The Bone Seeker Read Online Free PDF Page B

It’s been in the water a while.’ He scraped a hand across his forehead. ‘In this heat.’
    But he was too late. Edie was already striding towards Luc’s ATV.
    Luc glanced across at the policeman, who shrugged.
    At the gurney she stood for a moment to gather herself. Then she took hold of the zip on the body bag and pulled. In an instant, Martha Salliaq’s face appeared from under the plastic, as if in some terrible hallucination, puffy, the skin mottled, a greenish-purple web already creeping across its surface. Edie heard herself give an involuntary cry, more animal than human, like the moan of a gull. Her hand was shaking, her whole body electrified. Something fluttered uncontrollably in her chest but she barely recognized it as her heart.
    The girl’s eyes were still part open, the mouth slack and watery, the lips blue-tinted now to match the hair, which had been cut crudely into a short bob. But there was nothing on the face to suggest anything other than a kind of calm and remote unreality, as though the skin had only ever contained an impression of life, a reflection perhaps. As she stood an implacable sadness came over her, as though she’d reached a vast wall at the end of a dark track.
    She reached for the zip again and the nightmare disappeared under the plastic.
    Derek came towards her with his hand outstretched, a pained look on his face. She pulled her arms tight around her body. Last thing she needed right now was sympathy. She thought about the girl’s firebrand father, Charlie, then about her fragile mother, Alice; how this news might crush the life from them both.
    â€˜When?’
    Luc gave a little shrug. ‘Hard to tell. The condition of the body suggests a while ago, maybe a couple days, but I’m no expert. I’m guessing from all the blood that she was alive when she went in.’
    Edie suddenly felt numb and useless. ‘Her hair. Someone cut it. Why would they do that?’
    â€˜A trophy maybe? I don’t know, Edie.’
    She heard herself give a low moan. ‘You’re sure she was murdered then.’
    â€˜It looks that way,’ Luc said.
    â€˜Do you know how?’
    For a moment no one answered. She saw Luc cut a sideways look at Derek, seeking permission to speak, then bite his lip and avert his eyes.
    â€˜It looks like a stab wound. We can’t confirm anything yet. There will be tests, an autopsy,’ Derek said.
    There were no signs of injury on the girl’s face or neck. None on the body, at least what she had seen of it.
    â€˜A stab wound where?’
    Derek threw a glance at Luc and braced himself.
    â€˜
Utsuk
.’ The vagina. ‘It looks like the knife went a long way inside her, most likely severed the uterine artery, Luc thinks, which led to the blood loss. But it’s not inside her now.’
    Edie felt something inside her melt. An ill vapour spread through her body.
    â€˜At this stage it’s hard to say whether or not she was raped, other than with the knife of course,’ Luc added hastily.
    A steadying hand landed on her arm but she didn’t need it. Part of her felt strangely energized. She guessed it was the shock, or the adrenalin, or both.
    â€˜We should tell the Salliaqs,’ she said.
    â€˜I think that might be best coming from you,’ Derek agreed. ‘Before the gossip starts. You know how it is up here.’
    She did. Her own home settlement of Autisaq was exactly the same. There were only two kinds of secrets in the High Arctic: the open ones and the ones you took to your grave.
    â€˜Don’t say anything specific about where the body was found if you can help it. It’ll be hard for them to hear that she was in Lake Turngaluk. The Kuujuamiut go out of their way to avoid coming here. They say it’s evil.’ He arced a finger in the air. ‘You’ll notice all the
inuksuit
point away. If they ask how she died just say she was stabbed. Right now,