Skinner's ghosts

41

The red-haired Inspector was already in the Head of CID's office when Skinner and his assistant arrived. Both men sat relaxed, as if waiting for him, as they had been.

'Morning, Arthur. No, don't get up,' said the DCC, as he and Mcl henney took the other seats that Martin had drawn up to his desk.

'Well,' he said. 'The DCS said you had made a breakthrough. Let's hear about it.'

'Very good, sir,' said Dorward, sitting more upright in his chair.

'The first thing I have to report is that the pathologist's staff have completed their examination of Mrs McGrath's body. There was nothing there, nothing at all, that shouldn't have been. The tissue under the fingernails was her own, right enough, and there were no stray hairs lodged anywhere.'

'Certain?' asked Skinner.

'One thousand per cent, sir.'

'So where's your breakthrough?'

The Inspector fought to suppress a smile of self-satisfaction. 'Wel, sir, it started with a bit of luck, real y. One of my team was talking to the cleaning woman, and she mentioned that Mrs McGrath's en suite bathroom had only been fitted a few months before, with some of the insurance money she received after her husband's death.'

'Yes, that's right,' said the DCC. 'I remember her mentioning that she'd made some improvements to the house. So where does that take us?'

Dorward's smile broke through, irresistibly. 'Well, sir, that made me wonder. Like, how many people would have used the shower, or the handbasin since they were installed? And like, did the killer wash away the blood and stuff after the rape and murder?'

'So I got in a plumber to strip out the piping and examine the traps.' He paused. Skinner and Martin each nodded approval.

'There were some hairs trapped in the shower,' he continued. 'Al Mrs McGrath's. Some head, some pubic, but al hers, no doubt about it.

'But in the S-bend of the basin, there we got lucky. We found hair samples from six different people. We've identified three of them.

The lady herself. Mark, his nanny, and the cleaner. The other two, we don't know about, other than that they're from different people. With your permission,' he looked from Martin to Skinner then back again,

'I'd like to start DNA testing.'

'Fair enough,' said Skinner, 'but before you get too excited, remember that Leona had been a widow for quite a few months. There may have been other people in her bedroom, apart from the kil er.'

Martin shook his head. 'Not since the new plumbing was instal ed.

We've spoken to the close family members and to her friends. None of them can remember having used that basin.

'As for man friends, we don't believe that we're in the plural there.

We spoke to a close woman friend of the victim. She said that the two of them had a drink together on the Sunday evening before the murder, at Leona's place. Once they'd had a few, it got down to girl talk, and Leona confessed to her that since her husband's death she'd had sex just once.'

'Did she mention a name?' asked the DCC.

'No, sir,' Dorward answered: 'only that it had happened at her place, in her bedroom, and just on the one occasion.' He smiled.

'According to the pal, she did say that the guy had a bigger cock than her husband, but that's al she told her about him.'

'I don't think that's admissible in evidence,' said Martin. 'Okay, Arthur. Run your DNA tests. The budget wil stand them. It's a long shot, but you never know your luck.'