My Brother's Keeper - By Donna Malane Page 0,43

my postmortem findings?’

Sarcasm noted. Silence was my only defence. I paid close attention to my ginger nut-dunking. He downed the last of his tea, stood and stretched, hands in the small of his back like a pregnant woman; in fact, exactly like a pregnant woman. Stretched out like this, his little potbelly didn’t look all that little any more.

‘It will all be public information once I’ve sent my report to the coroner and he’s ruled on it.’

I knew better than to push him. It looked like Smithy wasn’t going to share on this one. Still, no harm trying.

‘Okay, but hypothetically speaking …’

Smithy raised those generous eyebrows. ‘Oh, yes?’ he said. Very droll.

‘There wouldn’t be many situations where someone died from hitting themselves on the neck, would there?’ I said, recalling Gemma’s astute reference to my own neck bruise.

That got a little flicker of amusement. ‘Not in my experience, no.’ He stared wistfully at his empty mug. ‘But it’s not my job as pathologist to decide on whether the deceased hit themselves, or was hit by someone else. Or for that matter, whether they sustained the injury — or injuries—’ he added pointedly, ‘in a hit or a fall.’ Having segued into teaching mode he was on a roll. There would be no stopping him now. He turned his back on me and stared down the corridor at an invisible lecture theatre of students. ‘The pathologist’s job is to ascertain cause of death by meticulous examination of the body and, if required, to answer questions by authorities, such as the courts, as to whether a given scenario may or may not have been possible, or indeed plausible.’

I knew better than to interrupt. Smithy had, literally, written the manual on postmortem procedure and this sounded like a version of the preface to me. Smithy was a born teacher and would give away far more than he intended if I kept my mouth shut and my ears open. I focused my eyes on my last fragment of ginger nut but concentrated on listening hard.

‘Some causes of death are more complicated to unravel than others. Take this latest case, for example.’ I held my breath. ‘The fact that the woman sustained a number of minor injuries — in all, I counted a total of twenty-three bruises down the left side of her body — may or may not be significant. Speaking as a pathologist, they are, I believe, irrelevant to cause of death. But to the police, those same bruises may be a clear indicator of events leading up to her death, and therefore are indeed significant to their investigation. Whereas the impact or blow to the back of the head was, in my opinion, the most likely to have caused the subdural haemorrhage that killed her. But—’ he added, pointing his finger at an invisible crowd of medical students, ‘there was also evidence of a number of small prior bleeds, which muddy the waters, so to speak. Unlike the bruises to her body, these may indeed be significant with regards to cause of death. Or they may not be significant at all but, without doubt, they deserve careful thinking about.’

He lapsed into silence, doing, presumably, just that.

‘What could cause prior bleeds in her brain?’ Smithy turned to face me, blinking rapidly. I’m pretty sure he’d forgotten I was there. ‘Hypothetically,’ I added belatedly. He turned back to stare out at the corridor.

‘Well, cerebral amyloid angiopathy for one, but I don’t think that’s the cause here. Beatings. That would do it,’ he said, thoughtfully. ‘But I’ve also seen little haematomas like these in sportspeople, too, contact sports in particular. Or, in theory they could be caused by something as seemingly innocuous as a migraine.’ He scratched at his comb-over before turning his attention back to me. ‘Did your client have a history of high blood pressure or serious headaches?’

‘I don’t know,’ I admitted. ‘But she had spent the last seven years in prison, which would fit with the beatings theory.’ He nodded, lost in thought again. It seemed a good time to take my leave. But I had one last thing to ask. ‘Was it quick?’ The question was no surprise to Smithy. It’s what everyone asks.

‘The subdural haematoma in her body had time to surface,’ he admitted. ‘But she wouldn’t have suffered for long.’ He threw a little smile in my direction, wanting to give me some good news, I think. ‘She was most likely in a coma not too long after the

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