'My predecessor left my office in a bit of a shambles and I'm trying to sort it out. I've just come across what appear to be dental records, but no indication of whom they might belong to. Now, I don't want to get Dr McLean into trouble, what with him just retired and everything, but these things shouldn't just be left around, should they? They're confidential?'
She nodded. 'Aye, they are.'
'The thing is, I have an idea whose they might be. If we could just check, I can leave them with you, you can file them where they belong and the problem's over with.'
'Isn't there a name on the X-rays?'
I tried to look as though I hadn't thought of that and pulled the film out. There was a code on the bottom that I recognized as belonging to the morgue but I felt pretty sure that Shirley wouldn't spot it.
'Whose did you think they might be?' she asked.
'Kirsten Hawick's. She's a patient of yours.'
'Thing is, we're about to close for the evening. Can you come back in the morning and see Dr McDouglas?'
I shook my head, looking sorrowful. 'I'm going to be in surgery all day,' I said, which was a big lie. The only place I planned to be the next day was in bed; exactly where I hadn't quite figured out. 'I guess we're just going to have to do this officially. God, the paperwork. For you as well, I'm afraid. Ah well, have a good time tonight. I guess you have plans?'
I started to turn away.
'You can call up the records yourself, you know. If you have a computer, that is.'
I turned back. 'I know, but I haven't got all my passwords sorted out yet. Too busy learning the ropes. I called the IT department before I came here but I think they'd all gone home for the evening.'
'Wouldn't surprise me,' she said, looking sympathetic. Then she appeared to have a brainwave. 'Is all you need the password then?'
I tried to look puzzled. 'I guess,' I said. 'Do you know it?'
'Sure,' she said and scribbled something down. Willing myself not to snatch, I reached out and took the Post-it note. I read what she'd written and then looked at her for confirmation. She smiled.
'Dr McDouglas's favourite film.'
'Mine too,' I replied, not entirely untruthfully. I thanked her and left.
Back in my office, I wasn't sure whether I was terrified at what I'd done or delighted by my own cleverness. Shirley would almost certainly tell her boss what had happened. Even if it didn't get back to Gifford, I could face some pertinent and difficult-to-answer questions from Dr McDouglas.
Did I really want to go on with this? So far, I hadn't done anything wrong. Granted, I'd tricked a junior colleague into giving me information I shouldn't have, but I hadn't used it. I could always claim I'd had second and better thoughts and would probably get away with it.
My screen still showed the homepage of the dental department. I typed in Terminator and waited. Then I was in. I found patient records and typed in Kirsten Hawick.
There was nothing there.
Huge relief. And a tiny but rapidly growing seedling of frustration.
I thought for a bit. Kirsten hadn't been married that long when she died. Maybe she hadn't got round to changing her name on all her records. I typed in Kirsten Georgeson and there she was: details of her age, address, brief medical history, records of her visits, invoices for non-NHS treatment. And her X-rays.
The comparison wasn't as easy as I'd expected, as the format was different. The X-ray taken during the post mortem was just one film scanning from one side of the mouth to the other. Those produced during dental appointments tend to be taken in sections from inside the mouth. I had six small X-rays to compare to one large one. I started off in the top left corner, the section that I guessed would be easiest to distinguish. I was looking for a crown. Nothing.
Then I tried the bottom right corner for a small gap. Next, I tried to count the teeth. That was tricky due to the overlapping of teeth on more than one shot. It didn't really matter, though. I was as sure as I could be, without having a dentist sitting next to me, that the X-ray taken of the corpse didn't match the dental records of Kirsten Hawick. I'd known already, of course, but now even Dana would have to accept defeat. It wasn't her.
I got ready to close up the site and started thinking. Dana had told me that most dentists on Shetland are NHS. If that were true, then whilst patients might visit a number of different surgeries scattered over the islands, their records would be on this one central database and accessible by yours truly, courtesy of a rather weird password, which would probably be changed the minute the hierarchy found out I'd been meddling. This was my one chance.
Which you are not going to take. You've done what you set out to do, proved the body in the peat wasn't Kirsten; it's up to the police now.
But dental records, like all medical records, are confidential. Even police working on a murder investigation couldn't gain automatic access to them. A court order, at least, would be needed and from what I'd heard, there were no plans to apply for one. This was a pretty unique opportunity. No one on the murder squad could do what I was doing right now. The big question, though, was whether the search was even remotely manageable. Just how many dental records would I have to look at?
No, that is not the big question, Tora! The big question is: why aren't you packing up and going to find a room somewhere to spend the night?
I switched to the Internet and called up the site of the Scottish Census. I knew the population of Shetland was in the region of 25,000, including the migrant workers on the oilfields, but I had no idea how many women there were in the twenty-five to thirty-five age group. Which, you could argue, was a bit unprofessional for the resident obstetrician, given they were what management consultants call my prime target group. The Scottish Census for 2004 was the most recent available and it told me that the number of women on the islands aged between twenty and thirty-four was 2,558: an impossible number to check.
Good, that's settled then, let's go and get some rest.
Could it be narrowed down at all? Not everyone is registered with a dentist. I remembered reading somewhere that a lot of people neglect their teeth, something like half the population. That would bring the number down to around 1,200. And my friend from the field had had dental work. If she was an island woman and an NHS patient, her records were here for me to find.
She isn't an island woman. DI Dunn's investigation has ruled out all the missing women from the islands. You and Dana were wrong.
Don't like being wrong. I went back to the dental database, wondering if I could sort the data. I pressed the button for data sort and put in my criteria: female patients, resident on the island, aged between sixteen and thirty-four. I'd have liked to specify a narrower age band but the system wouldn't let me. Then I was looking at a list of names. I scanned to the bottom of the page. 1,700 patients. Still an impossible search. I got up and crossed to the coffee machine.
OK, think, tired brain, think. 1,700 women, aged between sixteen and thirty-four years old. There was a real, good chance the lady from the peat was one of them, if only I could… Of course! I shot back to my desk and scanned the list of search criteria. Yes! There it was: date of last appointment. My friend had been dead since early summer 2005; I just had to get rid of all the women who'd attended the surgery since then. I typed in '1 September 2005', which I guessed would leave a big enough margin for error, and pressed search. It took a few seconds, then… sixty-three women left on the list.
It was a manageable – if lengthy – search. Five minutes per patient to be really sure; it was already seven thirty and I was shattered. On the other hand, this really was my only chance. By tomorrow morning my unauthorized hacking would have been discovered and terminated…
quite probably along with your employment
… and I had to make it worthwhile.
In my desk drawer, under Filing and Misc., was a copy of the print-out I'd given Dana at the start of the week: the list of women who'd given birth on the islands during the spring and summer of 2005. I began to compare the two lists, looking for a woman who had given birth that summer and, simultaneously, ceased to feel the need for regular dental check-ups. It took some time, as both lists were sorted by date rather than alphabetically, but thirty minutes and two cups of coffee later I was pretty certain there were no matches.