Skin and Bone by Kathryn Fox

Author:Kathryn Fox [FOX, KATHRYN]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, pdf
Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton
Published: 2008-02-21T05:00:00+00:00

Inspector Maloney informed the team that Dr Peter Latham was on his way to certify and assess the body. He had set up lights attached to an outside generator to augment the natural light inside the house. The group walked single file and carefully stepped around debris. They stopped at the kitchen.

Their attention was immediately drawn to a pot on the stove along the wall near the window and sink. The black cauldron-style pot had melted and buckled to the level of the fat it contained. Kate remembered the intense heat she had experienced. Now she saw the physical effects of it.

‘The first team through eliminated electrical faults, so it looks as though the pot of oil was the flashpoint, where the fire started. Just like around fifty per cent of all house-fires, which are caused by cooking left unattended.’

‘Except that Spender was in no position to cook for himself,’ Kate pointed out.

Maloney nodded. ‘That’s why we’re here. The flashpoint explains the burning oil you smelt when you arrived, and the black smoke when the window shattered.’

Oliver stepped closer to the stove. ‘What sort of temperature does it take to melt metal like that?’

‘A typical fire reaches about 1100 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s 593 degrees Celsius. Aluminium melts at 660 degrees, and brass at 940 degrees Celsius. Judging by that melted pot, this fire got to a temperature somewhere around that, I’d say.’ Maloney spoke with no emotion in his voice.

Zimmer looked up from snapping photographs. ‘When you think that a chicken cooks at only 180 degrees Celsius and you wouldn’t think of sticking your hand into your oven, you can begin to imagine the heat generated in this place.’

That explained the phenomenal heat Kate had felt when she tried to raise her hand. She immediately thought of the fireman’s melted helmet and had more respect than ever for fireys. They withstood these conditions every time they were needed. She was surprised that more didn’t lose their lives in the line of duty.

Kate had never before understood how people could jump out of burning buildings when they were multiple storeys up. She had wondered why they would opt for certain death when they still had a chance of being rescued. Maloney’s description of the furnace-level heat and her experience of the horror removed any lingering doubt about why they would jump. Given no other option, she would do the same.

As she looked around the kitchen, Kate saw that everything above about two feet from the floor had been destroyed.

A plastic rubbish bin had melted down. John Zimmer photographed it. Maloney instructed a technician to collect the contents, which were preserved inside. ‘We need an indication of the way this guy lived. Had he already eaten? Were there food scraps inside the bin, like potato peelings from someone preparing chips? Had he been drinking? We’ll also go through the contents of the fridge.’

From the way he spoke, he might have been training the technician. He continued: ‘When oil boils, it releases vapours which rise, emitting a distinctive, acrid smell that makes your eyes water.

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