The Betrayal of Trust Read Free

well.’
    ‘Have they startedclearing again?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Don’t let them. We don’t know whether there are any more remains, where they came from, how old they are. This will be a slow job, sifting through a few tons of embankment.’
    ‘Problem is, if they can’t reopen the bypass and traffic can’t get through the town …’
    ‘You said it. Any chance I can get out there?’
    ‘You’ll have to wade to the main road, get picked up thereand dropped off by the roundabout. Walk along the bypass from there. The landslip is about half a mile down. Forensics are out there now and they’ll get a couple of small diggers to start shifting the debris bucket by bucket. Move it to the other side, check, then scoop it away if there’s nothing in it.’
    ‘Slow job.’
    ‘And too many bods are still tied up in the rescue and clear-up op.’
    ‘I needboots.’
    ‘You need waders and a hard hat, sir.’
    He went down the concrete stairs to the basement and the equipment store. An hour later he was standing on the empty bypass looking at a small hill of soil and rubble, beside which tarpaulins had been laid out. Two forensics in their white jumpsuits were bending over some pale grey bones, dirty with earth.
    ‘What have we got?’
    ‘Most of a body –that’s limbs, skull, ribcage … there was some damage as it all tipped down. We’re missing a foot, pelvis –’
    ‘Same person?’
    ‘At a guess. But until we get it all onto the table and fitted together we won’t know for sure.’
    ‘Roman soldier?’
    The young woman shook her head. She was pretty, short dark hair, nice smile. Shelley Churcher. Simon knew her well from many a crime scene over the last fiveor six years. She had once told him she had wanted to do this job since she was twelve and watched an American detective series every Saturday night.
    ‘No,’ she said quietly. ‘Much more recent.’
    ‘How much more?’
    ‘Can’t tell you that yet. But categorically not your Roman soldier.’ She looked down at the bones.
    How appalling, Serrailler thought, to have what remained of someone who had been fleshand blood, life and breath and laughter, finally spread out on a tarpaulin under the sky. To have been pitched down from some hole or ditch or grave along with tons of earth in a howling storm and then to lie being scrutinised by strangers, waiting to be fitted back into something that once again resembled a human body. It seemed wrong simply to stare at the bones, wrong to see what should neverbe seen, wrong and lacking in all respect and sensitivity – though forensics, he knew, always treated the dead as respectfully as they could, even while doing their job with medical detachment.
    ‘Cause of death?’
    ‘Come on, sir, you know better than that.’
    ‘How long has he been dead then? Can you give me anything?’
    ‘No,’ Shelley said. ‘Not yet. Nothing at all.’
    They both stood for a momentlonger. On the empty bypass, the diggers were still. Clearing the mounds of earth and debris would now have to be done slowly and carefully, everything sifted in case there were any further remains. The road would not reopen for several days, adding to the traffic chaos around Lafferton in the aftermath of the storm.
    But the logistics of all that were someone else’s job. Simon glanced down againat the skeleton, laid out on the tarpaulin.
    ‘Poor bloke.’
    Shelley shook her head. ‘That’s one thing I can tell you,’ she said. ‘This is a female.’

 
From the Bevham Gazette , 21 August 1995
FEARS GROW FOR MISSING HARRIET
    Fears are growing for the safety of 15-year-old Lafferton schoolgirl Harriet Lowther who went missing last Friday afternoon after playing tennis at the house of a friend.Harriet left the house of Katie Cadsden, in Lea Close, at around four o’clock and was last seen walking towards the bus stop on Parkside Drive. She was due to catch a bus into Lafferton and meet her mother, Lady (Eve) Lowther, at La Belle hair salon.