A Cold Coffin. Gwendoline Butler

He had painted it white but his helpers had covered the walls with graffiti and advertisements that took their eye. Some advertisements tactfully or blatantly (depending on the publication) offered high wages for anything up to and including what sounded like gun-running or the odd quiet murder.

      It was, of course, recognized that professors and doctors worked all hours and no one questioned it, but when Joe took his cleaning equipment into what he called the ‘museum of bones’ it was a bit on the late side. On a less busy day he might have been having a drink in his local or cooking his wife a supper. She was a nurse who worked even harder than he did and for less pay.

      All the same, he would have been glad to have had the help of his assistant Sam, who hadn’t shown his face.

      ‘Not here, as usual . . . bloody loafer.’ When Joe had said he could have this job, Sam had replied that there was always work for a man, which Joe knew to be only half a truth.

      Sam was efficient when he turned up, but he claimed bad health. Big, dark-skinned and burly, and not much of a talker. Not Joe’s favourite chap, but he felt he must look after him, goodness knows why, it was just the effect Sam had on some people. ‘Ask him to supper and get the wife to cook one of her meat pies. Don’t think Sam feeds himself.’ Sam Brother lived in a small flat, built by the local council, in almost sensuous disarray. Joe would swear the cooker was never used. He drove himself around on an ancient motorbike that he kept in good repair; he was said to love it more than any woman. Not that Joe had ever seen him with a woman. Only dogs and the odd cat. He had a way with animals.

      He threw open the door of the museum of bones, which was, in fact, a smallish room lined with cabinets that exhibited human bones illustrating medical conditions.

      It was not much frequented, since medics don’t do things that way any longer; they have scans, and X-rays and hardly need to look at the human frame any more. But he supposed the odd medical man came in sometimes. He had a key himself, of course.

      As he advanced into the room, he gave a shout and seized his broom, his only weapon of defence since a vacuum cleaner is no help at all. Someone had broken open the cabinets, shattering the glass doors and throwing bones and skulls all around. There was glass on the ground and a body at his feet. A circle of small skulls had been arranged around the head.

      ‘They didn’t get there by accident,’ decided Joe.

      Joe was a great reader of detective novels and he knew he wanted the police. More, he wanted John Coffin, whom he had heard give a lecture on Crime and the Second City. A policeman who had a wife like Stella Pinero was the one for him.

      ‘Get John Coffin,’ he said aloud, looking down at the victim.

      There wasn’t a female version of victim, like ‘victime’ or ‘victima’, but this one was definitely a woman.

      He saw her lips move. ‘Coffin,’ she seemed to say. ‘Yes, yes.’ An echo of his words, or her last wish?

      Then she stopped. Death had silenced her.

      Mr Jones of Farmers Restaurant received them with a smile and showed them at once to a table in a corner. In spite of what he had said Coffin must have rung up and booked a table.

      Stella shook her head at her husband. Mr Jones saw it and looked anxious.

      ‘You prefer somewhere else?’

      ‘No, this is just right,’ said Stella.

      ‘I thought it was what Mr Coffin wanted.’

      ‘It is,’ said Coffin speedily. ‘Just what I wanted. Have you got a bottle of that good Sancerre?’ Then he responded to Stella’s raised eyebrows. ‘When you were putting on fresh lipstick and some more scent.’

      ‘I didn’t think you noticed.’

      ‘I always notice.’

      ‘So?’

      ‘I know that the death of the Jackson twins has distressed you.’

      Stella looked down at her hands. One way or another her life with Coffin had brought her close to death, sometimes too close.

      ‘They were only kids.’ Sometimes she felt that being married to a man like Coffin brought death into the family. ‘Don’t let’s talk about it now. Later.’ The best solution was to think of herself as a character in a play, a bit of fiction, and the deaths the same, nothing real.

      He took a drink. ‘I had a letter today. It came this morning, but I opened it just before I came out.’

      Stella looked at him.

      ‘It was from Sally Young. About their baby.’

      Stella nodded.

      ‘She enclosed a letter from Charlie. He wrote it just before he was killed. Didn’t have a chance to post it. He wrote it just after he’d seen the scan on the child. He already knew he had a son. He rang up his father and asked if it would be all right to ask me to act as godfather.’ He took a swig of wine. ‘Archie said yes, of course. Hence the letter. Sally held on to it for a while, and now she has posted it. The christening is next week.’

      ‘You’ll be godfather, of course.’

      ‘You’ll help me, Stella, won’t you? I can’t do it without your help.’ He held out the letter. ‘Read it.’

      Stella read it slowly, then she looked up at her husband. ‘He admired you – you were a good copper. Straight. He doesn’t use the word integrity, but he means it. He wants the boy to have that. He says he knows you can’t really teach it, but you can show it.’ She put the letter carefully in his hand. ‘It’s a great compliment he paid you.’

      ‘A painful one.’

      Stella considered it. ‘I think the best ones often are, because they have a truth tucked away inside that can hurt. It’s the other side of a compliment.’

      That’s a bit too profound for me,’ said Coffin, who suspected she had made it up that moment to cheer him up.

      ‘I read it somewhere, I think,’ said Stella, confirming his suspicion.

      They were halfway through their meal, after the clear soup and enjoying the roast beef, when Coffin heard his mobile trilling away in his pocket.

      Phoebe’s voice always rang out loud and clear so that Stella could hear every word she said. As, probably, could the couple at the next table.

      ‘Sir,’ said Phoebe. ‘It’s about the head . . . the head that was different.’

      The couple heard that all right, but pretended not to.

      ‘The infant’s skull. We now know where it came from. Sex isn’t clear yet. Nor cause of death.’

      That took the couple’s mind off their smoked salmon. Coffin also had noticed the attention the next table was giving his conversation. ‘Go on.’

      Something in his tone must have told Phoebe she was shouting, because her voice dropped so that even Stella could only catch odd words.

      ‘University . . . museum . . . specimen not noticed.’

      Then Phoebe’s voice became audible again. ‘Yes, sir. I have Inspector Dover with me, this being his patch . . . There’s no need for you to come, but I thought you would want to know.’

      Coffin put his mobile on the table, then looked at his wife.

      ‘Eat up, Stella,’ he said.

3

      Friday evening.

      Joe stood waiting quietly for the arrival of the Chief Commander. Phoebe Astley, whom he knew – they bought their meat and sausages from the same butcher, of whom there were not many left around, even in the Second City – had told him to wait. He stood looking out