A wedding ring on the victim’s left ring finger, thick with sooty grease, was photographed in situ then Garvey removed it, small crumbs of flesh dropping from the finger as he did so. He peered at the band under one of the powerful lights above the table, took a sample swab from inside and out, then cleaned it up. ‘Inscribed,’ he said, ‘R.K. and J.S. 23.4.72.’ He glanced at Gill and sketched a bow. Gill smiled: this could be a useful lead, to identity if nothing else. Pete got an evidence bag ready and placed the ring inside.
As well as photographs of the victim, a number of X-rays were taken of different sections of the body, Garvey, Pete and Gill withdrawing from the room each time while the scanner did its job. The resultant images came up on the computer screen. Garvey clicked on the first, the skull.
‘Forensic odontology?’ Gill said, suggesting another route to identification. The teeth were uneven, some missing, some broken. ‘Doesn’t look like he had a check-up every six months.’ Must cancel my check-up, she thought, the day after tomorrow but she’d be up to her neck with this. Garvey clicked on the second picture. The hand and neck.
‘Some evidence of wear in the vertebrae,’ he pointed out.
‘Middle-aged?’ said Gill.
‘Most likely.’
Then the third image. The mesh of broken ribs, the main part of the chest. Gill noticed the dark smudges at the same moment as Garvey said, ‘What have we got here, then?’
He clicked closer. The smudges were clearer now, two of them, small cylindrical forms with a conical nose, the size of cigarette butts.
Gill’s heart missed a beat. ‘I think we can safely rule out accidental death, or suicide,’ she said. ‘The poor bugger’s been shot.’
They were ready and waiting in the incident meeting room when the boss arrived, having sent word that she was launching a murder inquiry. Rachel had been part of DCI Gill Murray’s syndicate for three years now. Could’ve been sergeant if things hadn’t conspired to make her miss her exam. But there’d be chance again if she stuck at it. And she was determined to do so. Things had been rocky and Godzilla had been on her back on more than one occasion, making Rachel feel like shit, but she’d not yet been chucked out. Janet reckoned that the boss rated Rachel as a keeper, someone who’d fly up the career ladder if she put her mind to it, but Rachel wasn’t so sure. She’d been on the receiving end of Godzilla’s tongue-lashing so many times that she sometimes thought the boss had it in for her. Though to be fair there had always been good reasons for the bollockings. Not as if they were trumped up, bullying or whatever.