Dead Famous

DAY THIRTY-ONE. 11.20 a.m.

Coleridge was taking a break from reviewing the Peeping Tom archive when the pathologist’s report came in.

“Well, the flecks of vomit on the toilet seat were Kelly’s,” he remarked.

“Yuck,” said Trisha.

“Yuck indeed,” Coleridge agreed. “And, yucker still, there were traces of bile in her neck and in the back of her mouth. They think she’d been gagging. There’s no doubt about it: when Kelly left that sweatbox she must have been extremely upset.”

“Poor girl. What a way to spend your last few minutes, trying not to puke up all over people in a tiny plastic tent. God, she must have been drunk.”

“She was. The report says eight times over the limit.”

“That’s pretty seriously arsehole – legless. No wonder she was having trouble keeping it down.”

“The report also says that her tongue was bruised.”

“Bruised… You mean bitten?”

“No, bruised, reminiscent of someone forcing a thumb into her mouth.”

“Ugh… So somebody wanted to shut her up?”

“That would seem the obvious interpretation.”

“Perhaps that’s why she was gagging, because someone had their thumb in her mouth. No wonder she wanted to get out of that sweatbox in such a hurry.”

“Yes, although if someone in that box had put a hand into Kelly’s mouth sufficiently hard to bruise her tongue, you’d think that someone would have heard her complain, wouldn’t you?”