The Cold Hand of Malice

by Frank Smith

  Paget listened carefully, asked a couple of questions, then looked at the grandfather clock in the hall and gave a sigh of resignation. Another evening gone, he thought, and couldn’t help thinking that it was just this sort of thing that led to the break-up of so many marriages among members of the police service. The thought chilled him, but there wasn’t much he could do about that now.

  ‘I’m on my way,’ he told the custody sergeant, ‘and make sure you keep them separated. Better get Tregalles in as well.’ He hung up the phone and turned to face Grace. ‘Looks as if we may have a break,’ he told her. ‘That was Broughton, the custody sergeant, on the phone. Two young people were caught breaking into a house in Hatch Lane. The homeowners returned unexpectedly, tackled the two of them and held them until the police arrived. Looks like the same MO as all the others, so I’d better get going.’

  Grace looked at the clock. ‘It’s twenty to nine,’ she said. ‘Couldn’t it wait till morning?’

  ‘It could, but I’d prefer to talk to them before they have a chance to get over the shock of being nicked. Sorry, love, but I have to go, so don’t wait up. And make sure you lock up after me. You never know who’s about these days.’

  Tregalles was already there when Paget arrived, and they sat down together with the custody sergeant to review the information provided by the arresting officers.

  The burglary, Broughton told them, was reported by a woman named Denise Grey of The Willows in Hatch Lane. She said that she and her husband, Evan, had caught the two youngsters ransacking the house, and were holding them. A patrol car was dispatched immediately, and a seventeen-year-old male, and a sixteen-year-old female were taken into custody.

  The back door of The Willows had been forced and, although the thieves couldn’t have been inside the house more than a few minutes, drawers had been pulled out, and the contents thrown on the floor. The tool used to gain access was identified as a leaf spring taken from a car or truck, with one end filed down to make it easier to insert between door and jamb, while the other end was taped to give it a better grip. Mr Grey told the arresting officers that the girl had tried to use it as a weapon on him when he apprehended her, and showed them a bruise on his upper right arm as evidence. He also showed them bruises on his shins where he alleged the girl had kicked him before he could subdue her.

  He explained that he was a marshal arts instructor, and his wife was a fitness trainer. They were on their way to the recreation centre, where they were both teaching classes, when he realized he’d left a set of instructions behind, and they’d returned to the house. His wife remained in the car while he entered the house to find two teenagers ransacking the place. They tried to make a run for it, but he caught the girl, and shouted to his wife, who tackled the boy as he tried to jump the hedge at the front of the house. The boy made no attempt to fight, and he’d accompanied Mrs Grey into the house and remained there passively while she telephoned the police.

  ‘Just kids?’ Paget said to the custody sergeant. ‘I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised by their ages, but I am. What do we know about them?’

  ‘The boy is seventeen, the girl is sixteen going on thirty,’ Broughton told him. ‘Terry Coleman and Chloe Tyler. We have nothing on the boy, but the girl has quite a record. Prostitution, possession, dealing, and a couple of assaults to her credit. She’s a hard case, and she’s not volunteering anything, but the boy’s a different story. They were both cautioned at the time they were apprehended. She’s not talking, but he certainly is. He claims this is the first time he’s done anything like this, and he blames it all on the girl. And he may be right. Like I said, she’s a hard case, living rough in one of those old buildings on King George Way – the ones the local authority keeps saying are to be torn down but never seem to get around to. I knew you’d want it secured for search, so I took the liberty of dispatching one of your blokes with one of ours to turn it over. We should be hearing back from them soon.

  ‘Coleman says the girl talked him into it,’ the sergeant continued. ‘He said she needed the money for drugs, and the bloke who used to do houses with her is away. He says she promised him sex if he’d do it.’

  ‘Looks like he can forget that,’ observed Tregalles drily.

  ‘I’ve kept them separate as you asked,’ Broughton continued. ‘I don’t think you’ll have any trouble with Coleman – he’s scared shitless about what his parents will say when they find out, so he’s more than willing to tell us anything we want to know, but I doubt if you’ll make much headway with the girl.’

  ‘Have the parents been notified?’ asked Paget.

  ‘Nobody home at the Coleman house. We’re told by the boy that his parents are in Switzerland on holiday. As for Chloe Tyler, she left home when she was fourteen. She’s from Sheffield originally. She’s got form there and in Leeds and Newcastle. There’s no record of a father, and according to this –’ Broughton tapped the face of the monitor in front of him – ‘her mum’s been on the game most of her life, and she’s moved around a lot as well. Last known address was in West Brom, but she disappeared not long after Chloe left home. If the girl knows where her mum is, she’s not saying, and I get the impression she’s not interested anyway.’

  ‘You said Coleman mentioned someone who has worked with her before on other burglaries?’ said Paget.

  ‘That’s right. Someone who goes by the name of Josh. The boy describes Josh as “a bit of a weirdo”, and he gave us a description. Tall, thin, maybe twenty-five or so, pale eyes, nose is always running because he snorts coke. Talks like a schoolteacher. He says Chloe told him that Josh had gone off to visit some traveller friends who are camped over Cleobury Mortimer way.’

  ‘Shouldn’t be too hard to track down, then,’ Tregalles observed. ‘I can get someone started on that now.’

  ‘Right,’ said Paget, ‘then let’s hear what else Terry Coleman has to say while he’s still in a talkative mood. We’re going to need a duty solicitor by the sound of it.’

  ‘Carmichael,’ Broughton said. ‘He’s waiting for you.’

  ‘Good. At least we know where we are with him,’ said Paget as he pushed his chair back. ‘As for the girl, I think we’ll leave her until we’ve heard what Mr Coleman has to say for himself.’

  Terry Coleman was a skinny, spotty-faced kid who barely looked his age. A shock of lank, unruly hair kept falling forward over his face, and he was forever pushing it out of his eyes. The interview room wasn’t particularly warm, but he was sweating profusely, and he looked as if he might burst into tears at any moment.

  The procedure was explained to him, and he was reminded once again that he was still under caution. ‘Do you mind if I call you Terry?’ Paget asked pleasantly.

  The boy licked his lips several times and said, ‘Yeah – I mean no, I don’t mind.’

  ‘Good. Now, I’d like you to tell me in your own words exactly what you were doing in the home of Mr and Mrs Grey of The Willows in Hatch Lane earlier this evening, and how you came to be there in the first place.’

  As far as the burglary was concerned, despite cautionary advice from the duty solicitor, Lionel Carmichael, the boy could hardly wait to tell his side of things, and his story was pretty much a repeat of what he had told the arresting officers. ‘I was just supposed to be the lookout, that’s all,’ he ended, ‘but once we were inside Chloe said we might as well give the place a good going over, and it would be best if we both did it. She said we’d have plenty of time because they wouldn’t be back for hours. But we hadn’t been there five minutes when they came back, so we never had a chance to steal anything. Not that I wanted to in the first place,’ he added hastily.

  ‘Let’s go back a bit, then, Terry. Tell me when and how you met Chloe Tyler.’

  ‘I met her a few weeks ago at a friend’s house. His parents were away for the weekend, and he invited a few of us over, but word got round somehow, and a bunch of kids we’d never seen before crashed the party. Chloe came in with them.

  �
��I danced with her a couple of times, and when we left she cadged a ride home. That’s when I found out she was living in a squat down on King George Way.’

  ‘Cadged a ride, Terry?’ Tregalles said sharply. ‘How old are you, Terry?’

  ‘Seventeen.’

  ‘Who’s car were you driving, Terry?’

  Colour rose in the boy’s face. ‘My dad’s,’ he mumbled.

  ‘You have a license and your dad’s permission, do you?’

  Terry wilted beneath the sergeant’s gaze and shook his head. ‘Not-not really,’ he admitted. ‘But you see—’

  ‘Never mind the excuses,’ Tregalles said roughly. ‘We’ll talk about that later. Let’s get back to your giving this girl a ride. Trying to impress her, were you?’

  Terry Coleman shrugged and looked down at his hands. ‘I thought she liked me,’ he said. ‘I went down to the squat a few times, but then I realized she had something going with this bloke, Josh. It was like he had some sort of hold over her; she’d do whatever he said. But he was out of it half the time, and when that happened, Chloe and I would take off somewhere. She’s had a rough life, and I felt really sorry for her.’

  ‘You say it was Chloe who suggested the burglary. When was that, Terry?’

  ‘Yesterday. She said she needed money, and she knew of this house in Hatch Lane where the people would be out all evening. She said it would be easy; she said she and Josh had done houses before.’

  ‘Did she say where or when?’

  ‘Mostly other towns, I think. I don’t think they’ve been here all that long. The way she talks about other places, I think she and Josh have moved around quite a bit. But things have been sort of rough for her since Josh went off to see some friends, and she was getting a bit desperate. Trouble was, she said she didn’t like going in alone, and she asked me to go with her.

  ‘I knew I shouldn’t do it,’ he said bitterly, ‘but she kept on at me about putting a bit of excitement into my life; she said she’d find someone else if I was afraid to do it, but if I would just go along with her this once, I wouldn’t be sorry.’

  ‘What did you think she meant by that?’ asked Paget.

  ‘That she’d sleep with me,’ the boy said sheepishly. Then, more spiritedly, ‘See, she never had before, although we’d come close, and I thought if I could just prove to her that I wasn’t afraid, she’d . . .’ He shrugged the thought away.

  ‘All right. Now, tell me about the burglary itself. Were you watching the house?’

  Terry nodded. ‘We watched from the car. There’s a sort of curve halfway down Hatch Lane, and we sat back there waiting for them to leave, and when they did, we waited a few minutes, then went in the back.’

  ‘This was your dad’s car, was it?’

  ‘No. It was hers. Well, she said she’d borrowed it from a friend.’

  ‘Borrowed it, Terry? Surely you didn’t believe that? Who would loan a car to a sixteen-year-old girl living in a squat?’

  ‘Sixte—? No, you’re wrong. She’s eighteen! She told me.’

  ‘And you believed her? Come on, now, Terry, I thought you were going to tell me the truth. Chloe Tyler is sixteen, and she has a long record with us. Did you tell the constables who arrested you about the car?’

  ‘No, I never even thought about it and they never asked.’

  ‘So it should still be there?’

  ‘I suppose so,’ the boy said miserably, ‘but if it was stolen, I didn’t have anything to do with it. Honest!’

  ‘Make? Colour? Style? Registration?’

  ‘Ford Focus. Dark blue. Not very old. That’s all I can tell you. Honest,’ he said again, ‘if it was stolen, I didn’t know about it. You have to believe me.’

  Paget caught Tregalles’s eye. ‘Better have someone bring it in,’ he said. ‘Sergeant Tregalles is leaving the room at . . .’ Paget checked his watch and entered the time.

  ‘Now, then, Terry, let’s get back to the burglary itself. Who used the bar on the back door?’

  ‘Chloe. She had it open in a couple of seconds. It made a hell of a noise, all that splintering wood, and I was sure the neighbours would have heard, but next thing I knew Chloe grabbed my arm and pulled me inside.’

  ‘She used the metal bar? The leaf spring?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Did that belong to you or to her?’

  ‘It was hers. She brought it with her. She said she got it out of an old car down at the junk yard at the bottom of Fox Lane.’

  ‘Who pulled out the drawers?’

  ‘I started to, because she told me to look in them for money while she looked around to see if the woman had left a purse or wallet there. But Chloe told me I was doing it all wrong, and pulled them all the way out and dumped everything on the floor. She said it was quicker that way.’

  ‘And did you find any money?’

  The boy shook his head. ‘It was about then that this bloke came in. He must have come in quietly, because all of a sudden he was there in the room and he had hold of Chloe, and she was screaming at him.’

  ‘So what did you do?’

  The colour deepened in the boy’s face. ‘I took off,’ he said so quietly that Paget had to ask him to repeat it for the tape. ‘Well there was no point in hanging around, was there?’ he said, trying to justify his actions. ‘I mean this bloke had Chloe and there was nothing I could do about it, was there?’

  ‘And you ran straight into the arms of Mrs Grey.’

  ‘I got caught up in the hedge, and she got this sort of hammer-lock on me. I couldn’t move.’

  ‘What happened then?’

  ‘We went back into the house and she rang the police.’

  ‘How did she manage that while still holding onto you?’

  ‘She wasn’t. She told me to sit in a chair and stay there, so I did.’

  ‘What was Chloe doing while this was going on?’

  ‘Spitting and screaming, mostly, but she wasn’t getting anywhere. He was a big bloke.’

  Tregalles came back into the room, and Paget announced his re-entry for the benefit of the tape. ‘They’re on their way,’ Tregalles said, referring to the car in Hatch Lane. ‘And we have a car that matches the description reported stolen from a car park earlier this evening.’

  ‘Right. In that case, I think we’ve almost finished here for the time being,’ said Paget. ‘Just one more thing, Terry, before we wrap it up. You told us that your parents are on holiday in Switzerland. Is that true?’

  The boy eyed him suspiciously as he nodded.

  ‘Yes or no, please, Terry. The tape doesn’t record nods.’

  Coleman swallowed noisily. ‘Yes,’ he said hoarsely.

  ‘And I’m sure they left a number where they could be reached in case of an emergency. Right?’

  Coleman looked as if he wished he could sink through the floor. ‘Do you really have to?’ he pleaded. ‘Dad will kill me.’

  ‘We won’t let him do that,’ Paget told him, ‘but we do have to notify him, so let’s have it, Terry. Where is he and how can we get hold of him?’

  Chloe Tyler was a stocky girl, well-developed for her age. She wore a faded blue anorak over a tight-fitting black jumper and short skirt. Her legs were bare, but her feet were clad in scuffed black trainers with most of the tread worn off. Paget wouldn’t have described her as a pretty girl, but with long black hair, dark, satin-like skin, and even darker, predatory eyes, there was an aura of sexuality about the girl, and he could well imagine how someone as young and naive as Terry Coleman would be attracted to her like a moth to an open flame.

  As Broughton had said, Chloe had been in trouble with the police often enough to be familiar with the routine, and she hotly denied almost everything Terry Coleman had told them. She said it was his idea to enter the house, and she was scared of what he might do to her if she didn’t go along with him. As for the leaf-spring, she claimed she’d never seen it before Terry took it out from under his coat to use on the back door.
/>   How was it, then, Paget asked, that she had had it in her hands and hit Grey with it when he was trying to detain her?

  ‘Terry dropped it when he ran, didn’t he?’ she said blandly. ‘Snivelling little coward. Forced me into going with him then ran like a bloody rabbit as soon as there was trouble. I picked it up when I saw this big bloke coming at me. It was self-defence. I thought he was going to kill me.’

  ‘Speaking of killing,’ Paget said, ‘is that the weapon you used on Mrs Holbrook? The one you killed her with?’

  ‘Killed?’ Even Chloe appeared to be shaken by that. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ She turned to Carmichael. ‘What’s he on about?’ she demanded. ‘Is this a wind-up or what?’

  ‘He is very serious,’ the solicitor told her. ‘The police are investigating the death of a woman who was killed during the course of a burglary.’

  Chloe gaped at him. ‘And you’re just sitting there like a bloody great dummy while they fit me up for it? You’re supposed to be working for me, remember, and I had nothing to do with anybody being killed, so tell him. Go on, do your job and bloody tell him!’

  ‘I take it, then, that you’ve changed your mind,’ Carmichael said. ‘Are you prepared to talk to me now?’

  ‘Well, I’m not going to bloody sit here and let them fit me up for murder,’ the girl declared, ‘so, yeah – but I don’t want them listening.’

  Carmichael looked at Paget. ‘I’d like a few of minutes alone with Miss Tyler before we continue,’ he said, then nodded in the direction of the WPC who was seated just inside the door. ‘The WPC can stay, of course.’ Having the WPC remain was as much for his own protection as it was a safeguard for the girl. Some females weren’t above accusing their assigned solicitors of sexual harassment if they thought it might gain sympathy when they appeared in court.

  The recorder was turned off, and Paget and Tregalles withdrew until some ten minutes later when Carmichael came to the door to say they were ready to continue. Back in the room with the recorder turned on, Carmichael said he would like to make a statement for the record.

  ‘Miss Tyler categorically denies any knowledge whatsoever of the killing of Mrs Holbrook,’ he said. ‘She denies ever having entered the house in Pembroke Avenue, and claims to know nothing of that crime. In fact, she has an alibi for the evening of March fourth. She claims that—’