Parachute Hunting

Detective Inspector Evans had never really understood why people would want to throw themselves out of a plane and hurtle down to earth. Why gamble with your life? Why throw the dice? It was bound to end in tears. As she weighed up the scene, she thought this looked like a typical accidental death, the parachute had opened, the lifeless body twisted more unnaturally than the ropes it was attached to, no reason to suspect foul play. The pathologist stood up from the body and made his way towards her. A nasty, sexist old man; one of the old guard, soon to be retiring and taking his lecherous, wandering eye with him.

‘Male, early forties, it was his first jump, a learner. Eye-witnesses said everything looked normal until the body crumpled on landing.’ He spoke to DS Jones without once looking at Evans, for the simple reason that Jones was a man.

‘Accidental death?’ Evans said

‘No,’ the doctor replied still talking to Jones. ‘Interesting one this, I think he bled to death before he landed. He’d been shot.’

It was dark outside and the waxing moon shone its slim light over the crime scene. Evans and Jones were huddled inside a police van watching a grainy video the parachute school had taken of the jump.

Something sparkled on the screen like a shooting star. ‘Stop it there’ Evans instructed. ‘Look!’ she pointed towards the tiny object. ‘Now, one frame at a time.’ The tech officer did as he was told, moving the film on slowly. The detectives watched the speck move across the screen, it seemed to pass through the body of one of the jumpers, their stiff,  and then continue on its way.

‘It can’t be a bullet’ said Jones, ‘we’d never pick that up.’

‘It’s an arrow,’ came a voice from behind them. ‘Well, a crossbow bolt.’ It was a scene of crime officer still kitted out in her white overalls, holding an evidence bag with the offending item in it.  

Two days later Evans’ phone rang; she didn’t recognize the number.

‘DI Evans, this is DI Martin from Thames Valley Police. I think I might have something that would interest you, a body, a parachutist…’

‘A crossbow wound.’ Evans finished his sentence.