ONE
Pale aquamarine and milky like the waters of Venice, the sea moved slowly inland. The shoreline at Todhempstead welcomed the advance reluctantly, giving up its golden sands inch by inch, unwilling to concede a single yard of the most beautiful beach.
The body lay some way distant from the incoming tide, but sooner or later it would have to be moved.
For the moment, though, it lay there, surrounded by a frozen tableau â a small group of people immobilised by what lay at their feet. Death changes behaviour patterns, imposes a protocol of its own.
She was young, she was blonde, and she may have been pretty but for the hideous open wound that claimed half her face. Her dress was glamorous in an inexpensive sort of way, arranged around her decorously enough. It was still dry, a sure indicator it had not been here too long.
Frank Topham looked down with some discomfort. The long shallow beach had at its furthest end a high embankment, surely too far away for the victim to have fallen from and landed here. The injuries which claimed her life were too severe â that much was evident â for her to have walked or crawled to her final resting place, yet there were no footprints around the body apart from those made sparingly by the small group of eyewitnesses.
Nor was there any blood.
These contradictions jarred Inspector Tophamâs usually tranquil state of mind, but were swept aside for the moment as he looked down on the wretched girl.
âTwenty, I should say,â he murmured to the two faceless acolytes standing at his shoulder.
âNo shoes,â said one.
âNo handbag,â replied Topham.
The other lit a cigarette and looked up at the sky. He didnât seem terribly interested.
Whatever passed next between these custodians of the peace was drowned by the arrival of the up train from Exbridge, a billowing, grunting triumph of the steam engineerâs art, slowing as it made its long approach into Todhempstead Spa station.
âBetter get her away,â Topham said to the police doctor. The man on his knees looked over his shoulder at the advancing waves and nodded.
âNo evidence,â said Topham wretchedly. âNo clues. Weâre moving the body and thereâs no clues.â
Taking his cue, the second man moved vaguely away and came back. âTizer bottle.â
âIs the label wet?â asked Topham without even looking at it.
âYer.â
âChuck it,â snapped the inspector. âNo use to us.â
He moved swiftly off to the slipway where the car was parked, not wanting the men to see his face. There had been too many deaths back in the War, but wasnât that why he had fought? So there wouldnât be any more? It was a manâs job to die, not a womanâs.
For a moment he turned to look back at the scene below. The dead body claimed his focus, but, beyond, it was as if nobody cared that the world had lost a soul this morning. In the distance two sand-yachts raced each other across the broad beach, and overhead an ancient biplane trailed a long banner flapping from its tail. Smithâs Crisps, according to its message, gave you a wholesome happy holiday.
Far in the distance he could see a solitary female figure, dressed in rainbow colours, standing perfectly still and looking out to sea as if what it had to offer was somehow more interesting than a dead body. It was as if nobody cared.
Inspector Topham got in the car and pulled out on to the empty road. He reached Todhempstead Spa station in a matter of minutes, but already the Riviera Express was pulling out, heading on towards Exeter at a slow roll â huffing, grinding, thumping, clanging. He could get it stopped at Newton Abbot to check if there was evidence on the front buffers of contact with human flesh from the downward journey, to quiz the train guard and the driver. But theyâd all be back again this afternoon on the return trip, and he doubted, given the distance of the body from the railway embankment, that this was a rail fatality. Though, with death, you could never be sure about anything.
As he drove back to the Sands, his eyes lifted for a moment from the road ahead. It was already mid-June and the lanes running parallel to the beach were bursting with joy at summerâs arrival. Though the bluebells and primroses had retreated, the hedgerows were noisy with young blackbirds testing their beautiful voices, while, beneath, newly arrived wild roses and cow parsley reached out, begging to be noticed.