Borderlands Read Online Free PDF Page A

down and pick up the cup was evidently too much to make it
worthwhile. The cup looked tiny in his hand and he seemed awkward drinking from
it.
    "Quite
a good response from the RTE thing," he said, holding the cup just below
jaw-level, his third and fourth fingers jutting out, the handle of his cup too
small to accommodate them. "Twenty-three calls. Twelve nutcases."
    For
the press conference we had decided not to mention that Angela's body had been
dumped naked but for her underwear, nor the ring which she had been wearing, in
an attempt to weed out the cranks from those with genuine information.
    "A
few promising leads though," Costello continued, stirring the tea now to
give him something to do with his hands and the cup. "A mention of a
traveller boy, presumably Whitey McKelvey. The two of them were seen together
on Thursday night, at a disco in Strabane. Drugs were mentioned too." I
nodded, unsurprised. "In connection with her - not him, Benedict."
    "Might
be worth asking for toxicology reports from the state pathologist," I
suggested, though I suspected Costello had already done so.
    "I
spoke to her earlier," he said, trying to place the spoon back on the
saucer as gently as possible. "The manager of the Cineplex saw Angela
there on Friday afternoon with her sisters. They bought tickets for a
children's matinee but went to some horror thing. They were thrown out at about
four o'clock." The spoon clattered off the side of the cup and fell to the
ground. Penny scurried over on all fours and retrieved it with a smile.
    "On
Friday?" I repeated. "Are you sure? Cashell said she left the house
on Thursday."
    "Best
check it out in the morning," Costello replied. "Preliminary findings
are through from the pathologist as well. They put time of death at somewhere
between 11 p.m. Friday night and 1 a.m. Saturday morning." As he spoke,
he lifted a cream-coloured folder out of the bag he had brought with him. He
passed it over to me and turned his attention to Shane, who was sitting on his
sheepskin rug, watching Costello with open mouth, a rusk held aloft in his
hand, his face smeared with soggy biscuit. He grinned, showing off his two
teeth, and gurgled with satisfaction.
    I
skimmed through all the technical jargon. In short, Angela had been engaged in
sexual activity before she died - more than likely consensual and most
definitely using contraception; the lubricant found in swabs taken from her
suggested Mates condoms, and precluded any possibility of finding DNA
evidence, unless hairs could be found on her body.
    Stomach
contents seemed to verify that she had indeed been at the cinema on the day of
her death: there was no doubt that Angela had eaten popcorn, chocolate and, at
a later stage in the day, burger and chips. The pathologist also noted a
partially decomposed tablet of some sort, speckled brown and yellow. Toxicology
would identify the exact constituents.
    The
level of lactic acid in Angela's muscles - all her muscles - when she died was
massive, suggesting that they had been in vigorous use at the moment of her
death. The pathologist suggested that this was probably not consistent with
regular activity. It was more likely that Angela had suffered some kind of
seizure. She had died through asphyxiation. The bruising on her chest and other
bruising, discovered around her mouth when the lipstick was removed, suggested
that someone fairly small had sat or, more likely, knelt on her chest and
covered her mouth, perhaps while she thrashed beneath them in a fit. Eventually
the lack of oxygen and massive electrical activity in her brain became too
much.
    "Someone
knelt on her?" I said, breaking my own rule of never discussing such
things in front of my children.
    "Someone
small," Costello said, "and s-e-x-u-a-l-l-y active," he added,
mouthing the letters, while motioning with his head towards my children, who
sat pretending to watch TV but were listening to the exchange. I decided not
to tell him that Penny is top of her class