Shroud of Evil Page 6

  He returned to the corpse. Tremaine looked up and shook her head, which meant she could get little from the sail cloth. When Dr Clayton and the mortuary assistant unwrapped it from the body Horton hoped to be able to see what type of sail it was. Not that that meant much, because it wouldn’t come with the boat’s name stamped all over it, and even if it had some identifying feature that didn’t mean it had come from the killer. It could have come from anywhere.

  He was about to call Dr Clayton when his phone rang. It was Bliss. Horton knew she’d catch up with him eventually.

  ‘Inspector, I have received a formal complaint about your attitude from Eunice Swallows. You entered the apartment belonging to the husband of one of her clients despite not having permission, on whose authority?’ she snapped.

  ‘My own. I had reason to believe Mr Kenton might be inside, possibly ill or injured. I was wrong.’

  ‘I’d say you were. This does not—’

  But he cut her short. ‘Kenton’s been found dead. On a beach on the Isle of Wight. I’m there now.’

  There was a moment’s stunned silence before she said, ‘Why wasn’t I informed?’

  ‘I didn’t realize you were on duty, Ma’am.’

  ‘I—’

  Again he cut her off. ‘Detective Superintendent Uckfield is with me at the scene. He was informed and it is now a Major Crime Team investigation.’

  Again a fragmentary pause. ‘I’ll call him.’

  She rang off before Horton could utter another sound. Horton heard Uckfield’s phone ring, the moment he came off the line to Dennings. Horton called Dr Gaye Clayton on her mobile, hoping she was available and not out sailing, although the weather wasn’t exactly fair he thought, looking up at the gathering dark clouds and at the high rolling waves topped with foaming white spray.

  ‘Don’t tell me,’ she declared brightly, her West Country accent sounding stronger on the phone, ‘you’ve interrupted the very important business of food shopping to say you’ve got a body.’

  ‘Afraid so, and it means a trip to the island.’ He told her that Sergeant Elkins would pick her up from the Commercial Ferry Port berth in ninety minutes.

  ‘Good, that gives me time to go home and unload this lot.’

  He knew that she lived alone. She’d once told him she was divorced but had never volunteered anything more about her personal circumstances, and he’d never asked. He’d seen her with male medical colleagues having a drink and didn’t doubt she had admirers. Why shouldn’t she? She was attractive, in a boyish kind of way.

  Uckfield was still on his phone. Maybe he was still talking to Bliss or perhaps he was speaking to ACC Dean, his boss. Danby emerged from the rear of Lord Eames’ property and Horton joined him on the pontoon.

  ‘No sign of any intruder,’ Danby reported, ‘as I knew there wouldn’t be. I’d like to stay until the body is removed.’

  ‘Fine.’ Horton called Newport police station and asked them to tell the undertakers to stand by at Newport Quay, which was a short distance from the hospital mortuary. He then rang the coastguard services and, after briefing the officer in charge, requested their assistance in removing the body and transporting it to Newport Quay, as the marine unit was tied up and he thought it would be extremely difficult to negotiate the body through the woods. They could have taken it via Lord Eames’ back entrance but Danby hadn’t volunteered that option and Horton didn’t suggest it although it would have given him the opportunity to see the property. The coastguard said they’d be across within twenty minutes.

  Uckfield beckoned Horton over.

  ‘Bliss is going to break the news of Kenton’s death to Eunice Swallows. She’ll get a full list of the cases Kenton was working on, along with names and addresses of the clients and those he was investigating.’

  ‘Including details of the Veermans.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘We’ll also need to check out this Roger Watling. I don’t think he would have left Kenton’s car in his space and then made such a fuss but he could have considered it a good diversionary tactic.’

  ‘I’ll get Trueman on to that. Wonder Boy’s given permission for Bliss to work as the DCI in the incident suite, which Trueman’s setting up now.’

  Wonder Boy was one of Uckfield’s kinder terms for ACC Dean, whom he often referred to more derogatorily as the gnome on account of his diminished height and beaky nose. Horton thought the news of Bliss’s involvement wouldn’t exactly thrill Trueman. He didn’t need the hyperactive, overcritical DCI hovering over his shoulder and questioning his actions every other minute. But he’d bear it with the stoical silence that was his customary manner. Extra manpower would be drafted in and, depending on the outcome of the autopsy, it might mean that Cantelli and Walters’ weekend could be disrupted. Horton had no conscience about disturbing DC Walters but he did about taking Cantelli away from the bosom of his family.

  They waited until the coastguard had zipped Kenton into a body bag, by which time it had started raining and the police launch had returned from its reconnaissance of the shore and creek entrance. Elkins said they’d gone as far as they could up the creek but not to the top. ‘We’ll need the RIB for that,’ he reported. ‘And there’s no entrance we could see to the west of the pontoon.’ Taylor had mapped the crime scene and he, Tremaine and Clarke left on the launch for Portsmouth. Danby offered Uckfield and Horton a lift on his boat to Newport Quay, which Uckfield accepted with alacrity. Horton wasn’t complaining either. Despite it being a choppy journey it was better than having to hack their way through the undergrowth.

  Many times as they headed up the River Medina to the island’s capital town, Horton was tempted to tell Uckfield about his presence on that beach and about his chance meeting with the beachcomber, but he didn’t. He didn’t like the fact that he was withholding vital information. The thought made him tense. But he also didn’t care for the coincidence. He didn’t understand what was going on – if something was – and until he did he was going to keep silent. Kenton might still have been alive on Friday at midday, but if he had been then Lomas could have been looking over the location with a view to taking Kenton’s body there after killing him.

  They took their leave of Danby, with Uckfield promising to keep him informed, and climbed into the waiting police car. As they were driven the short distance to the mortuary the beachcomber’s words plagued Horton. ‘You never know what you might find washed up on the beach.’ He did now.

  SIX

  ‘Looks interesting,’ Gaye Clayton said. Dressed in her mortuary garb with a microphone headband placed under the cap covering her spiky auburn hair and the mouthpiece in front of her lips, which Horton knew was connected to a small recording machine in the pocket of her mortuary plastic gown, she eyed the corpse on the slab with a gleam in her green eyes.

  Looking up, she addressed them. ‘Are you staying for the autopsy?’

  Uckfield replied. ‘No, only until you unwrap him. We want to know how he was killed because I don’t think he crept in there and zipped himself up.’

  ‘Can’t see any zip,’ she replied, her freckled face peering at the body, ‘unless it’s last year’s model and it’s up the back.’

  Uckfield smiled facetiously.

  She nodded at the mortuary attendant, a sturdy, solemn man in his late fifties, who stepped forward with a digital camera and video. Uckfield tutted impatiently and shifted his bulk as the corpse was again photographed and videoed. Gaye Clayton was good, the best forensic pathologist Horton had come across, and she wouldn’t be hurried by Uckfield or anyone else.

  He studied Jasper Kenton’s lifeless pale face visible through the opening of the sail cloth, peering out like a man behind a curtain not wanting to be seen. It must have given Mike Danby quite a shock finding the body of someone he knew on one of his most prestigious client’s land. Not that he had displayed that when they’d met, though he’d sounded shaken enough on the phone. Danby was ex-job and would have been used to seeing bodies in worse
states than this; he would have quickly engaged one of the techniques for coping with witnessing a violent death – they each perfected their own. After the initial shock the adrenalin of the investigation would kick in. Horton felt it now but this time it was tinged with anxiety and apprehension which he couldn’t shake off. The forehead was visible, the brown eyes were still open, and the nose and fleshy lips with the cleft in the chin were showing beneath it.

  ‘Do you have an ID?’ Gaye asked.

  Horton told her who it was and relayed the circumstances behind the finding of the body and its location. She listened attentively without comment. By the time he’d finished, the mortuary attendant indicated with a nod that he had got the pictures he wanted.

  ‘Shall we turn him over? Perhaps you’d give us a hand, Inspector?’

  It was the first time Horton had viewed the rear of the corpse and his interest was immediately heightened when he saw that the sail had been doubled up around the body with the ends joining at the back and the knots in the lines securing it tied expertly. His eyes flicked to Gaye.

  Clearly she read his thoughts.

  ‘They’re bowline knots,’ Horton said. Even though Uckfield owned a boat it was of the motor cruiser variety and Horton wasn’t sure he knew all things nautical – in fact he doubted it. ‘They’re perfect for when you need a strong loop of line around something to secure it. This killer knew what he was doing.’

  He thought back to where Kenton’s car had been found. Both Oyster Quays Marina and the Camber were within walking distance of the Admiralty Towers car park. Had Kenton met someone on a boat in either of those places? But if so why park in Roger Watling’s space? Maybe Kenton knew it would be vacant until Saturday morning and was expecting to be back long before then.

  Horton watched with bated breath as the mortuary attendant began to untie the knots. After a few moments he peeled back the double thickness of the sail to reveal that Jasper Kenton was naked.

  ‘No immediate evidence of cause of death,’ Gaye said, studying the neck, buttocks and back of the legs. ‘No sign of strangulation or stabbing and no blunt force trauma to the skull. Inspector, if we could call on your assistance again, we’ll lift him and get him unwrapped, as Superintendent Uckfield put it. Perhaps you’d like to help me extract the sail, Superintendent.’

  Uckfield looked as though he didn’t like to but had to grudgingly oblige.

  Horton took a breath and steeled himself for the unpleasant task of lifting the body with the help of the burly mortuary attendant. Gaye drew first the lines away and put them in an evidence bag and then with Uckfield’s assistance began to pull away the sail from the body. Horton could see that although sizeable it wasn’t from a big yacht. He and the mortuary attendant replaced the naked body of Jasper Kenton on to the mortuary slab while Uckfield and Gaye stuffed the sail into a very large evidence bag and heaved it on to the trolley.

  Red faced from the exertion, Uckfield said, ‘The killer must have had a hell of a job wrapping him up in that.’

  ‘Which suggests he is strong and fit,’ answered Horton, thinking of the beachcomber, recalling those strong suntanned hands as he’d given Horton the tatty business card. He’d certainly looked fit even though he must have been in his fifties.

  But Gaye contradicted him. ‘The victim could have fallen dead or unconscious on the sail cloth, which had already been folded over in preparation to receive the body. It would only be a case of undressing him, unless he was already naked, and then easing the body one way and then the other to tie the knots. It would have been easier if there were two of them. Let’s turn him over and see if we can find out how he died.’

  This time Horton’s services weren’t required. The mortuary attendant and Gaye turned the body on to its back and immediately Horton saw what must have been the cause of death. ‘He was shot,’ he declared, staring at the round-shaped hole in the upper thorax of the hairless chest before exchanging a swift glance with Uckfield who was looking worried and rightly so.

  Gaye frowned as she studied it. ‘It looks that way but I can’t say for certain until I open him up, or even if it was the cause of death. He could have been alive when he was put in that shroud and placed in the water and therefore drowned.’

  Horton suppressed a shudder at the thought. And judging by Uckfield’s glowering countenance he didn’t like what they were seeing any more than Horton did. What on earth had Kenton been doing to get himself shot, stripped, bundled up in a sail cloth and dumped on the shore?

  ‘Whoever shot him aimed well,’ he said.

  ‘Yes. Right at the heart,’ Gaye answered almost abstractedly, which wasn’t like her, thought Horton, wondering what she was thinking.

  He said, ‘His clothes have been removed to try and hide forensic evidence.’

  ‘Probably. And just to make it more difficult,’ she added, ‘your killer decides to wrap him up in a sail to further confuse any traces of forensic evidence and leave the sea to eradicate even more.’

  Uckfield sniffed. ‘A clever-dick killer. Let’s hope he made some mistakes along the way. They usually do.’

  Gaye looked up. ‘We might get something on where the body was prior to being found on the shore from an analysis of hair and skin. But there’s more.’ She paused. Horton could see her mind racing with thoughts. ‘The body is wet.’

  ‘Yeah, well it has been in the sea,’ Uckfield sneered sarcastically.

  Gaye rolled her eyes at him while Horton rapidly thought. ‘Wet all over?’ he asked sharply.

  ‘Yes.’ She waited for him to say it.

  ‘Which means he must have been immersed in the sea before being wrapped in the sail cloth.’

  ‘The sail cloth is laminated, which means it’s waterproof. And from what I could see there didn’t appear to be any tears or holes in it, but we’ve only shoved it into a bag, not examined it. You’ll need to have it tested to see if it has lost its waterproof capability. And if he was shot and fell on to it then there might be traces of blood. But he might not necessarily have been in the sea. I’ll test skin samples for a saline content but he could have been shot in the bath or the shower, hence his nakedness, and the killer could then have wrapped him in the shroud and put him in the sea. He could even have been shot in a shower on board a boat.’

  ‘I thought you were meant to be giving us something to help our investigation, not make it more complicated,’ grumbled Uckfield. ‘Time of death?’

  And this, thought Horton, was a critical point.

  She considered this while scanning the corpse. ‘As you know a body usually sinks because the specific gravity of it is very close to that of water. As putrefactive gas formation decreases so the body gravity creates enough buoyancy to allow it to rise to the surface and the length of time this takes depends on whether the body is dressed in heavy clothing, which this victim wasn’t, although I would say that sail was heavy enough to make him sink. Normally, at this time of the year, his body would have risen to the surface between three and five days but the victim hasn’t been dead that long. Even despite being cocooned there would have been much clearer signs of decomposition than there are. Post-mortem lividity looks well established, as you can see by the purple colouring of the skin, and rigor mortis is also well established but the temperature of the sea might have slowed it down. I’d say time of death twenty-four hours but that is very approximate. You could be looking at less or possibly more.’

  Uckfield raised his eyebrows as though to say thanks a bunch.

  ‘I might be able to be more precise when I open him up, and when we examine stomach contents.’

  Horton’s own stomach churned as though in sympathy, reminding him he hadn’t eaten since that bacon sandwich on The Hard, which seemed a lifetime ago, not that he felt much like food now. He quickly assimilated Dr Clayton’s information.

  ‘That puts it sometime late Friday afternoon but he was last seen leaving Swallows at four-thirty on Thursday afternoon. Are there signs he was restrained?
’

  ‘Difficult to tell because of the lividity but I’ll certainly take a closer look.’

  Horton addressed Uckfield. ‘We need to know what time he entered the Admiralty Towers car park.’

  ‘Get Trueman on to that. Any ideas on the shroud, apart from it being a sail?’ Uckfield asked Gaye.

  ‘It looked old, or rather I should say worn. I couldn’t see a number on it, could you?’ she asked Horton. A sail number might help to identify the boat it had once belonged to, although that wouldn’t necessarily give them the killer. The sail could have been abandoned or sold on long ago, or the boat itself could have been sold. They might get a manufacturer’s mark or name on the sail, Horton thought, which could give them the name of the person who had bought it, if the manufacturer had kept records, but that didn’t mean he was the killer. In fact Horton doubted he was because he couldn’t see this killer giving them such a nice big signpost saying ‘killer this way’. It could have been purchased second or third hand years ago. He said he hadn’t seen any number on it and Uckfield shook his head to indicate he hadn’t seen anything either, but they hadn’t unfolded it.

  Gaye glanced at the mortuary clock. ‘I’ll hopefully have more for you by seven-thirty.’

  Horton took the evidence bags containing the sail and the lines, thanked her and addressed Uckfield after they had disrobed and were heading out of the mortuary.

  ‘It could have been an accident, the gun went off, the killer panicked, undressed the body and wrapped him up like that, thinking he might sink when thrown overboard.’