chose it because he was full-face and clear. He picked another of the same man with a woman. In this one he was in white dinner jacket. The woman was in a clinging white evening dress with more décolletage than was
strictly
proper, unless she was hoping the good doctor was about to give her a thorough physical. From the way she was hanging on to his arm and gazing at him, perhaps she was.