‘I’ve now had a chance to examine Beatrice Ulbricht,’ she said, leading them in to the examination room, where a half open body bag was already on an examination table. Perry looked nervous; he had admitted that this was the first time he’d ever been inside a room where bodies were dissected. Dr Summers was a tiny dark-haired woman with a Mediterranean look, dark eyes and olive skin. But there was nothing in her accent to hint that she had ever lived anywhere but the south-east of England.

The forensic pathologist unzipped the body bag to reveal the naked girl in her entirety. Perry gagged audibly next to Gillard. Beatrice was an alabaster statue, a Halloween Snow White; perfect in every detail but for the crudely stitched Y-shaped incision in her thorax where her viscera had been removed, and the less obvious cut around her crown. That was where the top of the skull had been removed by an electric saw and had now been popped back, the scalp held on with a few stitches. Gillard and Dr Summers exchanged a quick glance as Perry turned away to compose himself. The detective chief inspector could see from the dead woman’s body that she had sustained cuts and bruising around her face, throat, forearms and feet.

Dr Summers continued: ‘The trickiest element in this case is to establish to what extent, one, did her immersion in water cause the injuries we see and, two, erase evidence of previous injury. Typical external injuries for a submerged body, which normally floats face down, include lateral abrasions to the forehead, nose, chin, the backs of the hands and the shins. There are patently very few such injuries. The corpse was trapped underneath a floating tree, but not for much of the time she was in the water.’

‘She may well have been in the Allegro with Jane Morris,’ Perry said.

Summers nodded. ‘In my estimation she was in the water for roughly twenty-four hours. Skin maceration was moderate, and she had not sloughed off significant keratin from hands or feet. Moreover, there’s no water in the stomach and nothing suggesting inhalation, which may well indicate she was already dead before immersion.’

‘So we can rule out accidental death?’ Perry asked.

‘Probably,’ Dr Summers said. ‘The cause of death seems to be strangulation prior to immersion, which I note chimes with Dr Delahaye’s conclusion for Jane Morris’ cause of death. In this case, self-evident bruising in the strap muscles and a fractured hyoid bone are indicative. There are also a few petechiae still evident in the face.’

‘What’s petechiae?’ Perry asked.

‘Broken blood vessels. In strangulation or drowning, they can often be seen in the eye.’

‘Oh, you mean bloodshot?’

‘Yes.’ She turned back to Gillard. ‘There is strong evidence of blunt force trauma throughout, including fingernail marks externally on the throat which I think you will have noticed.’

Gillard nodded. ‘I think she may have put up a fight.’

‘Yes, I am gratified that despite her immersion there are fibres and skin and a little blood still retained under the middle fingernail of her left hand. DNA as you know decomposes fairly rapidly in water, but we might be lucky. I sent them off for analysis this morning. Here is something interesting, too.’ She brought over a small torch from another table, and shone it on the body. It revealed a fine mist of glittery particles on her hair and right temple under the ultraviolet light.