When the Evil Waits by M Lee (top fiction books of all time txt) 📕

‘Checking the location where the body was found?’

Ridpath nodded.

‘Discover anything?’

They were walking towards a big sign with the words ‘Mortuary and Path Lab’ printed on it. Dr Sewell opened the door.

‘Not a lot. The location was similar to that of my victim in Manchester.’

‘In Chorlton Ees?’

Ridpath looked surprised.

‘I read your pathologist’s report. Dr Schofield, wasn’t it? Extremely thorough and detailed. A man after my own heart.’

‘You two should meet up and chat about the latest dissection techniques.’ Ridpath laughed light-heartedly. Mortuaries always made him feel light-headed. He never knew whether to laugh or cry.

‘You’re right, we should.’

The joke went over the doctor’s head as he unlocked the door.

‘Of course, the body has already been released back to the family, so I have nothing to show you. But we can access my original report and display it here.’

The mortuary was made up of a row of six stainless steel tables. The last two were occupied by the shapes of human bodies covered by white sheets. The whole place had a sterility and an anonymity to it that Ridpath hated. He hoped he never ended up in a place like this.

An image flashed through his mind. Polly lying on one of these tables, her body displaying the awful Y-section from her shoulder, down between her breasts and ending just after her belly button.

He quickly whispered his coping word, ‘freedom’, and concentrated on remembering the image of being on top of a mountain, the wind blowing through his hair, tired but happy.

‘What was that?’ asked Dr Sewell.

‘Nothing,’ Ridpath mumbled.

A technician was preparing the area for a post-mortem, placing the instruments in the correct order on a table next to the head of the body. ‘Let me finish this, Mike, and then we’ll get started.’

‘No worries,’ the technician answered. ‘Whenever you’re ready, Pete.’

The whole set-up was far more informal that Dr Schofield’s in Manchester. They walked down to the end of the mortuary and through another door.

A small lab. Another technician, female this time, was placing a slide on the viewing ledge of a microscope. ‘Got that gut cross-section for you.’

‘Won’t be a sec.’

Dr Sewell put his password into a computer and then entered another code for the McCarthy case. A standard pathologist’s report appeared. He scanned the report, reminding himself of the details of the post-mortem. ‘What do you want to know? I bet it’s if there are any similarities between this murder and the one in Manchester?’

Before he could answer the question, the doctor continued.

‘In post-mortem results, quite a lot of difference. Alan McCarthy was killed with a knife; two thrusts to the chest region, one of which penetrated the pericardium. The boy died instantly. Plus, unlike your case, there was no evidence of any sexual activity, either before or after death.’

‘Was the body washed?’

The doctor checked his notes. ‘It was. I found evidence of soap on the skin. A common or garden supermarket soap, Lifebuoy. Your body was also washed, I believe.’

‘We think it was to remove all fibres or DNA traces.’

‘True, there were no fibres or external DNA on the body.’

‘Where?’

‘Where what?’

‘Where was the body washed?’

‘We believe it was in a toilet in the Festival Gardens used by the homeless.’

‘Why take the risk?’

‘The risk?’

‘Of being caught washing a body in a public toilet?’

The doctor shrugged his shoulders. ‘You’ll have to ask the killer, I’m afraid. Science doesn’t tell us the motivations for any action, merely that it has happened. You can’t “follow the science”. You make a decision based on the evidence. All decisions are inevitably value judgements. Science doesn’t make decisions, people do.’

Ridpath felt deflated. He had been hoping there would be more links between the two deaths. But other than both bodies being washed, there was nothing. All the evidence was inferential: the location of the body, hidden in woods close to the Mersey.

‘Just a few more questions, Doctor. Were there any signs of violence on the body? Bruising or anything like that?’

Once again, the doctor checked his notes. ‘None that I found.’

‘Finally, you were the medical examiner called out when the boy was found.’

‘I was.’

‘Was the body posed in any way?’

‘No, unlike your boy it was naked and thrown away as if in a hurry. Not posed at all.’

‘Thank you, Doctor.’

‘I hope I have been of help, DI Ridpath, but I fear I haven’t. The only real similarity between these two deaths is that they both involved young boys.’

‘That’s it, Doctor. I can’t believe two child-killers were operating at exactly the same time only thirty-five miles apart. It just doesn’t make sense.’

‘The science suggests otherwise, Detective.’

‘But as you said earlier, Doctor, science doesn’t make judgements, people do. And my judgement is that these two cases are linked.’

‘Despite there being no evidence to support this claim?’

Ridpath tapped the side of his head. ‘The evidence is in here, Doctor.’

Chapter 81

On the drive back to Manchester along the M62, Ridpath’s mind went over every detail of the case again and again.

Nothing made any sense.

Were the cases linked?

Possibly, but there was no concrete evidence, plus Merseyside already had a suspect who had confessed to the crime.

In Manchester, they didn’t even have a suspect. Turnbull’s bullheaded insistence that Michael Carsley was guilty had wasted valuable days of work.

Daniel’s statement that it was his mother who was violent towards them, not his father, was interesting. Could the mother have picked up David from the street? It might explain why the boy got into the car. But the idea of any mother killing her son was unthinkable. Nonetheless, he made a mental note to ask Chrissy about Irene Carsley. Perhaps he would have to pay her a visit again.

By the time he parked outside Police HQ back in Manchester, he had been through the case, backwards and forwards. The problem was he still had nothing to offer Claire Trent.

Upstairs, on the MIT floor, the detectives were gathering in the Situation Room. There was a distinct atmosphere of gloom over the place. Ridpath could smell it, that bitter aroma of