TWENTY-NINE
Addington is gone, and Gray is furious about that. The dark cloud of anger hovering over locket-stealing Catriona shifts over a new target. Addington was supposed to come upstairs and speak to McCreadie before he left. That’s apparently the real reason McCreadie was having lunch here. He was waiting for Addington’s report. Addington and his assistant finished the autopsy and left notes jotted in a nearly indecipherable scrawl.
“He will file a report, won’t he?” I ask as Gray glowers at the brief notes.
“Report?” he says without looking up.
“The, uh…” I search for a word. “Coroner” isn’t used here. “Pathologist” is too much for Catriona. “The report that police surgeons make after an autopsy. There is one, is there not?”
Please tell me there is one.
“He will sign the death certificate stating cause of death,” Gray says. “Otherwise, he will make notes to present at court. Detective McCreadie will receive an oral report, but he’s going to need to chase Addington down to get it. That is inexcusable.”
“Is it possible…?” I clear my throat. “I know you are not licensed to practice medicine—”
His shoulders tense.
I hurry on. “I do not mean any insult, sir. I was only going to say—”
“Surgery,” he says. “Not medicine. I studied jointly in medicine and surgery, but intended to pursue the latter.”
“All right. Surgery then. Still, the fact that you have the degrees means you’re at least as qualified as Addington, licensed or not. I understand the lawyers need the police surgeon on the witness stand, but would it be possible for you to perform autopsies? With him in attendance?”
Gray snorts and slaps the paper onto his desk as he strides from the office. “Addington would never agree to it.”
A hesitation, and then he glances back, his chin dipping. “It is an excellent idea, Catriona. I am not dismissing that. Detective McCreadie and I have discussed it, as we have discussed the possibility of both being present at the autopsy, which is quite routine. Criminal autopsies are sometimes even performed in surgical theaters.”
“But more witnesses would mean more people to realize Addington is screw—making mistakes.”
Gray grunts and pulls open the door to the examination room. “Addington is too well connected for Detective McCreadie to argue with his process. We must simply be thankful that we may confirm his work after the fact. Now, let us do that.”
It doesn’t take me long to realize the true root of Gray’s anger. Yes, he’s annoyed that Addington left without speaking to McCreadie. But what truly infuriated him was that preliminary report. On it, Addington listed the cut throat as the cause of death. It is not. As we guessed earlier—and Gray confirms now—Rose Wright died of strangulation.
The killer strangled her, moved her body in front of that gate, and then slashed her throat and stabbed her in the stomach. That could be pure convenience. A bloodless killing with the mutilations added on the staged scene. I can’t tell them about the staging, though. Can’t say that the killer moved the body there because it resembles the spot where a woman will be murdered twenty years from now. Gray presumes the killer strangled her in a more private location and then displayed her in a busier one, and I need to go along with that.
“May I speculate, sir?” I ask as he measures the abdominal wounds.
“Certainly. That is the process of learning, Catriona. Ask questions and hazard guesses.”
“I think he strangled her because that’s how he likes to kill. Come up behind a victim and strangle them with rope. It means they don’t see him, but it also means he doesn’t see them. Doesn’t watch their face as they die.”
Gray pauses to look at me. “Interesting. You believe he is affected by their deaths?”
“Mmm, I don’t think so. I would imagine that only applies in cases where you regretneedingto kill someone. He’schoosingto kill. It isn’t about caring—it’s aboutnotcaring. He isn’t doing it because he enjoys the act of killing. He enjoys hunting his victims and the victory of success and any notoriety that comes with it, but he doesn’t care about the act of killing. He does it quickly and efficiently.”
I pause, but Gray says, “Go on.”
“Archie Evans was a bloodless death. Literally and figuratively, as you said. No one cared. To make them care, he gave them what he thinks they want.” I wave at Rose’s body. “This.”
His head tilts. “You believe he craves attention, then?”
“The elaborate staging of Archie Evans would indicate as much, would it not?”
“It does. It was a theory of my own, which is why I wanted those newspapers the other day.” He looks at Rose. “He failed to attain the desired degree of notoriety, and so he progressed to this.”
“Escalation.”
His lips purse. “Yes, ‘escalation.’ An excellent word. You seem to have a knack for this, Catriona.”