The Perfect Crime

by Roger Forsdyke

  He’d not long finished again burying the phone with paper, when it rang once more.

  Would he ever finish?

  For Christ’s sake. What now?

  He scrabbled under the files. “What? Hallo. Er, D/S Groat.”

  Silence.

  He cleared his throat. Start again. “CID – Detective Inspector Groat speaking.”

  “Oh, hallo – is this the tall officer that came to my flat last night?”

  The sound of her voice was seared into his memory banks, as was the sight of her walking down the hallway in front of him, long slim legs; her smile, the way she laughed.

  Mentally he gave himself a good kicking. Physically, he smacked himself on the forehead with the heel of his hand. “Who is this?”

  “Olivia,” she sounded somewhat put out, “Olivia Di Angelo. You knocked on my door last night – it was you, wasn’t it? After the raid on number 309. I said that I would call you if I could think of anything that might be of interest.”

  “Oh. Right.” His thoughts raced.

  He knew that he should have no more to do with her – as that feeling told him. A sensation only experienced on a few occasions in his life – and it always threatened major turbulence. Train crash, avalanche, parachute failing to open, that order of visitation.

  “I thought of something that might be of interest you – if you want to come round.”

  Common sense, experience and professional instinct shouted at him, send someone else, but contemporaneous with that, was the immediate and certain knowledge that he would not.

  He had never been a moth, even by the definition of the old constables’ joke about the timid probationary officer, on night shift, flitting from the perceived safety of one lamp post to the next. However, even he should have been much more aware of the danger of this flame. His head told him that it would be better not to go. Professionally he knew that he should ask her about the information, interrogate her, ascertain how relevant it might be to their enquiry. Could whatever it was be done on the telephone and so save time and a possibly unnecessary journey?

  He swallowed. “When?”

  SIX

  Police statement:

  I am the above person and I am the postmaster of the Wentworth Road sub post office, in Jump, near Barnsley.

  At about 3:45 a.m. on Monday 6th January 1971, I was asleep, at the above address when someone shook me awake. The first thing I saw was a flashlight between the barrels of a sawn-off shotgun. The man with the gun was wearing a combat jacket or anorak. I could see his eyes through slits in a hood which completely masked his face.

  He said, “Where’s the money?”

  I said, “In the safe downstairs.”

  He said, “Go on then. Get up. Fetch the keys.”

  I wear only a pyjama jacket in bed, so I said to him, “If you think I’m going downstairs as I am, mate, you’ve got another thing coming.”

  I got out of bed and put on my trousers. The safe keys were in my left hand pocket.

  My plan was to delay him for as long as possible in the hope that something, anything, might happen. All I could think of was to play for time.

  The gunman handed me a pair of wire cutters and made me cut the phone cables. He warned my wife to stay quiet as he led me away. Poor old girl was terrified. As I went downstairs I automatically reached out to switch on the light but the masked man knocked down my hand with the shotgun muzzle. I unlocked the door into the shop, leading to the post office counter. The safe is down behind the counter.

  I stood back to allow him to get in. He signalled me to go and empty the safe. I unlocked it and loaded the contents into a duffel bag he produced. There was a bag inside containing £650 cash, but I did not take that out and, as he could not get a clear view, he could not see it. He motioned me away from the safe still staying behind me. Then he picked up the bag of money and said, “Right. Upstairs.” As I walked back up towards the bedroom, he opened the back door and was gone.

  There was no sign of a car and my wife was watching out of the bedroom window upstairs, but she saw nothing. I woke my son and he drove me to Hoyland police station. I would describe the gunman as about 5’5” tall, slim, athletic, wiry and very edgy. No one had any right or authority to enter the premises and take the goods and cash, which is Post Office property. The total loss in cash and stock amounted to £3,064.

  SEVEN

  Once again, the phone on his desk chivvied. In spite of the standing order that callers should only let it ring four times before assuming that the extension was not manned, nobody paid any heed. Eventually he picked up.

  “D/I Groat.” He sounded fed up.

  “Lester. It’s Ted.”

  “Go ahead, over.” One of the reasons their friendship had lasted over the years. No matter how many times he cracked a joke, or trotted out the same line, Ted always obliged with a laugh. “What’s up, Doc?”

  “Can’t talk, not on the phone.”

  Groat frowned, “So why phone me then?” Idiot.

  “Can you spare me half an hour? I could do with picking your brains.”

  Groat, who was indeed so fed up that he could not be bothered to issue his usual riposte of ‘You’ll have to find them first’ and unusually at a loose end, agreed. Twenty minutes later, the two met at The White Swan, on Alie Street, not a usual police watering hole.

  Ted was paying, another reason Groat liked him and had bought himself a pint of Charrington’s Crown. Groat opted for Timothy Taylor’s Landlord.

  “Well?” When they were settled.

  “The boss has picked me out for big job. Something a bit special.”

  Not universally renowned for his sense, or sensitivity, Groat felt the hairs erect on the back of his neck and thought. Can of worms coming here. “What boss?”

  “The big boss, Commander Morrison.”

  Shit. Why you? Groat studied his friend intently.

  Commander John Morrison was a taciturn, grey haired Scot who, with twenty eight years’ service possessed the reputation of being one of Scotland Yard’s most experienced – and successful – detectives. Groat whistled quietly. “OK, so what’s the job?”

  “I’m not supposed to talk to anyone about it.”

  Groat sighed. “So don’t. Let’s drink up and go. Suits me.”

  Ted grimaced. “I’ve got to talk to someone. What I mean is, you really must keep this under your hat, all right?”

  Groat looked at his friend hard, his mouth squeezed into a grim, thin line. “Go on then. If you must.”

  Ted recounted how he had been called into the big man’s office. Mr Morrison was concerned about a series of post office raids that were spreading like a rash across the country. They were able to link them by their modus operandi, the MO of the criminal. Colloquially, they were termed the brace and bit jobs. Ted had read about them in the newspapers and seen the odd TV bulletin. He was surprised, however, that the head of the New Scotland Yard Murder Squad would bother himself with provincial post office robberies, let alone cared enough to allow himself more than passing interest. He was not long finding out.

  “He’s started murdering them, that is to say more accurately, he has to date – we are fairly certain – carried out at least sixteen such raids and during the last, shot the sub-postmaster.” He paused, allowing Ted to absorb what he was telling him. “In my experience, having killed once, he will not now hesitate to do it again.”

  Ted had no idea, still, why the commander was telling him this.

  Mr Morrison continued, “The raids have spread far and wide. From Leicestershire in the south, to Garstang in the north and from Mansfield in the east, to Radcliffe in the west. Although, technically I suppose Garstang is further west than Radcliffe,” he grimaced.

  He could have told Ted anything. He knew some of the place names, but where they actually were, apart from ‘up north’, he hadn’t a clue.

  “Sir?” He ventured.

  “Ah, yes, well…” He looked at Ted thoughtfu
lly, “Some of these force areas, not Greater Manchester or the West Midlands of course, but some, like Staffordshire, still have a policy of calling us in when they have a murder on their patch. I know,” he raised his eyebrows, “In this day and age. Still, it’s their prerogative and the Met get an allowance from the Home Office to accommodate the process.”

  Ted waited for him to continue.

  “I don’t get hunches as a rule, but I’ve got a feeling in my water about this. One day, sooner or later, we’ll get the call. Another postmaster will have been murdered and suddenly we will have the murders and this whole string of offences dumped on us. Can’t be doing with it.” He sounded uncharacteristically peevish.

  Ted could not hold himself back any longer. “Sir?”

  “Yes.” Back to his more usual, determined self. “D/S Pearson. I want you to look into what’s really going on here. I’ve already obtained some information, but the facts need analysing. The whole shebang wants putting in some sort of order. We need to be ready for the inevitable. They always expect us to produce a rabbit from the hat and I would not want to be the first head of the murder squad to disappoint.”

  Ted felt uncontrollably giddy. “Sir?”

  “If we can find the brace and bit man, we have found our murderer. If we can get to him soon enough, who knows, we may even be able to stop him before he kills again. You have a roving brief, laddie. Anywhere you need to go, talk to anyone and everyone you need to talk to. I’ll get you a letter of introduction signed by the Commissioner, but don’t go brandishing it about unnecessarily – we don’t want too many awkward questions. As low a profile as you can manage. Talking of questions?”

  Ted’s head was still spinning. “Yes, sir. Thousands, I expect, but I can’t think of one at the moment.”

  There was one, but the question he had formulated, uppermost in his mind, was the one he really wasn’t going to ask, certainly not then. All right, it might turn out to be a poisoned chalice, but what an opportunity. For once in his life, Ted Pearson was being given a crack at the big time, so he swallowed the question, Why me?

  Back in present time, he realised that Groat was looking at him with his mouth open. “What?”

  “Why you?” He asked. “No offence, Ted, but you’ve only recently made it onto the squad, surely…” he tailed off. Why couldn’t he have asked me? Typically allowing sentiment to obliterate reason and ignoring the obvious facts of the matter.

  Ted regarded him with concern. “You’d be so much better at this sort of thing than me – that’s why I’m asking you for help.”

  Groat put his head in his hands, thought for a few seconds then looked up at his friend. “If it comes off how you would want it to, it’d be a feather in your cap all right.”

  “Yes, but why me?” Ted asked.

  Groat pondered further. It was most likely that no one else wanted the job. The murder squad was divided into teams and although there was a certain amount of natural wastage, new blood and movement, everybody knew everyone else and any exchange of personnel was more by osmosis than anything. They were all too comfortable with their situation, their responsibilities. Not one of them would want to go off their area and out of their comfort zone, by themselves.

  Groat had some experience of working away from base. You didn’t have to stray far. In another division of your own force, you would be treated with suspicion and have difficulty with the smallest of everyday tasks. Co-operation would be minimal, if not zero and would hammer home the principle of It’s not what you know. Imagine trying to poke your nose into some provincial copper’s patch, especially up north, where, if rumours were right, they were even more parochial than down the smoke.

  “I take it you have accepted, already?”

  “Not much choice, really.”

  “OK.” If he had not been Ted’s friend, he would have shrugged the matter away, with a casual, ‘No idea mate,’ but he was a friend and, he hoped, a good one. “They probably want fresh eyes – someone not hidebound with the practices and procedures of the squad.” He paused and sighed to himself before continuing with his positive line in white lies. “He will know you come highly recommended – and you can bet your life he will have talked to your old DCI.”

  “And?” Ted looked concerned.

  “He will have given him the low-down on Ted Pearson.”

  “Which is likely to be what?”

  “That you are a methodical, hard working bloke; one that gets results. That you will work long hours if the job demands it, but at other times, you don’t piss it up the wall with the rest of the lads, you go home to your ever-loving and your family.”

  “You mean I’m a boring old fart.”

  “You’re not that old.” Groat smiled briefly. They had too much in common for him to say more to his face. Not at the present juncture, anyway. “Well, neither of us would class the other as one of the boys.” He said.

  Ted nodded in agreement.

  Groat continued, “And apart from each other, we both try to have as many friends and contacts outside the job as possible.”

  “I can just imagine Gloria in the local police wives club.” Ted laughed.

  Groat’s pacifications reassured him a little, but he was still short of what he had come for.

  Groat, however, did not join in the laughter. He sat, seemingly in a deep trance, or away in some far distant place. Ted frowned. Eventually, “Lester? Lester! Earth calling planet Groat… Groat!” He shouted. He snapped his fingers in front of Groat’s eyes.

  Groat blinked. “What did you say?”

  “I said I could imagine Gloria in the local police wives club.”

  “No, before that.”

  “What? Why? Which bit? For chrissake Groat, what are you talking about?”

  “How many post office jobs?”

  “Fifteen, sixteen, not absolutely sure. Why? What are you on about?”

  “You’ve got a series, a serial burglar, my boy.” He said delightedly.

  “So?”

  “So, what are the biggest hurdles that you’re going to have to overcome when you start on the big project?”

  Ted shrugged. “Dunno.”

  “No leverage. No co-operation.” Groat galloped on, “That’s apart from not knowing the local plod, no local knowledge, no help and as a consequence, no results.”

  Ted sat back. His career, if not his world at an abrupt and unceremonious end. He knew it was true. He had feared – in his heart – from the word go, that he could be doomed to failure. He had taken the job because he had no choice – but thought he would be able to make a passable stab at it. Now his friend, his one true friend was confirming his worst fears. He had only recently landed his plum job on the murder squad and if truth were to be told, wouldn’t have bothered too much if he never went anywhere else. Even further promotion was of less consequence to him than doing the job he knew and loved. On the squad. But if he failed with this project, probably abjectly – he would still have a job, but where? And with his reputation in tatters, how could he hold his head up and expect respect from his peers and those under his supervision. He was aware of what the piranhas could do to someone they considered unfit to supervise them. In a small voice, eventually he said, “What on earth am I going to do?”

  Groat beamed at him. “What’s the principle in all cases like this – life itself, even?”

  Ted shook his head, uncomprehending, a broken man.

  “Oh come on, my boy. It’s not what you know, it’s WHO you know.”

  “So?” Ted sounded desolate, disconsolate.

  “So!” Groat overflowed with munificence and bonhomie, having belatedly put two together with a rather similar number. “There’s someone I think you ought to meet!”

  EIGHT

  Monday 20th, January, 1971.

  First day of a national strike by the Union of Post Office Workers. Over the weekend emergency cash deliveries were rushed to post offices all over the country. Over £3000 was delivered to the vil
lage post office at Sandhills, Rawmarsh, near Rotherham.

  *

  Police statement:

  I am the above person and I run the sub post office in Sandhills. About 04:00 Monday 20th January 1971, I was nudged awake by the barrels of a sawn off shotgun. It was a nightmarish scene. Through the window, light from street lamps illuminated a figure dressed in red. I’ve never seen anything like it. He was dressed from head to toe in red. He wore a wine coloured boiler suit, a pillar box red hood, reddish rubber washing up gloves, red rubber soled boots and carried a red rubber torch. Downstairs he had a red holdall. He said, “Safe. Keys. Money”. There was something odd about his voice as if he was trying to disguise it as West Indian. I’m a pretty fit sort of bloke, but I was powerless whilst a gun was levelled at my back. Frankly, I didn’t fancy doing anything which might end in me being spattered over the room and although I was waiting for the chance to get near enough to get at him, he never came closer than 4 – 6 feet, not near enough to tackle him. I wondered whether he might relax his guard if I delayed him, so I told him I had to go to the toilet. But when I came out he was still waiting. He made me go downstairs to the office at the rear of the shop, past all the birthday cards, cigarettes and sweets. I was hustled at gunpoint to the safe. He got me to put the key into the safe lock, but all the time I had a nasty sinking feeling inside me that as soon as the safe was open and the money at his mercy, my usefulness was finished. I wondered whether he intended to shoot me then, so I refused to open the door. I told him, “I’ve done enough for you now. Open the door yourself.” I wondered if this would bring him close enough to let fly a mighty kick, but he was too wary. Instead he ordered me to back from the safe and told me to lie face down on the floor of the shop. Then he knelt down keeping his gun pointed at me, opened the safe and took out what he wanted. He must have thought it was his birthday, for it was an ideal time. The safe was crammed with cash, so much of it, in fact, that he did not have room to take the pile of postage and savings stamps that were stacked in a heap ready to take away. With £3104 in notes stuffed in his bag, he could afford to replace all the stamps in the safe and close the door. I was marched back upstairs. My wife had already tip-toed out to warn our son to lie doggo and pretend to be asleep. The red shadow came back and tied us to each other and to the foot of the bed. I must say that I wondered whether we would be murdered in cold blood. We listened to him moving round downstairs, cutting telephone wires. Then two heavy thuds, followed by footsteps running alongside the house. They faded and he had vanished. It took us a couple of minutes to get free and we called the police. The thuds were two hundred pounds worth of silver coin in two bags being tossed away.