Wages of Sin Read Online Free PDF Page B

self-protective, police manner, though she knew that Peach would want her to get whatever she could from the medical man at this early stage.
    She found herself looking away automatically as the man lifted the clothing of the dead girl. He said softly, ‘We can’t hurt you now, love. We want to find who did this, you see.’
    Lucy was startled for a moment. Then she realized that the pathologist was speaking to the corpse, not to her, as if apologizing for the liberties he had to take, the indignities he had to inflict in the causes of science and detection. He spoke as if she was a child, but a living child. Lucy was pleased and a little moved to hear it: it was a human contrast to the man’s necessary detachment, an acknowledgement that what lay beneath his hands had been a living human being, with a person’s reactions and emotions.
    â€˜Did she die here?’ asked Lucy tentatively.
    â€˜Impossible to say, yet,’ said the man without looking up. He switched his dialogue back to the corpse. ‘Just let me move you a little, love. Gently does it.’
    Lucy Blake let a few seconds pass before she said, ‘Any idea how long she’s been dead?’
    He grunted and at first she thought he was not going to answer. Then he said, ‘She’s been here some time. There’s extensive hypostasis throughout the body. Do you see?’
    Lucy looked unwillingly. She saw his ball pen pointing to a slim thigh that was very white on its upper surface but dark blue in the inch above the floor, where the blood had sunk in the many hours since the heart had stopped pulsing it around the limbs. She nodded, not trusting herself to comment. After a moment she said, ‘Is there much rigor?’
    The pathologist looked into her face for the first time, wondering how much these young, unlined features had seen of violent death. ‘It’s not as advanced as you might expect. But if she’s been here since she died, in the temperatures we’ve had this weekend, it would take a long time for the processes of rigor mortis to be complete. It’s not a very reliable guide to the time of death, you know, rigor.’
    Lucy seized her cue. ‘So you think she’s been dead for some time. Days, perhaps?’
    The pathologist smiled at her. Professionally, he wouldn’t commit himself to anything yet: he was experienced enough and had appeared often enough in court to have the spectre of a clever defence counsel who was out to make a fool of him perpetually at the back of his mind. But he was here to help the police, and the only service he could offer to this poor dead girl who sprawled so pathetically behind him was to point the way towards her killer. So he said, ‘You’ll have to wait until I’ve had her on the table for anything more definite. Even then, it will be informed speculation: time of death is notoriously difficult to establish, when we’re not on the scene immediately. But this girl’s been dead for some time: the body temperature has dropped virtually to that of the environment.’
    â€˜A day? Two days?’
    He smiled into the white face beneath the striking dark red hair, so anxious for information, so eager to get on with the hunt for the killer of what lay behind him. ‘I couldn’t stand up and state this in court – not yet anyway – but I’d say she’d been dead for two or three days. That’s an informed guess: it could even be longer than that; it’s as cold as a fridge in here, and cold preserves. But probably not less that a couple of days.’
    â€˜Thank you. It will help us with the door-to-door enquiries when we set them up. We’ve no idea who she is yet.’
    They turned automatically and looked down at the white face, smooth as carved alabaster upon a tomb. He said, as though reluctant to trample a little more on that face’s privacy, ‘She’d had sexual congress not long