Kissed a Sad Goodbye

by Deborah Crombie

  The only blessing Jo could see in her sister’s death was that her mother had not had to endure it. Although her mother had seen Annabelle more clearly than most, she had loved her fiercely nonetheless. As Jo loved her own children, despite their faults—and she found her mind could not fasten on the thought of their deaths, at any age.

  Moving into the dining room, she encountered her father’s essence; the muskiness of his shaving soap, overlaid with the sharpness of glue and the slight spiciness of balsa. He had always been good with his hands, and when her mother’s ill health, and then his own, had compelled him to turn the day-to-day running of the business over to Annabelle, he’d begun building scale models of tea clippers. Since childhood he’d been fascinated by the intricacy and precision of the ships that had first brought tea to Britain.

  The dining room table served as his workbench, and he’d not only given up any pretense of using the room for its original function, he’d built special illuminated shelves to hold his creations.

  Jo picked up the half-completed model in her hands, running her fingers over the curve of the hull, searching for imperfections. Would his bits and pieces of wood be enough to compensate for the loss of a daughter he had valued above all else?

  He still lived on income from his interest in the firm—as did she, to some extent. The money from her shares supplemented her own business, allowing her to work from home, and to be there for the children. Would Hammond’s provide security for any of them, with Annabelle gone?

  Jo shook her head and went to the drinks cabinet. No point thinking that far ahead, yet. There was this evening to get through first; tomorrow she would think about the next thing. She’d learned that when her mother died. And that there was no harm in the occasional numbing drink. Pouring some of her father’s treasured Courvoisier into a snifter, she carried it to the sitting room and sank into the armchair by the empty fireplace. The windows stood open and the edges of the drapes moved fitfully in the night air.

  Green velvet; her mother’s choice. If Jo stood near them she thought she could smell the pipe tobacco her father had smoked when they were children. It had been Annabelle who had bullied him into giving it up. She’d claimed it made her feel sick, that she couldn’t bear to be in the room with him when he smoked; then she’d administered the coup de grâce by refusing for weeks to kiss him good night. As a power play it had been brilliant, a harbinger of things to come.

  Jo’s hand jerked at the sound of a car coming up the lane and the brandy sloshed over the lip of the glass. She held her breath. How could she possibly do this? What preparation had she in her thirty-four years that would allow her to tell her father this terrible thing? For a brief moment she hoped that Reg Mortimer had phoned his parents, and that Peter and Helena had told him; then she cursed herself for a coward. Gravel crunched as the car turned into the drive. She heard the gears shift as it began to climb.

  Carefully, she set the glass on the end table and rose. Her limbs felt awkward, uncoordinated as a toddler’s, and once she had managed to unfold herself from the depths of the chair, she stood rooted to the spot. The car door slammed and a moment later she heard her father’s key in the door she had left unlocked.

  The door swung open. “Jo?”

  She found her voice. “In here, Dad.”

  “Good. I could have sworn I’d locked the door, and I’d hate to think I was becoming an absentminded old dodderer.” Coming into the sitting room, he offered his cheek for a kiss. He wore the light gray summer suit that set off his silver hair. In his late sixties, William Hammond was still a handsome man, and since Isabel’s death he’d had a time of it fighting off what Annabelle called “the widows’ club.”

  Had called, Jo reminded herself. She swallowed. “Dad—”

  “Peter and Helena send their regards. I see you’ve got a drink already. I think I’ll join you in a nightcap. Didn’t want to overdo and drive; you know how touchy they are these—”

  “Dad.” Jo touched his arm. Her hand was shaking. “I need you to sit down.”

  William peered at her face. “Are you feeling all right, Jo?”

  “Dad, please.” She saw his expression of mild concern turn to alarm.

  “What is it, Jo? Are the children all right?”

  “They’re fine. It’s—”

  “Is it Martin?”

  “Dad, please.” She pressed her hand against his chest so that he was forced to retreat a step. When the backs of his legs hit the edge of the sofa, he sat involuntarily. Jo dropped to her knees before him. “Dad, it’s Annabelle. She’s dead.”

  “What?” He stared at her, uncomprehending.

  “Annabelle’s dead.” Annabelle’s dead. The phrase echoed in Jo’s head like a children’s nursery rhyme.

  William drew his brows together. “Don’t be silly, Jo. Whatever is the matter with you?”

  Jo reached out and grasped his hands in hers. The skin on his knuckles felt like silk under her fingers. “The police came to my house. Reg reported her missing because she didn’t come home last night.”

  “But surely they’ve just had a tiff of some sort—”

  “That’s what I thought when he phoned me this afternoon. But the police found her body. I know. I saw it.”

  “No …” The muscles in William’s face began to sag with shock, like modeling clay held too close to a flame. He shook his head rigidly. “There must be some mistake, Jo. Annabelle can’t be dead. Not Annabelle …”

  Not Annabelle. Never your precious Annabelle. “Daddy, I’m so sorry.” As she squeezed her father’s hands, she felt the enormity of it overwhelm her. Annabelle had always been there, to love and to hate. However would she manage without her?

  CHAPTER 5 Isle of Dogs, the intended site [of the West India Docks], was then a lonely, boggy waste used for the pasturing of cattle. It was said to have only two inhabitants: one drove the cattle off the marshes and the other operated the ferry to Greenwich.

  Theo Barker, from Dockland

  When Kincaid’s alarm blared, he was sleeping with his pillow over his head. It was already full daylight at six o’clock, and when he emerged from his cocoon, the air from the open window smelled fresh and clean. That made him a bit less reluctant to roll out of bed, though it didn’t quite compensate for having to get up at such an ungodly hour on a summer Sunday morning. The postmortem on Annabelle Hammond was scheduled for eight o’clock, and he’d arranged last night to meet Gemma at the Yard beforehand and go together from there.

  Although he showered and shaved as quietly as he could, when he tiptoed into the sitting room on his way to the door, Kit stirred and opened his eyes.

  “What time is it?” Kit asked sleepily, propping himself up on his elbow. “Did you just get home?”

  “It’s half past six in the morning, and I’ve been home but I have to go out again.” Kincaid bent down to stroke Sid, who had abandoned Kit and was rubbing madly about his ankles, purring. “I was going to leave you a note.”

  Kit threw off the blanket and sat up. “Can I go with you?”

  “Sorry, sport. It’s work.”

  “But it’s Sunday.”

  Kincaid sighed. “I know. But that doesn’t matter when there’s a case on.”

  “It’s a murder, isn’t it?” Kit stared at him, wide awake now.

  Pushing Sid gently out of the way, Kincaid sat on the edge of the coffee table.

  Before he could answer, Kit continued, “You could take me with you. I’d wait in the car. I wouldn’t be any trouble.”

  Kincaid thought of the body that would be laid out on the stainless steel mortuary table, and of what would happen to it. “Kit, I can’t. It’s just not on, and I have no idea how long I’ll be.”

  “But I have to get the train back to Cambridge tonight.” Kit’s blue eyes widened in alarm. “I’ve got school tomorrow; it’s exam week. And there’s Tess—”

  “I’ll get you to the train, don’t worry. And in the meantime, why don’t you take the Majo
r up on his offer. I think you’d like Kew.” Kincaid glanced at his watch. “I’m sorry, sport, but I’ve got to—”

  “There’s nothing for breakfast.” Kit’s mouth was set in the stubborn line Kincaid had begun to recognize as his way of coping with disappointment.

  “I know,” Kincaid said with a rueful smile. “I’d planned we’d do the shopping together.” He thought for a moment. “I’ve an idea.” Removing his wallet, he peeled off a few notes. “There’s a good cafe round the corner on Rosslyn Hill. Why don’t you treat the Major to a proper breakfast. There’s enough for the tube and your admission to the gardens, as well.” He tucked his wallet back into his pocket, then hesitated a moment, not knowing how to make Kit understand that he wasn’t abandoning him by choice.

  “I’ll see you tonight,” Kincaid said finally, and as he let himself out of the flat, it occurred to him that perhaps his justification wouldn’t hold water, because he had, after all, chosen the job.

  “MILE END AT EIGHT O’CLOCK ON a Sunday morning,” muttered Gemma as they made their way down into the bowels of the hospital. “Just where I wanted to be.” She hated the smell of disinfectant and the underlying, cloying smell of illness.

  To distract herself, she thought of the music store she’d seen as she walked to the Angel tube station this morning. It had been closed, of course, but she’d crossed Pentonville Road and peered in the windows. Maybe tomorrow she’d have a chance to buy the music books Wendy had recommended, and at next Saturday’s lesson—assuming this case allowed her to go—she would actually start playing the piano.

  Last night, after putting Toby to bed, she’d dimmed the lights and poured a glass of white wine from the open bottle in the fridge. Then she’d stood, hesitating, looking out into the twilit garden. As much as she valued her all too infrequent opportunities for solitude, she’d felt itchy, unable to settle; she wondered if a few minutes’ quiet chat with Hazel would help her erase Annabelle Hammond’s image from her mind.

  As she’d quietly let herself out of the flat and made her way across the garden, she blessed the chance that had led her to the Cavendishes. Hazel had not only offered to care for Toby, along with her own daughter, while Gemma worked, but she’d become a much-valued friend as well. In many ways, Gemma felt closer to Hazel than she did to her own sister, for she’d learned blood was no guarantee of sympathy or common interest.

  She’d found Hazel and Tim sharing a quiet moment at the kitchen table, drinking mugs of hot cocoa. “I’m interrupting,” she’d said, one hand still on the doorknob. “I’ll just say good night.”

  “Don’t be silly. Come and sit down,” Hazel had said, patting the chair beside her. “I’d offer you cocoa, but I see you’ve brought your own tipple,” she’d added with a glance at Gemma’s wineglass. “Hard day?”

  “A right bugger.” Gemma had wandered over to the table but hadn’t sat. “And you can imagine what Toby was like after a day at Cyn’s. He fought going to sleep like it was the end of the world, then passed out from one second to the next.” Touching the soft knitting wool in Hazel’s basket, she’d added, “Would you mind if I went into the sitting room for a bit?”

  Tim had looked up from his paper and smiled. “Help yourself.”

  She’d wandered into the sitting room, drawn by the piano. Sliding the cover back, she’d run her fingers lightly over the keys just for the smooth feel of them, then pressed a few randomly, listening to the notes vibrate and die away. She couldn’t imagine that she would ever be able to string the notes together in a way that would make music—and after her talk with Wendy Sheinart, she found herself trying to work out why she had such a strong desire to do so.

  There had been a case the previous autumn that had unexpectedly opened up the world of opera for her, and she’d found herself fascinated … and since moving into the garage flat, Hazel’s wide-ranging collection of CDs had allowed her to sample everything from piano concertos to improvisational jazz … and then in the spring there had been the street musician with the clarinet, who had drawn her to listen whenever she passed the Sainsbury’s on her way home from work. An odd coincidence, she thought fleetingly, that Reg Mortimer had described a busker with a clarinet, but surely it was no more than that.

  Having asked her why she wanted to play the piano, Wendy Sheinart had accepted her fumbling attempt at an explanation with a smile. “You don’t have to understand it,” she’d said. “I think perhaps a need to make music is innate with some of us, and background and experience don’t figure into it. And it really doesn’t matter. I just wanted to be sure you were doing this for you.”

  “Here we are.” Kincaid touched her arm, and with a start Gemma realized she’d been about to walk past the doors to the morgue. He gave her a quizzical glance. “Why do I get the feeling you’re not all here this morning?”

  Gemma smiled and pushed the bell for admittance. “Sorry. I was gathering wool.”

  “Then I envy the sheep.”

  The door swung back and they identified themselves to the ponytailed young man in spectacles.

  “Dr. Ling’s expecting you,” he informed them as he ushered them in.

  Kincaid frowned. “Dr. Ling? Would that by any chance be Kate Ling?”

  “In the flesh,” said a white-smocked woman as she emerged from the postmortem room. Dark hair as straight as broom bristles framed her pale, oval face and swung just above her shoulders. The pathologist’s dark eyes gleamed with the wicked humor Gemma remembered. They had worked with her in Surrey the previous autumn, on a case that had resulted in the death of one of Gemma’s friends and the near-fatal injury of another. The unexpected rush of memory was sudden and painful enough to leave Gemma momentarily speechless, but Kincaid carried on in the breach.

  “What are you doing in London?” he asked, shaking Kate Ling’s hand warmly.

  “A promotion of sorts,” Kate answered. “The Home Office had a vacancy needed filling, and I drew the short straw. But I can’t say I’m minding the bright lights all that much, and I get a nice variety of clientele.” She nodded towards the room at her back. “Nice fresh one, this, and just out of the cooler. Shouldn’t be too unpleasant for you, if you’re ready.”

  They followed her into the room, masking and gowning as Kate retied her mask and pulled the instrument trolley up to the autopsy table. Was it possible to envy the dead? Gemma wondered as she looked at Annabelle Hammond’s body. The breasts were perfectly formed, neither too large nor too small; the neck slender, the shoulders well-shaped; the waist small and belly flat; the thighs smooth and slim. Even her feet and ankles were beautiful, and Gemma had seldom seen a set of toes worth writing home about. Fat lot of good all that loveliness did her now, of course—and it might even have got her killed. But it had certainly been a body to inspire passion, even obsession.

  “Did you do the on-scene yesterday?” Kincaid asked Kate Ling. “Sorry to have missed you. Bit of a balls-up there.”

  “The old headless-chickens routine,” Kate agreed as she pulled a new pair of latex gloves from the dispenser. “But I imagine we’ll cover everything now.”

  As she reached up to switch on the microphone over the table, Kincaid said, “What about time of death? Off the record?”

  The corners of Kate’s eyes crinkled as she smiled beneath her mask. “Half past twelve.” She laughed aloud as she saw Kincaid’s skeptical expression. “You asked me for off the record, and now you don’t believe me? Seriously, though, I’d say it’s not likely she was killed before midnight, although the calculation of body cooling is made a little more difficult by the fact that the ambient temperature began rising rapidly as soon as the sun came up. Lividity was fixed, but the corneas had just begun to cloud, and rigor was not fully established.”

  Gemma looked up from her notebook, pen poised over the page. “Eight hours or less, then?”

  Shrugging, Kate said, “There are always unanticipated factors. Perhaps the tox report and stomach contents will help you.”

&
nbsp; “Spoken like a true pathologist,” Kincaid said, grinning, and it abruptly occurred to Gemma that he found Kate Ling attractive. It wasn’t that he was flirting, exactly, but there was somehow an extra degree of attentiveness in his responses. And his interest was a dangerous thing, as she well knew.

  “Was she killed where she was found?” Gemma asked, diverting Kate’s attention from Kincaid.

  “It looks that way, unless she was moved very shortly after death. The lividity corresponds to the position of the body.”

  “Can you hazard a guess yet as to how she died?” Kincaid asked.

  “Now that would be telling.” Kate reached up and switched on her microphone, then stated that she was continuing the external examination of Annabelle Hammond. She tilted the head back so that they had a good view of the throat. “We won’t know until we get into the tissue if there was any crushing of the larynx. But the bruising on the throat is minimal, as is the facial congestion.”

  “Anything else obvious?”

  Kate lifted one of Annabelle’s hands and then the other, examining the long, slender fingers. “No visible blood or tissue under the nails, but we’ll send samples to the lab just in case.”

  When she’d finished her careful scraping of the nails, she buzzed for the attendant. “Gerald, let’s have a look at her back.”

  Gerald turned the slender body with the ease of practice, and Kate began her examination of the back of Annabelle’s head, carefully parting the mass of red-gold hair with her gloved fingertips. “Here’s something,” she said after a moment, glancing up at them. She used a magnifier for a closer look. “I think it’s possible we have some blunt force trauma here. There’s a bit of loose hair and tissue, maybe a bit of swelling. We won’t know for sure until we peel back the scalp.”

  Gemma swallowed and focused fiercely on her notebook. This was the part she hated most, even more than the initial incision and the removal of the internal organs. She’d always assumed that this part of the job would get easier for her the more exposure she had, but that hadn’t turned out to be the case, and somehow it was always worse when the corpse was as unblemished as this one.