Free The Hangman's Song (Inspector Mclean 3) by James Oswald Page B

What is that smell?’
    McLean stood at the entrance to a narrow alleyway running down the back of an anonymous row of prefab concrete garages. It was a place where things went to die: bits of old car, rusted beyond recognition; rotting mattresses, springs escaping like metal insects; an exercise bike bent as if it had been in a collision with a truck; the inevitable purloined shopping trolley. Mostly it was decaying black bin bags, ripped open by seagulls and urban foxes. Chip pokes, foil containers scraped clean of their biryani and saag aloo, pizza boxes stained with grease. Here and there a used condom, as if this foetid hole were the perfect spot for a bit of romance. And in amongst it all, thrown out with the rest of the trash, the decomposing body of a man.
    At least, he assumed it was a man. It wasn’t easy to tell from what was left. No doubt finding them tastier than rancid pizza, the foxes had taken his fingers down to stubs, and something had eaten away at his face. It had to be a man’s body, though. No self-respecting woman would dress up like that.
    ‘Putrefaction, Tony. Enzymatic breakdown of the body’s cells. Bacterial decay. And I dare say the garbage doesn’t help.’ Squatting close to the dead body, the city pathologist, Angus Cadwallader, lifted a flaccid arm andinspected what was left of a hand. McLean stayed put at the end of the alley, to avoid contaminating the crime scene, of course. Although if truth be told he was more worried about ruining his shoes. He doubted forensics would get anything useful from here.
    ‘What’s the prognosis then? You think you can save him?’
    Cadwallader levered himself back up to his feet and picked a careful route back from the body. His white overalls were stained a riot of greens and browns around his legs, black wellingtons slimed with things best not thought about. ‘I can’t be hugely accurate until I get him back to the mortuary, but given the weather we’ve been having lately and the state of the insect life living inside his mouth, I reckon he’s been there at least a fortnight.’
    McLean took a step back and turned slowly on his heels. The garages were surrounded on all sides by squat, six-storey tower blocks. Ugly concrete and pebble-dash, each apartment with a wide balcony affording views across the Forth. Or the back of the next block if you were unlucky. At least half of the balconies had washing draped on airers or dangling from railings. Many hundreds of people lived here, looked out these windows, saw what was going on. For two weeks, no one had come forward to report the rotting corpse chucked out with the bin bags.
    ‘He was covered up, aye?’ McLean asked the uniform sergeant who’d first greeted him when he’d arrived on site.
    ‘Reckon so, sir. That many foxes round here these days, they must’ve dug down and pulled him up.’
    ‘How’d we find out about him then?’
    ‘Anonymous tip-off. Probably someone round here gotsick of the stench.’ The sergeant nodded in the direction of the nearest flat as another squad car drew up. A couple of uniforms were trying to placate a small mob of garage-owners, no doubt anxious to know when they could get back in and dispose of all the stolen goods and pirated DVDs that were hidden inside. It might be an idea to use the body as an excuse to search all the lock-ups in the close, but they’d need a lot more manpower if they were going to do that. A riot squad too.
    The short figure of DCI Jo Dexter climbed out of the squad car and ducked under the cordon tape. McLean watched her size up the whole site as she approached. Her eyes darted from tower block to parked car to garage and finally to the group of people standing at the opening to the narrow alley.
    ‘One for us, Tony?’
    ‘Not sure. I thought you might want to take a look. It’s not pretty, mind you.’
    Dexter gave him the sort of look his grandmother had reserved for the times he said something really obvious. He held the