Free The Corpse's Tale (Trevor Joseph Detective series) by Katherine John Page A

Wales before, but most of them were domestic. Farmers killing their wives and vice versa. I remember being surprised that all the samples the pathologist took weren’t sent to the lab. Professor Robbins was meticulous. I watched him do the post-mortem. Part of my training,’ he explained.
    ‘We’ve all been through it.’ Peter took a long pull at his pint.
    ‘I asked Sergeant George why he was only sending some of the samples for analysis. He said there was no point in testing everything because it was obvious that David Morgan was guilty. More lab work would only add to the cost of the investigation and eat into our budget which was already stretched.’
    ‘What samples are you thinking of in particular?’ Trevor asked.
    ‘The watch that had been strapped on to her wrist after death.’
    ‘You knew about the injuries beneath it?’
    ‘You couldn’t miss them once the watch was removed. And there were semen stains on her dress. I thought it might be as well to check them against David’s blood type. DNA wasn’t in common use – not here anyway, not back then.’
    ‘Anything else?’
    ‘Reading through the notes I made at the time it struck me that I would investigate a similar case – not that I want one thank you very much – differently now. But the force has changed a great deal in the last ten years.’
    Lily came in with their meals and Mike waited until she had served them before continuing. ‘As I said, I was nineteen when Anna Harris was murdered, Inspector. I didn’t move in the same circles she did, but I knew who she was.’
    ‘ T h e r e ’s a social pecking order in this backwater?’ Collins smothered his boar steak with redcurrant jelly.
    Mike laughed. ‘The class war is well and truly alive and well in Mid Wales, sergeant. The moneyed crachach…’
    ‘The what?’ Peter demanded.
    ‘Crachach – it’s Welsh for elite or toffs – send their children to private or We l s h medium schools. They don’t mix with the kids from the council estates where I come from. The two factions don’t drink in the same pubs or even buy in the same shops. But I knew Anna Harris by sight and reputation.’
    ‘What sort of reputation?’ Trevor suspected he already knew the answer to his question.
    ‘For sleeping around. But she was choosy. According to one of my friends who worked as a TV extra alongside Anna, she was star-struck and ambitious. Her nickname in the studios in Llandaff was “Brutus” because she’d stab anyone in the back to get ahead. There were rumours she’d have sex with anyone who would introduce her to a producer or director. Some even said she slept her way into Drama College, but I think that was jealousy coming from the ones who didn’t get in.’
    Trevor was instantly on the alert. ‘Any ideas who these “anyone” were?’
    ‘As I said, I didn’t know her personally. It could be no more than idle gossip.’
    Collins wiped his lips with his napkin. ‘More killers have been caught through idle gossip than interrogation, Sergeant Thomas.’
    ‘Excuse me.’ Mike Thomas answered a ring on his mobile. He listened for a few seconds, then barked. ‘I’ll be there. Two minutes.’
    ‘The Morgan house?’ Trevor asked.
    ‘Lynch mob. Williams has sent for back-up.’
    Trevor was already out of his chair. ‘We’ll drive you.’
     
    The Morgan house was engulfed by a crowd of angry people. Trevor had expected teenagers, but there were a hundred or more people of all ages, from elderly men and women down to babies in pushchairs who had been brought there by their mothers.
    Mike Thomas left the car and held his hands up in an appeal for calm. But the mob carried on shouting, screaming insults and throwing sticks and stones. A uniformed constable was standing in front of the house desperately trying to look as though he wasn’t concerned by what was happening. Trevor noticed that all the missiles that were being thrown were landing well clear of him. But two garden