The Big Fiddle

by Roger Silverwood

  ‘In the wheelie bin, sir. Morris had obviously discarded it.’

  Angel smiled. ‘That would be another one of the three masks worn during the robbery in 1983, and it lends credence to the hypothesis that Charles Morris knew about Ernest Piddington and the ten million quid. However, it seemed that he didn’t know it was sitting in his loft disguised as a water tank.’

  ‘I knew you’d be pleased.’

  ‘Any prints on it?’

  ‘There are some smudges, sir. We haven’t had chance to make any comparisons yet. And we haven’t been able to pick up any of Charles Morris’s fingerprints either.’

  Angel looked at him strangely. ‘But the man lived here for a few months. Don’t tell me he’s been eating, sleeping, washing and doing whatever else people do with gloves on?’

  ‘Every surface, ridge, doorknob, door handle, grip and ledge we can think of has been wiped over with a cotton vest soaked in white spirit. It’s as if he knew we would be looking for them.’

  Angel frowned. ‘How do you know it’s a vest?’

  ‘Because we found it in the waste, sir. It was at the top of his wheelie.’

  Angel wrinkled his nose. ‘Is it all right if I walk about the place?’

  ‘Yes, sir. The vacuuming is done, the photography and the floor are finished. All we have to do is a finger search and a final look round for his prints.’

  There was a knock at the door.

  ‘Excuse me, sir,’ Taylor said, and he went across the room and opened the door.

  ‘Come in, Mr Timms,’ Taylor said.

  A big man with a face like a worried hippopotamus came in. ‘This is most irregular,’ Timms said. ‘We’ve never had a tenant who dashed off leaving us with a flat to let like this. It is most irregular. And I’m afraid that he paid his rent in cash.’

  Taylor looked disappointed. ‘Thank you for checking anyway,’ he replied. ‘Meet my boss, Detective Inspector Angel. He’s in charge of the case. This is Mr Timms, church warden of St Peter’s. Mr Timms has been to see how Morris paid his rent. I thought if he had had a bank account, we could possibly have been able to trace him that way.’

  Angel nodded. Then he smiled courteously at Timms and said, ‘I am sorry that your tenant has run out on you. We are also very interested in catching up with him. Can you tell me? … When he applied for the tenancy of the flat, how did he hear that it was coming vacant?’

  ‘We ran an advertisement in the Bromersley Chronicle,’ Timms said.

  ‘And in response to that, he wrote to you?’

  ‘No. He phoned.’

  ‘Did he say where he was living at the time?’

  ‘I believe he said he was staying in a hotel.’

  Angel rubbed his chin. ‘A hotel? In Bromersley or … or some other town?’

  ‘I don’t believe he said, Inspector. If he did, I don’t remember.’

  ‘Mmm.’

  The clock on the chimney breast began to strike. Angel looked at his watch. It said 11.05. ‘I think it’s slow,’ he said.

  Taylor said, ‘Yes, sir. It is.’

  Timms looked at his watch. ‘Five minutes. Can’t abide a slow clock,’ he said and went up to the wall to take it down.

  Angel said, ‘Leave it, sir, please.’

  Timms’s jaw dropped. ‘I just want to put it right, Inspector.’

  Angel turned to Taylor. ‘Has it been checked for prints, Don?’ he said.

  ‘Don’t know, sir. We don’t usually check stuff on walls like clocks for prints. I’ll find out.’

  While Taylor rushed off to consult the member of the SOCO team who had been responsible for checking for fingerprints throughout the flat, Angel turned back to the church warden and said, ‘Sorry, Mr Timms, for being so abrupt, but we are anxious not to miss any place where this chap Morris’s fingerprints might be.’

  ‘That’s all right, Inspector. I didn’t realize. But you do have to take the clock off the wall to adjust the time. I am used to it. I am afraid it seems to lose about three minutes a week.’

  Taylor returned with one of his SOCO team, a young detective constable in white paper overalls and rubber gloves carrying a pot of aluminium powder and a soft brush. The young man deftly applied thin amounts of powder with the brush on the glass and wood face of the clock, and peered at the result from different angles using a small hand torch. Apparently finding nothing usable, he carefully removed the clock from the wall and did the same to the back of the clock. His face brightened when he peered closely at his handiwork with the torch, and he reached into his pocket for a roll of clear tape.

  Angel read the signs. ‘What you got, lad?’ he said.

  ‘Eight fingertips. Four at each side. Must have been made while taking the clock off the wall, sir,’ the detective constable said. ‘There were corresponding thumb prints on the face of the clock, but they were smudged.’

  ‘Are they recent?’

  ‘They seem to be, sir.’

  The young man lifted the prints with the tape and applied the tape to stiff card, then he made some notes on the card, returned the clock to the wall, and went away into another room.

  Angel turned to Taylor and said, ‘Get him to email those prints to Records immediately, Don.’

  ‘Right, sir.’

  Satisfied that the search for the ID of Charles Morris was moving along satisfactorily, Angel left Taylor and his SOCO team at Morris’s flat and returned to the station.

  He was sitting at his desk trying to make sense of all the details accumulated in the two murder cases. It was difficult trying to distinguish between inconsequential information, and vital, meaningful evidence. He considered the facts. A beautiful young woman, Nancy Quinn, carer to old Mr Piddington, was savagely murdered by stabbing which seemed to have occurred during sexual intercourse. The man known as Edward Oliver boasted as much, and Angel had a description of him from two witnesses. They had said that he was tall, dark and handsome with a cherubic face. In addition, while speaking to him on the phone, Oliver had quickly recognized Angel’s voice, which meant he must have known Angel and in turn Angel must know him, at least to have spoken to him several times. However, Angel couldn’t bring him to mind. There were so many people he had spoken to over the years.

  Then Angel turned his thoughts to the murder of Ernest Piddington.

  His first suspect was Piddington’s daughter, Christine Elsworth, suspicious because she wanted to keep the existence of the money secret and thereby retain it entirely for herself? Perhaps she was worried that in his ramblings, old Mr Piddington might have let out the secret of the money in the loft to some villain.

  His second suspect was the man purporting to be Charles Morris, who was courting Moira Elsworth possibly to get near the money. An individual who had now vanished. Angel had told Moira that her fingerprints and his would be required. When she conveyed the message, Morris seemed to have run off, dumping the 30-year-old mask on the way.

  Angel was thinking about that when he recalled that Moira’s fingerprints had still not yet been obtained. Also, it was quite possible that she could assist them in their search for Morris.

  He reached out for the phone and tapped in Crisp’s mobile number.

  ‘Where are you, lad?’

  ‘In my car, just pulling into the station car park, sir.’

  ‘Come straight up to my office. I’ve got a job for you.’

  A few minutes later, Crisp knocked on the door.

  ‘I want you to pick up Moira Elsworth,’ Angel said. ‘I asked her to call in so that we could take her fingerprints a few days ago. She never arrived. Also I want to interview her. I don’t have her address, but you know where her mother’s flower kiosk is, don’t you? Start there.’

  ‘Yes. Right, sir.’

  ‘Now look, Trevor, she’s a strikingly beautiful young woman. All I want you to do is deliver her here and let me interview her before you start making any romantic advances towards her.’

  ‘I don’t chase every woman that co
mes along, sir.’

  ‘If they’re under fifty and don’t have a face like Red Rum you’re after them as if sex was going out of fashion.’

  ‘That’s not fair.’

  ‘It might not be fair, but it’s true. Now hop off, lad, and bring in Moira Elsworth.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Crisp said and made for the door, when somebody knocked on it.

  ‘See who it is, lad.’

  It was DC Ted Scrivens.

  ‘Come in, Ted,’ Angel said.

  Crisp and Scrivens acknowledged each other with a nod. Then Crisp went out and closed the door.

  Angel said, ‘Now then, lad, have you managed to trace the family of that chap Bottomley?’

  ‘Yes, sir. I was glad of that message you sent by Ahmed.’

  ‘Good. Right, lad. Tell me what you got.’

  ‘The young priest at St Cecilia’s Church, where Bottomley’s funeral service was held, has only been in the job a year, so he didn’t know the family. I traced the previous priest and he didn’t know them either. There were some records, however. His widow’s address at the time of the funeral was given, but she had moved twice since then. I eventually caught up with her, still living in Bromersley. She was living in Canal Street.’

  Angel’s eyebrows lowered and his face creased. Canal Street was the roughest and lowest street in town. He felt sorry for anyone living down there.

  ‘She denied that she was Bettina Aimee Bottomley at first,’ Scrivens said, ‘as she had reverted to her maiden name. She was eighty-two years of age and lived with her daughter, Patrice, and her son-in-law. When I mentioned the robbery in 1983 she became quite angry. She said that Ronald had got twelve years for robbing the Royal Westminster Bank in 1983, but that she had not seen a penny of it, also that he had died three years later in a hospital while serving time in Franklin prison, Durham. She said that Vernon Almond had also been found guilty with him and that he had been sent to serve his time in Armley. She had heard that he had died last year. His widow sent her a letter from an address in Leeds. She hadn’t heard from her since.’

  ‘You’ve got the address?’

  ‘Yes, of course, sir.’

  ‘They also had a son, Sean. Did she mention him?’

  ‘No, sir, but I asked her where he was and how he was doing. And she said that she saw him from time to time and that he was doing very well.’

  ‘Right, lad,’ Angel said. ‘Great stuff. Did you find out anything else worth knowing?’

  ‘Don’t think so, sir.’

  ‘Well, follow up that lead to Vernon Almond’s widow in Leeds. Let’s see if that produces anything more helpful.’

  Scrivens grinned, stood up and said, ‘Right, sir,’ and went out.

  A few minutes later Crisp arrived.

  ‘I’ve got Moira Elsworth and Gerald Mackenzie in interview room number one, sir,’ he said. ‘Her mother insisted that she had a solicitor present.’

  Angel shrugged. Having a solicitor present meant that he could interview as hard as the solicitor would allow without there being any argument later about who said what, and complaints about bullying and charges that he had taken advantage of her gender and age and all that, so Angel wasn’t put out at all. Anyway, every word uttered would be recorded.

  ‘All right, lad. You’d better sit in on this with me, Trevor,’ he said, getting up from his desk.

  They both made their way out of the office and a short way up the corridor to the brown door marked ‘Interview Room 1’.

  Having thanked them both for coming in, Angel sat opposite Moira Elsworth, and Crisp opposite Gerald Mackenzie.

  Angel switched on the recording machine, checked that he could see both spools rotating, made the usual introductions and then said, ‘Miss Elsworth, four days ago, on Tuesday, when I saw you at your mother’s shop, I asked you to call here as soon as you could, with Mr Morris, to give us your fingerprints for elimination purposes, but you failed to arrive. Are you prepared to leave your fingerprints with us now?’

  ‘Yes, of course. I am sorry that I have not been sooner, but to tell the truth, Inspector, I forgot all about it.’

  Angel wasn’t very pleased. His lips tightened back against his teeth. ‘Your grandfather had been murdered, and the only thing you could possibly have done to help us find the culprit was to give us your fingerprints for elimination purposes, and you forgot all about it?’

  Moira’s face went scarlet. She lowered her head.

  ‘In addition,’ Angel said, ‘I discover that Mr Morris has left his flat in Tunistone in a big hurry. He has disappeared without trace, without leaving a forwarding address, also without leaving us his prints.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said.

  ‘An apology is hardly adequate, Miss Elsworth. Perhaps you could tell us why he has disappeared and where he is now?’

  ‘I’m afraid I can’t. He said that he had some urgent family business to attend to that wouldn’t wait, but that he would be back as soon as he could.’

  ‘And he gave you an address and telephone number where you could get in touch?’

  ‘Well, no, he forgot to say where he was going to – exactly.’

  Angel sighed. ‘I’ve heard that song before, Miss Elsworth. I reckon we’ve seen the last of him.’

  ‘Oh no, Inspector. I’m sure I haven’t. Look,’ she said proudly, holding out her left hand.

  On the third finger of the hand was a ring set with a very large single clear stone. She wriggled her fingers slightly to catch the light.

  Angel peered at it and blinked. ‘Is that a diamond?’ he said.

  Moira Elsworth withdrew her hand and stared at him indignantly. ‘Five point two carats,’ she said.

  He pursed his lips and shook his head. There was no more certain a way of fostering and retaining a woman’s attention than by putting a big ring on her finger, he thought. If he never returns she will always remember him in a most favourable light.

  Angel sighed. ‘Have you got a photograph of him?’

  ‘No. That’s my only regret,’ she said. ‘I asked him for one, but he must have forgotten.’

  ‘Would you, by any stretch of the imagination, describe his face as cherubic?’

  ‘Certainly not,’ she said. ‘There is nothing immature about Charles.’

  Angel frowned. She was in love with the man. Hers was a subjective opinion, so he wasn’t disposed to query it.

  ‘Do you know anything at all about Charles Morris,’ he said, ‘that might assist us to find him, anything at all? Did he talk about where he came from or where he intends to go to? Have you any information at all? Please try and remember, it could be extremely important.’

  Moira Elsworth shook her pretty little head. ‘I’m afraid I haven’t a clue. Sorry, Inspector.’

  ‘Did he have an accent … an unusual mannerism? Did he smoke?’

  ‘Did he have a tattoo?’ Crisp said.

  ‘Oh no,’ she said. ‘No. He was … he was perfect.’

  ‘Did he mention his mother, father, brothers, sisters, wives?’ Angel said.

  Her eyes flashed. ‘Certainly not.’

  Angel thoughtfully rubbed his chin. He was wondering whether to play his ace or not. Eventually he said, ‘Would it surprise you, Miss Elsworth, to learn that his name is not Charles Morris?’

  ‘It certainly would, Inspector,’ she said. Then she added, ‘What is it, then?’

  ‘The Charles Morris he is pretending to be died last November in Hull.’

  ‘You’ve obviously got the wrong Charles Morris,’ she said. ‘I suppose there might be a few people in the country called Charles Morris.’

  ‘There’s no mistake on our part, Miss Elsworth, I assure you.’

  ‘What is his real name, then?’

  ‘We don’t know. We expected you to tell us.’

  Her eyes flashed. ‘It’s just a trick, isn’t it, to get me to betray him?’

  ‘Not at all. We need to speak to him to assist us with our enquiries, that�
�s all. If he’s innocent, he’s nothing to worry about.’

  ‘Well, I don’t believe you.’

  Angel blew out a lungful of air. He didn’t really believe her. He rubbed his chin and said, ‘Well, I’m afraid I must warn you that it’s an offence to withhold any information that would assist us in our enquiries. You could be fined or even imprisoned.’

  Gerald Mackenzie said, ‘With respect, Inspector Angel, I don’t think it’s necessary to threaten Miss Elsworth.’

  ‘I’m not threatening her, Mr Mackenzie, only reminding her of the facts of the situation.’

  Moira Elsworth turned back to her solicitor and said, ‘He doesn’t frighten me with his threats, Mr Mackenzie. He has had the money taken away from us and now my mother has to go to the crown court.’

  ‘That is stolen money,’ Angel said. ‘It doesn’t belong to you or your mother. Now, if you can’t or won’t tell me how I can get in touch with Charles Morris—’

  ‘I don’t know how to reach him,’ she said. ‘I wish I did. I honestly wish I did, Inspector.’

  Angel looked closely at her. Her moist eyes twinkled in the light. Angel wondered if the tears were genuine.

  ‘Right. Thank you,’ he said. Then he looked at the recording machine to check that the red light was still on. ‘Interview terminated at 15.25 hours.’

  Angel reached over to the recorder, switched it off, took the tape out of the machine, and then whispered to Crisp, ‘Make sure you get her prints before she leaves the station. Don’t take no for an answer. Then come down to my office.’

  ‘Right, sir,’ Crisp said and he followed the fragrant Miss Elsworth and her solicitor, Gerald Mackenzie, out of the interview room.

  Angel switched off the light, closed the door and returned to his office to find Flora Carter waiting at the door. She was holding several sheets of A4.

  He looked at what was in her hand and said, ‘Is that the latest copy of Christine Elsworth’s accounts, Flora?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ she said brightly.

  ‘Good,’ he said, giving her a quick smile. ‘Come in, lass,’ he said as he pushed open the door and made his way round to his desk. ‘Sit down.’