The Murder List

by Roger Silverwood

  Angel looked quickly from one to the other, finally settling on the doctor. ‘Right, Mac. Let’s see the note.’

  The doctor said, ‘I haven’t got it, Michael. Don has it.’ He pointed to DS Taylor.

  Taylor said, ‘I’ve got it here, sir.’

  Wearing white, skin tight rubber gloves, he unzipped a white sterile bag which was on the dining table and took out a small, clear plastic box, removed the lid and inside was a much folded sheet of A4 paper. In the folded state, the paper measured 11¾” by ¾”.

  ‘One end of this fold was sticking out of her nightdress, at the neck,’ Dr Mac said. ‘If it hadn’t been sticking out, I probably wouldn’t have found it until the post mortem.’

  Angel nodded.

  Taylor reached out for two pairs of tweezers. By use of them he unfolded the paper to reveal the message. He held the paper out for the inspector to see.

  Angel saw that it was neatly printed by hand in black on plain white paper.

  He read it aloud:

  Fay Hough was very self-willed,

  She got her own way and had to be killed.

  Fay is the second, there are four more to go.

  Mac said, ‘I think it’s supposed to be poetry, if it is, it’s nae like Robbie Burns.’

  Angel rubbed his chin. He turned to Taylor and said, ‘I want that photocopied, Don. Make three copies. Email one to the graphologist. See what he makes of it.’

  ‘Right, sir,’ Taylor said.

  ‘I don’t like that line that says Fay is the second, and that there are four more to go.’

  Taylor said, ‘It suggests we’ve got a serial killer on our hands, sir.’

  Angel nodded. ‘And all the signs are that she is a psychopath,’ he said. ‘So we are going to have to be especially careful and thorough. It seems that our psychopath is so confident that she dares to give advance notice of her intention to murder four more.’

  ‘Are you sure it’s a woman, sir?’

  Angel said, ‘No, I’m not, but a woman was seen entering the shop at the critical time in the Gladys Grant case by two independent witnesses. On present showing, this looks like the work of the same crazy female, doesn’t it?’

  Taylor nodded. ‘But stabbing is predominantly a male method of committing murder.’

  ‘True, but it doesn’t entirely preclude women,’ Angel said. ‘There have been plenty of instances where a woman has used a dagger or a stiletto.’ He then turned to the doctor. ‘You might very well find a similar verse of poetry on Gladys Grant’s body, Mac.’

  The doctor frowned. ‘I might very well, Michael.’

  Angel’s forehead creased. ‘If you do, or if you don’t, I’d like to know about it, Mac, ASAP.’

  ‘Aye, Michael. I’ll check up on it as soon as I get back there.’ Then he said, ‘Anyhow, will you take a good look at this poor woman so that I can get her moved?’

  He nodded. ‘Where is she?’ he said.

  ‘In the bedroom, sir,’ Taylor said. ‘Through this door. Follow me.’

  Angel entered the bedroom, stopped and looked round. One of the two SOCOs there was taking photographs, the other was checking off a list from a clipboard. The room was generally tidy and clean. He looked at the double bed. It had obviously been slept in, by one person. The duvet was neatly turned back from a top corner and there was a dent in the pillow where a head had been.

  Taylor went round to the other side of the bed. Angel followed him. And there it was.

  On the carpeted floor leaning against a bedside table was the body of a woman aged about sixty, in a nightdress, housecoat and slippers. The heart and stomach area was covered in ruddy brown dried blood, and in her lap was a blood-spattered cauliflower.

  The muscles of Angel’s jaw tightened. His heart beat faster.

  He approached the body and leaned over it. He saw small white flecks – he thought to be rice – on her neck, around her body and on the carpet. He counted them. They added up to twenty-four.

  He straightened up, stepped back a pace and rubbed his chin. He then turned to the doctor and said, ‘Have you got a time of death for this, Mac?’

  ‘Aye. It’s looking like sometime between five o’clock and eight o’clock, this morning.’

  Angel’s eyes narrowed. ‘Same as Gladys Grant.’

  The doctor said, ‘Can I have the body now, Michael?’

  ‘Poor woman. I’ve seen all I need to see. Yes, Mac, of course. As soon as you like.’

  ‘Ah,’ Mac said. He opened his phone and scrolled down for a number.

  Angel turned to Taylor. ‘Was this lady, Fay Hough, married?’

  ‘Yes. I understand from her friend and neighbour that she was.’

  Angel said, ‘Well, the husband should be told as a matter of great urgency. Who is this neighbour? I’d better see her.’

  ‘It’s the lady who found her, sir. Her name is Mrs Ivory.’

  Angel nodded and turned towards the bedroom door. ‘I’ll see her now, if I can.’

  Taylor said, ‘She lives a couple of doors away. Flat 24.’

  FIVE

  Angel knocked on the door of Flat 24 Monserrat House and waited.

  The door was opened by a slim, pretty lady. Her face was bright pink, her cheeks a little puffed and her eyes were red. She was holding a tissue.

  Angel could see that she had been crying. ‘I’m sorry to bother you,’ he said. ‘I’m from Bromersley Police. Are you Mrs Ivory?’

  She stepped back and opened the door more widely. ‘Yes, I am,’ she said. ‘Please come in.’

  She showed him into the sitting-room. ‘Please sit down.’

  ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Angel.’

  She smiled weakly and said, ‘Yes, I know.’

  He looked at her closely. ‘Have we met before?’

  ‘I’ve seen your picture in the papers and on the television often enough to remember,’ she said. ‘You’re the one who always gets his man, like the Mounties, aren’t you?’

  The muscles of his face tightened then relaxed. Whenever anyone said that he always got his man, it worried him that it might be the very next murder case he was investigating when he didn’t.

  ‘My team and I always do our very best, Mrs Ivory,’ he said quickly to get it out of the way. Then he said, ‘I understand that you found the body of Mrs Hough earlier this morning? Would you tell me about it?’

  The corners of her mouth turned down. ‘Oh dear,’ she said. ‘Yes, of course.’

  Angel took the envelope out of his inside pocket and began to make notes.

  Mrs Ivory said, ‘Well, Fay and I have been friends for many years, and when my husband died last year, she and her husband became even closer friends of mine. And one of the things Fay and I did together was go to the gym. Now we found that going early in the morning was the best time to go because it wasn’t as busy. So as Lance was away – Lance is Fay’s husband – we had arranged to go to the gym this morning, and I was to collect her as soon as I was ready after quarter past eight. This morning I was on time. I knocked on her door. When I didn’t get any reply, I tried it, found it was unlocked, came in and called out. Of course, there was no reply. It seemed strange. I walked through the flat, calling all the time so that I wouldn’t surprise her. I went into the kitchen, the bathroom and I went into the bedroom last of all and … and … and found her …’

  Her voice trailed away. She dabbed her eyes with the tissue.

  Angel put down the ballpoint, looked across at her and said, ‘I’m sorry.’ Then he waited a moment and said, ‘But I have to ask … what did you do next?’

  ‘I didn’t touch her,’ she said. ‘It wasn’t necessary. I rushed out of the flat back into here. Then I picked up the phone and dialled 999.’

  ‘Did you touch anything in the flat?’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘At least I don’t think so. Maybe the door handles. I am not sure.’

  ‘Do you know of any person who might have wanted to murder Mrs
Hough?’

  ‘Certainly not. Lance and Fay Hough are the nicest couple anybody would like to have met.’

  ‘Where is Mr Hough right now?’

  ‘I don’t know precisely, Inspector. Fay would have known, of course. I know he is away on business. He is sometimes away. He is in management at Mixendon’s Glass Works on Wells Road. They will know.’

  He made a note of it, then looked up at her and smiled. ‘Do you happen to know if anything is missing from the flat?’

  She shook her head. ‘I don’t know.’

  He persisted. ‘Did they have any valuables … gold, silver, any cash in the flat? Any antiques?’

  ‘Not as far as I know.’

  He rubbed his chin.

  Then his phone rang. ‘Excuse me, Mrs Ivory,’ he said, and he pulled his mobile out of his pocket. He looked at the LCD screen. It was Mac. It must be important. He almost never phoned Angel. He preferred to communicate by email. Angel stood up and turned away from Mrs Ivory.

  He pressed the button. ‘Yes, Mac?’

  ‘Ah, Michael. You wanted to know if there was a note on Gladys Grant’s body?’

  ‘I certainly do.’

  ‘The answer to that one is yes. At least, there’s a sheet of paper, same size and folded like the other one and sticking out of her bra. Do you want me to open it up and read it to you?’

  Angel interpreted that as confirmation that it was a serial killer he was after. He felt as if he had a hot brick inside his chest. His heart beat was stronger. He positively ached for a clue to the killer.

  ‘No. Keep it as it is, Mac.’

  ‘Right. There’s something else, Michael,’ the doctor said. ‘It’s about the rice – and I can confirm that it is dried rice all right. On examination firstly of Gladys Grant, I discovered that her mouth was filled to bursting with grains of rice, so I naturally immediately checked the mouth of Fay Hough. And I discovered that her mouth was also filled with rice. However, the rice didn’t have anything to do with their deaths. It had been deliberately put into their mouths post mortem. I assume it was put there by the murderer. I canna say that I can understand it, Michael.’

  Angel rang the mortuary bell.

  The door was opened by a man in a green operating gown, green trousers and white wellington boots. Angel knew him from his many visits to the mortuary over the years.

  ‘Hello, Inspector. Come in. You want to see Dr Mac, I take it?’

  ‘Yes, John. He is expecting me.’

  ‘He is working on one of yours now, I think, in the operating theatre. You know your way? Straight through that door, Inspector.’

  ‘Thank you, John,’ Angel said and he pushed open the door.

  The theatre was a big white tiled room. There was the bank of refrigerated drawers, like forty giant filing cabinet drawers down one wall. There were four operating tables. Two of them had a covered cadaver on them.

  The stench was unbelievable. It was the result of the opening of human innards, and it competed with the alternative acrid smell of ammonia. At that moment the former was winning. In the background, there was the perpetual humming of the refrigerator compressor, together with the clatter and vibration of the bank of cold metal drawers it served.

  Angel was not unfamiliar with the environment.

  Dr Mac was in a green operating gown with wellington boots. He was leaning over a body on one of the operating tables. The body was covered with white waterproof covers, leaving open only the area around the heart where he had been working. There was a large powerful lamp overhead.

  Beyond, another man in green was wielding a hose pipe and flushing the tiled walls and floor. There was a network of narrow channels across the floor of the room for water and human waste to drain away.

  Mac sensed that someone had entered. He turned. He had a scalpel in one rubber covered hand and a swab in the other, and he had a powerful extra lens attached to his spectacles.

  ‘Come in, Michael,’ he said, pushing away the lens with the back of his hand. He put down the scalpel and swab, and covered the area of the body he was working on with a white waterproof cloth.

  ‘Come round to the other side of the table,’ he said. ‘And I’ll show you what I mean.’

  Angel crossed the wet tiles carefully and took up the position.

  Mac turned back the cover to show the head and shoulders of a body. The neck was on a white block shaped to keep it in position facing upwards.

  ‘This is the first victim, Gladys Grant,’ he said. Then with tight, rubber-gloved hands, he held tight her nose with one hand and with the other, pulled down her jaw.

  ‘Look there now,’ Mac said.

  Rice grains seemed to move upwards and spill out of her mouth, which was filled to capacity.

  Angel wrinkled his nose involuntarily. ‘I see what you mean.’

  Mac closed the mouth, then crossed to the other operating table where there was another body.

  ‘Come round here, Michael,’ Mac said.

  Angel followed him across the room. Mac uncovered the head and shoulders of the other body.

  ‘Now, this is the second victim, Fay Hough,’ Mac said. He repeated the demonstration.

  Grains of rice spilled out of her mouth.

  Angel stared at the figure. He pursed his lips. ‘And the rice had nothing to do with the death of either of the victims?’ he said.

  ‘Nothing,’ Mac said.

  Angel rubbed an eyebrow and said, ‘I don’t understand it.’

  The doctor closed the dead woman’s mouth and turned the sheet back over the victim’s head and shoulders.

  The operating theatre not being conducive for discussions, Mac said, ‘Let’s go into the office.’

  Angel followed Mac to the glass windowed office in the corner of the operating theatre.

  When the door was closed, the sound of the machinery and water being sloshed around was excluded but the smell was still with them.

  Mac took up his seat at a desk. ‘Sit down, Michael,’ he said. ‘I’ll get you that note.’

  The doctor was still wearing his rubber gloves. He took the keys out of the middle drawer of the desk, selected one, stood up, turned round and unlocked a safe that was behind his chair. Then he reached inside and produced a small, white plastic box. He put it at the end of the desk in front of Angel.

  ‘I have gloves and two pairs of tweezers for you,’ Mac said.

  Angel slipped on the rubber gloves, opened the box, and with the tweezers took out the folded paper and opened it up.

  Like the other note, it was neatly printed by hand in black on plain white paper. He read it out loud. It said:

  Gladys Grant, it had to be said,

  Was a vicious bitch and had to be dead.

  She is the first, and there are five more to go.

  Angel’s muscles tightened. He ran a hand through his hair. ‘Five more to go, Mac, it says. Five more to go!’

  ‘The other note said four more to go.’

  ‘The notes have been found out of sequence. The point is the murderer has six people in her sights in total.’

  ‘That’s only what she has declared in her notes.’

  Angel sighed. ‘I can’t live with that. I have got to anticipate where she will strike next. There must have been some place, situation, gathering, circumstance where she has been with the six women, maybe more than six, but minimally these six women and herself. A place where she – in her madness – was hurt, offended, stolen from, ridiculed, whatever … had reason to hate these six enough to want them dead.’

  ‘She didn’t have to know them, Michael,’ Mac said. ‘They could be on a list in front of her to get a council house or something like that.’

  Angel acknowledged Mac’s possibly important contribution with a nod.

  ‘I’ve got to look at the lives of Gladys Grant and Fay Hough and see what is similar,’ Angel said. ‘And I’ve got to do that before another woman is murdered.’

  It was after six o’clock when Ang
el left the mortuary.

  He drove straight home a worried man.

  Mary liked to serve up their tea at around 5.30. It sometimes meant a spoiled meal if he was late. He made an apology for being late and pulled up to the table in the kitchen. Mary wasn’t pleased and as she served out the meal, she slapped the mashed potatoes on the plate, banged the spoon on the plate, and rattled the pots and pans around generally in retaliation, but he didn’t choose to notice.

  When they were settled with their coffee in the sitting room, and a news reader was looking at them from their television set, Angel said, ‘Any post?’

  Mary got up and brought him an envelope from the sideboard. It was a window envelope and he recognized the sender.

  He pulled a face. ‘It’s from the gas company,’ he said.

  He put it down. He wasn’t in any hurry to open it, although he knew he would have to. He put it down on the table at his side.

  ‘And I’ve got a message for you,’ Mary said.

  Angel frowned. ‘Yes?’

  ‘It’s from that friend of yours, with the little antique shop in town.’

  That was Daniel Ashton. Angel’s eyes shot up and then came down again. He hoped that Daniel had been discreet and not mentioned anything about diamond rings.

  ‘Oh yes?’ Angel said, trying to sound nonchalant.

  ‘He said he’s got some information for you. His home number’s on the pad.’

  ‘Thanks, love,’ he said. ‘It’ll wait until tomorrow.’

  Mary frowned. ‘That’s unusual for you. You always phone back people you like straightaway.’

  Angel returned to the letter from the gas company. He began to open it. He hoped it would divert Mary’s interest from the phone call.

  ‘Let’s see what they have to say for themselves,’ he said. ‘Oh, hell. It’s the monthly bill,’ he said as he began to unfold the contents. ‘We’ve just paid them more than my annual pay as a sergeant for a new boiler because we had to. It was supposed to save us more than thirty-six per cent. Let’s see how much this is … if it is that much less … Oh no. Oh, Mary!’