When You're Safe, page 8
“I see,” the man said, looking along his nose up at Finn.
“I am Inspector Winters. Please ignore my colleague’s jokes, he’s actually quite capable… when chaperoned.”
“My name is Wilfred Amblin,” the man said, shaking both of their hands. “I am the senior pathologist here. I was given word by Chief Constable Collins that you were on your way.”
“Thank you for giving us your time,” Winters said, looking around.
Three metal tables sat in front of a row of shiny doors. Finn knew very well what was behind those doors.
“Rob… Chief Constable Collins,” Finn started, correcting himself. “He informed us that you’ve come to the conclusion that Quentin DeGrey was murdered?”
“Yes,” the man said with some excitement. “I don’t want to talk ill of other pathologists, but the initial autopsy was not as thorough as it should have been. But I had to be sure.”
Wilfred moved to the row of shiny doors, clunked open the handle of the middle one, and then rolled out a cadaver, hidden by a sheet, which was slid via a metal tray onto one of the surgical tables.
Finn noticed Winters jump slightly from the clatter as the body and tray came to rest.
“You okay?” Finn asked.
Winters didn’t say anything. She just looked at the outline of the body covered by a clinical white sheet.
Wilfred unceremoniously pulled back the sheet, revealing the cold, dead body of Quentin DeGrey. He was elderly, his white beard covering a sea of wrinkles, each one telling of life’s relentless march, like the rings inside a dead tree.
The pathologist walked over to a small box, pulled out some blue gloves, and put them on. Moving over to the body, he pointed to the left hand.
“Here, look,” Wilfred said, holding up the ring finger of the victim.
Finn leaned in. Just underneath the tip of the fingernail, there was an almost unnoticeable pinhole.
“Took me two days to find that,” the pathologist said with pride. “I suspected he had been poisoned with something exotic, but I couldn’t for the life of me see how. There was no evidence in the stomach, throat, or mouth. His intestines were clear, and even the blood didn’t show poison per se.”
“Then how did you know?” Winters asked, blinking a few times as if moving herself out of another daydream.
“The first clue was the heart,” the pathologist said enthusiastically, as if few ever spent much time talking to him down there in the depths of the hospital.
“What about it?” asked Finn, still examining the hand of the deceased.
“One ventricle was damaged by something,” the pathologist said. “The nature of the damage at first glance looked like a bog-standard cardiac event, but then on closer inspection it was almost as if the material had been worn away by something, to a degree.”
Finn turned to him and said, “Fascinating. You know, we dealt with a poison on our last case, Dead Man’s Noose. From a flower that’s native in my home state. It causes marks around the neck that can be mistaken for strangulation. But this poison…” Finn trailed off into thought, a memory surfacing.
“I can’t identify it,” the pathologist said. “It’s a slow-acting poison, you see. The deceased was injected in the finger with the slightest pin prick. Then it moved around Mr. DeGrey’s body, causing damage to the heart, possibly even some other internal organs, though I haven’t discovered that yet. Then the poison was metabolized by the body and excreted.”
“Clever,” Winters said. “So the murderer poisons Quentin DeGrey, then the poison weakens his heart until he has a cardiac arrest. By that time the body has removed the poison from his system and there’s no sign of it. Is that what you are telling us, Dr. Amblin?”
“Yes, exactly,” the pathologist replied, looking down at the body. “But the only evidence is the strange erosion in the heart and that pin prick.”
“How long between being poisoned and death?” Finn asked.
“Going by the healing on the injection site,” Wilfred said, thoughtfully, “two days, perhaps? Without knowing what the poison is, I can’t be certain of how long it took to work. But it’s certainly an effective murder tool. Most pathologists would have missed it.”
Finn patted Wilfred on the shoulder. “Good for you, Wilfred, my man.”
“Quite,” Wilfred said, half smiling, half shocked at Finn’s brazenness. He rubbed his shoulder as if Finn was a little too rough. “I’m afraid, then, this is most certainly a murder. Unless Quentin DeGrey injected himself.”
Finn looked down at the hand again. He rubbed the blond stubble on his face, deep in thought. “I do remember reading about metabolizing poisons when I was back in basic training. But they are very uncommon. I wonder, could you, with a little research, come up with some possibilities for us, Wilfred?”
“A list of poisons that could have been used, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“Of course,” Wilfred answered. “It might take a while, though. I should be able to come up with some candidates in the next day or two?”
“Great,” Winters said. She turned to Finn. “Well, looks like you were right all along, Finn. Two murders. Two dead family members. The question is, who’s next?”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Finn was trying his best to follow Winters’s car along the country road.
The rain had come, and with it Finn watched the last dying embers of the day’s sun begin to extinguish somewhere beyond the horizon. In the distance, he could see only two blurry things as prominent as any moon or star: the London skyline glowing as a faraway point of light in the darkness, and then the tall looming shadow of DeGrey Castle miles to the side of it, closer yet stark against the darkening sky.
The weather was worsening.
“Where’s the wipers on this thing?” Finn said in frustration, the view now being obscured by a downpour covering the glass in front of him.
He touched one of the controls, thinking it was the wiper settings, but instead a spray of windshield washer fluid joined the rain on the window.
“Ugh.”
He flicked something else, and that was more worrying. Nothing happened in response. Finn imagined that he had put on some new setting for something in the car, and that he would find out about it at the worst possible moment.
“I hope that wasn’t an ejector seat,” he joked to himself, turning for a moment to the empty passenger seat next to him.
Finally, in the darkness of the interior, lit only by a few glowing dials on the dashboard and the occasional street light outside in the rain, Finn found the right control. The wipers sprung to life, but then every few swipes, one of them would stick for a moment, making a horrible squeaking noise against the glass.
He shook his head. “The rental company should be paying me for taking this car.”
Finn started to think how amusing it would be if it were all some sort of elaborate psychology experiment. If they wanted to see how far the car could push him before he broke, he felt he wasn’t far off it.
The taillights of Winters’s car soon came into view ahead through the rain. She was slowing down, letting Finn follow more closely so as not to lose his way. Her indicator switched on for a left turn-off. Finn breathed a sigh of relief, happy at the thought of getting out of the rain and off the shadowy road as Winters took the turn-off and headed toward a coffee place. A lone beacon in the stormy night, the world around a dark blanket of unseen countryside.
Pulling up in the almost empty parking lot, Finn struggled to put the parking gear on. He gave a gasp of exasperation, and it finally clicked into place. He pulled himself out of the driver’s seat and straightened up in the rain as if trying to maintain some exterior of charisma.
Winters was already out of her car, standing beneath a dim overhead light, her face cast in the shadow of the umbrella she was holding above her head. Even in the shadows, Finn could see her smiling at him.
“I’m glad my struggles amuse,” he said.
“You have your moments, Finn,” she replied playfully.
“I’d roll the car off a cliff and into the sea, but I don’t think something that evil can be killed by conventional means.”
Winters let out a loud laugh. One of those uncontrollable giggles that reminded Finn of being back in school and making a girl with red hair laugh at his antics. It felt good to hear that laugh from Amelia Winters. Her laugh felt like a tonic to the weary world.
“Is this place okay?” Winters asked above the sound of the pattering rain all around them.
“If it’s got coffee, it’s the right place,” Finn answered, walking toward the run-down building with the word “Cafe” burning bright in neon lights above the dingy entrance.
They stepped inside and shook the rain off their clothes, Finn taking longer to do it. The cafe was as close to an old American diner as Finn had seen so far during his time in England. Red booths with scarred leather cushions sat around the periphery of the room, the dull metal counter in the middle. There were three or four other patrons dotted around, sitting silently staring into their coffees. Finn reckoned they were all there just passing time, waiting to get back on the road again to some unknown destinations. Either toward new troubles or running from them.
Walking up to the counter, he smiled at the woman behind it, her badge showing the name “Heather.” All Finn got in return was a tired glance.
“How is the coffee in here?” he asked.
“American?” the woman asked, her tiredness abating slightly.
“Yes ma’am,” Finn answered.
“That’s nice,” Heather said in a broad accent. “We don’t get many around here. The coffee is fine, it’ll do its job if you’re wanting to stay awake for the road.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Finn said. “One coffee and…”
“One tea, please,” Winters added.
“I’ll bring them over,” the tired woman said with an equally weary smile.
Finn walked over to an empty booth and sat down. Winters sat across from him, They both looked out through the glass to the rain beating on the window. It was bleak darkness outside and Finn was surprised by how quickly the weather had turned.
“You wouldn’t know it’s summer out there,” Finn said in a low voice, feeling as though he was somehow catching the tiredness of the place. Like it was contagious.
“You still don’t get the British weather, do you?” Winters said, turning to him.
Her eyes were tired too, but more than that, there was a disappointment within them. Finn knew it was about the case.
“It changes so fast,” Finn observed.
“That’s the way of it,” Winters replied.
Heather brought over their hot drinks and set them down in front of them.
“You don’t happen to sell a hair dryer or a towel by any chance?” Finn asked.
Heather looked puzzled, as though not getting the humor. “Oh yeah,” she then said. “You’re wet… Very funny.”
She then turned and busied herself with one of the other patrons.
“She doesn’t like my jokes,” Finn said.
“You think?” Winters replied.
“Actually, I have been thinking,” Finn said, sipping his coffee. “We’re really far behind the game.”
“What do you mean?” asked Winters, holding her tea cup in both hands and blowing on it to cool it down.
“It’s not our fault,” Finn continued. “I mean, we’ve only been on the case for a day. But Quentin was killed two weeks ago and we only now know it was murder. The killer has taken his second victim in Maggie DeGrey, and I wonder if that’s where it’ll stop. If there are more DeGreys to die, then the killer is following a plan, and it’s one he’s been meticulous about. That means he’s more than a step ahead of us. By the time we get done with all of our basic inquiries, that castle up there could be more like a grave than anything else.”
Finn nodded to the darkness outside. Somewhere nearby the castle loomed, but the rain and the dark had now obscured it in the distance.
“I agree the killer is meticulous,” Winters said. “Waiting for Maggie going on her run, to kill her with a car, that takes planning and knowledge.”
“Yeah.” Finn nodded and took another sip from his cup. “I think now that we’ve established two murders, we need to look at the bigger picture.”
Winters rubbed the sides of her temples and closed her eyes for a moment.
“Either you have a headache,” Finn said, “or you are trying to psychically destroy me.”
Winters opened her eyes. “The first one. I just need to drink this.”
“What you need is rest,” Finn said.
“So what is the bigger picture?” Winters asked.
“The DeGreys are powerful, rich, influential,” Finn explained. “At least, on the surface.”
“Do you think things are worse for them than they’re letting on?”
“I don’t know,” Finn said. “But one thing I do know is that Stewart DeGrey and Devon Langdon both confirmed that they are in a dispute over money and ownership of a business. It could be the normal slice and dice of business, but it could also be that there are money problems and that’s why Stewart and Quentin DeGrey were both trying to dissolve the company and sell its assets.”
“Money certainly pushes people to kill,” Winters said, sipping her tea. “I agree it’s a good line to investigate, but we know Quentin was the patriarch of the family. With his death, could it have been about inheritance?”
Finn took out his phone and started scrolling through it.
“It’s not the time to look through social media, Finn.”
Finn looked up from the blue hue of the phone screen. “I want to see if the tabloids have caught wind of something we haven’t. Something from the last few weeks.”
“Tomorrow, we can take a look at the inheritance and money trouble angles,” Winters said, yawning. “This tea isn’t doing it. I think I need to get some sleep.”
Finn was deep in thought, reading on his phone. He knew he had hit the jackpot.
“Inheritance, you say?” Finn said, grinning. “Things just got very weird.”
“You found an article?” asked Winters.
“It’s from the Chronicle Standard,” he said. “You know it?”
“You’d be better reading tea leaves than reading that,” Winters replied. “If you’re wanting something reliable.”
“Now, now,” Finn said. “Let’s not judge our friends at the Chronicle Standard too harshly. Their rummaging around in sensationalist speculation might have turned up a key clue.”
“Okay,” Winters sighed. “What does it say?”
Finn cleared his throat and put on his best news reporter voice:
“Rumors abound that Quentin DeGrey’s sudden death has sent the DeGrey family into a panic. An insider from the DeGrey estate has confirmed to the Chronicle Standard that the entirety of DeGrey Castle and its grounds has been left to the Dashville Museum in London. We reached out for comment from the DeGrey estate, but so far they have refused to answer our inquiries. No matter, because soon the entire family will be easily reachable on the dole queue.”
Finn broke character. “What’s dole mean?”
“It’s a slang word for unemployment line,” Winters said. “So let me get this straight, the paper is reporting that Quentin DeGrey left his fortune, including the ancestral home, to a museum and not to any of his family?”
Leaning back in his chair, Finn finished his coffee and placed the empty cup back on the table. “Could someone have murdered Quentin, thinking they would inherit the castle? Then they found out they weren’t going to get anything in the will. Following that, the killer lashes out and kills Maggie DeGrey for some reason?”
“But why the second murder?” Winters asked. “Surely that wouldn’t change anything?”
“Maybe,” Finn said. “Or maybe Maggie had a hand in persuading Uncle Quentin to cut the family out of his inheritance. In which case, Maggie DeGrey’s murder would be…”
“Revenge,” Winters said, finishing his sentence. “It’s possible.”
“What do we do next?” Finn asked.
“Sleep,” Winters said. “In the morning, let’s go to the museum and see if we can find out more.”
A worrying thought fluttered through Finn’s mind for a moment. Winters clearly saw the expression on his face change.
“What’s wrong?” Winters asked.
“We should contact the museum staff right now,” Finn said, gravely. “If the killer has started lashing out in revenge, what’s to stop him from murdering those who would benefit from the inheritance? He could be about to kill someone who works there.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
The killer sat in the darkened room, bathing in the blue glow of the television screen, captivated by the outcomes of his actions.
A fresh-faced female news reporter with blond hair was on the screen, standing outside the grounds of DeGrey Castle, lit by a video light in the dark. In one hand she held a microphone and in the other a large umbrella, which protected her only partially from the downpour of rain.
Her words were like rocket fuel for the killer. They caused great delight.
“A late-night admission by Chief Constable Robert Collins suggests that authorities now consider the DeGrey deaths as a double murder,” the woman said to the camera, holding her microphone tightly in her grip.
Now the screen changed. The female reporter was on the right-hand side, and on the left, a popular news reader with a black mustache and a neat side part, sitting in a warm studio.
The female reporter winced in the wind and rain, trying desperately to hear what was being said.
You got the raw end of that deal, the killer thought, watching the on-scene news reporter trying to put on a brave face.
“So, Kelly,” the news reader in the studio said, “what we’re looking at here is, for the first time, public acknowledgment of the rumors that have been spreading around social media tonight about the deaths of Quentin DeGrey and Maggie DeGrey. Both killed. Both murdered in different ways. Are the police saying this is the work of one individual?”
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