Chapter Sixteen
SIXTEEN
McCreadie doesn’t stay for the autopsy. He wants to start looking for Nellie’s next of kin, and autopsies don’t really interest him. He isn’t squeamish. He’s just disinterested.
Gray would be delighted if McCreadie were fascinated by forensic science … but he’d hate for him to fake that interest. What matters is that McCreadie appreciates his friend’s lifework as much as his friend appreciates his.
For the autopsy, the most common sign of drowning is fluid in the lungs.
As Gray says, however, fluid may be found in the pleural spaces of any body that decomposes in water.
The stronger the current, the more fluid there will be.
Where Nellie was found, the water was almost still, and so when he finds a significant amount of fluid and algae and debris in her lungs, that does indicate drowning.
He collects samples, in case he needs to be sure it comes from that part of the Water of Leith.
When searching for the signs of forcible drowning, he returns to the bruises between Nellie’s shoulders. They’re consistent with her being held down, but it’s not enough for him.
“It would be a start,” he says. “Or perhaps a finish, holding Nellie under after she stopped fighting. But while she was struggling, which she was, given the strain in her neck muscles and the debris under her nails, a killer would have needed to hold her head down as well as her body.”
For that, he examines the back of her head. There he finds what looks like two fingernail cuts.
“Someone held her under,” he says. “And she struggled. Struggled hard enough to leave those cuts.”
“So murder by forcible drowning?”
“That would be my conclusion.”
Gray is still stitching up Nellie when McCreadie raps at the closed laboratory door.
“Perfect timing,” I say as I let him in. “Definitely drowning, with clear signs that it wasn’t accidental or a suicide. Someone held her under.”
McCreadie looks at Gray. “How certain are you of that?”
Gray arches his brows.
“I have found something…” McCreadie begins. “Let’s say that the presumption will be exactly what Addington found. Drowning by suicide. I will need to present my case in full, including the odds that you are mistaken.”
“The bruising on her back indicates she was held under. Marks on her neck suggested strain from fighting to keep her head up, and the autopsy made that clearer. She was in shallow water. Accidental death would require head trauma or heart failure or something similar, which I did not find. Death by suicide would require drug-induced sleep.”
“As with the other young woman.”
“Yes, but in that case, I would not see the bruises between her shoulders or fingernail marks in her scalp or that trauma to the neck. Even if Nellie wished to die, her body would fight to breathe and in such shallow water, it would be easily done. There is, in short, no explanation except murder.”
McCreadie chews his lip.
“Hugh…” I say. “What aren’t you telling us?”
“I need you to assess the actual probability that you are wrong, Duncan. Five percent? Ten? One? I will also need Isla to look for signs of chemical sedation.” He lifts a hand. “I know that does not fit, but I will be asked for it.”
“All right,” Gray says. “I would put the probability of murder at ninety percent, which is as high as I could ever go without something like an eyewitness. Even then, I would only go to ninety-five percent, allowing for the possibility the witness misinterpreted or lied about what they saw. As for the chemical analysis, of course, you may ask Isla.”
“I just do not want you thinking I am second-guessing your findings.” He looks from me to Gray. “I have found Nellie’s next of kin. Her mother.” He pauses. “Who lives near Puddocky Burn.”
I turn sharply to face him. “Is there any chance Nellie knew the first girl who drowned?”
“More than that. They were the best of friends.”
Gray offers to prepare the samples for Isla and speak to her about the drug testing, while McCreadie and I notify Mrs. Carmichael of her daughter’s passing.
Yes, I’m going along with McCreadie on official police business and, more shockingly, no one will have a problem with it.
McCreadie is free to adjust protocol as needed as long as he gets results, which he does.
If anyone asks why he took a civilian to notify next of kin, he’ll just say that women are better at that sort of thing. And if it makes the upper ranks start thinking there might be a place for female cops—at least to play the role of emotional-support humans—that’s never a bad thing.
Nellie’s mother lives in a loose collection of houses that can’t rightly be called a village. The house is what I’d expect for the location. It’s little more than a shack, but the occupants will consider themselves lucky to have four freestanding walls to themselves.
We knock on the door. When no one answers, we knock again, and a voice from behind us says, “She’s not there.”
We turn to see a woman with a wash basket on her hip.
“We are looking for Mrs. Betty Carmichael,” McCreadie calls. “Is this her house?”
“Aye, but she’s not there. Hasn’t been there in…” The woman switches the basket to her other hip. “A fortnight maybe?”
“She is gone permanently?” McCreadie asks. “Or temporarily?”
The woman shrugs. “Depends on the fellow.”
A moment’s pause. Then McCreadie says, “Do you mean she has found employment elsewhere? Or has found a suitor?”
The woman laughs. “‘Suitor.’ That’s a pretty word for it.
” When McCreadie opens his mouth, she waves a hand.
“I’m teasing you, sir. You’re being polite.
Betty has taken up with a fellow in the city.
Been doing that as long as I’ve known her.
She might come back in a week. She might come back in a month. ”
“Would you know more about this current beau?”
“Not a single thing.” She looks from me to McCreadie and back again, clearly trying to decide what we want. Then she hits on the usual explanation, when I’m paying a visit to someone in the Old Town, accompanied by Isla, McCreadie, or Gray. “Are you from the charitable society?”
“I am afraid not,” McCreadie says.
She cackles. “Such fine manners. If you were from one of those, I’d say no more. Terrible people, most of them, looking down their noses at us.” She shifts her basket again. “So what do you want with Betty?”
“It’s about her daughter, Nellie,” I say.
The woman perks up, her eyes lighting. “Nellie? Oh, now there’s a good lass. She’s off in the city, working for a fine woman. Comes by every week to give her mother a few shillings. Not that Betty appreciates it. How is Nellie?”
McCreadie and I exchange a look.
“We really do need to speak to her mother,” I say.
The woman frowns. “Not in any trouble, is she? I can’t imagine that. Some girls are always in trouble. Her mother would have been one of those. And some girls stumble into it, trusting the wrong fellows, but that’s not Nellie.”
“I fear there has been an accident,” McCreadie says. “Nellie has … well, she has been killed.”
The woman rocks back, and I hurry over to take the basket from her.
She pats my arm. “There’s a good lass. Thank you. Killed. Our Nellie.” She squeezes her eyes shut. “The poor girl.”
The woman doesn’t break down. Doesn’t demand more information.
Doesn’t say we must be mistaken. Death in this world is too common for that.
It is still a tragedy, but it’s the sort of tragedy people expect, and there’s little sugarcoating it with euphemisms like “passed away.” Nellie is dead, and McCreadie only briefly hesitated to say so, mostly because he knows her mother should have been notified first.
“Are there other relatives we might speak to?” McCreadie asks.
The woman shakes her head. “It was just Betty and Nellie.”
“Would anyone know where Betty might be?”
“You can ask around, but I’d be shocked if she spoke more than five words a year to anyone but me. She considers me a friend, but that’s only because I’m kind to her, though mostly because I am fond of Nellie.” A flash of grief.
“Are we sure Betty is with a man?” I ask. “If she didn’t tell anyone she was leaving…”
“Oh, she told me. Always does. But she just says she’ll be gone and when Nellie comes by, tell her to put the money in the usual place.
” A flash of disgust. “I know where I’d like to tell Nellie to put it.
Back in her own pocket. But she’s too good a girl.
” A pause. “Was too good a girl.” She looks at McCreadie. “Do you know what happened to her?”
“We are still working that out. May I ask when you last saw Nellie?”
“This past week, when she came with the money.”
“Do you recall the day?”
“Sunday, as usual.”
Before her death, then.
McCreadie says, “We have heard she went out often in the evening. Did she visit more than once a week?”
“No, just the once, always on Sundays.” She blinks. “Oh, you are a policeman.”
“I am. Detective Hugh McCreadie of the Edinburgh police.”
“A detective? How very fine. You do not look like a policeman. Or talk like one.” She lowers her voice. “That is a compliment, sir.”
He smiles. “I will take it as one.”
She turns to me. “Are you a policewoman?”
“No, I am just helping Detective McCreadie.”
She looks disappointed and pats my hand. “Perhaps you will be someday, dear. If that’s what you’d like to be.”
“It would be lovely.”
She takes her basket and points to a house a few hundred feet away. “That’s mine. I’ll be home all afternoon. Call on me whenever you like.”
We could have interviewed the neighbor right away.
She’s sure to be able to tell us more about Nellie, including more about Nellie’s friend Mary and Mary’s death.
But McCreadie wants to speak to the schoolmaster.
He’s the one who knew about the poem firsthand and its connection to Mary’s death.
McCreadie wants to fully understand that before he interviews anyone else.