‘Bryant will speak with you first so you can get off, okay?’
He nodded. ‘All right if I have a smoke first?’
‘Go for it,’ she said, walking around him.
She stepped into the Portakabin.
Jameel and his companion turned. Jameel nodded briefly and turned back to the screen. The gaze of the man next to him lingered.
Kim met the look squarely. The expensive grey suit told her she was looking at the owner of the Aston Martin outside. He was a man that wore a pricey suit well. Not too tight and not too loose. His shirt was a crisp white with a burgundy silk tie. His chestnut hair was cut stylishly and professionally short but he had the blackest eyelashes she had ever seen on a man.
He stood and offered his hand. She reached out and shook it.
‘Curtis Grant, Managing Director of Elite Systems Security.’
Kim recognised the name. It was embroidered into Darren’s jumper.
From the corner of her eye she could see the quad grid on Jameel’s screen. ‘You set up the CCTV here?’ she asked.
He nodded. ‘We offer a complete security service to meet all your needs.’
He began to reach into his suit pocket and Kim held up her hand. He may have been in the habit of offering a business card to everyone he met but she wasn’t in the market for his services.
He took another step forwards. ‘Professor Wright asked me to come in. We’re looking at an upgrade.’
The words horse and bolted sprang to mind but this was not her business.
She turned away and took two steps further into the Portakabin.
‘Morning, Professor,’ she offered. Now that was progress. She had learned to offer a morning greeting. Woody would be so proud.
‘Please, Inspector, call me Chris.’
She nodded the acknowledgement. She very rarely allowed people to drop her title. The use of her first name was an intimacy that she did not invite. It was good for people involved in a case to remember they were dealing with police officers and not friends. Although the title dropping could be used to her own advantage sometimes.
His voice dropped to a whisper as he turned his back towards the others. ‘Have there been any developments on the case – anything you can share with us?’
Kim could understand why he was asking. He was in charge of the facility and he’d been right there with them when the body had been found. However, he was a civilian and she could no more share details of the case with him than she could with anyone else.
‘I’m sorry, Professor, but I can’t really discuss our lines of enquiry.’
She had been unable to force his first name out of her mouth.
She ignored the surprise on his face and continued with her reason for being here. ‘I’d like to take a walk around with…’
‘Catherine is just about to start her morning checks. Perhaps you could tag along.’
Perfect.
She nodded her agreement and headed towards the woman whose concentration was fixed on the clipboard.
‘The Professor said I could—’
‘I heard, Inspector. I’m not deaf,’ Catherine said without raising her head.
Clearly not a morning person, Kim surmised. She didn’t hold it against her. She herself had yet to find any time of day that enhanced her mood.
However, she was not a patient person. She offered a small cough.
Catherine finally turned and looked at her. There was neither a smile nor a frown.
‘Subtle,’ she said, standing and towering over Kim. The loose jeans and plain black vest top enhanced the woman’s androgynous shape. ‘I am now ready to make a start.’
Kim transferred her mobile to the back pocket of her black canvas jeans and removed her jacket. The temperature was around nineteen and humid.
She followed Catherine out the door and turned left. The discovery of Jemima’s body had curtailed their guided tour and Kim could see they were now taking the other route.
‘So you’re an entomologist?’ Kim asked as they left the gravel and stepped onto grass.
‘Yes,’ Catherine answered.
‘And you’ve worked here for—’
‘I’m thinking, Inspector. I work as I walk.’
So do I, Kim thought. Or at least I try to.
Catherine’s words were not unpleasant or rude. Merely cool and detached. Not unlike herself, Kim conceded.
‘Am I a suspect?’ she asked and Kim saw the first evidence of an expression. It was the hint of a smile.
‘Everyone is a suspect,’ Kim answered honestly. ‘So…’
‘I have worked at Westerley since it opened, having been asked by Professor Wright to leave my old job.’
‘And you two met…?’
‘I was a student of his at Aston University.’
‘So what appealed to you about… oh my God!’ Kim exclaimed.
‘I’d like you to meet Elvis,’ Catherine said.
A body had been placed half sitting, half lying against the trunk of the tree. Kim was glad Catherine pointed out the name as she honestly could not have fixed a gender.
It wasn’t the sight of the body that had startled her. It was the volume of wasps.
One buzzed close to her ear and she instantly swatted it away. Two hovered close to Catherine’s right eye, but she made no move to displace them.
Nerves of steel, Kim noted.
‘Elvis is helping us learn about wasp activity on the body.’
‘How?’ Kim asked.
Catherine leaned down closer to the body. Kim did not. She had seen many dead bodies that were combed for clues to help her do her job. Somehow the sight of corpses deliberately abandoned to the insect and wildlife community for feasting and housing was a new experience for her.
‘We all know that clumps of fly eggs hatch into thousands of maggots in as little as four to six hours. But yellow jackets and wasps show up within the first few hours too. Some feed on the body itself. Others snag flies in their wing, carry them off and decapitate them with one swift bite of their jaws. Others feast on the masses of fly eggs or the young maggots hatching in the body’s openings.’
‘So what are you hoping to learn about the wasps?’ Kim asked, taking a step back. Catherine’s movement around the body had caused a clump of them to emerge from the left eye of the corpse.
Catherine didn’t move a muscle.
‘I want to analyse the level of wasp activity against the level of decomposition. The fresh stage, the bloated stage, the decay stage and the dry stage.’
Kim could verify from the unique aroma that Elvis had not yet reached the dry stage.
‘Is there a reason Elvis is under a tree?’
Catherine nodded as she pushed herself to her feet.
‘Bodies left in the sun tend to mummify. The skin becomes tough like leather, impervious to maggots.’
Kim was prevented from asking anything further as Catherine began to write. Kim watched the hand move across the paper but it was the joints that caught her eye. All four knuckles contrasted with the tanned skin. Each one of them was white with scar tissue.
‘You can speak,’ Catherine said.
The woman tried to write something and then shook the pen up and down.
‘You really do like your insects, don’t you?’
‘I am fascinated by their ability to survive. I only hope they never learn to communicate with each other.’
‘Why?’ Kim asked, finding the statement a little strange.
‘Because there are over a million species of insect and they represent more than half of all known living organisms. So if they ever managed to communicate with each other, we’re in big trouble.’
Kim had never thought of that. But perhaps Catherine had thought about it enough for both of them.
Catherine shook the pen again and then looked at Kim.
‘Do you…?’
Kim shook her head.
As Catherine spun it between her palms Kim glanced over towards the location she’d stood in just twenty-four hours earlier. There was no activity.
‘Have the techs gone?’
Catherine nodded. ‘Just before I got in this morning.’
Kim hadn’t been informed they’d finished collecting evidence.
She took out her phone and dialled Woody’s number.
‘Stone,’ he greeted.
‘The techs have gone, sir. It’s a pretty big area. I can’t believe they’ve finished combing it already.’
‘I know,’ he responded. ‘It was my instruction. They were called off first thing this morning.’