Читать книгу A Cold Flame: A gripping crime thriller that will keep you hooked - Aidan Conway - Страница 11

At the reception area, Tiziana waved them through the security checks despite the burly security guard’s evident displeasure.

“These gentlemen are with me,” she said. “They are senior police officers.”

The additional information seemed to make the necessary difference as the guard acquiesced and went back to studying his phone.

“I think we know the way now,” said Rossi.

“Wait,” she said, “let me ring ahead first. It will make things easier.”

She unlocked a door on her right in the dim, impersonal corridor in which they now stood. “My office. The back door.”

She emerged a moment later holding out a slip of paper. “Doctor Piredda. First floor, corridor 2, room 209. He’s not busy, so ask him as much as you want. He’s usually pretty straight up actually. Sardinian.”

They thanked her with firm handshakes all round and made their way along the eery passageways. While there was nothing to see, what lurked behind the doors and the nature of the traffic that went through the place was enough to overload the dark side of the imagination.

“Always prefer to come here in the morning,” said Rossi. “Gives me time to forget about it during the rest of the day.”

“Bad dreams?” said Carrara.

“Bad memories more than dreams,” Rossi replied. “I can deal with the dreams. You wake up from them.”

Doctor Piredda was sitting waiting, his hands joined on a writing pad in front of him, a clunky monitor and a computer keyboard yellowed to a soiled ivory colour to one side on his sparse, largely unencumbered working space. He reached across to shake hands with them both, his white-coated bulk straining against the edge of the desk.

“A bad business,” he began. “And still none the wiser, are we?”

Who we was supposed to be, Rossi couldn’t quite be sure.

“I went through it all, you know,” he continued, “with your colleague. He looked down then at his notes in an open Manilla folder. “Lallana.”

“Yes,” said Rossi. “He’s in homicide, specifically. We, Inspector Carrara and I, are from the Serious Crime Squad. We are investigating acts of arson in the city, and we were wondering if there was anything else that may have come to light in the intervening period. Apart from the identification, of course. Any anomalies, for example? We are fairly certain it was intentional. Could you give us something that might indicate intent?”

Piredda shook his head. Rossi knew the signs: that he wasn’t going to stick his neck out on the motive behind the fire.

“Death was due to asphyxiation in primis. The absence of oxygen. It would have been relatively rapid, in the circumstances, with the confined space and the volume of highly toxic smoke.”

“Even with the windows open?” said Carrara. “It was hot. There were locked bars on the windows but the windows themselves must have been open, for ventilation.”

“I think that’s beside the point. The oxygen coming in would only have fed the flames further. They would have quickly lost consciousness, in minutes, and the burns would then in a sense have been secondary factors. Horrendous though they were. I’m sure you know that most victims are not actually burnt to death. What’s more, they will have been asleep and the chances are they were already inhaling the fumes as they slept. They were, I believe, in all but one case found close to where they would have been sleeping. It was night. You can’t orientate yourself in such conditions, and the heat would have been completely overpowering.”

“The ethnicities?” said Rossi feeling already that it was going to be a wasted visit. “Age? Nothing you think you might be able to add?”

“I provided my estimates for age, considering a margin of error of around three to five years either way. I also provided the racial profile. Nothing has changed, Inspector.”

“You said African. Black African. And North African.”

“That is correct. Three black African corpses. One North African. The other victim, of course, was identified by his jewellery. His ‘dog tags’.”

“Could you hazard a guess as to a country, a more specific region?” Rossi asked. “South or West African? You see we’ve had very little in the line of witnesses who had even seen the occupants.”

“Seems like we’ve run into a bit of omertà,” Carrara chipped in. “No one’s saying a goddam word.”

The doctor gave a weak smile.

“That’s more difficult without DNA tests, but I’d venture that the two black Africans were likely sub-Saharan, possibly West African.”

“But we could run those tests,” said Rossi. “If necessary, and get something more definite on age. It could help narrow the search considerably. It might give us something more to work on.”

“Teeth can give excellent results. Carbon-14 dating and crown dentin analysis, without blinding you with the science, Inspector. Of course it takes a little time and it’s rather expensive and there are budget constraints to consider. But if it’s required …,” he trailed off without appearing to exude any great enthusiasm at the prospect.

Carrara meanwhile had whipped out his phone. He nudged Rossi.

“We’re going to have to adjourn, I’m afraid,” he said.

“Now, what?” said Rossi. “Another fire?”

“No. Look,” he said showing Rossi the screen on his wafer-like smartphone. Codice Rosso. Tutte le unità. A red alert. For all units.

“You will have to excuse us, Dottore,” said Rossi, rising with as much decorum as was possible but already making for the door. “Maybe we can talk about that DNA again soon, but it seems we have a major incident in the city. I think it would be a good idea to alert the hospitals. Perhaps all of them.”