And all the time, I was struggling not to vomit. Every so often I’d catch the smell at the back of my throat and cough, and gag.
When I finally felt clean, I called the police.
‘Kent Police, how can I help?’
‘I just found a body in the house next door. It’s badly decomposed.’
‘Right,’ said the female voice on the other end. I could hear her rattling away at her keyboard already, entering the opening code 240B for ‘suspected body’. ‘Can I take your name?’
‘Annabel Hayer.’
I went through all the responses – address, phone number, all the details of what I’d seen (the light on) and heard (nothing) and smelt (putrescence) and seen (a body in the armchair) – until I’d convinced myself in my head that I’d imagined the whole thing.
‘We’re very busy tonight,’ she said, ‘but a patrol will come out to you as soon as one is free.’
I went upstairs, had a shower and washed my hair, and dressed in clean clothes, yet I could still smell it, fainter now but nevertheless there. I looked outside but there was still no sign of the patrol.
The cat cried to be let in, and I shut the kitchen door and ran her a makeshift bath in the kitchen sink. I’d tried to bathe cats before and this was every bit as traumatic as all my previous experiences. She scratched my arms to shreds as I sponged her back and undersides down with my best organic pH-neutral additive-free shampoo and warm water. I got most of it off. She’d been licking herself too, her fur sticking up in spikes. The thought of it, and the smell of her, even when she’d been washed and rinsed and dried off with a teatowel, was enough to make me heave. As soon as she struggled free of the towel she started hurtling about the kitchen in a panic, knocking things flying. Fearing for my crockery, I opened the back door and she shot straight out.
The patrol had arrived by then, and, having gone next door, and called in that there was indeed a body and could they please have someone else to deal with it, they had agreed that I could go off to bed.
In the cold light of day on Saturday morning, everything had looked very different. The cat was sitting on the back step, looking exceptionally pissed off. She came in when I opened the door and immediately turned her back on me, sitting in the corner of the kitchen and only moving when I filled her bowl with cat biscuits. The fur on her back and belly stood out in sticky spikes, but at least the smell had faded.
I’d never met the Major Crime DC who eventually interviewed me, and, although he showed me his warrant card when I let him in, I instantly forgot his name. He told me he’d worked at Briarstone police station for the past year, and, when he said that, I recognised him from the canteen.
‘How are you?’ he asked me at last, coming into the living room. ‘Must have been quite a shock.’
It was late afternoon, and I’d not eaten all day. Every time I thought about it, I remembered the horrible inflated shape of the body, the colour of the skin and the puddle under the chair.
‘I guess so,’ I said. ‘I think I was kind of expecting it, given the smell.’
‘Yes, it’s quite bad in there.’
‘You want a tea? Coffee?’
‘Coffee would be great, thanks. Two sugars. Alright if I use your loo?’
I pointed him in the direction of the toilet and then I went to the kitchen and filled the kettle, waiting for it to boil. On the windowsill of the kitchen was a little statue of an angel that I’d bought in a New Age shop in Bath. It was lit up by the sunshine, shining as though surrounded by a halo of glory.
I brought the coffees through to the living room. He was already sitting there, his pocket notebook out on his lap, writing something, head bent over the task.
‘Thanks,’ he said. ‘You work in Intel, right?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I’m the public protection analyst. And I’m also one of the divisional analysts.’
‘You’re doing two jobs?’
‘Pretty much. There were four of us and I just did public protection, and then two of the team were redeployed last year and now there’s just me and another analyst. We share the stuff for the division between us.’