Deep Cover Read Online Free Page A

was.’
    â€˜Indeed . . . well . . . skeletons do not tell us as many tales as a fresh corpse would, but they tell us sufficient . . . and this lady died of a fractured skull.’ Shaftoe ran his latex encased fingertips over the surface of the deceased’s skull. ‘Of note is a single massive blow to the top of the head which is linear in form. Care to take a look?’
    Vicary stepped forward and approached the dissecting table. He examined the top of the skull and noted the linear depression with minor fractures leading from it.
    â€˜That,’ Shaftoe said with a restrained, matter-of-fact tone, ‘is what’s called making sure. The felon was making sure alright, God in heaven was he making sure. Or she. You don’t survive a blow like that, not on this planet anyway.’
    â€˜Murder?’
    â€˜Oh yes, it’s the linear pattern which suggests a blow to the skull with a linear weapon . . . a golf club would do nicely. If she had fallen head first on to a hard surface you’d see a more radial pattern of fractures.’
    â€˜I see.’
    â€˜The blow seems to have landed right on top of her head, which suggests that she was in a sitting position when she was attacked . . . possibly from behind, but that’s supposition. I just say what caused her to stop breathing, if I can . . . and don’t ever ask me the time of death . . . not ever. That’s the stuff of television shows. I’ll determine her approximate height in a moment, but she is not going to be a tall woman – about five foot or one hundred and fifty centimetres.’ He paused. ‘Ah . . . the wrists have been fractured, and, yes, so have the ankles, as if she was disabled before being killed. The ankle and wrist fractures are peri-mortem . . . and two of her ribs have been fractured on her right side.’
    â€˜Battered to death.’
    â€˜Well, yes, but the fractured ribs, ankles and wrists would not be an attempt to kill her; it’s more in the manner of being tortured before being murdered.’
    â€˜Strewth!’
    â€˜Strewth is right. The work of a very bad boy or girl . . . this is a right bad ’un.’
    â€˜All about the same time? I mean, occurred at the same time?’
    â€˜All peri-mortem, yes.’ Shaftoe rested his stubby fingers on the edge of the stainless steel table. ‘But the fractures to the wrists and ankles seem to be deliberate, precise. The blow to the head has the sense of being a single strike at a can’t-miss target. So, the overall impression is that she was disabled prior to being murdered.’
    Vicary groaned, then inhaled through his nose and received the strong smell of formaldehyde. ‘So this is not just a murder victim? It . . . she is also a torture victim?’
    â€˜Seems so, there is a story here, a right old yarn.’
    â€˜Can you tell how old she was at her time of death?’
    â€˜Yes, I’ll extract a tooth; that will give us her age at death to within twenty-four months, that is to say an age, plus or minus twelve months . . . but she was an adult and she had given birth. You note the pelvic scarring? That is caused by breech delivery . . . two or more children. I can say that she was over the age of twenty-five when she died. The skull plates have knitted together. There is no indication of rheumatics or arthritis. I accept that children can succumb to infantile arthritis and that is not a funny number, but, by and large, rheumatics and arthritis are indications of middle to old age and are not present.’ Shaftoe pointed into the skeleton’s mouth. ‘British dental work, you’ll be able to confirm her identity from her dentures if she was murdered less than eleven years ago. Dentists are obliged by law to keep all records for eleven years after the patient last attended