Chapter Three

The next morning, Molly was in her office, putting the final touches to her Post Mortem report on the RTA victim, when she heard the door to the laboratory open and, after a brief pause, a voice called, timidly,

'H-hello? Amanda?'

Molly did not recognised the voice but, since Amanda was not on duty, she rose from her desk and went to the office door to see a woman in nurse's uniform standing in the middle of her pathology lab, looking a little wary.

'Oh! You're not Amanda!' the lady said, rather unnecessarily.

'No, I'm afraid not. She's doing the Twilight shift this week,' Molly explained.

The woman nodded, nervously, then smiled and said,

'You must be Doctor Hooper. Was it your maternity leave that Amanda was covering?'

Molly nodded.

'Well, I'm Nurse McCarthy. How d' you do!' she added, extending a hand to Molly, with a nervous laugh.

'I do very well, thank you!' Molly replied. 'Can I give Amanda a message?'

'Ah, n-no, thank you. I'm not really here to see her. I'm more on a sort of mission, you might say.'

The nurse looked down, shyly and gave another giggle.

Molly gave her an encouraging nod.

'Did you happen to know Jared Shaw?' Nurse McCarthy asked.

'Erm, no, I didn't - at least, not when he was alive,' Molly replied. 'I know him rather well now. I'm just completing his PM report.'

'Oh, poor lamb! So sad!' Nurse McCarthy exclaimed, with a sad shake of her head.

'Was he a friend of your?' Molly asked.

'Oh, no, not so much,' the Nurse explained. 'I'm here more on behalf of his family, really. You see, Jared was a porter here in the hospital – I expect you knew that. Such a kind boy! And so very kind at home, too. His dear mother, she's a single parent and disabled, too, and young Jared looked after her ever since he was a child. He was the family's bread-winner, too, since his mother wasn't...isn't able work and his sisters are still at school. So, you see, they can't possibly afford to give him a decent send-off – well, any kind of send-off, really.'

Nurse McCarthy lapsed into a pensive silence.

Molly waited a few moments then said,

'That is very unfortunate.'

She wondered where this conversation was leading and, also, how she could bring it to an end so that she could get on with her work.

'Yes, very unfortunate indeed. So, I've sort of decided to start a bit of a collection – just around the hospital, of course – to try and raise something to go towards the funeral costs,' Nurse McCarthy stammered, then produced a screw top jar from under her arm, thrusting it awkwardly under Molly's nose. 'Would you be so kind as to make a contribution, Doctor Hooper?'

'Well, that's very considerate of you, Nurse McCarthy, but did you know that the hospital has a benevolent fund? The boy's mother could apply to it for financial assistance with the funeral costs. There's really no need for you to go to so much trouble,' Molly explained, regretfully.

'Oh! Oh, I see!' Nurse McCarthy replied, looking extremely embarrassed. 'I haven't been here long – just a few months. I came whilst you were away. I didn't realise there was a provision for that sort of thing. Oh, dear! Th-thank you for pointing that out to me, Doctor Hooper,' she said, looking even more flustered than before. 'Well, it's lucky for me I came to you first!' the nurse added. 'Otherwise, I would have had to go round and give all the contributions back, wouldn't I? Oh dear!' she gabbled.

'Oh, well, not to worry. No harm done!' Molly exclaimed, feeling equally embarrassed to have discomforted this poor public spirited lady. 'So, are you and Amanda good friends?' she asked, in an effort to brush aside the awkwardness.

'Oh, no, not friends, as such,' Nurse McCarthy explained. 'We're just acquaintances, really. I work on Geriatrics, taking care of the dear old ladies and gentlemen at the end of their days. I like to make them as comfortable as possible, you know? Well, they have earned our respect, haven't they? And when their time comes, I do like to pay my last respects. Amanda is kind enough to help me out. She lets me come down to the mortuary at the beginning or the end of my shift, just to have a quiet word, you know? Just to say goodbye. I do hope that's alright, Doctor Hooper. I wouldn't want to get anyone into trouble.'

Molly couldn't think of a specific reason to object. It showed a high degree of devotion to duty on the part of this nurse. But she wondered whether there might be a protocol for this sort of thing. In her experience, it was only close relatives who were allowed to view bodies in the mortuary – or police, if it was a suspicious death. She would have to check with Amanda to see if she had run it by the Head of Department. But, in the meantime, Nurse McCarthy was talking again.

'You have two of my lovely patients here right now,' she said, 'Mr Riceman and Mrs Bowles. I was wondering if I could…' She stuttered to a halt and looked pleadingly at Molly.

'I'm afraid not,' Molly replied, ruefully. 'Not at the moment, at least.'

She was stalling for time until she could speak to Amanda.

'I'm just about to start PM'ing those two p-people,' she explained, noting that she seemed to have reverted to stammering, too.

'Oh, oh, of course! I thought they would have been done already, since they passed a couple of days ago.'

The nurse was making a valiant effort to hide her disappointment.

'Perhaps you could check back tomorrow?' Molly suggested, with an apologetic smile.

'Oh, thank you, I will, Doctor Hooper,' the woman gushed. 'Thank you so much! And it was so nice to have met you!'

'Yes, you too!' Molly replied, for the sake of social convention. In truth, she really just wanted the woman to leave so she could get on with her work. But that mean thought was accompanied by a pang of guilt. Nurse McCarthy was only trying to help, after all.

How Molly envied Sherlock, as she watched the nervous nurse exit through the heavy fire doors. He would have just told her to go away! Molly wished she could be more like him, sometimes! She checked her watch. Goodness, she had spent ten minutes talking to the woman. She would have to skip her coffee break to make up the time lost. Giving a resigned shake of the head, she went back into her office to conclude her report on Jared Shaw and then she would be off to the mortuary to carry out the post mortems on Nurse McCarthy's former charges.

ooOoo

True to her word, when Sherlock checked his emails – at his desk in the sitting room of 221B – Canon Rachel Morris had sent him all the information she had at her disposal with reference to the strange occurrences in Canterbury. Sherlock downloaded all the documents individually then sorted them into five files, one for each of the deceased and one for the many – mostly newspaper – reports of other encounters in the Dark Entry. Choosing a file at random, Sherlock opened that of David Wilson, the cathedral Organ Scholar, and the youngest of the 'victims' at just twenty-one years of age.

He began to read.

ooOoo

Molly drew the sheet back over the corpse of Mrs Iris Bowles, peeled off her surgical gloves and dropped them into the clinical waste bin then reached up to switch off the over-head microphone. She stood staring at the shrouded body, her brow wrinkled, deep in thought.

Prior to beginning this post mortem, she had studied Mrs Bowles medical records. The staff in attendance at the time when the patient passed had recorded classic symptoms of a myocardial infarction - a heart attack – which, considering the patient's age, did not seem too remarkable. In the process of her examination, Molly had found evidence of cardiogenic shock – the heart's muscles were so severely damaged that they could no longer contract properly to supply enough blood to maintain many body functions. However, other than that, Mrs Bowles' vital organs – most specifically her heart - were in remarkably good condition for a lady of her vintage. There was no narrowing of the arteries, no sign of a blood clot, nothing to explain why she had suffered a heart attack in the first place. The damage had all been caused by the attack itself.

Molly continued to stand and stare at the covered corpse for a further few minutes then, with a shake of her head, turned and strode away. She had ordered a tox screen as part of the post mortem procedure. She would have to see what that turned up. In the meantime, she would have the body returned to cold storage and would not sign off on it. The relatives – she assumed the lady had some - would have to wait a while longer to pay their last respects.

ooOoo

Amongst the documents supplied for David Wilson was the eulogy read at his funeral, which had taken place at the cathedral – an honour available to any individual who died whilst in the service of that institution. Sherlock chose to read this first, to get an idea of who this person was.

David Wilson had recently taken up his one year appointment as Organ Scholar at the beginning of September, having just graduated from the Guildhall School of Music. He had been a chorister at Southwell Minster in Nottinghamshire, as a child, from where he had progressed to Chetham's Music School in Manchester on a keyboard scholarship and then to the Guildhall, where he had specialised as an organist. His eulogist was at pains to say how it had always been David's ambition to be a church organist and how thrilled he had been to be given the opportunity to play the magnificent instrument in the cathedral.

According to the police report, on the night of his encounter in the Dark Entry, David had been practicing a piece he was to play the following Sunday – his first 'public' performance since his appointment at Canterbury. He had left the cathedral at ten o'clock, when Security came to lock up for the night, and was walking though the Dark Entry on his way to meet with friends at the Dolphin public house on St Radigunds Street, when he was startled by the sound of a woman's voice calling for assistance. He had looked in earnest for the source of the voice but found no one.

He had then made his way to the pub, leaving the precincts via the Mint Yard Gate, where he paused to share his experience with the Security Guard on duty. Up to this point, David had been ignorant of the Legend of the Dark Entry and when the guard told him, jokingly, about Nellie Cook and her Friday night exploits, he had just laughed and dismissed it all as a trick of the acoustics in that part of the ancient building. But, three weeks later, he was dead.

David had collapsed whilst playing a game of five-a-side football at the local sports centre and despite the best efforts of the other players, the centre staff and the paramedics who attended at the scene, he could not be resuscitated.

Sherlock turned to the young man's post mortem report. The post-mortem had been authorised by the local coroner, due to the sudden and unexpected demise of such a young person. A copy of the report had been obtained by David's family and they had shared it with Canon Morris at her request, on the understanding that it would only be shared on a 'need to know' basis.

Scanning through the detailed report, Sherlock soon found what he had been looking for – cause of death, Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy. It transpired that the deceased had an undiagnosed heart condition which had resulted in his untimely demise. Theory confirmed, the Consulting Detective concluded - case closed.

Opening the next file, Sherlock read the biography. Elsie Gadget was ninety-three and a resident of St John's Hospital almshouses, on Northgate, a street very near to the precincts, having served the cathedral for forty years as a seamstress, making and repairing the clerical vestments. She had passed through the Dark Entry many times, over the years, and on most nights of the week without incident but on this particular occasion – the first Friday in October – she had reported being confronted by a lady dressed in black who smiled at her, sympathetically, and then disappeared.

Unlike David, Elsie was very familiar with the local legend and she took the encounter seriously. She told all her friends that she knew she was going to die and spent the next few weeks putting all her affairs in order. When she failed to open her curtains one morning, the almshouse superintendent entered her cottage and found that she had passed away – apparently peacefully – during the night. It stated on her Death Certificate that she died of natural causes – old age. Sherlock felt obliged to conclude, once again, case also closed.

With two down and two to go, Sherlock could see why the local police were not treating these deaths as suspicious. He pushed away from the desk and went to the kitchen to brew a pot of coffee. Placing the coffee pot, a clean mug and the sugar bowl on a tray, Sherlock carried it through to the sitting room and sat back at his desk. He filled the mug with the aromatic brew, added two scoops of sugar and stirred it, slowly, taking a couple of sips before opening the next file.

Alan Jones was a stone mason, one of a team working on the restoration of the Great South Window, in the South West Transept of the cathedral. He had related to his work mates how he had been passing through the Dark Entry, late one Friday night, when he heard running footsteps approaching from the direction of the undercroft. He had paused, expecting the runner to pass by but the sound just stopped abruptly and no runner appeared.

Needless to say, his work mates were patently unimpressed and asked him how much he'd had to drink that night, since it was his practice to enjoy a jar or three in The Millers Arms on Mill Street, after work on a Friday. But Mr Jones stuck to his guns and insisted that his story was true. A week later, the man suffered a fatal motorcycle accident.

The newspaper report of the accident described how Mr Jones had lost control of his motorcycle and skidded into the path of an oncoming lorry at an infamous accident black spot on the A291 between Sturry and Herne Bay.

An inquest heard that the deceased had been found to have twice the legal limit of alcohol in his bloodstream at the time of death. The verdict of the court was he had died as a direct result of driving whilst under the influence of alcohol. The lorry driver was deemed innocent of all blame and no charges were brought. Third case closed.

The case of the fourth 'victim' was perhaps the most tenuous of all – and perhaps the most tragic. Sally Dawson had been a second year student at Canterbury Christchurch University, working part time as a Receptionist at the Cathedral Lodge hotel in order to support herself through her studies, when she told her close friends and fellow students how she had experienced a 'funny feeling' whilst passing through the Dark Entry at the end of one of her shifts.

But this fact did not come to light until after the young lady in question had met an untimely end as a result of over-heating at a campus party, after indulging in the so-called 'legal high' Mephedrone – also known as 'meow meow'. The police were pursuing a case against the person who had supplied the deceased with the substance and they were most definitely not interested in any suggestion of supernatural interference.

The various reports included in the fifth file, Sherlock afforded only a cursory glance. The sources were unreliable and he was quite sure could be accounted for as evidence of mass hysteria or just people wanting to get in on the act.

Closing all the files, Sherlock snapped shut the lid of his laptop and leaned back in his chair, stretching his arms above his head to release some of the tension brought on by hunching over his computer for such an extended period of time.

Reviewing all the information, the only thing any of these people had in common was a connection to the cathedral. The church was a major employer in the area, as well as a centre for worship and social and cultural activities. Nearly everyone in Canterbury had some sort of connection with the institution. And the nature of the encounters were all very different – some auditory, some visual, some 'hyper sensory'. This was the singular point he found to be of the greatest interest, though why, he really couldn't say.

ooOoo

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