The Innocent Dead - Rhona MacLeod Series 15 (2020) Read online

  The familiar smell of coffee on entry was, however, not accompanied by the usual and much-anticipated filled rolls. Rhona found herself perturbed by this, since her brisk walk through the park had definitely given her an appetite.

  Chrissy’s hair colour at present was a deep auburn. Rhona harboured a suspicion that she was attempting to replicate the DS Michael McNab look. Not the chin stubble, of course, but definitely the hair tone.

  DS McNab was a hero of Chrissy’s, having shielded her pregnant self from a gunshot, the scar of which he still wore on his back, although it was now cleverly disguised by a skull tattoo.

  ‘What? No rolls?’

  Rhona looked about in the hope that the familiar paper bag might be on view, just not yet opened to allow the hot aroma to escape.

  ‘I thought we’d try something new for breakfast for a change,’ Chrissy said, rather sheepishly, it seemed to Rhona.

  ‘What exactly?’ Rhona demanded.

  ‘Porridge pots,’ Chrissy offered. ‘And you have a wide choice of flavours.’ She pointed at a line of the pots. ‘Cinnamon, apple, banana, honey, syrup. All very healthy,’ she added.

  ‘What’s going on, Chrissy? Since when have you been health-conscious?’

  Her forensic assistant looked mightily offended by that remark. ‘Since I had wee Michael.’

  ‘I’m talking about your eating habits, not what you feed your son.’

  Chrissy shrugged. ‘People change. They get older. They get wiser.’

  ‘You’ve joined a gym,’ Rhona accused her.

  ‘Never,’ Chrissy replied with gusto.

  ‘What then?’

  There was a moment’s silence before Chrissy admitted, ‘I’ve taken up running.’

  ‘Really?’

  Rhona was impressed if it were true, although Chrissy had ‘taken up’ things before now, only to discover her enthusiasm waning after a while. Usually because the guy she was joining on such pursuits had lost his appeal.

  ‘Who is it?’ Rhona demanded.

  ‘No one,’ Chrissy said categorically. ‘Just me. So, what’s your poison?’ She gestured at the line of pots.

  Trying not to look too downhearted, Rhona chose a pot, hoping this new plan of how to start the day was simply another one of Chrissy’s fanciful ideas, like changing her hair colour regularly, and would soon be abandoned.

  ‘Right,’ Chrissy said, pouring what Rhona prayed was still strong coffee. ‘There’s a message for you from Bill. He wants you to call him after breakfast.’

  DI Wilson, or Bill as she and Chrissy called him, had been Rhona’s mentor since she began in this job. He’d been on duty the night she’d attended the scene of a particularly brutal murder of a teenage boy – a boy who had looked so like her that Rhona had imagined he might be Liam, the son she’d given up for adoption seventeen years previously. In the end, Liam had found her and they’d eventually come to an understanding regarding why Rhona, when still a teenager herself, had given up her baby.

  She’d confided in Bill back then, how personal the death of that teenager had been to her, and how it had prompted her to search for her own son. Bill, with two teenage children of his own, had known exactly what she meant.

  ‘It’s my biggest fear,’ he’d said. ‘That one day I’ll turn up at a scene of crime and one of my kids is the victim . . . or the perpetrator.’

  His inclusion of perpetrator hadn’t just been a way to lighten the tension of that moment. Every parent worried about their kids getting into trouble, police officers probably more than most. They knew that kids from supportive families could go down the wrong path just like the ones who didn’t have the same advantages.

  Bill too had been the one who’d never given up on his quest to get her to go to Castlebrae. How she had fought him on that. Rhona smiled in silent thanks that she’d finally listened to his wise advice.

  ‘You like the porridge pot!’ Chrissy said, thinking the smile had indicated that.

  Rhona didn’t correct her.

  Two cups of strong coffee later, Rhona made the call.

  ‘Good morning, Dr MacLeod. How was your porridge?’

  ‘You know about that?’

  ‘I was given full details this morning. I’ll take a bet and say you went for plain.’

  ‘You know me too well. So, what’s up?’

  ‘Wild swimmers spotted what they thought was a human hand in a raised peat bank next to Advie Lochan, south of Glasgow. We sent someone up to take a look and they confirmed the sighting. Since buried and hidden bodies are a speciality of yours, we’d like you to excavate the site.’

  ‘Okay. Can you send me the location?’

  ‘A police car will lead you out there. It should be with you in ten minutes or so.’

  As she rang off, Chrissy appeared. ‘We’re off then?’

  ‘We are,’ Rhona said. ‘An excavation by Advie Lochan. South of the city.’

  ‘Cool. I’ll get organized.’ Chrissy paused for a moment. ‘I take it we’re in the wilds up there? Do I need to take a food supply just in case?’

  ‘Just not porridge,’ Rhona said firmly.

  5

  Diary entry of Karen Marshall aged 11

  2 May 1975

  They’re still looking for Mary. So am I. I’ve been to all the places we like. The den was first. She always went there when she was happy. I imagined her sitting in her white dress, but she wasn’t there.

  Dad’s a detective, so he’s looking for her too. The police are going to every house in the street to ask questions. Nobody came out to play Kick the Can tonight. Dad wouldn’t even let me go outside the garden to skip on the pavement. I had to play ball against the side of the house.

  When I was going to bed Dad asked me if Mary might have run away.

  I know about Mary’s dad. How angry he gets if Mary, her big brother or sister don’t come in when he whistles on them. There’s a big belt he uses hanging up in their kitchen.

  Mary never seemed to mind that, although she got the belt sometimes. The belt wouldn’t have made her run away. She had been confirmed in her white dress and veil. She was saved now and had a seat reserved for her in heaven.

  When I told Dad that, he didn’t seem to understand about the dress. But the dress was the most important thing in Mary’s life. She would never go anywhere she might dirty her dress.

  6

  The scene on arrival had immediately reminded Rhona of a black-and-white photograph she’d seen of Saddleworth Moor, near Manchester, when the police had been searching for the bodies of three of the children killed by Ian Brady and Myra Hindley in the mid-sixties.

  Under a clear April sky, though, this Scottish moor looked benign, empty and majestic. On closer inspection, Rhona could make out dark burnt patches among the heather and mosses, indicating it was being used for driven grouse shooting. Despite the intrusion of man, this was still a perfect spot – just like Saddleworth Moor – in which to hide a body that would never be found.

  Whoever had buried the body she and Chrissy were preparing to expose could never have imagined that folk would be mad enough to ever wild swim in the neighbouring dark waters of Advie Lochan, never mind in early April.

  Even then, had there not been a long dry spell – had the water level not fallen, exposing the bank and allowing it to dry out – there would have been nothing to see, even for the determined and curious wild swimmer, which had been Bill’s description of the young woman who’d alerted the police to her find. Despite the shock, Julie had fetched her mobile and, swimming back, had taken a number of images to back up her gruesome discovery.

  Rhona had already set up the time-lapse camera, with a cover to protect it from any change in the weather. Although, according to the forecast, there was a chance that they might avoid rain for the next twenty-four hours.

  Once they were ready to begin, she would set the camera to take an image every ten minutes of excavation. That sequence of shots would eventually be put together as an MP4 video,
which she could use in court if required. This type of work required daylight, so that the different-coloured layers of the soil might be registered, hence no forensic tent.

  En route to the locus, Rhona had called Jen Mackie, her forensic soil scientist colleague, regarding their destination and had discovered that the co-ordinates of the locus were likely to be in an area of raised bog. If true, that would affect what they might find during the excavation.

  ‘I was involved with the Woodland Trust in 2012 surveying areas of raised bog across Scotland,’ Jen had told her. ‘Where you’re heading is one of the areas we mapped. I’ll email you the report. It makes for interesting reading.’

  Rhona had put the call on speaker in the car, so Chrissy might listen in.

  ‘So what does that mean exactly for the state of the remains?’ Rhona had asked.

  ‘The chemistry of raised bogs would suggest you may find more than just a skeleton. I’ll be in touch when I get back from Paris,’ Jen had promised. ‘I’m currently being driven through the streets in an armed police convoy to give evidence in an enquiry.’

  At this news, Chrissy’s eyes had lit up.

  ‘When can I go to Paris to give evidence?’ she’d whispered.

  ‘When you come to work for me,’ Jen had told her with a chuckle, having obviously heard Chrissy. ‘You’ll send me images?’

  ‘I will,’ Rhona had promised.

  At that point, Jen had wished them good luck before they’d heard the whine of a siren, and she’d rung off.

  ‘Does she have to give her evidence in French?’ Chrissy said.

  ‘With the degree of complexity involved there’ll be an interpreter, although Jen’s quite fluent in French,’ Rhona had told a wide-eyed Chrissy.

  ‘I’d better get started on the Duolingo then,’ Chrissy had announced with a characteristic grin.

  The emailed piece from Jen on raised bogs had made for interesting reading, particularly in the current circumstances.

  The specific acidic and oxygen-poor conditions which are present allow for the mummification of the body’s soft parts such as skin, hair and stomach contents. However, many other conditions must also be fulfilled in order to prevent micro-organisms from breaking down the human body. The corpse must be sunk in water or dug into the ground and covered quickly. In addition, the deposition of the body must occur when the bog water is cold, in the winter or early spring, otherwise the process of decay can begin. Examples of raised bog bodies include the Woman from Huldremose, Grauballe Man and Tollund Man.

  ‘Cool,’ Chrissy had pronounced on reading it. ‘So that’s how we become famous. We unearth a five-thousand-year-old body, perfectly preserved, and have to go around the world giving lectures on our discovery.’

  They’d exchanged looks at that point, signifying their mutual hope that it would in fact be a prehistoric mummy they were heading towards, rather than a more recent burial.

  Had it been warm, damp summer weather, rather than a cool, dry spring, disturbing the heather cover near the designated area would have resulted in a concentrated cloud attack by the resident midges. There were still some about, many of which found their way to the areas of Rhona’s face not covered by the mask. Chrissy had determinedly flapped at a few herself before heading for her bag to bring back a supply of midge repellent.

  Rhona smiled her thanks as she sprayed her exposed skin.

  Once the mix of grass, heather cover and associated roots were removed to expose the underlying peat, they began laying out an alphanumerical grid round the suspect area at 0.5-metre intervals.

  There had been nothing definitive on the surface in the form of vegetation to suggest a recent decomposition below, although the heather had given way to grass in part. If it was indeed an ancient burial, then the ground cover would have had time to recover.

  Rhona had already studied the fingers visible in the bank, just short of a metre below the surface of the peat. They belonged, in her opinion, to a human hand, either that of a small female or a child. Its time in the ground would only be determined when the excavation was complete. Once the remains were fully exposed, should they appear to be prehistoric, like the other bog bodies found in Britain and Europe, then archaeologists would be called in.

  As she became absorbed in the careful removal and sifting of the layers of earth, Rhona recalled the last time she’d been involved in such an excavation. Then, they had been called to the Orkney island of Sanday where a digger, breaking up the tarred playground of a former island school, had unearthed a human skull. The site had been very sandy, much like the rest of the island, although as exposed to both the wind and the weather as the current locus.

  Of course, Orkney was rich in archaeological sites, so the first thing they’d had to confirm was that they weren’t digging up the bones of some Viking ancestor, a common enough occurrence and definitely the province of archaeologists.

  Rhona found herself quietly wishing that what they were about to unearth might prove to be what Chrissy desired – another bog man or woman – rather than the discovery of a child’s body, like the scene she’d recalled from Saddleworth Moor.

  Eventually the hope she’d been nursing began to evaporate. Chrissy knew it too, but said nothing, although Rhona could read it in her eyes as she carefully extracted the last of the peaty soil to expose their first full view of a naked and mummified body.

  Possibly a female, she lay on her back, a stuffed plastic bag placed under her head, seemingly to act as a cushion.

  They knelt in silence for a moment, the monstrosity of what they had just unearthed overwhelming them.

  ‘When did supermarkets start giving out plastic bags?’ Chrissy said quietly.

  ‘Sometime in the sixties, I think.’

  ‘So we have a time frame at least,’ Chrissy said.

  Jen had been right about the effect of the raised bog locus. The exposed body appeared well preserved, the quality of the soil allowing for the mummification of the skin and hair – and, hopefully, the stomach contents.

  ‘It’s every parent’s nightmare,’ Chrissy said, and Rhona knew she was thinking about her own toddler son, wee Michael.

  ‘We can raise the tent now,’ Rhona said. ‘Then you can take the soil samples to the van. Get the SCO to give you a hand. Best to give Bill a call too and tell him what we’ve found, while I do a closer examination.’

  ‘You’re okay to be here alone?’

  In the silence that followed Chrissy’s question, the memory of what had happened during the sin-eater case passed between them.

  ‘I’ll be okay,’ Rhona assured her, although she wasn’t at all certain that she would be.

  Well, this is how I find out.

  After the tent had been raised, Rhona began to take a series of her own photographs at close quarters, noting the careful laying out of the body and the cushioned head, seemingly at odds with a violent end, although there were marks on the pubic area that suggested stabbing might have played a part.

  The long, dark, peat-reddened hair looked carefully arranged on either side of her face, the setting of her arms at a sixty-degree angle to her side resulting in the fingers of the left hand protruding from the dried-out bank.

  Something the gravedigger hadn’t anticipated, Rhona thought.

  Focused as she had been on the body, she had managed for a while to blot out the strong smell of disturbed earth. Scent, she was acutely aware, lingered longest in the mind and was the most likely sense to trigger a PTSD flashback, and so must be avoided.

  Despite her best efforts, the scent now rose to engulf her and with it came the memory of soil raining down on her, to clog her throat and blind her eyes.

  Focus on the victim, she told herself. I am her witness, and that’s more important than anything that’s happened to me.

  Eventually her brain reacted to her command and the tidal wave began to retreat, slowly at first, but then more swiftly.

  And then it was gone.

  Rhona released
the breath she hadn’t been aware she’d been holding and set about taping the body in situ, as there was always a chance that she might recover something other than soil. Once on the mortuary slab, all this would happen again, but in the movement between here and there, something vital could be lost.

  It was time to write up her notes. Climbing out of the grave, Rhona settled down with her notebook. She felt strangely calm now, knowing the emotional storm had passed. Having weathered it, she could feel more confident about working in confined locations again.

  It had grown cold as the early April sun had started its descent. Having now bagged the remains for the journey to the mortuary, the locus would be covered, and they would return to it in the morning. A careful study of the soil beneath the body was as important as the material removed from above.

  ‘Are we just securing the plastic bag and its contents?’ Chrissy asked on her return.

  ‘We’ll check inside and bag the items separately,’ Rhona said.

  Rhona carefully opened the bag, noting how resilient the plastic had been. It was no wonder that the world was groaning under an ever-increasing accumulation of plastic in the time since the plastic bag had become a shopping essential.

  The first item she extracted turned out to be a plastic tiara with a stained veil attached. Next came the remains of a white net dress and underskirt. Finally, a pair of small black pumps with a bow.

  The clothing was, of course, circumstantial but it did point to their initial thought that they were likely dealing with a young female.

  As each item was recorded and bagged, the air of sadness between them grew.

  ‘That might have been the outfit I wore when I was confirmed,’ Chrissy said, a catch in her throat. ‘Except for the shoes. Mine were white.’

  ‘How old were you back then?’ Rhona said.

  ‘Eleven. What are you thinking?’ Chrissy added, noting Rhona’s thoughtful expression.

  ‘I was wondering what happened to her underwear.’