He picked up the severed stumps and examined them carefully. His nose caught a whiff of rotting flesh, so he started to breathe through his mouth. He checked every part, lifting them all up apart from the torso, which he flipped over like a burger, but there was nothing else. With as much haste as possible, he bundled the body parts back into their cover and out of his sight.
Next on the list was a John Doe. Luke said this one was brought in on Sunday morning. His age was difficult to gauge, though late forties had been the estimate. The face was sagging under the weight of death, black hair tangled and the black-grey beard unkempt. Foster did a double take. It was the tramp whose suicide they had been called to the previous Sunday, the one that Heather had been taking so personally.
He was about to zip it back up there and then, but something made him carry on looking. The chest was clear, the stomach too. He picked up the left arm, saw nothing; then the right, nothing apart from a few track marks. Obviously a junkie . . .
Tilting his head to one side, he looked once more at the punctures on his arm. Small nicks, all the world like the scars caused by injecting smack. But then they appeared to coalesce, to join together. He peered more closely. There it was: two slanted red cuts, a small cut bridging them. An 'A'. It was even less distinct than before, and done with less care, but it was possible to make out the other marks, letters and numbers. The same letters and numbers they had found on Darbyshire: 1 A 1 3 7.
He owed Heather an apology.
He put the arm down. 'Cause of death,' he shouted to Luke, his eyes still fixed on the body.
'Strangulation seems the likeliest option.'
'Anything from toxicology?'
'No. But there were signs of heavy drug and alcohol abuse.'
Foster completed a clockwise lap of the body.
He picked up one of the man's limp feet by the ankle. Strange, he thought. This guy's feet are in immaculate condition. He couldn't have been on the streets for too long. Most tramps' feet are knackered: covered in corns, bunions and blisters, filthy and stinking. It didn't make sense. Unless the guy used to be married to a chiropodist. The hands were soft, too; smooth and uncalloused like a clerical worker's, not the gnarled hands of a derelict who slept on the streets, smoked tab ends from the gutter and drank meths.
Something didn't add up.
Nigel had asked Ron for microfilm copies of the Evening News and the Evening Standard. It seemed to take him an eternity to return. Nigel sat there, cursing his name and his bulk, the building empty and quiet apart from the silent hum of a distant generator.
Darkness was beginning to fall and the huge bowls of light, suspended by chains from the ceiling, cast a sepulchral glow across the main reading room.
I need to do something, he thought. He got up and wandered into the second, smaller room. To one side of that was the microfilm reading room, a dark space bereft of natural light, lit only by an occasional lamp and the illumination of the reading screens.
Nigel had spent hours of his life in here, spooling through centuries of copy.
To his left, away from the microfilm readers, was a bank of computer terminals, a few of which were allocated for searching recent issues of the national newspapers by keywords. He sat down at one, hit a key and the screen burst to life. There was nothing on this database that would be much use to the investigation, it only went back a decade or so at most. It was the recent past, but still he fancied losing himself in it for a short time.
He wondered how high-profile a cop Foster was. In the search field he typed 'Detective+GrantsFoster'
and hit return. The machine chuntered reluctantly then produced its results: nineteen hits. The first few were reports of murder investigations in which he'd been quoted. But it was the seventh that caught Nigel's eye: 'Top Cop Cleared of "Killing"
Father'.
The story was nearly eight years old. Nigel clicked the link immediately.
A Scotland Yard detective suspended after being suspected of murdering his father in a mercy killing has been cleared and reinstated after no charges were brought against him.
Detective Inspector Grant Foster, 39, was arrested two months ago after his father, Roger Foster, a retired detective, was found dead at his home in Acton last July. His son made the call to the emergency services reporting his father's death.
Last month an inquest into Mr Foster senior's death recorded an open verdict. The coroner said at the time: 'It is clear that Detective Inspector Foster helped his father end his life. It is not the duty of this inquest to decide whether that help was criminal. That is a matter for the police and the Crown Prosecution Service.'
The news that DC I Foster will not be charged and will return to his job has already attracted criticism from anti euthanasia compaigners.
Last night, Adrian Lewis, Conservative MP for Thewliss, said: 'I'm not sure what message this sends out to the general public. It is not for us to decide whether someone has the right to die - it is our Lord's decision. I do hope this isn't a case of one rule applying to members of the public, and another to members of the Metropolitan Police.'
Nigel sat back to absorb what he'd read. Regardless of whether he had been charged, there seemed to be an admission that Foster in some way assisted his father's death. In that case, how did he keep his job?
Nigel checked his watch. He could plough on and find more stories, but it had been half an hour since Ron had descended into the bowels of the building and time was getting on.
Back in the reading room there was no sign of life.
He decided to go and find Ron himself, hurry him up, get an estimate for how long it would take. He walked across the reading room to the double doors through which the attendants disappeared when they retrieved an order. Nigel had always wondered what lay behind them. A vast cavernous hall stacked with shelf upon dusting shelf of yellowing files? He opened the door and stepped on to the landing of a brightly lit staircase. In front of him was a lift.
He pushed the button and it opened immediately.
He half expected Ron to step out, clutching his microfilm or file. But it was empty. He entered and looked for the list of buttons on the wall. There was only one: B. He pressed it, the doors closed and with a slight judder the lift began its long descent.
It juddered once more when it hit the bottom, and with a weary clank the doors parted. Nigel was faced with an area with three exits: one ahead, one to the left, the other to his right. Which to choose? The window of each door was frosted, so he could not peer through. There was no light behind the glass on either side, but the path ahead appeared to be lit. Ron must be down there, he thought.
He opened the door to a long corridor, its walls uninterrupted by doors or windows. At the far end was another double door. Nigel hesitated. What if Ron wasn't down here? What if he was upstairs wondering where the hell Nigel was? He should turn back. But, no, he was certain Ron was down there and he needed those newspapers. He started to walk, his footsteps the only sound.
He reached the door, dark green and swinging slightly on its hinges. He pushed at it slowly and was immediately hit by the unmistakable, sweet waft of ageing paper and dust. But the area beyond was inky black. Funny, he thought. If Ron is down here, then why isn't the light on? The corridor light behind him was on, the only source of illumination. He shrugged and stepped through into the darkness. He reached with his left hand to the wall inside the door. His hand touched something cold and hard. Steel, he thought. He patted the area around the door hinges, finally locating a switch. He turned it on.