The Brief

by Simon Michael

  Charles cast about looking for a weapon by Sands’s hands but, finding none, stepped closer.

  ‘Too late,’ said Sands softly. He mouthed the words rather than spoke them.

  ‘Why?’ demanded Charles, but Sands’s head was slowly dropping to his chest again. The breath whistling through the hole in his trachea was less regular, with longer pauses between each one. Charles grabbed Sands’s bloody chin and lifted his head. The Scotsman’s eyes were half-closed but for a second they focused, and he reached up with a bloodied hand and grabbed the sleeve of Charles’s leather jacket. He seemed about to say something, but the light died from his eyes and with a final bubbling wheeze, his arm and head fell in unison.

  Charles returned to the door and locked it and then sat at the small table that looked down onto the dark street below. He regarded the dead man thoughtfully. One step behind, yet again. And a growing body count. Until less than a week ago Charles had never seen a body – one of the advantages of the RAF over the other armed service. Now they were turning up everywhere he went.

  He stood and surveyed the room. There was a massive old wardrobe, its mirror blotched with age, but it contained only a coat with nothing in the pockets and a small pile of clothes, a change of shirt and underwear, none of it clean. A spare blue blanket was folded on the floor of the wardrobe. On a shelf by the door was a bathroom bag contained shaving gear, toothpaste and so on, but nothing of interest. Charles balked at searching Sands’s body, but he was about to start when he glimpsed something dark by the end of the bed. Partly hidden under the trailing edge of the counterpane was a small brown leather attaché case. It looked like a narrow school satchel with two buckles fastening it. Charles pulled it out and sat on the bed. Inside was a sheaf of papers, including a simple sketch of Putt Green with his own home marked with a large red asterisk, the layout of the house, and a blurry photograph of Henrietta. Charles’s heart thundered in his chest; here, at last, was real proof.

  He stood up and took the photograph to the light hanging from the central ceiling rose. It looked as if it had been a section from a larger photograph, but blown up. It was a grainy photograph of Henrietta standing in a line with other young women, all wearing summer dresses. Some wore hats and others were shading their eyes against the sun, which appeared to be low and shining directly in their faces. Behind them was a section of a single storey wooden building with a veranda, behind which were tall trees in leaf. Charles had a vague recollection of the scene, but couldn’t immediately place where the photograph had been taken.

  A lightning bolt of illumination suddenly struck Charles, and he whirled round and reopened the wardrobe door. He lifted out what he had supposed was a blanket and turned it over. It wasn’t a blanket; it was a barrister’s robes bag, blue, and brand-new. It still had the Ede & Ravenscourt price label hanging from the cord which pulled the mouth of the bag closed. Charles felt around inside it, but it was empty. His scrutiny was suddenly cut short by a shout from downstairs. He threw the bag back into the wardrobe.

  ‘Mr Collins? Mr Collins!’

  Charles hurriedly slid the documents back into the leather case and replaced it half-hidden at the foot of the bed. He tiptoed across to the door, unlocked it, and put his head out onto the landing. The landlady was calling from the bottom of the staircase. Charles closed the door behind him, and went downstairs.

  ‘I’m awfully sorry,’ he said, ‘but on reflection, I think I’ll find somewhere closer to the centre of town. I’ve business in the City, and this is a bit far out for me. I’m really sorry to have troubled you.’

  Without waiting for a response, Charles strode past her and out of the front door, closing it behind him. The woman watched him go and then ran upstairs as fast as her arthritic knees would allow to reassure herself that Charles hadn’t stolen the furniture from her top room.

  PART FIVE

  THE REVEAL

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  ‘Is that Thames Valley Police?’

  ‘Yes. How can I direct your call?’

  ‘I need to speak to Detective Constable Sloane. I think he’s based at Aylesbury Police Station. It’s very urgent.’

  ‘Please may I have your name?’

  ‘Charles Holborne. I’m wanted for the murder of my wife. And I have another murder to report, perhaps two.’

  There was no sharp intake of breath from the young telephone operator at the other end of the line. ‘Please hold the line, sir,’ she said calmly, ‘and I’ll put you through.’

  Remarkable sang froid, thought Charles. It took five minutes before Sloane was located.

  ‘Holborne?’ he asked, without precursor, his voice echoing down the line.

  ‘Yes. Listen carefully. I’m going to have to trust you, Detective Constable.’

  ‘You’re going to have to trust me? And why would you be doing that?’ asked Sloane. Charles thought he detected a very faint Irish accent.

  ‘Because I can’t trust your Superintendent. I have proof of my innocence, but if I give it to him, it’ll disappear.’

  ‘What proof is that?’ asked Sloane in a neutral tone.

  ‘If you get your men quickly to Oak Lodge Boarding House, Ormiston Grove, Shepherd’s Bush, in the front bedroom on the first floor you will find Charles Sands, recently of HM Prison Long Lartin. He escaped 10 days ago. He’s dead – shot – and before you ask, no, I didn’t kill him either. At the end of his bed you’ll find a briefcase with the instructions he was given prior to killing Henrietta. It should have his fingerprints all over it. And with a little luck, if you check under the bonnet of my Jag, you might find some more there.’

  ‘Where are you Mr Holborne?’

  ‘I’m in a call box in West London.’

  ‘Don’t you think it’s time you handed yourself in?’

  Charles laughed sardonically. ‘Are you serious? I may have been a yard behind the murderer throughout, but at least I’ve been looking. I know how this works, Sloane, and I know your bastard of a Superintendent. If anyone’s going to break the seal on his “watertight case”, it’s going to have to be me.’

  ‘We’re not all as stupid as you think, Mr Holborne. We already know the Jag wasn’t running, so it had to be fixed before you could make your supposed getaway. And we’ve also traced the owner of the girl’s Mercedes, Neville Fylde – who I gather you’ve already visited – and we know he was paid to make it look like you had a mistress. Was it you who put the hole in his ceiling?’

  ‘Ceiling? Don’t know what you’re taking about.’

  ‘What colour’s your robes bag?’

  ‘What?’ asked Charles, incredulous.

  ‘You heard. What colour?’

  ‘Red.’

  ‘Your wife’s murderer was seen to run off with a blue bag.’

  Sloane was, after all, no fool. ‘Which you will find in the wardrobe of Sands’s room,’ confirmed Charles. ‘It’s brand-new – the price label’s still on it – and it has no barrister’s initials on it.’

  ‘I’m telling you all this Mr Holborne to persuade you to come in. I assure you I have more than just an open mind, and my guvnor is… coming round. But you must realise the danger you’re in. You’ve done well so far, but you’ve been lucky. You’re not trained for this; we are.’

  ‘I’ve a got a few things to do first. But I promise I’ll hand myself in when they’re done.’

  There was something about the way Sloane referred to his guvnor which made Charles suspicious.

  ‘Are you recording this?’ he asked.

  ‘Of course I am.’

  ‘And how many others are in the room with you, Sloane?’

  There was a pause. ‘Most of the team.’

  Another dry voice added: ‘Including DC Sloane’s bastard Superintendent.’

  It was Wheatley. He continued: ‘You told the switchboard you wanted to report one murder, perhaps two? Do you want to tell us anything about the other one? Or are you keeping that one as a surprise?’

 
‘Hello, Superintendent. Sands’s accomplice on the Express Dairies robbery was a man named Derek Plumber. When I left Plumber’s house in Limehouse this morning he was in a diabetic coma. I organised an ambulance and left him with the district nurse. I’m not 100% certain about this, but I think Sands deliberately kept him from his insulin. I’m not sure of the motive yet, maybe simply for money. And I have one further lead to – ’

  And at that, Charles’s money ran out. He fished in his pockets for more change, but then stopped and let the beeps finish. The line was cut.

  At Aylesbury police station DC Sloane hung up and turned off the tape recorder. He turned to face the room. Behind him sat or stood all the members of team who he could round up in response to Holborne’s call. He’d made sure they were all in the room before he called Wheatley down. Only then did he have Holborne’s call put through.

  Superintendent Wheatley pulled another chair out from the desk and sat down heavily. 24 hours after the murder he’d had enough evidence to convict Holborne. Now what had looked like a simple collar was falling apart in his hands. And half the team had heard it, so he had no choice; he had to follow through on Holborne’s information. What galled him most was that that arrogant Jew-boy had more or less demolished the case against him by a combination of dumb luck and brute force.

  ‘Bricker,’ said Wheatley.

  ‘Sir?’ replied the detective sergeant from the other end of the long table.

  ‘Have we got all the elimination prints from Chancery Court yet?’

  ‘All except three. One’s confirmed as being in the British Caymans for the last month, so he’s ruled out. Two others are here, but out of town on cases.’ He fished in his pocket for his notebook and flicked over some pages. ‘Erm…Jonathan Beardsley and Simon Ellison.’

  ‘Where are they?’

  ‘According to their diaries, Beardsley is in York on a three-week civil trial and Ellison is at the assizes in Wiltshire.’

  Wheatley turned to Sloane. ‘I assume you’ve had the Jag looked at? Seeing as you ignored my earlier orders about it?’

  Sloane smiled cheerily at his Superintendent, trying to look fresh-faced and not too clever. ‘Yes. There were prints all over it belonging to Holborne and his wife, a couple from two of the mechanics at the local garage, and some half-prints from someone presently unidentified.’

  ‘You think Sands was working with someone in Holborne’s Chambers.’

  ‘Well, sir, we know someone set him up to make it look as if Holborne had a mistress. They had to have access to the Chambers diary, to know where Holborne would be – they couldn’t risk running into him at Fetter Lane. And they had to have his keys copied. Both of which would be easy if they worked in the same office. There’s no security of any sort and the barristers wander into one another’s rooms all the time. So, yes, I’m thinking that it was one of the other barristers. Several witnesses say that Mrs Holborne was, if you don’t mind my language, a right tart. I’m pretty sure we’ll turn up any number of motives.’

  Wheatley sighed. ‘Alright. I’m not saying I’m buying it, but we’d better get down to the Temple. Get one of the SOCOs to bring the prints from the Jag. If it is one of the barristers we need to identify him before Holborne gets himself killed. Not that I’d shed any tears, mind, but still…Bricker, get on the radio. Get the City of London boys to bring in the clerk, Stanley Wigglesworth. Sloane – you and PC Redaway go to Shepherds Bush and see about Sands. Come on. Let’s get on with this.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Stanley arrived at Chancery Court just before 11.00 pm. He had still to get over the shock of having one of his guvnors on the run, charged with the murder of his wife. Rita had never known him to get home so early, so assiduously had he been avoiding all his usual haunts for the last week. He couldn’t bear the looks he received whenever he met other clerks. But then, to be called out of his bed just as he was settling to sleep, raced to London in a speeding police car while still in pyjamas, and required to open up Chambers for more investigations, this time into another member of Chambers, well that was the final straw. ‘I’m going to retire at the end of term,’ he’d announced to Rita, as he pulled a coat on over his pyjamas.

  Superintendent Wheatley, DS Bricker and a third man got out of the car in which they had been waiting for Stanley’s arrival. Bricker introduced Stanley to Wheatley and to the third man, Reeves.

  ‘Mr Reeves is a Scenes of Crime Officer,’ explained Wheatley.

  ‘Who should have been off duty four hours ago,’ added Reeves, pointedly.

  ‘Now, Mr Wigglesworth,’ said Wheatley, ‘can you let us in, please?’

  Stanley led the men upstairs to the first floor and opened the main door.

  ‘We need to see the rooms of Mr Beardsley and Mr Ellison.’

  ‘They’re both on the other side of the landing,’ replied the clerk. ‘I’ll show you.’

  Stanley unlocked the other door on the landing and led the way inside to the far room. He pointed to the desk facing the door. ‘That’s Mr Ellison’s, superintendent,’ he said.

  ‘And which is Mr Holborne’s?’ Stanley pointed to the room next door, and Wheatley and Bricker shared a glance. ‘Does anyone else use Mr Ellison’s room?’

  ‘Not usually, no.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Wheatley to Reeves. ‘Off you go.’

  ‘Nobody touch the light switch, please,’ requested Reeves.

  Reeves took a torch from his pocket and entered Ellison’s room. He went over to the desk. He prowled round it, bending over, looking closely at the surfaces without touching anything.

  ‘Hmm,’ he said, turning on the desk lamp and extinguishing his torch. ‘The phone might be the best place to start.’

  He stood upright again and walked back to the other men who were watching him. He examined the door frame and then the light switch. ‘And then the light switch,’ he concluded.

  He went back to the desk and opened his briefcase. He took out a small pot and unscrewed the lid to reveal a brush inserted into it, rather like those used by photographers to blow dust from their camera lenses. He lifted the telephone handset off its cradle by the cable and placed it carefully on the desk blotter. The others standing at the threshold watched him silently. Reeves dusted a tiny amount of silver dust over the inside of the handset and looked carefully at the result.

  ‘Lovely,’ he said. ‘There’s a couple of quite decent ones.’

  He reached down into his case and took out a roll of tape. He cut a small piece off with a pair of scissors and pressed it firmly over the handset. He repeated the procedure twice more and then gently lifted the prints off. He immediately attached them to pieces of plastic card obtained from his case, and initialled the cards with a pen. He then moved to the light switch, and started again.

  Wheatley’s foot tapped impatiently. ‘Well?’ he asked.

  ‘What do you want me to compare them with?’ asked Reeves. Bricker opened his briefcase and handed Reeves an envelope from which Reeves took a further set of plastic cards. ‘Is there another room I can use?’ Reeves asked Stanley.

  ‘Next door?’ suggested the clerk.

  ‘Fine,’ said Reeves. He went to the adjoining room, taking the plastic cards with him, sat at the desk, and turned on the desk lamp. He took a magnifying glass from his breast pocket and looked closely at the fingerprints Bricker had provided. Then he turned to the lifts he had just taken. Wheatley peered over his shoulder like a vulture.

  ‘You realise this is not supposed to be my job, don’t you?’ asked Reeves.

  ‘I know. But didn’t you used to be – ’

  ‘Used to be, yes. But that was almost eight years ago. Would you mind, Superintendent? You’re distracting me, hovering behind me like that.’

  Wheatley moved away and Reeves continued his perusal. Every now and then he would make a jotting on the pad next to him. After about ten minutes, he switched off the lamp, and sat back.

  ‘I’m not a fingerprint expert any mo
re, you understand, and these are hardly the best conditions to work under… but…’

  ‘But?’ demanded Wheatley.

  Reeves was not to be hurried. ‘This wouldn’t stand up in court, Superintendent. You have to have a minimum number of identical features, and the prints marked “bonnet” aren’t complete and they’re not of the best quality – ’

  ‘Yes, yes, yes! I know all that!’ shouted Wheatley. ‘But what is your opinion?’’

  ‘Okay. There are no clearly inconsistent features between the prints here and those lifted from the car. As to common features, I can see six or seven in the thumb print on the phone, and ten on the forefinger by the door. Yes. If you have to have an answer, I’d say that in all probability – no higher than that, understand? – they were made by the same man. Not enough to convict, though.’

  ‘And they’re definitely not Holborne’s?’

  ‘Definitely not.’

  ‘That’s enough for me, especially if a rather high-profile barrister is about to be murdered!’

  ‘What?’ demanded Stanley. ‘Is Mr Ellison about be murdered?’

  Wheatley turned to Stanley. ‘I’m sorry sir, I shouldn’t have said that in your presence. No, he’s not. But I need to know where he lives, right now.’

  ‘Er… er…Chelsea somewhere…I’ve got the address in my room…’

  ‘Bricker, go with Mr Wigglesworth and get the address. Then make him a cuppa and sit with him till you hear from me. He’s not to contact anyone.’

  ‘But – ’ protested Stanley.

  ‘Sorry, sir, but I’m not taking any chances.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  Almost as soon as he had left the boarding house in Shepherd’s Bush Charles had remembered when that grainy summer photograph had been taken, and by whom. Simon was the captain of the Chambers cricket team, and every year Chancery Court barristers used to play a motley group of clerks and ringers gathered together by Stanley. Two years before Charles had been persuaded to play and, to his surprise, Henrietta had asked to watch and help with the tea. The photograph of all the wives and girlfriends had been taken by Jenny Ellison during the tea interval. Charles had seen the original on several occasions on the wall of Ellison’s study.