Juliet was the first person Tim saw when he arrived back at the police station. She had removed her spectacles and her face was pushed up close to her computer screen. She was concentrating intently. Tim had seen her like that before – it gave away that she was examining scene-of-crime photographs.
‘Have Lincoln sent over some photographs already? That was quick!’
‘Just these few, of the young girl…’
‘Yates! Come up here, will you?’
‘I’ll see you later,’ said Tim. ‘You can show me the photos, tell me what you make of them.’
Superintendent Thornton was seated behind his desk when Tim entered his office, looking both important and annoyed. ‘I expect you to come to me to be briefed about a major case, not consult your subordinates.’
‘I wasn’t asking Juliet – DS Armstrong – to brief me, sir. I was just interested in the photographs she has up on her screen. Lincoln have sent them quickly.’
‘All right, Yates, we’ll overlook it, shall we. This is no time to be petty. You’re right, the photographs have come through quickly, but only of the latest victims. What did Armstrong tell you?’
‘Nothing at all, sir. We barely spoke. She was just mentioning a young girl… she didn’t even finish the sentence.’
‘Yes, well that young girl is Michael’s first priority. He needs to find out who she is… was. If at all possible, the parents must be notified before the media get hold of the story and the parents have to suffer the misery of putting two and two together.’
‘I’m sure you’re right, sir, but would you mind starting at the beginning? I’m a bit confused about what’s happened.’
The Superintendent sighed and began again, enunciating his words slowly and carefully, as if humouring a willing but backward child.
‘You will remember, Yates, that Michael came here to brief us because a body had been discovered in the Fossdyke… dyke… er, whatever it is.’
‘Canal.’
‘Yes, yes, the Fossdyke Canal. And you will remember that the body was without its head; and that the head was missing. In fact, I think it was you yourself, Yates, who enquired whether North Lincs intended to search the canal to see if the head could be found. Which of course they did. Michael had a dredger and two police frogmen detailed to the spot yesterday afternoon, I must say with admirable efficiency. They worked for a few hours yesterday, apparently without finding anything, and returned this morning at first light. The man operating the dredger arrived first and set to work immediately. The frogmen arrived a bit later and entered the water some distance away from him, for obvious reasons.’
‘They didn’t want to get entangled with the dredger?’
‘Indeed. I believe they’d decided to work along the stretch of the canal where the dredger had been the day before, hoping that it might have dislodged something of interest.’
Like a disembodied head, Tim thought, without saying the words aloud.
‘Well, the uncanny thing is that the dredger pilot and one of the frogmen each found something at practically the same time. The dredger pilot realised that he’d dislodged a large mass of some kind. And, even before he’d dived, the frogman noticed a young girl’s body floating in the water.’
‘Floating?’ said Tim. ‘How long had it been there?’
‘Michael’s still waiting for Forensics to send in their report.
But we’re more or less certain that she’d been there for only a few hours.’
‘You mean she was killed and dumped in the canal last night?’
‘Either then or in the early hours of this morning.’
‘And she’s intact? I mean, none of her body parts are missing?’
‘As I said, we don’t have a pathologist’s report yet. But visibly she’s ‘intact’, as you put it. She hasn’t been decapitated, if that’s what you meant. I must admit it was one of the first things I asked Michael myself.’
‘Christ!’ said Tim. ‘A young girl! That’s terrible. Do we know how young? I know we’ll be waiting for the path lab to tell us exactly,’ he added, pre-empting a further comment from Thornton about this.
‘Quite,’ said the Superintendent again. ‘But we can hazard a guess. Michael says he’s pretty certain she’s a schoolgirl – he’d put her age at about fourteen.’
‘Was she wearing a school uniform?’
‘I don’t think so.’
‘And no girls from the area have been reported missing?’
‘Not yet. It’s almost certain to happen in due course.’
‘What about the other body? The one found by the dredgerman? I’m assuming from what you’ve already told me that it was a body,’ said Tim.
‘Yes, indeed. And this one appears to be much like the first one – the one found first, I mean. It appears to have been in the water for some time; it was weighted down with rocks; it’s that of a young woman (but not a girl) and it’s dressed in chain store clothes. No jewellery or other possessions that could aid identification. And the head has been hacked off.’
‘I don’t mean this question to sound flippant, but is there any sign of either of the heads?’
‘No. They’re both still missing. Of course, the canal search has been halted now. It will be resumed in due course.’
‘We actually have no reason to believe that the death of the young girl is linked to that of the two murders, do we? We’re not even yet certain that she was murdered?’
‘It’s correct that her cause of death has yet to be established, but it’s likely she was murdered. I don’t get the drift of your thinking.’
‘The two women were almost certainly killed by the same person. He... or she, though I doubt it was a she... could either have been watching or alerted to the fact that the first woman’s body had been found when DI Robinson issued his press release. My money’s on the second. Whoever it was will therefore have known there was a good chance of the second woman’s body being found quite soon afterwards. Even if the killer is one of those who enjoys notoriety, why risk getting caught by dumping a third body in the same place? And whether or not it was the same killer, how did they manage to dump the girl without being seen? Even if she was a suicide, and unconnected with the murders, how did she manage it? I’m assuming there was a police guard on that stretch of water last night.’
Superintendent Thornton looked uncomfortable.
‘I wouldn’t know about that, Yates. You’ll have to ask Michael when you see him. I’ve said I’ll free you up to report to him later this afternoon. That’s all right with you, isn’t it?’
‘“Report” to him, sir? But we’re both on the same rank. I hadn’t envisaged…’
‘It’s Michael’s investigation and he’s asked for you to be seconded to it. So yes, you will be reporting to him, Yates. As I’ve already said, there’s no time at present for pettiness. You know yourself there can only be one SIO. Too many cooks, and all that.’
The Superintendent consulted his watch.
‘You won’t need to leave for Lincoln for an hour or so, so I suggest you make best use of the time by briefing MacFadyen as fully as you can about the farm vehicle thefts. You’d better include Armstrong in the briefing, as well and, come to think of it, it might be a good idea for me to sit in. Then I’ll have more idea about what to say to the Lord Lieutenant.’
‘I thought you said DI Robinson had asked for DS Armstrong to be seconded to the case as well.’
‘He has, but I haven’t made up my mind about that yet. Always willing to help, but he can’t have all the outstanding members of my team. I’ve already agreed to loan Ms Gardner’s services as well.’
Tim was left none the wiser about whether in the Superintendent’s estimation he was ranked with Juliet and Patti Gardner as ‘outstanding’.