Murder Sky High: detectives crack the mystery of a deadly cargo, page 3
‘What do you mean he was out of it?’ Gawn jumped on the comment.
‘He was asleep when you first saw him?’ Harris spoke at almost the same time. He glanced across, fearful that she would be annoyed at his interjection.
‘Yeah. Sort of. Not one hundred percent maybe, but he wasn’t gonna talk to me anyway.’
‘Did you speak to him again at any time during the flight, sir?’
Smith smiled across at his girlfriend. ‘I was otherwise engaged most of the time, if you know what I mean.’ He looked directly at Harris not quite with a wink but near to it.
‘You did speak to him once, Dave, remember? You said he sort of moaned or something.’
‘Oh yeah, that’s right. Maybe about ten minutes before we landed I wanted to put something away into my bag in the overhead locker and I knocked against him when I was reaching up. I said sorry but he only kind of moaned at me. I noticed that he seemed to be sweating a lot and drooling. It was hot so I didn’t think too much about it and like, old guys like that do sweat and drool, don’t they?’
Both Harris and Gawn wondered what age Smith would regard as ‘old’. To anyone his age, twenty-two according to his passport, anything over fifty would be ancient.
‘And there’s nothing else you noticed?’ She looked closely at the Australian as he shook his head. ‘Well, we may need to speak to you again, Mr Smith. How long are you staying in Northern Ireland?’
It was Mandy Robson who replied to Gawn’s question.
‘We’ll be here for at least three months. Dave’s goin’ to meet my family and see a bit of the country.’ Her accent was Derry moderated by Melbourne, Gawn reckoned.
‘Thank you for your help. Both of you. Leave your contact details with the sergeant here. Enjoy your stay.’
While Harris walked them out, Maxwell walked across to his former boss.
‘Anything useful, ma’am?’
‘No joy. Unless you count the fact that the man was asleep and was sweating which might suggest he was ill, but we don’t have anything definite and won’t until Dr Norris is finished. It’s probably all been a total waste of our time. Just down to our newbie pathologist being overly careful but it was good to see you, Paul.’ She smiled broadly at him.
‘You too, ma’am.’
He watched her walk away with her new sergeant following in her wake. He couldn’t help thinking how Kerri had said he followed Gawn like a puppy. It wasn’t true but for ten seconds he allowed himself to remember when that would have been him. He loved his new job and Kerri loved the extra money which was allowing them to move house and the fact that his hours were more predictable, but he couldn’t totally ignore a little pang of regret not to be in the thick of investigations again alongside Gawn.
Chapter 5
The last time Gawn had visited the Regional Forensic Mortuary it had been to question the State Pathologist as a suspect in her serial killer investigation. She could remember the nerves in her stomach that day, the enormity of what was happening and how it could mean the end of his career, or hers even if he wasn’t guilty. Today was very different. Harris was by her side this time, not Maxwell. She considered Maxwell’s suggestion that she go easy on the new man and give him a chance. He should have known her well enough to realise that wasn’t her way. Harris needed to understand what she expected of him and, if he didn’t measure up, he needed to know that too. It wouldn’t be doing him any favours to let him get used to being sloppy.
As they approached the examination room they were surprised to hear music. Gawn immediately recognised it. Billy Joel belting out We Didn’t Start the Fire. They suited up before entering the room. The music increased in volume when they opened the door. Dr Norris seemed to have already started even though they were on time, one of Gawn’s character quirks. She hated being late for anything.
Dressed in a long green gown and white boots, the pathologist was standing, back to the door, over the body which was partially uncovered and lying on a cold steel slab, the middle of three in the room. The others were empty. Bright light flooded down onto the body. The pathologist hadn’t heard them coming in over the noise of the music and only became aware of their presence when they entered her peripheral vision. She immediately switched the music off looking guilty.
‘Sorry. I don’t know what the protocol is here but I always had music when I worked in Boston. The medical examiner didn’t mind but I guess Dr Munroe might. But he’s not here.’ She smiled conspiratorially as she added the last phrase.
How the pathologist chose to do her work didn’t really concern Gawn although she expected Munroe would have apoplexy when he found out. All she was worried about was that the work was accurate and preferably speedy.
‘I didn’t think we were late.’
‘You aren’t. I started a bit early. I undressed Mr de B and bagged his clothing for your forensics people. I’m just about to start the external examination now. I waited for you. You’ll be pleased to know I kill the music at this point so I can record my findings. Judges don’t tend to like a rock ‘n’ roll background when they listen to my evidence.’ She smiled at them.
Gawn remembered Maxwell always complaining that the mortuary staff had a weird sense of humour. She had never thought they had any sense of humour at all but this one seemed like a lively sort. She would certainly bring some fresh thinking to the job. She speculated how Norris would get on with Munroe when he got back from his sabbatical and guessed there might be fireworks ahead.
‘And I was right,’ she continued. ‘There’s some indication of a mark on the upper right arm corresponding to the mark on his jacket. Not a knife. Too fine for that. Even for a stiletto. Probably a syringe. I could have missed it if I hadn’t noticed his jacket.’
‘You mean he was a junkie?’ asked Harris.
‘You guys must have really funny junkies here if they shoot up through their jackets.’
Harris blushed and Gawn interrupted, displeased with the doctor’s sarcasm towards her officer. ‘If not a junkie, what are you suggesting, doctor?’ And she thought of the woman’s comment from yesterday about not speculating.
‘He may have been injected with something recently. But obviously not at your local doctor’s surgery when it was through his coat. We’ll have to wait for the tox report to know exactly what was injected. And even then, depending what it was and how long ago it happened, there may not be any traces left in the body.’ The doctor sounded disappointed. Perhaps she was bored already with her move from Boston to much more parochial Belfast and was seeing mysteries where there were none.
‘But I’m sending his clothing to forensics,’ she added. ‘There’s a chance there may be some residue of whatever it was on his sleeve.’
Gawn wondered how Munroe and McDowell, her boss, would feel about financing speculative tests like this. She suspected it would never have happened if Munroe had been here though she liked to think he would have picked up on the mark on de Bek’s arm. But she wasn’t sure. She was beginning to think Norris was the kind of pathologist she could work with.
Dr Norris pulled back the covering on the body, fully revealing the corpse. Gawn was aware of a slight movement to her right. She glanced quickly across at Harris but he seemed OK. Meanwhile, Norris had been hunched over the body. She called on her assistant to help her turn the corpse over and then on his back again before she spoke.
‘Other than that, the body is of a well-nourished fifty-five-year-old man. There are no distinguishing marks and no indication of any other external trauma. Inspector Maxwell was quick off the mark and got me de Bek’s medical details from The Netherlands. He hadn’t seen a doctor in the last six months and there was no indication of heart problems or high blood pressure or anything like that in his medical history or his family history either. He seemed to have been remarkably healthy, until he wasn’t. However, at his age, if he had a stressful job, it could have crept up on him or come out of the blue. But an examination of the heart and brain will tell us that. Our answers all lie inside the body.’
Gawn was pleased to hear about Maxwell’s good work. She had been sure he would do well and wouldn’t be surprised to see him make chief inspector before very long. Maybe someday she would be answering to him.
Dr Norris turned and addressed the two detectives.
‘There are no other external marks on the body but with even just a quick look I’ve seen some damage to the rectal area. I’ll need to examine the rectum and bowel more closely to know what might have caused it.’
‘You think he was gay, doctor?’ Harris asked.
‘How would I know what his sexual proclivities were?’ came the sharp reply.
Gawn was still enjoying the thought that Maxwell’s career move seemed to be working out well for him when she noticed that Harris was beginning to look slightly green. His voice when he had been speaking to the doctor was slightly higher pitched than usual and now she watched as his eyes scanned the room trying to focus but avoiding to take in the equipment sitting ready for use – the saw, the electric drill, the metal dishes, the specimen jars. The pathologist was poised with her scalpel over the chest cavity ready to make the Y incision to give her access to the internal organs. Gawn didn’t relish the prospect of having to try to catch her sergeant if he fainted or worse still accompany him to A&E if he injured himself.
‘I think we’ll leave you to it then, doctor. If anything shows up in the body, let me know. Otherwise we’ll wait until you have all the test results back.’ Gawn turned as she spoke, signalling Harris to follow her, which he seemed only too glad to do.
Once outside in the fresh air, the sergeant stood still, hands on hips, bent slightly forward and took several deep breaths. He looked abashed. A normal colour was beginning to return to his face. Gawn had walked ahead to her car ignoring him, and was sitting inside waiting, engine running. He ran across and jumped in beside her.
‘Sorry, ma’am.’
She looked across at him. Her expression was not unkind. ‘First time?’
He didn’t speak, just nodded.
‘It happens to the best of us. Next time you’ll be better prepared.’
It had never happened to her. She had seen worse than a body sliced open neatly and respectfully by a pathologist. Her mind went to twisted and bloodied bodies, missing limbs, even missing heads. Men, women and small children, blown apart. Some of them, her friends. One of them, her lover.
Chapter 6
Seb had phoned several times over the previous three days. Each time she had rejected the call. She wasn’t ready to speak to him; wasn’t sure exactly what she was feeling and what they might end up saying to each other if they did speak. Better to put it off. Keep some space between them.
Eventually, by Thursday, when they were still waiting for de Bek’s post-mortem results to come through, and she was trying to find any excuse to ignore the pile of reports which had been accumulating on her desk, Gawn decided she would follow up on finding out what the man had been doing coming to Northern Ireland. Then, if it did turn out that it was not a natural death, they would have a head start on the investigation. She was sitting at her desk waiting to hear back from the Politie with background on the dead businessman. The Dutch had notified de Bek’s next-of-kin, his son. He was arriving in Belfast this morning to identify the body. Gawn had dispatched Harris to meet him and escort him to the mortuary. Not that there could be much doubt about the identification. All that would be left to do then was for the coroner to release the body to the family and he could be repatriated to the Netherlands for burial.
When her desk phone rang she expected an internal call but instead it was the switchboard.
‘There’s a Dr York on the phone for you, ma’am.’
Her thoughts had been elsewhere and she took a minute to react.
‘Tell Dr York I’m busy at the minute and I’ll call him back. I have his number,’ she added.
She had no sooner put the receiver down, than it rang again.
‘Chief Inspector.’
Gawn recognised the warm tones of Dr Norris, the pathologist. She wondered how the woman managed to sound so cheery doing what she did every day. Perhaps being around the dead all the time gave you a deeper appreciation of the joys of being alive, she thought.
‘Dr Norris, I hope you have some good news for me.’
‘It depends what you call good news, I guess. I’ll email my full report as soon as I get off this call but I wanted to give you the dummy’s guide first.’
Gawn drew her breath in sharply.
‘Sorry, that sounded patronising.’ Now the pathologist seemed a bit ruffled. ‘I’ve been working with the same people in Boston for a while and they know me and they know my wacky sense of humour. I guess you don’t and that could have come across as very rude. Apologies, Chief Inspector.’
‘Apology accepted.’
‘Bottom line, if you’ll excuse the pun, Mr de B died of natural causes.’
Gawn wondered why the doctor seemed so upbeat if they had all just been wasting their time. She relaxed back into her chair feeling a bit deflated. She was dealing with no major cases at the minute. She had been hoping that de Bek’s death would provide a bit of a challenge, something out of the ordinary.
‘I was going to say, are you sure, but that would be rude to you. You know what you’re doing.’
‘Thanks for the vote of confidence.’
‘What was the actual cause of death?’
‘Myocardial infarction,’ came the prompt reply.
‘Heart attack? Wouldn’t he have been feeling pretty ropey? He would have called for help, surely? Said something to somebody? The cabin crew or one of the passengers nearby? I’ve always imagined people collapsing and clutching their chest and all that sort of stuff.’
‘You’d be amazed at the number of people who wait. They convince themselves it’s something else. They’ve got bad indigestion. It was something they ate. Remember he was on a plane, heading to a foreign country. Maybe he ’couldn’t speak English well.’
Gawn interrupted her.
‘He could, I’m sure. Most Dutch are very competent English speakers and he was travelling for business.’
‘OK, well maybe by the time he realised how bad it was it was too late but what I’m going to suggest might explain why he didn’t want to cause a fuss and draw any attention to himself.’
Gawn sat up in her chair again and waited. Norris’ timing was perfect. The pause was not too long but just enough to build a sense of expectancy.
‘I examined his rectum and there were clear indications of damage.’
There was silence on the end of the line. The pathologist was obviously waiting for Gawn to pose a question.
‘Do I want to know how? We’re not talking about sexual assault, are we?’
‘I think in this particular instance it’s much more likely we’re talking about smuggling.’
‘Smuggling? Smuggling what?’
‘It’s impossible to say without at least some trace evidence and there wasn’t any.’ She sounded disappointed. ‘But there was damage to the mucus membrane and when I’ve come across that before it was caused by drug smuggling.’
Gawn remembered hearing some of the Drugs Squad boys talking about catching smugglers at Heathrow who had inserted huge amounts of cocaine inside their body cavities.
‘There’s no other indication de Bek was involved with drugs?’ Gawn questioned.
‘No. No evidence of any drug-taking current or historic. He wasn’t a user but he could have been a mule. I just offer the thought. And…’ The doctor paused. ‘I also asked forensics to have a look at his jacket. Remember I mentioned there was a tear or kinda rip in it?’
‘Yes.’
‘They found traces of propofol on the material,’ she finished with a flourish.
‘I’m afraid that doesn’t mean a lot to me.’
‘It’s a short acting drug used in anaesthetics. Depending how much was injected it would have knocked him out very quickly and he wouldn’t have remembered too much about it afterwards. Anaesthesiologists refer to it as milk of amnesia. It didn’t turn up in his tox screen. I wouldn’t expect it to unless he’d been injected just before his death. A single dose wears off within a couple of minutes and it would have been eliminated from the body within anywhere from two to twenty-four hours.’
Gawn wasn’t sure exactly what all this meant.
‘You’re suggesting he was knocked out and then what?’
‘Who knows? That’s your domain, not mine. I give you the facts. It’s your job to join the dots.’
‘Could he have been injected on the plane and that caused his heart attack or prevented him trying to get help when he felt ill?’
‘Probably not. I think there would still have been some traces in that case. More likely it was done sometime before then. Did you find a syringe on the plane?’
Gawn wasn’t sure how hard they had looked. Reading the reports, she had seen no mention of finding anything like that. But then the passengers had never been searched. Someone could still have had the syringe on them even when she had been questioning them. Maybe they had all, herself included, being going through the motions assuming at the back of their minds they were wasting their time and the man had died of natural causes.
Being injected, possibly smuggling. She had no idea what it all meant. It all sounded crazy like a plot from a spy thriller. But she wasn’t going to jump to any conclusions. On the plane, de Bek had looked like a very insignificant middle-aged businessman. Nothing to suggest anything criminal. They needed to hear back from the Dutch police urgently. De Bek may not have been murdered but if he was involved in smuggling then they needed to know what he was bringing into the country, or planning to bring in if this was a practice run, and who else was involved. If she couldn’t find something definite quickly, McDowell would close the investigation down.
