First impressions: no blood, and little or no evidence to show what had actually happened. No external marks were evident on her face. He quickly checked the areas he could see for cuts and bruises but found nothing. “What do you think?” he asked his colleague.
Smart and Reynolds had joined them. “All clear downstairs.”
“Hard to say,” replied Longstaff. “Looks like she was ready for bed. It’s still made up. Duvet folded back. Maybe she’d just come up here, used the bathroom and was just turning in.”
“Heard a noise downstairs, maybe?” said Smart.
“If she did, she certainly didn’t go and check, otherwise why have we found her up here?” Atherton asked.
“In that case, the burglar was obviously pretty quiet and took her by surprise.”
“Not sure about that, either,” replied Atherton. “Look around the room, I can’t see any sign of a struggle, can you?”
“Bathroom’s a mess,” replied Reynolds. “Maybe it all happened in there.”
“Why drag her in here?” asked Smart.
“I’m with Steve on that one,” replied Atherton. “Can’t see any evidence of that either. If he’d dragged her from the bathroom, surely something would have been left in its wake.”
“Not for us to try and determine,” said Reynolds. “We’ll need the CSIs to work their magic.”
Atherton stood up. His bad feeling about the crime scene was still with him. As he glanced around, the five building block principles kicked in again. Preservation of life was out of the window. He’d broken rule two by not preserving the scene so far, but that couldn’t have been helped because he was too busy applying rule one.
Although they knew the victim’s name, she would still have to be identified officially. As for suspects – there were none, as yet. That only left securing evidence. And there didn’t seem to be much of that either: certainly not as far as the death was concerned. He suspected the place would be littered with prints from the theft but as his colleague had said, that was up to the CSIs.
“If the burglar did kill her, how the hell has he done it?”
Longstaff leaned in towards Jane Carter’s body. “Can’t see anything on the outside, so it must be something on the inside.”
“Maybe he’s poisoned her,” said Reynolds.
“What with?” asked Atherton.
“Could be anything,” said Reynolds, eyes darting around the room. “Not that I can see any signs.”
“He’ll have taken it with him. Can you see any puncture marks on her skin?” asked Longstaff.
“Not on any of the visible areas,” replied Atherton.
“It’s all a bit strange, isn’t it?” said Reynolds.
“How do you mean?” asked Smart.
“There’s only four possible options for loss of life.” Reynolds held up his fingers to count them off. “Natural causes, which it could always be. Accident, but no evidence to suggest it. Suicide – it doesn’t seem very likely to me. Once again, lack of evidence. Or homicide.”
The reasoning was left unsaid but Atherton could tell from their expressions that they were all of the same opinion. Something didn’t add up.
“In that case, let’s get out of here and start treating it like the crime scene it is,” said Atherton. “We shouldn’t disturb anything else until the big boys get here. Can you two secure front and rear entry? Emma, take one of the cars down the end of the street and block it off. We need a crime scene log. Have you guys got any stepping plates in the car? We need to establish one route in and one out.”
“Not enough,” said Reynolds.
“I’ll call Cragg, ask him to have more sent over. And while he’s at it he can call MIT. This one’s way beyond us.”
Chapter Five
“So... what’s happened here, Sean?”
Detective Inspector Gardener was standing over the body of Jane Carter. Having made an initial examination, he was waiting for the Home Office pathologist, Doctor George Fitzgerald, to arrive.