Coffin's Ghost by Gwendoline Butler

Phoebe. ‘And doesn’t want to talk. I’ll get her though.’
    This she did, walking towards Mary Arden with the question on her lips.
    ‘It wasn’t Etta, was it?’
    ‘He wouldn’t let me see the legs and arms. Just showed me a photograph.’
    ‘That was good enough, wasn’t it?’
    ‘I don’t know . . . the real flesh . . .’ She shook her head. ‘One might get a different impression . . . Colour, feeling.’ Mary Arden seemed genuinely anxious.
    Phoebe reassured her. ‘Can’t be Etta, wrong age.’ Even as she said it, she thought, this girl Etta might just fit the younger age estimate, girls do get into trouble, disappear, or worse, but she persevered: ‘Wrong life history from what one can tell. I think it’s brave of you to want to see those limbs. You are really worried, aren’t you?’
    ‘They were left on the doorstep of the house I live in and run as a refuge for women who are sheltering with me from violence. Of course I am worried, I am worried about Etta. She left, she has never been in touch with me as she promised and she has been seen around the town.’
    ‘I’d get off home if I were you.’
    ‘Home? The Serena Seddon Refuge? Do you know what it is like now? My poor residents whom I am supposed to be helping are worried because of what turned up on the doorstep. Each and every one thinks they will be next.’
    Her eyes flicked across to where Coffin stood talking to the young doctor.
    ‘Who’s that with you?’
    Phoebe did not answer.
    ‘Another policeman? He’s got the look.’ Mary began to move away. ‘Who is he? I fancy I have seen him before.’
    Again Phoebe did not answer.
    ‘Or are you arresting him? Could be, he has that drawn look about the eyes. Rather attractive.’
    Still no answer, and Phoebe could see that Coffin, although still talking politely to the doctor, was growing restive.
    ‘Oh, you’re right,’ said Mary Arden. ‘I did have a very strong vodka and tonic – that’s the chosen tipple in the Serena establishment – before leaving home . . . to strengthen me to look at the legs but much good it did me . . . I will go home.’ She was gone, with a brave wave of the hand.
    ‘What was all that about?’ Coffin asked as Phoebe came back.
    Do you say to your boss: She thinks you look haggard but attractive? Also a likely criminal. Phoebe thought not.
    ‘She wanted to view the limbs, she was shown a photograph which failed to click with her.’
    ‘That was a long talk about nothing.’
    Can he lip read? Phoebe asked herself. ‘She’s upset.’
    The young doctor had disappeared through one of the shining glass and chrome doors. The old pathology rooms had been dark brown with dim unpolished floors. Coffin, an occasional visitor, had thought it suitable for death, polite and quiet, but the new atmosphere was bright and brash and highly sterile, which he had to admit, the old place probably had not been, although it had always smelt strongly of disinfectants which yet failed to mask other deeper, darker, more intimidating smells.
    All gone now, there were even pictures on the walls of the corridor down which Phoebe was leading him. Although to be fair to Professor Garden, they were photographs of interesting autopsies and specially selected corpses, with here and there a greatly enlarged mordant eye or a scrap of malignant tissue.
    Lessons in mortality all the way along, thought Coffin. A learning experience every step of the corridor with a desiccated adult body placed next to a tiny, mummified foetus. Even just a hint of Garden’s sense of humour.
    Once out of the corridor, through the anteroom and into the working area, the atmosphere changed.
    Here inside was all clinical with almost an industrial feel to the tables, with running water draining down into largechrome apertures, and wall cabinets with their freezing drawers.
    Coffin nodded to the white-coated pathologist standing by the cabinets.
    A figure clad from head to foot in white, booted in white