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In his first crime novel “Toxic Family Blood,” Uwe Trostmann lets Chief Inspector Steve Brennan and his assistant Roberta Foster deal with mysterious cases of poisoning that originated in Scotland many hundreds of years ago. Exciting crime story that has its origins in Scotland in the 15th century. An old family feud is rekindled and the murderer poisons young people in revenge. Inspectors Steve Brennan and Roberta Foster use all their skills to solve the mystery of these poisonings. What do a skeleton from the Middle Ages, a dead woman who was murdered 27 years ago and a corpse in the trunk have to do with each other - except that they all have a distinctive mark on their forehead? While Chief Inspector Steve Brennan and his assistant Inspector Roberta Foster investigate on the northern coast of Scotland, more women are killed in England. All were killed with henbane poison. After a lengthy search and pursuit, the inspectors are able to arrest the perpetrator, but the murder continues in the same pattern: this time of young men. Are they ritual murders or is there an ancient family feud behind it? Will Steve Brennan and Roberta Foster solve this mystery?
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Seitenzahl: 302
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025
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www.tredition.de
Uwe Trostmann
Toxic Family Blood
Crime Novel
Imprint
©2025 Uwe Trostmann
Website: www.uwetrostmann.de
Editing by: Ms. Friederike Schmitz, www.prolitera.de/
Cover design by: Jochen Pach, www.oryxdesign.de/
Printing and distribution on behalf of the author:
tredition GmbH, An der Strusbek 10, 22926 Ahrensburg, Germany
The work, including its parts, is protected by copyright. The author is responsible for the content. Any use is not permitted without his consent. The publication and distribution are carried out on behalf of the author and can be reached at: tredition GmbH, “Imprint Service” department, An der Strusbek 10, 22926 Ahrensburg, Germany.
ISBN Softcover: 978-3-384-48703-2e-Book: 978-3-384-48704-9
My special thanks go to my editor, Ms. Friederike Schmitz (www.prolitera.de), for her perseverance and patience in revising the text material for my first crime novel and for her valuable comments and corrections.
I would also like to thank Ms. Claudia Chmielus for her careful proofreading.
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Witch Dance
The Seed Is Sprouting
The Commissioner And The Fish
Strange Signs
Findings
The Train Arrives
The Order
The Body In The Trunk
The Skeleton In Front Of The Wall
Brennan Daughter Weekend
Old Documents
An Unplanned Murder
A Family Tragedy?
New Clues
The Poison
Brennan Summarizes
A Problem For Roberta Foster
The Dead Woman In The Cinema
The Trail
The Hunt Begins
A Weekend Full Of Uncertainty
Brennan's Risk
The Trap Snaps Shut
What Is The Truth – Interrogation Day 1
Foster In Distress
Interrogation Day 2
Interrogation Day 3
Interrogation Day 4
A Dossier
Interrogation Day 5
Who Is George Dale?
Interrogation Day 6
A Kidnapping
Interrogation Day 7
Without A Trace
Interrogation Day 8
A New Poisoning
Interrogation Day 9 In the Morning
George Is Wanted
Interrogation Day 9 In The Afternoon
Victim 8 Is Kidnapped
The Plan Doesn't Work
The Hunted
Interrogation Day 10
Michael Glenn Defends Himself
Interrogation Day 11
The Poison Still Works
Hamlet, Act 1 Scene 5, William Shakespeare
Claudius to poison King Hamlet:
Sleeping within mine orchard,
My custom always of the afternoon
Upon my secure hour thy uncle stole,
With juice of cursed hebenon in a vial,
And in the porches of mine ear did pour
The leprous distillment, whose effect
Holds such an enmity with blood of man
That swift as quicksilver it courses through
The natural gates and alleys of the body…
… Thus was I, sleeping, by a brother's hand
Of life, of crown, of queen, at once dispatch’ d:
Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin.
Witch Dance
The long dresses billowed, the dancers spun around the fire, the flames rose many feet high, the drums beat the beat quickly. The whole scene painted a ghostly picture on this moonlit night. They had rubbed themselves with this ointment, Margareth had shown it to them. Their skin tingled, burned, they spun faster and faster. Margareth, swaying between the others, spoke sentences in another language, said she was connected to the ancestors, they spoke through her mouth:
"Many of the Donn family had to die, they were victims of revenge. Their deaths are avenged today."
She passed the goblet around, everyone took a sip, she was now dancing next to Diane Glenn, handing her the goblet again and again. Diane kept spinning, her expression was happy, her mind was already far away, her body was spinning like mad. When Margareth noticed that Diane could not stay on her feet much longer, she led her a little way away from the square, next to a bush, did not hold her when she fell, and moved herself back to the others in time with the drums. Ecstatic faces, laughing spinning people, who were now throwing themselves more and more around each other's necks; now they lay down on the ground or sat down with their eyes closed, far away in their thoughts, the poison taking effect, the intoxication. The flickering flames and the full moon did the rest. Diane Glenn was no longer with them.
The first guests of the witches' night had fallen asleep, others were still in a trance, the flames had turned to embers when the first clouds moved in front of the moon. Margareth, keeping a full overview, saw the weather coming and packed her things in the light of the remaining fire, the drummers did the same. It began to rain. She woke the sleeping people and the whole entourage followed her to her house in Port Isaac. On the floor, others on a couch , they slept off their intoxication.
“Good morning, everyone, or should I say hello?” Constable Settler had rung the doorbell.
Margareth had seen the constable from the window and had already gone to meet him. "What can I do for you? If we left something lying around last night, we'll clean it up today."
"You left a person up there. A dead person. According to the papers in her bag, her name is Diane Glenn. Was she at your party last night?"
"Yes," Margareth said hesitantly. "You say dead? That's terrible! How did she die?"
"We don't know yet. Didn't you notice that she wasn't there when you walked back?"
“Guests often leave without saying goodbye.”
“Please, all of you come with me to the station.”
"Are we under arrest?"
Constable Settler did not answer this question. A police van was waiting outside to take the whole group to the station.
Half a year later, Margareth Dunn was sentenced to one year's probation for illegal drug possession. She was also prohibited from holding similar "witches' festivals" again. All those involved had testified that they had consumed the henbane drink voluntarily. No one had forced them to do so. The judge assumed that Diane Glenn had taken the lethal dose herself.
The Seed Is Sprouting
It had been a long journey. First by bus to Plymouth and then by train to Birmingham. Gerald Dunn felt ill and did not know how long he had left to live. At 56, he was not old, but the work on the cutter had left its mark. With his deep wrinkles on his face, his slightly bent back and his slow gait, he gave the impression of being 66 years old.
"At some point we must avenge the family honour. Just like we did in the past ," his cousin Margareth had explained to him years ago. "If you feel too weak to do it, perhaps Winston will do it later."
“ But he’s only two years old,” Gerald Dunn replied.
"I still have enough time to prepare him for that."
"No. I want to do this! It's time it was finally done." Gerald Dunn shared Margaret's opinion.
He had taken the bus from Birmingham train station to Oldbury, from there he walked to Claire Glenn's small, terraced house and rang the bell. Once, twice.
“She wrote that she would be home at this time,” he muttered to himself.
Finally, a noise. She came down the stairs and opened the door. The young woman with the big brown eyes and medium-length blonde hair smiled at him:
"Are you Gerald Dunn? Come in."
They had exchanged letters, and Claire was looking forward to learning about her ancestors.
“Do you still have the letters?” Gerald wanted to know.
"Sure. I have them all stacked here on the living room table."
Gerald Dunn made sure that all four letters were on the table.
Claire had just closed the door and was about to turn around when Gerald Dunn pressed a cloth with chloroform on her face. She immediately fainted. He dragged the young woman into the basement. From an earlier observation he knew that the basement had no windows. And he had found out a lot more about Claire Glenn that was now useful to him. He took shackles and a gag out of his briefcase and the small container with the oily substance.
Claire woke up. Gerald Dunn had put her on an old chair and tied her down. At first, she didn't know what had happened, but then she realized her situation and panicked. Fear was visible in her eyes.
"You must not become weak when she looks at you," Margareth had repeatedly said. "Don't look her in the eyes if you can't bear it."
“I’m going to tell you a story now,” Gerald Dunn began.
Claire tried to free herself. She tugged at the bonds on her hands and feet. She wanted to scream. The gag in her mouth prevented any sound from coming out.
"In 1457, Aleen Glean refused to marry Gilmore Donn, as the families had decided. Aleen first ran away and was then murdered, poisoned. People said that it was Gilmore's brother. The Gleans swore revenge and began to poison all the young girls of the Donn family for generations. Many were killed.
Do you know this story?"
Claire shook her head. She had trouble breathing with the gag in her mouth.
"I'm taking the gag off now. Here in your basement, you can scream as much as you want. No one will hear you. And at this time of day the neighbours are all at work."
“What do you want from me! I haven’t done anything to you!”
"You and your ancestors: you wanted to wipe out our family."
"That's not true! I don't know this story at all. And if it is true, it was a long time ago. What do you want to do with me?" Claire asked anxiously. Tears ran down her face.
"You are part of my revenge."
"You want to kill me?"
“You will do that yourself.”
Claire shook her head.
“Would you like something to drink?”
“Yes,” she answered quietly.
Gerald Dunn went into the kitchen, filled a glass with apple juice and added the contents of the bottle he had brought with him. Claire drank the glass in one go, to Gerald Dunn's satisfaction. She leaned back.
"What do you want me to do for you? There must be a reason why you're tying me up here."
“You will feel better soon.”
“If you want me to feel better , please let me go!”
"Soon," he said. He then told them about the coastal town of Port Isaac, where he lived, and about his work as a fisherman.
After not too long, perhaps 20 minutes, her face relaxed. Gerald Dunn had learned from his cousin that the poison would then soon develop its strength. It took another half hour before Claire Glenn fell asleep, and another half hour before her breathing stopped. He untied the bonds and carried the dead woman up the stairs to the entrance. He drove Claire's Nissan – the car keys were hanging on a hook in the hallway – right up to the front door, loaded the corpse into the trunk, remembered the letters that were lying on the living room table and put them in his bag, fetched a spade from the garden and drove ten miles to a small forest. He dug a hole, took his knife – it was the knife he used to cut up the fish – and began, with great force, to carve the mark into the dead woman's forehead.
She was still bleeding, he realized, he would have to wash himself. Was the cut deep enough for the mark, this disgrace, to remain forever?
He rolled Claire Glenn into the damp, woody grave, threw the earth on top and covered it with a few branches. The foliage was wet enough to wipe the blood from his hands. He washed the rest off with the water from his bottle. He got back in the car, drove it to a bus stop and parked it there. Then he took the train back to Port Isaac.
“Margareth, I have avenged the family,” were his first words as he closed the door behind him.
"Part of the family. There is still much work ahead of us."
The Commissioner And The Fish
Steve Brennan had been standing in the Forensic Investigation River repeatedly for three days, casting his fishing rod into the ice-cold water again and again. Yesterday had been a good day. He had caught three salmon and five trout. He could spend hours and hours doing his favourite activity. But he could no longer stand in the fast-flowing parts of the river. It was now costing him too much energy. And he also felt the coldness of the water. Despite his long, padded fishing trousers, his aching bones were noticeable after just a few hours. When the time came again, he took his fishing rod and sat down on the bank in a calmer part of the river and tried his luck from there. Today he had walked to a sunlit sandbank. The trees around him made him feel alone here. He loved this place. For him, the Chief Inspector from Birmingham, his hobby was the relaxation he needed and found in his nerve-racking job.
There had been no major cases in his station for a long time. The last murders that fell under his jurisdiction were about a year ago and solving them had not been difficult. A child abduction had taken place two years ago, and with considerable effort he had also been able to solve this case. Brennan found the current calm in the station pleasant, as he would be retiring in a year and a half at the latest. He no longer needed a highly complicated case. But he was suspicious of this calm.
His thoughts were abruptly interrupted by a fish that had bitten his hook. It was a large one that pulled violently on his rod, forcing him to stand up. Brennan carefully pulled taut on the line again and again, but the fish tried to swim away with the current. Brennan pulled taut, reeled in the line, and had to give way a little because the pull was too great, and the line could break. He saw the fish as an opponent that had to be defeated. The fish pulled more and more, forcing the angler to get into the river. Brennan's height of more than six feet allowed him to go into the deeper parts of the river. His whole body was now tense, his facial features became even harder, his rather large nose protruded prominently – Brennan was fighting with the fish.
They had been wrestling for half an hour when a kind of tie occurred: Brennan brought the fish two yards towards him and soon had to give it back the same length. Then it happened: the fishing line got caught in a washed-up root that was wedged between two rocks and broke. Brennan cursed as he watched the fish swim away. He ran angrily back to his folding seat and looked at the river for a long time.
"Good. You won this time. Next time I'll get you."
Chief Inspector Steve Brennan was known for his persistence. Many of his colleagues and even his former wife Carol accused him of being stubborn and inflexible. But he was always right. He was able to solve most of his cases in his own way. However, many of his colleagues were not left with only happy faces. Some felt ignored, others humiliated.
But he had always put all his strength into the falls, which his body did not always react well to. High blood pressure and heart problems were the result. Brennan's eating habits only made this condition worse: ready-made pizza and hamburgers, washed down quickly with at least one beer. His friend and doctor Dan Halfpenny had warned him several times that he would not be able to enjoy his retirement for many years if he continued like this.
The weather was still nice that morning, but unfortunately the weather forecast was right, and it started to rain in the early afternoon. As he was fighting with the fish, Brennan hadn't noticed that dark clouds had moved in front of the sun. The first drops of rain prompted him to pack his things and drive back to the small cottage near Ordiequish with his catch of three fish. In the car, he suddenly remembered that a new inspector would be joining his department on Monday, or more precisely, a female inspector. A woman, that was all he needed. They thought they knew everything better. And she didn't seem to want to follow the rules either. In Edinburgh, she wanted to do her own thing. "That doesn't happen here!" Brennan parked his car in front of the holiday home. "That didn't have to happen now too." He had been talking to himself, first mumbling, then getting louder and louder.
Brennan gutted the fishes and froze two in the freezer. He prepared the best one on the grill.
“I mustn’t forget to take the fish with me to Birmingham tomorrow.”
The fire was burning in the fireplace, giving off a pleasant warmth. Brennan pushed the empty plate away from him, picked up his beer bottle and sat down in an armchair near the fireplace. It was the last day of his short vacation. This time he hadn't been disturbed by a phone call, neither from the police station nor from his ex-wife Carol nor from his daughters Judy or Miriam.
“The three women are finally learning that they have to get by without me,” he muttered to himself and picked up the newspaper.
But sometimes his peace was disturbed. Six years ago, a call came through to his cell phone while he was fishing. Someone had robbed a bank in Birmingham four weeks earlier and was now in Brennan's area, probably in Scotland. He had left his fingerprints in Aberdeen during another bank robbery. He was supposed to be hiding somewhere on the Forensic Investigation River. Brennan reluctantly interrupted his vacation and began to investigate in the surrounding towns. He found him. The Scottish police were able to arrest the bank robber. His boss at the time thanked him, but did not give him another day's vacation. Brennan had to return immediately.
He had taken four days off and driven the long way up here from Birmingham. He had been doing this for almost thirty years. In the past, Carol or his daughters had come along. It had never gone well. They had never left him alone. He wanted to go fishing; they wanted to change up by hiking and sightseeing. Until one day he decided that from now on he would only drive here alone. Much to Carol's annoyance. But that was history.
Tomorrow, he had to go back - but only for the next year and a half. Then he would sell his house in Birmingham and move here. The Chief Inspector put his feet up on the armrest of his chair and immersed himself in his newspaper.
Strange Signs
It was not her habit, but that morning Roberta Foster had gotten up very early. And she did not have a hangover. She had deliberately skipped her gin the night before and had just a glass of wine. She did not want to be noticed at her new place of work as being late and sleepy. She had passed her exams well and successfully completed her time as a sergeant. The new position would be her first as an inspector.
"You look smart this morning," came a voice from the bathroom. "Hopefully the working climate in Birmingham is better." Paul put the hairdryer back in the bathroom cabinet.
"I also hope that the move to Birmingham was worth it. In Aberdeen, everyone was yelling at each other." Roberta Foster looked at herself in the mirror. Her dark red dress fit very well and went with her dark brown hair. She had had it cut to medium length two days ago, so she did not have to tie it back today – for her first day at work. She looked down in the mirror and noticed that the shoes with the medium heels went well too.
"And how lucky that I got a job at the bank here straight away. But please be a little more cautious," Paul added.
"What do you mean?"
"You know. Your temper gets the better of you sometimes. And not everyone can handle that," Paul explained, putting on his dark blue suit.
“You probably like it when I show temperament in bed.”
Foster drank the hot coffee slowly. The last case she had worked on in Aberdeen had almost turned into a disaster for her. Only a few months before, she had completed her final exams as a prospective inspector at the police academy. She wanted to apply for a position as soon as possible. She wanted to do everything particularly well. But it had all started out quite normally: a raid on a petrol station, an employee had been killed, the evidence pointed to a raid by a biker gang. Foster was involved in the investigations; it could not have been a group known locally. The perpetrator who had shot the man was not found at first. But a friend told her that she had seen another group that had not been very prominent. But they were not making any progress with their investigations into the local people because bikers do not rat each other out. Foster had then decided, without speaking to her boss, to contact the Hell Waves privately. She had taken time off work for this, hung out with them in a bar one evening or another and was allowed to go on tour with them. She hung around Will, he seemed like the right person for her. On one of the tours the group wanted to rob a gas station again. Dick had drawn his gun, threatened, wanted to steal the cash register by force and was about to shoot the gas station attendant when Foster identified himself as a sergeant and wanted to arrest Dick. She threw him to the ground, but his friends helped him. There was a brief scuffle in which she was tied up and beaten. In the meantime, the gas station attendant had managed to press the alarm button. The police were on the scene less than five minutes later. Six bikers were able to get away. Dick had been overpowered before he could point his gun at Foster. She had not only received a reprimand, but also an entry in her personnel file. Her promotion had been postponed for six months.
Paul took his wife in his arms and gave her a big kiss.
“See you this evening then,” she said goodbye, closed the door behind her, got into her car and drove to Lloyd House, Colmore Circus Queensway, her new place of work.
"Good morning, everyone. My name is Roberta Foster. I'm the new inspector." She stood in an open-plan office and looked around. What she was looking for were private offices, which to her horror she couldn't find.
Oh, my goodness. She particularly liked open spaces. Like in Aberdeen, she realized with a shock, and she ran straight to a desk near the entrance door. Elli Lightfoot smiled back, examining this well-dressed young woman. Overdressed, she thought spontaneously. I'm curious to see what the Chief Inspector says about that.
Elli also introduces herself: “I’m the secretary. Welcome to our office. I’ll introduce you to my colleagues.” Elli walked around with her. Everyone looked interested, the men especially.
"Chief Inspector Steve Brennan sometimes arrives a little late. I'll introduce you to him as soon as he gets here."
Foster had to smile at this comment. Another person who did not like being on time. Brennan was her new boss. They continued their rounds; Elli led them to the constables and colleagues from forensics and IT and assigned Foster a desk. Inspector Roberta Foster began her first day at work.
With a brief “Morning!” the Chief Inspector entered the open-plan office. As usual, he was wearing a grey suit.
“Elli is there anything new?” he asked into the room and went straight to his desk.
“Ms Foster is here, the new inspector.”
"Aha, fresh out of school and never seen a dead body," Brennan growled into the room, but turned around and greeted her.
She must have chosen the wrong outfit. We're not at the opera, he thought when he saw her clothes.
“I have been involved in a few cases,” she replied promptly.
"I know your story. But don't take my comments personally – they will be nicer towards the end of the week . Still welcome."
She had already heard a few stories about her new boss, Steve Brennan. She should prepare herself for a lot of things. Life with this old Chief Inspector was not a bed of roses, but he was capable and had already solved many complicated cases. You could learn a lot from him. Foster had no choice. Her application letter had only been received positively here in Birmingham.
The two inspectors talked over a cup of coffee about the police academy and its teachers, whom Brennan also knew, and then got down to their daily work.
"There's not much going on here at the moment. I mean, nothing big. A break-in here, a robbery there. A lot of paperwork," he explained.
"When was your last big case? I mean, a murder?" she wanted to know.
"That was about a year ago. But two years ago, we had this child abduction case. The child's body was later found and that's when things really started to get going for us. We spent a whole year looking for the murderer."
“Who had fled to Italy,” Foster added.
This case had almost broken Brennan's neck. He had been able to solve it. But the threat of torture was not covered by the law. He would leave no stone unturned to save the child. They had been able to arrest one of the kidnappers, Berry Duff. But he would not talk. Brennan threatened waterboarding, had a tub brought into the interrogation room and filled with water; he grabbed the kidnapper and, full of anger, dragged him to the tub. Then Duff started to talk. His statement about the location where the child was found turned out to be correct. But the child had already been dead for two weeks. The kidnapper later accused Brennan of torture. The press was mainly behind the Chief Inspector. But torture was torture, he knew that, and even the threat was forbidden. He had gotten away with a reprimand.
Brennan rummaged through his stack, pulled out one or two files and said, "Take a look at these cases. It involves a burglary gang, probably from the continent."
“Chief Inspector, a call from the Metropolitan Police.” Elli came from the other corner of the office with a piece of paper.
"Hikers found a skeleton above the Botanical Garden. Colleagues are on site."
"Well, you've barely arrived and there's already a dead body. Pack your things, Roberta. We're going on a little trip."
The site was on a slope at the edge of the forest next to a small road. Foster was not prepared for this mission in her clothing. Brennan grinned as she tried to walk up the slope in her high heels. The body had probably been buried, but not deep enough, so rain had slowly eroded the soil, and animals might have dug around there.
"But it's been here for a while." Busy with his investigations and without looking up, the forensic scientist Dr Kincaid continued: "About thirty years, I would guess. I won't be able to say for sure until a few days from now. Unfortunately, animals have also been sniffing and nibbling around here. That makes a precise analysis difficult. We'll be busy here at the site for a few more days until we've identified all the remains."
"Any signs of violence?" Foster thought she was already seeing her first case. She hoped to be able to take it on.
"Far too early, young lady. We're only seeing a few bones and the skull now."
“By the way, this is our new colleague, Inspector Roberta Foster. Today is her first day at work,” Brennan introduced her.
“Well, welcome to your first case!”
“It looks like it was scratched,” said the Chief Inspector.
"What do you mean? The one on the brow bone? Well, let's wait and see. We'll let you know as soon as we know more. But as I said, it could take a while." The two inspectors got into their car and drove back to the office.
"You can be useful, Roberta. Stay in touch with the Forensic Investigation and the Forensic scientist and tell me the news. That's all we can do now. Oh, and look for the files of people who were reported missing about 30 years ago."
“All of them? That’s a lot.”
“Start with the ones around here.”
At the office, Foster was presented with thirty-five cases of people who had been reported missing within a fifty-mile radius plus or minus thirty years ago and had never been found. But before she started her desk work, she went to the restroom and fixed her shoes. There was mud everywhere.
“From tomorrow on I’ll come in jeans and boots,” she decided and freshened up her make-up.
She went through the cases superficially because it seemed pointless to search without further clues. But she remembered that mark on the forehead. It had not been easy to see, but it did not belong there. She looked for other cases in which the victims had been marked, but to no avail. Over the next few days, she repeatedly called the forensic department to find out more. After five days in Kincaid's office, she finally received the information she had been hoping for.
"She is a young woman, around twenty-five years old, with medium length, straight, probably blonde hair, who at first glance shows no signs of violence, apart from the mark on her forehead. What we cannot rule out, of course, is that she was strangled or poisoned, for example. But there are no signs of that anymore."
"No arsenic."
“There are many other poisons, as you know,” Kincaid replied.
"That's not much, unfortunately." Brennan shifted impatiently from one foot to the other. "But what about the mark on the forehead?" he asked.
"We may have something," Kincaid began. "There was actually something carved into the forehead, in such a way that it can be seen in the bone."
“So pretty brutal,” said Foster.
"You could say that. Whether it was before or after death, I can't say. Take a look at this photo. The signs are even clearer on the X-ray. The lines may represent a house and a stick. I'm not sure whether that's part of the bottom of the stick."
"That's something. Roberta, now you can reduce the number of files."
"We are still trying to find and analyse DNA. Maybe then we will know more. And here is a picture of her teeth. Maybe you can find the dentist she went to shortly before."
“Why just before?” Foster wanted to know.
“A tooth was filled not long before her death.”
"About 25 years old, female, medium-length blonde hair, obviously murdered, otherwise she wouldn't have that mark on her forehead," Brennan summarized as he walked from the forensic department back to his. "Any news from Forensic Investigation?"
"Haven't heard anything yet."
“Then let’s go right past there,” Brennan decided, directing his steps toward the department.
Tess Stevenson, head of forensics, came to meet them with a smile.
“She definitely has something for us,” said Foster.
“I am the new colleague, Inspector Roberta Foster,” she introduced herself.
The Chief Inspector reported on Kincaid’s findings.
"This fits quite well with what we found. The few fabric remnants of the clothing indicate that it was thin clothing, which suggests a warm season. The dress the young woman was wearing was made of medium blue fabric. She was wearing pumps and obviously no stockings. We didn't find a bag or any other clues as to who she was."
"This suggests that it was a planned murder. It's just that the dead woman wasn't buried deep enough," added Foster.
“Let’s wait and see,” growled Chief Inspector Brennan, and they made their way back to the office.
"You mean it could have been an accident? And someone carved the mark on his forehead later?"
“Could be,” was his short answer.
Foster now had enough to do. Although the information about the dead woman was now much more precise, she had to expand the radius of her search. None of the missing people within a radius of fifty miles met the criteria. Surveys that Foster had carried out in the immediate and wider area of the location where the body was found brought no news. She expanded the area to a hundred miles. Everything looked as if the location where the body was found was not the scene of the crime.
Findings
Two weeks later, the two inspectors returned to the forensic department. Kincaid was still examining the skeleton, which had been lying in the ground for around thirty years.
"Come in. Take a look. Most of it is in good condition." He slipped on a white coat, pulled on rubber gloves, and removed a cloth that had been laid over the object under examination. Foster only took a quick look at it. Her stomach began to rebel.
“Do we know anything more specific about the person ’s age?”
"I would estimate it to be about 27 years old, give or take a year or two. Have you ever asked dentists? Oh, right, I wanted to give you a better picture of the teeth. And, Roberta, here's another interesting find: the young woman bought some of her clothes and underwear from a store called "Top Fashion," the labels are still legible. Take a look."
Dr Kincaid reported further details which the two inspectors did not consider relevant at this time.
Foster went back to the office alone; Brennan left the house. Great, then I can research in peace, she thought and began searching on the Internet. There were several "top fashion" stores within a fifty miles radius. She had set this radius for herself. With six company names on her notepad, she went online to the commercial register. It had to be a company that existed thirty years ago, she put together. The result of her search was zero. None of the companies or stores were that old.
OK, Roberta. Then we'll go to the ones that no longer exist, she said to herself. After another ten minutes she found what she was looking for. "Top Fashion in Coventry" – that was the right distance. The former owner was an Eve Porter. Hopefully, she was still alive. Foster found the address, left a short note on Brennan's desk and got into her car.
She pressed the doorbell button. At first nothing happened. She pressed it again. There were noises from inside:
“Yes, yes, I’m coming.” It sounded like an older lady.
"What do you want?" A small, elderly lady with bluish-shimmering perm opened the door a crack. "I'm not buying anything," she said.
"I'm Inspector Roberta Foster of the Birmingham Criminal Investigation Department. Here is my ID."
The cautious Eve Porter took the ID, closed the door behind her and disappeared into the house. After two minutes she opened it again .
“What do you want to know? Are you here because of this neighbour?”
"No, Ms. Porter. Because of something completely different . Did you previously own the Top Fashion store ?"
“Yes, but that was a long time ago.”
“May I come in? I think we can talk better in your apartment.”
Eve Porter hesitated, but she let Foster in.
"We are looking for a former customer of yours. Thirty years ago, she was about twenty-five years old, probably had medium-length blonde hair and, in addition to underwear, she also bought a blue dress from you that looked something like this..." Foster showed her a picture that Tess had provided her with.
“Oh, we had a lot of customers who bought dresses like that.”
"I think it was someone who came often. She also bought the underwear from you."
"How do you know?"
