The Big Fiddle

by Roger Silverwood

  By the time Monday morning arrived, in his imagination he had stolen the valuable stone and got away with it four times.

  FIFTEEN

  It was 8.28 a.m. when Angel made his way down the corridor to his office. As he took off his coat and hung it on the hook on the side of the stationery cupboard, there was a knock at the door. ‘Come in,’ Angel called.

  It was DC Scrivens. ‘I couldn’t see Mrs Almond on Friday afternoon, sir. When I got there the house was locked up both back and front. I knocked and knocked, but there was nobody in.’

  ‘Did you look through the windows?’

  ‘Everything looked all right, sir. All neat and tidy. All windows closed. So I asked a neighbour, but she didn’t know anything.’

  The phone rang. He reached out for it. ‘Yes, Angel.’

  ‘DS Clifton. Duty sergeant, sir. Good morning.’

  ‘Good morning, Bernie. What is this … so early in the day?’

  ‘It’s late in the day for me, sir. I have a man in the reception waiting room anxiously wanting to see you. He wouldn’t explain to anybody what he wanted except that he had a crime to report and he wanted to report it to you.’

  Angel wrinkled his nose, blew out a foot of air, then said, ‘What’s his name?’

  ‘Vittorio Ramazzotti. Do you know him?’

  Angel blinked. ‘Never heard of him. Did he say it was urgent?’

  ‘He did, sir. He’s been waiting more than an hour.’

  ‘Right, Bernie, thank you,’ he said, resigned to hearing what Vittorio Ramazzotti wanted to tell him. ‘I’ll send Ahmed up to collect him in a couple of minutes.’

  Angel returned the phone to its holster and turned back to Scrivens. ‘I’d better come with you to Leeds. Yes. I have a man waiting to see me; when he’s gone, we’ll go in my car. All right?’

  Scrivens looked relieved. ‘Yes, sir. I’ll wait in the CID room, sir.’

  ‘Will you ask Ahmed to bring Mr Vittorio Ramazzotti to me? He’s in the reception waiting room.’

  ‘Of course, sir,’ he said and he went out.

  Three minutes later there was a knock on Angel’s office door. ‘Come in.’

  It was Ahmed.

  ‘Mr Vittorio Ramazzotti, sir,’ Ahmed said as he showed the small man with the Van Dyke beard into Angel’s office.

  Angel said, ‘Thank you, Ahmed.’

  Ramazzotti also turned round to thank Ahmed, but he had gone and the door was closed.

  ‘Ah, Inspector Angel,’ Ramazzotti said. ‘There you are. I recognize you from your photograph. It is my very great pleasure to meet you, I am sure.’

  He reached out for Angel’s hand, held it tight and shook it, pumping it up and down without letting go, until Angel managed to pull it away.

  Ramazzotti realized what he had done and a little embarrassed said, ‘Scusi.’ He moved his hands and arms around excitedly as he spoke.

  Angel smiled. ‘That’s all right. Please sit down, Mr Ramazzotti, and tell me the nature of the crime you have to report.’

  ‘Of course. And thank you. May I say what a great honour it is to have you listen to my story which is a great mystery to me.’

  ‘What is the nature of the crime exactly?’

  ‘It is a mystery, Inspector Angel, a mystery that has confounded me these past few days.’

  ‘But has a crime been committed, Mr Ramazzotti? You are here to report an incident where someone has broken the law, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes. Oh yes, indeed. I have longed to meet you since I first read about you in the Canadian Picture Pictorial, where you have taken the motto of the Mounties, that you always get your man.’

  Angel sighed. ‘You live in Bromersley, do you, Mr Ramazzotti?’

  ‘Indeed I do, Inspector. I live in Clement Attlee Square. I ran a musical instrument shop there. Unfortunately the good people of Bromersley are not interested in the making of their own music. They prefer to listen to others on the discs making millions. So I could not sell the instruments any more. I went into the discs and sold some, but now they take them for free from the World Wide Web at no charge, so I cannot make a profit from selling discs. Alas, I say to myself, what shall I do, when I see in the newspaper this advertisement.’

  He took out a small newspaper cutting from a battered leather wallet and passed it over to Angel. ‘Please to read it, Inspector. Your reading of the English is much better than mine.’

  Angel took it. It was a small ad in the personal column of the Bromersley Chronicle. He noted that the date of the ad was Friday, 19 April 2013. He read it silently.

  It said:

  Golden Opportunity with The International String Music Foundation!

  Wanted: a suitably experienced double-bass player for part-time employment. Bursary of £700 per week offered.

  A representative of The International String Music Foundation will be at the Feathers Hotel, Bromersley, between noon and 5 p.m. on Saturday, 20 April 2013 to interview. Candidate must be accomplished, have flair and be able to work on his or her own. Great opportunity for suitably qualified musician. Apply in person.

  Angel rubbed his chin, read the ad again and then put the cutting on his desk under the telephone holster.

  ‘Now, Inspector,’ Ramazzotti said, ‘I play ze bass fiddle. I learn it as a boy in Milano. I played it professionally in Italy, and I have played in professional orchestras in Sheffield and amateur orchestras in and around Bromersley for years. I have lately played for Gilbert and Sullivan societies’ productions of Iolanthe, Pirates of Penzance, The Mikado, as well as light operas such as Die Fledermaus, and so on.’

  Angel brushed his hand through his hair, leaned forward over his desk and said, ‘Yes, Mr Ramazzotti, but what offence has been committed?’

  ‘I am coming to that, Inspector. Please to listen to me. Uno minuto, if you pleeese! Well, where was I? Ah yes. I went to the Feathers Hotel, I sat in a room set aside as a waiting room for two hours. There were six other candidates. Some looked very young. I didn’t believe I would get the job. I was eventually interviewed by a director of The International String Music Foundation.

  ‘I was told that the big man … the chairman of The International String Music Foundation had been a keen double-bass player and was also keen on the works of Gilbert and Sullivan. As a surprise, the committee had decided to engage a double-bass player who has the necessary flair and ability to transpose the music of Sir Arthur Sullivan so that the double bass played a more significant part in the music throughout.

  ‘The man also said that if my work was satisfactory, it would be published and performed in the West End and then, possibly, New York. He asked me a few questions and then asked me to play my double bass. He seemed satisfied with all that and put me on his shortlist of three. Then he told me the conditions of the employment. I have them here somewhere.’

  Ramazzotti began fumbling around in his inside pocket. At length he produced a folded sheet of A4 and unfolded it carefully.

  Angel sighed. ‘I suppose you are going to tell me the conditions,’ he said.

  ‘Sì, Inspector Angel. It is necessary for you to understand the crime,’ he said.

  ‘Oh, there is a crime?’ Angel said.

  ‘The conditions,’ Ramazzotti said. ‘I wrote them down on this paper so that there would be no misunderstanding. I read. “(1) All writing and rehearsing must be done in premises appropriate to keep the work secret, also to avoid any possible annoyance to neighbours. Such premises to be determined and approved by The International String Music Foundation,

  (2) Applicants must be prepared to work each evening from five o’clock to midnight, seven days a week until the work is finished, and

  (3) A bursary of £700 per week to be paid by our representative at the end of each week.”’

  Ramazzotti then folded the paper and put it back into his pocket.

  ‘I said that I would agree to all those conditions and would be glad to be given the opportunity. He asked me to wait. Three of us wa
ited. I waited another half an hour, then he called me in and offered me the job. Oh, I was so pleased, Inspector! To get the job against thirty-six other people, all, I believe, younger than I.’

  Angel looked at the clock on the wall, shook his head and wondered if he could suggest to Ramazzotti that he came back tomorrow to finish the story, but the little man did sound as if he was reaching the conclusion.

  ‘So I started the job on 25 April. It was necessary to travel to Tunistone to work. I worked as arranged beginning with The Mikado. At 5 p.m. on the 2 May, the man from The International String Music Foundation looked at the manuscript I had written. He said that it looked excellent and I was duly paid the £700 in cash. I continued working as they wanted, but last Thursday, 9 May, again, when I was due for a second visit at Tunistone from him and payment of £700, nobody came. I continued to turn up for work on the Friday, Saturday and yesterday, but still no sign of the Foundation man. I am still working hard, but he does not come. They now owe me over a thousand pounds. They seem to have vanished into thin air. There is the mystery, Inspector Angel, and there is the crime.’

  Angel frowned and rubbed his chin. It certainly was a strange story, but he was not certain that he could find any criminal act there. Even if Mr Ramazzotti had not received payment for work done, it might not be a matter for the police. It was possibly a labour dispute.

  ‘Mr Ramazzotti, are you a member of a trade union?’

  ‘You mean like the Musicians’ Union? I used to be, but no. I am not. Should I be?’

  Angel blew out a length of air. ‘Never mind,’ he said. ‘I will look into it, when I can. Firstly, I will need to know the address of the Foundation.’

  ‘I’m afraid I haven’t got that, Inspector.’

  ‘Didn’t you have a letter or a card or something, the conditions of employment you spoke of?’

  ‘I’m afraid not. You understand, Inspector, I wanted the job. I didn’t want to be … erm to be … er difficult. I take everything from what he say, not what he didn’t write down.’

  Angel blinked. ‘Well, all right,’ he said. ‘What were the names and addresses of the men who interviewed you, engaged you and subsequently paid you?’

  ‘They were all the same man, Inspector. I just called him “sir”.’

  ‘Well, what did he look like?’

  ‘He look just like my older brother, Emilio,’ he said with a big smile.

  Angel’s jaw muscles tightened. ‘Have you a photograph of Emilio?’

  ‘No. He lives in Milano with my dear mother. Some time ago, he went to a seminary in Rome, to study to be a priest, but he met a young woman and she led him away from his vocation. I do not know where he is. I haven’t seen him for eight years now. My mother is distraught.’

  Angel ran his hand through his hair. ‘She’s not the only one,’ he thought. He shook his head, then said, ‘All right, Mr Ramazzotti, do you know the address of the place in Tunistone where you worked?’

  ‘Of course. It was St Cuthbert’s parish hall on Church Street.’

  ‘Ah! And who did you see or meet while you were there writing and playing?’

  ‘Nobody. It was a lonely existence. The door was always unlocked for me when I arrived at five o’clock, and I was to put out the lights, drop the latch and close the door when I left at midnight.’

  Angel’s face muscles tightened. He wiped his hand impatiently across his face.

  It was ten minutes later that the little Italian left Angel’s office, much to Angel’s relief. Angel promptly opened a file and labelled it ‘Double bass/Vittorio Ramazzotti’ and dropped his notes into it, hoping that the mysterious and unusual story would have a logical, happy and glorious ending without needing any effort on his part.

  However, the remarkable story told him by the double-bass-playing Italian was to dominate his subconscious and preoccupy him when his mind was not involved in matters immediately all-consuming until the mystery was completely solved. His mind – more than most other people’s – worked in an unfathomable way. He did not have complete control over it, and it was easily sidetracked by what he saw, heard, smelled or remembered.

  He pulled open the top drawer of the filing cabinet and was placing the new file between ‘Dangerous substances’ and ‘Emergency call-out’ when the phone rang. It was Don Taylor.

  ‘I thought you’d like to know, sir, that the prints on the back of old Mr Piddington’s wheelchair are not those of Moira Elsworth.’

  Angel frowned. ‘Thank you, Don,’ he said. He banged down the phone. He was not pleased. He pursed his lips. It was not Moira Elsworth.

  But who could be the one who dragged that wheelchair with a 92-year-old grandfather in it to the top of the staircase and then simply let it go, watching him and the chair drop down the steps, throwing the old man out, who then rolled over and over and came to rest at the bottom on the parquet floor with a broken neck.

  He was still weighing the probabilities when there was a knock at the door.

  It was Flora Carter.

  ‘Come in, lass,’ he said and pointed to the chair. ‘You’ve seen Christine Elsworth?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Flora said. ‘I told her that we had seen last year’s accounts which she had submitted to HMRC and that we were surprised to see that she had paid a total of £31,200 to King and Company for his accounting services for the year 2012/13.

  ‘She was quick to say that he was very good with his advice to her.’

  ‘He needed to be. Did you ask her how she managed to earn such huge profits – over 300 per cent – when other similar florists only manage around 50 per cent?’

  ‘Yes, sir. She had no real answer other than that she worked very hard and kept long hours.’

  ‘That really won’t do, Flora. It isn’t realistic … such profits from a tiny shop. It simply isn’t good enough. I’ve been thinking about this. This is what I think was happening. Christine Elsworth was regularly introducing stolen money from her father’s loft into her cash till at the kiosk. Whenever anybody bought flowers and required change, she gave it to them in the old stolen notes and retained the legitimate notes. Also, when she paid her suppliers, she paid them with stolen notes. But when she banked her takings, she paid in only legitimate notes. Christine Elsworth worked hard at buying good flowers and selling as many as she could at competitive prices, but it really didn’t matter how profitable or unprofitable the flower kiosk was because it was merely a front for laundering money big-time. And Andrew King of King and Company, her accountant, must have been complicit in the fiddle. He was, possibly, the brains behind it, and he was supposed to have covered it up in the accounts. So get a warrant to seize Christine Elsworth’s cash till and check it for any stolen notes, also her handbag. Of course, she may not have any of the stolen notes any more because the bulk of the money has now been handed over to the court, but she’s a sly old fox, she has probably got some stuffed down her stocking leg or hidden in the fridge or somewhere. You’ll have to move quickly.’

  She nodded. ‘What about Andrew King, sir?’

  Angel rubbed his chin thoughtfully. His face hardened. ‘You can bet he’s fireproof, but charge him, and collate as much information as you can and let us hope that Mr Twelvetrees at the CPS can make a case against him stick.’

  ‘Right, sir,’ she said, getting to her feet, then she looked at him closely. ‘Christine Elsworth’s going to love you,’ she said.

  He shrugged, then pursed his lips. ‘Huh. That’s a burden I will have to bear, Flora,’ he said lightly. ‘Now you’d better shift. You’ll need some help. Take two PCs with you.’

  ‘Yes. Right, sir,’ she said and she was gone.

  Angel looked up at the clock. It was eleven o’clock already. He remembered his arrangement with Scrivens. He reached over for his coat and pushed an arm into a sleeve, then put on his hat and rushed out of the office. He crossed the corridor to the CID office, stuck his head in, saw Ahmed and Scrivens talking to each other. Both men saw him and stood
up.

  Angel looked at Scrivens. ‘Come on, lad.’ Then he turned to Ahmed. ‘I’m going to Leeds, if you want me, you can get me on my mobile.’

  ‘Right, sir,’ Ahmed said.

  Angel and Scrivens made their way quickly down the corridor, past the cells and through the back door to the car park and the BMW. Angel drove and Scrivens navigated. Forty-five minutes later they were in the middle of a large Victorian estate of terraced houses on the northern side of Leeds.

  Angel thought the streets were unusually quiet for the time of day. He saw a woman washing the outside of the windows of an upstairs room by sitting outside on the window ledge with her legs and feet dangling inside the bedroom. Two boys aged about ten were kicking a tin can ahead of them in turns as they ran along the pavement.

  Angel stopped the BMW outside the front door of number 166 Sebastopol Terrace. The two men got out of the car.

  Angel said, ‘You take the back, Ted, I’ll do the front. I’ll give you five seconds. And have a peek through the window.’

  ‘Right, sir,’ Scrivens said and he moved quickly through a narrow ginnel in the row, which led to the back doors.

  Angel peered through the net curtains into number 166, but could see only a sideboard loaded with pot ornaments and, nearer, the arm of a sofa. No signs of life.

  He waited a few moments, then knocked on the door. There was no reply. He knocked again, more urgently.

  Suddenly, the front door of the house next door opened, and a woman wearing a yellow cloth in the form of a turban and a flowered overall came out, stood on the doorstep and leaned against the door jamb. She looked Angel up and down, then took a cigarette end out of her pocket, lit it, took a big drag, blew out a cloud of smoke and folded her arms.

  Eventually she said, ‘Looking for Bettina Almond?’

  Angel looked back at her and smiled. ‘Yes, I am actually.’

  ‘Are you from the police?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Is Mrs Almond out?’

  ‘What’s she been up to?’