by Tim Ellis
‘No, and don’t try,’ the Professor said. ‘We need to get him back to the mortuary to straighten him out.’ He knelt down. ‘He may be frozen now, but that’s not what killed him though – look.’
Dark peered over the professor’s shoulder at the stake protruding from the corpse’s chest. ‘I was hoping that wasn’t going to be the cause of death, Professor.’
‘Hope is not a strategy I would recommend, Dark.’
‘No. And I wouldn’t normally adopt it, but leads are a bit thin on the ground. Is there an injection site?’
‘Difficult to tell. The body’s filthy. You’ll have to wait until the post-mortem.’
‘Time of death?’
‘I’d say last night, but in this weather . . .’ He shrugged. ‘It’s really only a guess.’
Dark’s forehead wrinkled up. ‘I can’t imagine the body has been in the bin for any longer than that. This is a fairly busy place, and people would have spotted it.’
‘You’re probably right, Dark. I’m not much help today. Maybe Burrows can magic up some forensics.’
He glanced at Burrows. ‘Are you a member of the Magic Circle, Burrows?’
‘If I were, I wouldn’t be doing this job, Sir.’
‘I suppose that’s a “no” then.’ He straightened up. ‘Well, I guess there’s nothing keeping me here. When are you planning to carry out the post-mortem, Professor?’
‘Tomorrow morning, say about eleven o’clock.’
‘I’ll try and make it.’ He glanced at Burrows. ‘You’ll contact me if you find anything?’
‘Of course, Sir.’
‘Enjoy the rest of your day off, Burrows.’
‘Very kind, Sir.’
‘And you, Professor.’
‘I am enjoying myself, Dark. If I go home, Mrs Finn will make my life a living hell, so here is the best place for me.’
As he walked back to his four-by-four, like the professor, he wondered what the hell was going on. He had two bodies, both of whom had probably been injected with Rohypnol to render them unconscious, and then a wooden stake, with a numbered reference to a passage from the bible engraved on it, had been hammered into the heart of each victim as if they really were vampires. None of it made any sense.
On the one hand, he was looking for someone who could easily have escaped from a mental institution. On the other hand, the killer was someone who appeared to be very organised and methodical.
Burrows mentioned something about a film crew being in Brabyns Park last week – why didn’t he know about that? He’d get Lake onto it tomorrow morning.
***
Once he was sitting in his Rave-4 he called the Duty Sergeant.
‘Sergeant Withers.’
‘It’s DI Dark.’
‘Sir?’
‘I need a squad car with two officers inside to back me up at an address in Wilmslow, Sergeant.’
‘No problem, Sir. What’s the address?’
‘Number 14 Hawthorn Drive.’
‘They’ll be there in twenty minutes.’
‘I’ll meet them there.’
The call ended.
Under normal circumstances, he wouldn’t have given the corpse-chasers the jam between his toes, but he hadn’t eaten since Shirley’s breakfast muffins, and he was starving.
He pulled up just beyond the tape, left the engine running and the heater on, fought his way through the swarms of reporters to reach the food van, and ordered two hot dogs and a coffee.
The press were bombarding him with questions as he slathered mustard on his hot dogs.
He ignored them.
‘Mabel Webb from the Marple Review, Inspector. Is it another vampire killing?’
After reaching his car in one piece, he placed the hot dogs on the passenger seat, the coffee in the cup holder and made his way to Brabyns Brow. He turned right, drove up the hill and pulled in at Lock Number 9 to eat his hotdogs in peace and quiet.
Why was Mrs Webb so obsessed with vampires? Maybe he’d get Lake to ask her tomorrow.
It didn’t take him long to demolish the hotdogs, and then he made his way to Wilmslow by four-thirty.
The squad car, with a male and female officer inside, was waiting for him further along the road. He parked outside the house and signalled for them to join him.
‘Names?’
‘Constables Randy Chatterton and Judy Hetherington, Sir.’ Hetherington said.
‘Stab vests on underneath those coats?’
‘Yes, Sir.’
‘I have no idea what I’m going to find when I knock on number 14. It could be nothing, it could be something. Come with me to the door. Be prepared for any eventuality.’
They both nodded and fingered their batons.
It was a large detached house in its own grounds hidden behind a six-foot wooden fence, a laurel hedge, and an assortment of towering oak and fir trees. It was one of those houses that you never noticed until you had to visit.
The gravel drive crunched underfoot as they walked up to the arched entrance and oversized heavy wooden door.
Dark stepped onto the tiled floor and used the Jacob Marley brass faux door knocker, which seemed to reverberate inside the house.
Eventually, the door opened. A middle-aged woman with greying hair, glasses hanging from a red cord draped around her neck and a gnarled walking stick in her right hand was standing there. ‘Yes?’
He proffered his Warrant Card. ‘Detective Inspector Dark from the Serious Crime Division in Manchester.’
Her face wrinkled up. ‘What brings you here, Inspector Dark?’
‘Miranda Flagg.’
‘Ah! Miranda said that someone might turn up one day. You’d better come in.’
‘Do I need to bring in the heavy mob?’
‘No . . . Although they could have tea and biscuits in the kitchen while we talk about why you’re here?’
He turned.
Hetherington licked her lips. ‘That would be good, Sir.’
‘Okay. Leave when you’ve finished, and thanks for coming.’
The three of them followed the woman into the large tiled entrance hallway.
‘Melanie?’ the woman called.
An attractive young girl of about sixteen years old with black hair scooped back into a ponytail, wearing jeans and a knitted patchwork jumper appeared. ‘Yes, Mother?’
‘Can you give these two police officers tea and biscuits in the kitchen, and bring a pot through into the library?’
‘Of course.’ She looked at Chatterton and Hetherington. ‘If you’ll follow me?’
The two officers followed Melanie through a door to the right of the hallway.
‘We’ll go through into the library, Inspector. What you’ve come for is in there.’
‘How did you know Miranda Flagg?’
‘Oh! Where are my manners? I’m Wincey Adams. Miranda and I met through work and hit it off straight away. We were both accountants, but I worked for different company. When Albert was run over, and after she received the anonymous note, she came to see me. She told me what she’d found out, but swore me to secrecy, because she was petrified that they were going to go after Toby.’
‘You know Toby is dead, don’t you?’
‘Yes. When I saw on the news that he’d died, I had the feeling someone would come. Was it them?’
‘By “them”, I’m assuming you mean Jeffrey Higham?’
‘He’s certainly one of them, but there are many others – you’ll see.’
The library was a library. Sometimes, what people called a library hardly resembled a bookcase, never mind a library, but this room was full of shelves, which in turn were full of books. There were three sofas, four easy chairs, occasional tables, Persian rugs on the floor and extendable reading lights. It wasn’t simply a storeroom for books, but a place where books were devoured by people who loved the feel and smell of them, and the sound of pages turning in the silence.
Melanie came in carrying a tray with a pot of
tea draped in a colourful knitted cosy and an assortment of biscuits on a plate.
‘Thank you, Melanie. Shut the door on your way out, please.’
‘Yes, Mother.’
‘Tea, Inspector?’
He didn’t normally drink tea, but he’d not long since had a cup of coffee, so he accepted.
She poured him a cup of tea. ‘Help yourself to sugar, milk and biscuits.’
He decided to pass on the biscuits. He still had the taste of hotdogs, mustard and onions in his mouth.
‘Do you know why you’re here?’
‘No. My partner and I found the library card in the safe deposit box, we deciphered your address from the list of books Miranda took out from Marple library, and here we are. I’m hoping it’s not a wasted journey, and what you have for me will put Jeffrey Higham behind bars.’
‘It’ll do a lot more than that, Inspector. That’s why she and Albert had to hide it.’
She took a sip of her tea, stood up, went to a shelving unit on the right-hand wall and pulled out a book: ‘A first edition of Agatha Christie’s The Mystery of the Blue Train, in case you were wondering.’
He wasn’t.
There was a click.
A section of the shelving gave a sigh and moved forward slightly. Wincey pulled the shelving open on its hidden hinges. Beyond was a proper door, only this one was made of steel with a keypad lock. She keyed in a number, the steel door opened and she stepped through it.
After a handful of seconds she came back out carrying two thick A4-sized books, closed the steel door, locked it and pushed the section of shelving back into place. ‘A panic room,’ she explained. ‘My late husband was slightly paranoid, but now I’m thankful that he was. It offers a degree of comfort in these crazy times.’ She passed him the two books – one red, and the other blue. ‘These are what you came for, Inspector.’
Chapter Twenty-Two
His phone vibrated. He put the books down on the sofa next to him to answer it.
It was Lake.
‘Excuse me,’ he said to Wincey. ‘I need to take this.’ He stood up and went to the window. ‘Yes?’
‘It’s me.’
‘I know it’s you. And?’
‘I saw on the news that there’s been another murder.’
‘Have you finished packing and listing your collection of stork spoons?’
‘Nearly.’
‘That’s your priority. I’m on top of everything else.’
‘You don’t need me?’
‘I never did.’
‘Where are you now?’
‘Here.’
‘Was it Joseph Corbyn?’
‘I’ll see you in the morning, Lake.’
He ended the call.
‘Sorry about that. My partner’s on a day off and thinks I can’t manage without her.’
‘Are you married, Inspector?’
‘Yes.’ The simplest answer was always the best. He didn’t want to get drawn into the highs and lows of marriage, or anything else to do with Ellie.
‘And children?’
‘Two girls – nine and seven.’
She didn’t say anymore.
The tea wasn’t too bad, but if he’d had the choice between coffee and tea on a desert island, he’d choose coffee every time. Tea was refreshing, but it wasn’t coffee.
He picked the red book up first and opened it. On each line were details of a cash payment made to an individual. The column headings were: Date, Name, Reference, Amount and Notes. He recognised some of the names as he scanned down the list. Some were long gone, but others were still in office: Sir Tyler Bell had been the leader of Manchester City Council for many years; Cecil Mullins was a City Centre Independent Councillor; Sir Allen Davis was Deputy Chair of the Regional Growth Committee; Carmen French MBE was Chair of the North West Local Enterprise Partnership; Raymond Graham was the Conservative Member of Parliament for Altrincham & Sale and currently Chair of the government’s Housing Executive . . . There were police officers, health authority officials and civil servants named in the book as well. The cash sums ranged from one thousand to ten thousand pounds. He flicked through the pages. There must have been fifty to a hundred people who had been paid varying amounts of money between 1991 and 2002. Was the bribery and corruption still taking place?
Together, with the list of contracts Albert Flagg had overseen between those dates, and the written conclusion from DS Joydeep Murali at the Fraud Squad on the number of contracts awarded to Whitchurch, it was evidence of a web of deceit and corruption at the highest level for many years. He could imagine that Jeffrey Higham and others in positions of power would kill to keep what was contained in the book secret. However, there wasn’t a shred of evidence that Higham had arranged the death of Albert Flagg.
Yes, Higham and a number of other people might end up in prison for corruption, and some senior figures in the government might be forced to resign, but it wasn’t really the magic bullet he’d been hoping for.
‘You look disappointed, Inspector,’ Wincey said.
‘Yes and no. I’m a murder detective. Fraud doesn’t really interest me. Oh, don’t get me wrong, the people in this book will be held accountable for their crimes, but it doesn’t get me anywhere nearer to solving Albert Flagg’s murder.’
She stretched out her right hand towards him, opened it – palm up – and said, ‘Maybe this will help.’ Lying in the middle of her hand was a memory stick. ‘There are two video files on there. The first is of Jeffrey Higham paying off Albert’s killer. Both men, and the number plate of the stolen BMW are clearly visible.’
‘And the second file?’
‘You’ll have to watch it yourself. That, and the blue book, are what got Albert killed, but they also kept Miranda and Toby safe for the past fifteen years.’ She stood up, retrieved a laptop computer from a table in a corner behind Dark and brought it to where they were sitting.
While she was setting up the computer, he glanced through the blue book. Whereas the red book was for payments made to corrupt officials, the blue book recorded receipts of cash, but had the same column headings: Date, Name, Reference, Amount, Notes. As in the red book, he recognised some of the names, but these weren’t officials – they were known criminals. Filip Ghenosu’s name was recorded half-way down Page 67. He’d paid Higham a hundred and fifty thousand pounds on September 26, 2001. In the Reference column was a name he didn’t recognise – Nenad Milić. In the Notes column was written : St John the Baptist’s Church, Cheetham Hill. There was no specific reference to explain what the payments were for, but if Filip Ghenosu’s name was there he had a good idea that it involved murder.
He watched both video recordings, and understood what the payments in the blue book were for. He also recognised Jeffrey Higham as being the man in the photograph with Miranda Flagg in Rhyl on October 13, 1990, but he didn’t resemble either of the men in the E-FITs from Rose Hill train station.
As he finished watching the second recording, he glanced out of the window to see Chatterton and Hetherington walking back down the gravel drive. Not long after they’d left, two men in black coveralls, ski masks and gloves appeared carrying silenced weapons.
‘Quick,’ he said to Wincey. ‘Get your daughter and lock yourselves in the panic room.’
Wincey hobbled out calling her daughter’s name.
Within a couple of seconds they both hurried back into the library, Melanie helping her mother to move slightly quicker. Wincey opened the section of shelving, input the number into the keypad on the steel door and stepped inside the panic room.
‘Are you coming?’ Wincey directed at him.
‘No. Lock the door.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes, don’t be concerned about me.’
The panic room steel door closed first, followed by the section of shelving. Unless you knew the panic room was there, you’d never find it. Even the CCTV cameras were hidden throughout the house.
He sent both video file
s to Hendrik, and hid the two books under a seat cushion on one of the sofas. As he left the library through a door that led him into another room, he put the memory stick in his pocket and turned his phone to silent.
It had been a long time since he’d used any of the skills he’d applied with lethal efficiency behind enemy lines in the Persian Gulf, Bosnia, Peru and Sierra Leone as a Captain in the Special Air Service, but he hadn’t forgotten any of those skills.
He found himself in the kitchen.
The two men were whispering to each other, but clattered around like removal men. He heard one of them begin to climb the stairs.
Eventually, the other one, tasked with searching the ground floor, came into the kitchen – Glock-19 leading.
Dark took the gun off him and turned it around.
‘Mask off.’
The man didn’t move.
‘I can shoot you in the head first and then take your mask off – your choice?’
The man slowly removed his mask. He had a forehead that sloped backwards, a broken nose, large ears, a droopy left eye and his bottom jaw – the mandible – protruded further than the maxilla.
In his experience, Cesare Lombroso’s theory that criminals could be identified by their savage or atavistic appearance, usually wasn’t very helpful or reliable. However, there were times when a criminal did actually look like a criminal, and this was one of those times.
‘Lie face down on the floor.’
Dark could see the man looking for an opportunity to retrieve the gun and reverse the situation.
‘I can see you’re wearing a vest, so if you try anything, I’ll simply shoot you in the head. It doesn’t really matter to me whether you’re alive or dead, so don’t get the idea that I won’t shoot you. Lie down. I won’t ask you again.’
The man lay face down.
He took a plastic restraint from his coat pocket and dropped it on the floor in front of the man’s face. ‘Loop it around your wrists and put them behind your back.’
The man did as he was told.
Dark put his left shoe on the back of the man’s neck, and then bent down and pulled the end of the restraint through the double-toothed locking mechanism until the man’s wrists were secured. Next, he smacked the man on the back of the head with the butt of the gun.