Page 12

As we trooped through to the examination and storage room I’d been in the day before, Daniel Jackson started babbling.

‘It’s so sad to think that people might die without anyone knowing who they really were.

Thankfully all my family members are accounted for and I have never had to experience the trauma of not knowing what might have happened to them.

I had an old schoolfriend whose uncle vanished and it was terrible for his family.

Simply terrible. To this day they’ve never found out what happened to him.

’ He turned to me. ‘Is that why you are so keen to help us identify this man, Ms McCafferty? Have you experienced something similar?’

It felt like an intrusive question given that we’d only just met, but I decided that I would allow it.

During my tossing and turning the night before, and in between my agonising mental re-runs of my kiss with Thane, I had wondered why I was so bothered by John Doe’s death.

The real answer was that I’d never felt enthusiasm for assassination contracts that required the victim’s body to disappear because it felt like the terminal punishment was being extended to others.

Maybe just this once I could make a difference to a victim’s family.

Not that I could tell Jackson any of that.

‘No,’ I said. ‘I’ve never experienced anyone close to me disappearing without explanation, so I can’t begin to imagine how awful it must be.’ I shrugged helplessly. ‘He died at my local market, in my community. I feel a need to help out in any way I can.’

Jackson reached across and patted my arm. ‘You are a good woman.’

He wouldn’t have said that if he’d known the truth. I smiled anyway and thanked him.

As soon as we entered the room, Dr Singh unhooked the clipboard from the wall. ‘You’ll have to sign to indicate you have viewed the body,’ he said.

‘Is that necessary?’ Fetch Jackson frowned.

Dr Singh nodded. ‘Oh yes. It’s procedure. Anyone outwith the mortuary staff who views a body has to sign in.’

I watched the Fetch, curious at his reluctance. He must have felt my eyes on him and he hastily wrote his name before handing the clipboard to me. My scrawled signature was already there from the previous day. ‘I’ve already signed,’ I said.

‘You have to do it again, Ms McCafferty,’ Dr Singh said politely.

I sighed. ‘Why?’

‘It’s procedure.’

For fuck’s sake. I signed the damned thing and handed it back; I didn’t want to delay this any longer.

The body of the deceased troll had gone and a different shrouded corpse was in his place: John Doe laid out in preparation for our macabre perusal.

Dr Singh glanced at both of us. He was already aware that I wouldn’t vomit or faint away onto the tiled floor, and the Fetch was also made of sterner stuff than he might have expected.

Jackson’s jaw was clenched and he had gone rather pale but there was no other indication that the dead body bothered him.

‘I can offer you something to allay any nausea or unpleasant sensations,’ Dr Singh offered.

Fetch Jackson shook his head. ‘I’ll be fine,’ he said.

The pathologist cleared his throat. When he spoke again, he explained his findings in a practised, professional tone.

‘I conducted a full post-mortem. I can confirm that this is the body of a male in his late twenties. Caucasian skin, brown eyes, dark blond hair, with one scar along his chin and two on his upper right thigh that suggest old injuries. From the stains on his fingertips and the preliminary blood tests, he is a witch in origin – the lab work will confirm that within three to five working days. The contents of his stomach suggest that he had been drinking alcohol in the hours before his death and he had eaten some sort of meat sandwich. Again, the laboratory will be able to confirm that in more detail.’

Daniel Jackson swallowed hard. I nodded.

‘There is no fluid in his lungs so I am of the opinion that he was dead before he entered the water. There are some external injuries and abrasions on his skin that suggest that his body was carried down the river for a short distance before it was found.’

He didn’t fall into the Tweed at the same point as Quentin Hightower then, which suggested that the two incidents weren’t immediately connected.

Jackson straightened. ‘Interesting. It appears that he’s not from your community at all, Ms McCafferty – he’s not a Danksville resident.’

‘Perhaps not.’ I tried to sound non-committal; I’d already made up my mind about this investigation: I wouldn’t back away even if John Doe turned out to be from Timbuktu .

Dr Singh continued. ‘Cause of death is a single stab wound to the heart.’ He raised his eyebrows at me.

‘The blade, which must have been a foot in length but only three or four millimetres in width, entered his body lower down and was thrust upwards. Whoever stabbed him intended to kill him. Death would have been very swift.’

He lifted one corner of the white sheet, gestured to the wound on John Doe’s side and demonstrated how the murder weapon had been used.

I gazed again at the small incision. It had been made by a professional weapon wielded by a professional hand.

It didn’t take a hardened assassin to surmise that whoever had killed John Doe had either killed before or had zero compunction about ending another’s life.

Not that I thought for a moment that it was any of my ex-colleagues’ work.

None of them would wander around with such an identifiable sword because it could easily be traced if it were found and it would be difficult to carry around unobtrusively.

I glanced at Jackson. His eyes weren’t on John Doe’s body but on his face. I sucked in a breath. ‘You know who he is?’

Jackson licked his lips. ‘I believe so.’ He raised his head, clicked his tongue and nodded sadly, then went to the table in the far corner of the room and opened his briefcase.

He rummaged inside for a moment before extracting a slim folder.

He frowned at its contents then stared again at John Doe’s face.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I know who this is. I’ll conduct a trace spell on his blood to be certain, but there’s little doubt. Our John Doe is actually a witch called Rory Taggert.’