4

Leith, 14 April 1850

George Cameron watched in grim amusement as the young constable spewed his guts all over the baker’s shop doorway. A nice filling for the cakes.

That’s the bother with these Lowlanders, no ballast. He glanced over to where the girl’s body lay slumped against the wall; ye could not blame the boy, I suppose, first night on patrol with his big Highland sergeant, excuses himself to go up a back street then finds he’s near relieved himself upon a corpse.

The constable had nothing else to offer but his shoulders still heaved. Dearie me. The dry boke. Few things are worse.

Unless you’ve had your brisket mangled. He turned away from the grovelling young buckie, took a deep breath and delicately pulled away the girl’s dress. My God, she’d been split apart.

Cameron took some eyeglasses out of his pocket, perched them on his nose and looked to his heart’s content.

His father had worked as a gillie on the laird’s estate; he remembered the first time he saw the auld man gralloch a deer, the gush of entrails followed by a ritual smearing of blood on the son’s forehead. Most unwelcome. Some had dribbled right down his nose. Cameron sniffed. But that was just a drop in the bucket compared to this, a drop in the bucket.

He gingerly lifted the head of the corpse which had fallen face down on to the ravaged breast. Cameron did not recognise the features, but the clothes proclaimed her profession. A young face, mouth parted, sweet lips, nae scabby gums. She’d be new at the whoring … come from nowhere, gone to the same place.

A noise by his side, the constable had returned dabbing at his mouth with a big white hankie.

‘Now, don’t you be spewing up again,’ said the sergeant. ‘Not over me, not over the corpus. We do not want our evidence obscured by vomit.’

The young man swallowed hard. He wouldn’t give this big Inverness teuchter the satisfaction. He forced himself to look at the terrible gash in the girl’s body.

‘Not be the last cadaver ye see on these streets. I’ve witnessed twelve murders in ten glorious years,’ announced the sergeant. ‘But I have to confess, this one’s a sight all on its own, son. All on its own.’

The constable nodded. He noticed something in the hand of the corpse and gently teased it out. It was a fragment of thin black cloth which the sergeant took from him and held close to his thick eyeglasses, then sniffed.

‘Fine quality, new bought, but torn from what? A cravat, stocking, glove?’ He looked at the constable who made no answer. ‘Are you in the huff because I watched ye cast up?’

Shake of the head. Cameron was amused, vomit or no, this boy might have the makings. ‘Away tae the station, son, get me the hand cart and we’ll fetch this lassie home, well as near home as she’ll ever find this night.’

As the young man started off Cameron called after.

‘And as ye make your way, review the events of the night. In case something comes to mind. It’s always a good idea. To review events.’

‘I’ll do just that,’ said James McLevy.