The Snuffbox Murders

by Roger Silverwood

Angel blinked. ‘Peter Queegley?’

  ‘I think so. Looks like he was wishful thinking, sir. Hoping to find a padlock left unlocked. Anyway, it’s run up ready for you to see in the theatre.’

  ‘I’ll come down now.’

  Angel put down his pen and made for the door. Ahmed led the way. The two men walked the length of the corridor to the theatre. Angel closed the door and dropped into a chair and Ahmed switched on the videotape.

  The screen showed two men through a blue night-vision lens walking purposefully along the pavement on Market Street, passing various shops as they approached Jeeves the jewellers. The jewellers’ windows were all shuttered up, with a particularly large shutter across the largest display window.

  One of the two men was tall and wore a large dark hat, the other walked with his head jutting forward. This idiosyncrasy reminded Angel immediately of Peter Queegley. The shorter man glanced round to see if anybody was watching and unknowingly looked straight into the lens of the video camera set on the wall of the jewellers. The man then reached up and tugged at the sturdy padlock. It was obviously locked, so he released his hold. The two men then walked on past the Northern Bank, turned right towards St Mary’s church and the churchyard and out of shot.

  Ahmed stopped the tape.

  Angel rubbed his chin. ‘You’re right, Ahmed. It is Peter Queegley. Can’t think what monkey business he’s up to out there in the middle of the night.’

  Ahmed nodded and smiled, pleased to have discovered something that his boss might find useful.

  ‘Can’t be certain of the identity of the big man in the dark hat,’ Angel said.

  ‘Is it Alec Underwood, sir? I can take a still of this and see if “Facial Recognition” will confirm it.’

  ‘Do that, Ahmed. It probably is. He always wears that hat, as if he’s in the Gestapo. Anyway, I’m going to take a look round that churchyard right now.’

  He came out of the theatre, up the corridor, past reception and out through the front door into the sunshine. He skipped down the steps, turned right and walked on a little way to the end of the side street to Church Street. It was nice to be out of doors and feel the breeze on his face. He passed Jeeves the jewellers and the Northern Bank and went on to St Mary’s church, the parish church of the town. He pushed open the wrought-iron gate. It squeaked like a cat in pain. He stepped into the old churchyard with its headstones and boxed gravestones, some topped with stone, marble, iron and other dramatic representations of angels, saints and other monuments to heaven, typical of the excesses of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Most were now neglected, damaged and in need of attention. The monuments were invariably set much too close together, separated by several centimetres of earth only and framed by overgrown grass, nettles, ivy and brambles.

  He walked down the flagstone path and round the side of the church to the porch. He tried the door and was pleased to find it unlocked. He walked in and turned down the aisle towards the chancel, then left again to the vestry door next to the lady chapel. An old priest in black was coming out of the vestry carrying a cassock. He looked up, saw Angel and smiled broadly.

  ‘Michael. Nice to see you. How are you keeping?’

  They shook hands.

  ‘Fine,’ Angel said. ‘I heard you had some unwanted visitors last night, Father. Now what seems to be the trouble? Was it lead thieves again?’

  ‘No, thank God,’ the priest rubbed his chin. ‘To tell the truth, Michael, I don’t know what goes on in this churchyard at night. A good man, a regular parishioner, who was on shift work, was passing here in a car at two o’clock this morning and saw two men carrying a coffin down the outside of the church. A coffin, of all things!’

  Angel pursed his lips. ‘That’s what was reported. And what else happened?’

  ‘Just walked by the side of the church, the man said.’

  ‘Could he describe them?’

  ‘Just two men. In the dark, he couldn’t see. That’s all he could say.’

  ‘And was there any disturbance to any grave? Any ground disturbed?’

  ‘None at all. That’s what worried me. I had a good look round. I would have been greatly worried if any graves had been disturbed. This graveyard is full, you know. There hasn’t been an interment here for more than forty years.’

  ‘And was the church broken into?’

  The priest smiled. ‘No. We haven’t had a break-in or lead robbers for more than two years now. We’re doing very well.’

  Angel nodded his agreement and pulled a wry face. After all, he had seen the crime figures. He rubbed his chin.

  The priest said: ‘The church would never pay out for closed circuit television, and I couldn’t expect you to put a couple of men out here every night on the off chance. We must trust to providence, and maybe they’ll go away.’

  ‘Don’t worry, father. There might be something I can do.’

  The priest’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Really? Is there really? You know something, Michael? I know you’re a shrewd copper. I knew that if this was a murder enquiry you’d be certain to get to the bottom of it. The newspapers say you’re like the Canadian Mounties, you always get your man.’

  Angel rubbed his chin. ‘The papers say all sorts, Father,’ he said quietly.

  The priest smiled and nodded.

  ‘Well, I must be off,’ Angel said. ‘But I’ll see what I can do. I’ll have a look round outside before I go.’

  He shook hands with the old priest and came out of the church. The sun was warm, and the trees and bushes rustled in the breeze. He had a walk round the perimeter path on the outside of the church, looking down at it for anything untoward that might have been there. He trod some of the overgrown flagstone paths, glanced round at the crowded graveyard, with its big boxed gravestones, crosses and crucifixes, then up at the church roof. There was nothing at all that might have provided an explanation as to why two men should have been seen bearing a coffin there in the middle of the night. He shook his head and made his way to the gate. In the gateway he saw marks on the stones under his feet. He crouched down. There were marks on the surface of the stones, about nine inches long and six inches apart. The same marks were repeated in parallel on the other side of the path. Also he saw that the edge of the worn step had recently been freshly scuffed in two places. He frowned. Machinery of some kind. Probably a grass-mower. But the grass hadn’t been cut. Needed to be something narrow to pass through a gate that, after all, was intended for pedestrians. He couldn’t imagine what it might be. He heard footsteps behind him. It was the priest.

  ‘Found something, Michael?’

  Angel stood up. ‘Have you had a narrow-track vehicle through here recently, Father?’

  The priest shook his head. ‘Like a gravedigger? No, Michael. There have been no graves dug here for years. This graveyard is full.’

  On his amble round the church, Angel had already looked carefully for recent digging and there wasn’t any. He couldn’t help but wonder.

  ‘Have you had builders or workmen in the church?’

  ‘No, sorry. No workmen of any kind, Michael. Not for months.’

  Angel pursed his lips. ‘Right, Father. I’ll give it some thought. Nice to see you again. Goodbye.’

  ‘Goodbye Michael, and good hunting.’

  Angel went through the black wrought-iron gate into Church Street, and back past the Northern Bank and Jeeves the jewellers and up to the police station.

  He went round to the police car-park at the rear of the building to collect his car. He drove the BMW into town, then out on Park Road to Mountjoy Street. There were so many cars parked on both sides of this back street, it was difficult to find a parking spot. He eventually managed to find a space between a 1997 Passat and a 1992 Ford. He then walked back to house number 20. He pressed button number 6 with the name ‘P. Queegley’ scrawled against it and reached down to the speak box above it.

  Eventually a man’s belligerent voice said: ‘Yeah? Who is it?’ It was Peter Queegley.<
br />
  ‘Detective Inspector Angel. Open up.’

  The man wasn’t pleased. He sighed noisily and said, ‘What do you want, copper?’

  Angel heard the squeal of a female from the speak box. Angel was certain it was in response to Queegley’s reference to ‘copper’ and not the result of any romantic liaison between the female and Queegley.

  ‘Shut up and put summat on,’ he heard him whisper, then down the speaker he said, ‘Come back tomorrow?’

  Angel’s lips tightened back against his teeth. ‘Open up at once,’ he bawled. ‘I’m not the ruddy Avon lady.’

  There was a pause, then Angel heard the buzzer and then a click. He pushed the door open and made his way into the hall. He charged up the bare wooden stairs to the second floor.

  Queegley was outside the room door on the landing. He was wearing trousers, trainers and buttoning up his shirt when Angel reached the top of the stairs.

  ‘Is this absolutely necessary, Angel?’ Queegley said.

  ‘I want to know what you’re up to.’

  ‘I’m not up to nothin’.’

  Angel walked past him and through the open door.

  Queegley glared after him and followed him in.

  The same girl who had been there before was standing by the bed with her back to him, tucking a T-shirt into her jeans. She turned round, glowered at him briefly, then turned back.

  Angel said: ‘You’re Gloria, aren’t you?’

  She stopped and looked up at him wide-eyed in astonishment. ‘How the frigging hell do you know that?’ Before he could answer she turned to Queegley and said, ‘Is this the cop you was saying what knows everything?’

  Queegley nodded, lighting up a cigarette. ‘Angel. Inspector Michael Angel.’

  ‘Frigging hell,’ she said.

  Angel shook his head. He wasn’t for taking credit when credit wasn’t due. ‘You told me your name when I was here last time.’

  She pulled a face of disappointment. ‘Aw,’ she said, tightening the belt on the jeans.

  ‘How old are you?’ he said.

  ‘Nineteen.’

  Angel wrinkled his nose. She looked nearer fifteen.

  ‘Wanna see my burf certificate?’

  ‘Probably,’ he said.

  Queegley came up to Angel quickly and said, ‘She told me she was nineteen.’

  Angel said, ‘Better get off home, smartly. Your mother’s screaming blue murder. She wants to know where you are and who you’re with.’

  She was stunned. Her eyes opened wide. She looked terrified. She believed him.

  ‘Oh my god,’ she said. Then she looked back at Angel. Her lip curled anxiously. ‘What you been saying to her?’

  ‘Every second counts,’ Angel said. ‘I should run, if I were you.’

  She considered whether to reply.

  All she could manage was a frustrated, ‘Aw.’

  She went back to the bed for her shoulder bag, grabbed it by the strap, dashed for the door and was gone.

  As the clickety-click of badly fitting high-heeled shoes noisily stabbed the wooden steps, Peter Queegley said, ‘I should sue you for harassment, you know. You’re ruining my love life.’

  ‘If she’s under age you could finish up inside, don’t you know that?’

  ‘She told me she was nineteen. That’s good enough for me and it’s good enough for any judge.’

  ‘You said eighteen before.’

  ‘So what? She’s had a birthday probably. Anyway, eighteen’s all right.’

  If she didn’t deny it, Angel knew he was correct. You could get away with murder in some courts.

  ‘You haven’t come to argue about the girl, have you?’ Queegley said, taking a drag on the cigarette.

  ‘No. I want to know where you were last night?’

  ‘I was here, as usual, of course.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘I haven’t no spare to go down the pub any more.’

  ‘Were you on your own?’

  ‘Of course I was on my own.’

  ‘Well you weren’t here all the time. You were seen.’

  ‘Couldn’t have been me.’

  ‘You were seen with a big man in a big, black hat. Now who would that be?’

  ‘No. You’ve got it wrong.’

  ‘Where is your mate Alec Underwood hanging out these days?’

  ‘No idea,’ he said. ‘And he’s not my mate. Haven’t seen him for … ages.’

  ‘You were seen together, Queegley. No point denying it.’

  ‘You’re wrong. It wasn’t me.’

  ‘You were seen on Market Street at 1.48 a.m. passing Jeeves the jewellers. You checked the padlock of the middle window.’

  Queegley’s jaw dropped.

  ‘And at 2 a.m. you were seen with your friend parading a coffin round the perimeter of St Mary’s church.’

  Queegley started coughing. Smoke from the cigarette seemed suddenly to have caught in his throat. He continued coughing.

  Angel ignored the coughing. ‘I can guess who your friend is,’ Angel said. ‘It would be Alec Underwood. The man who, two years ago, got you twelve months inside while he got off scot free. Are you going back for more? If you’ve some scam going with him, you can depend on him dumping you when it gets umpty. Just like he did last time. Did you break in and steal three mahogany coffins from Hargreaves undertakers last Monday night?’

  ‘No. It wasn’t me,’ he said wiping his wet mouth with an oversize handkerchief.

  ‘What do you want three coffins for?’

  Queegley’s eyes shone like traffic lights. ‘I don’t know nothing about coffins and walking about a churchyard with them. You must be off your trolley. I’m absolutely completely innocent. I’m going straight. I’ve paid my debt to society. You’ve no evidence … you’re just stabbing in the dark. If you’d any evidence, Angel, you wouldn’t come here pussyfooting round asking me daft questions, and looking at my woman to see if you could get me for bedding a lass under age. You’d be here with a warrant as thick as a prison visitor, a pair of handcuffs and a fresh-faced flunky to fit them on to me, so sod off and don’t come back until you’ve got some evidence.’

  Angel was not unhappy to leave. The visit had served its purpose. He came away satisfied that Queegley knew all about the coffins, that he was one of the men carrying one round the churchyard, that he was up to something nefarious with Alec Underwood, and that he would be off like a scared rabbit to tell him all about it, asap. When Angel reached his car, he slumped down in the driver’s seat and adjusted the rear mirror so that he had a direct line of vision to Queegley’s front door. Then he switched on the car radio for some light music and waited.

  Two minutes later, Queegley appeared. He dashed down the steps, his face the colour of a judge’s robe.

  Angel licked his lips in satisfying anticipation.

  A few moments later a large silver Mercedes estate car raced past him noisily. He carefully observed that Peter Queegley was in the driving seat.

  He started up the BMW.

  He kept his distance behind the Mercedes estate, allowing a blue van to overtake him so that it would be the van that would appear mostly in Queegley’s rear-view mirror and not the BMW. That was just in case Queegley was at all concerned that he might be followed. As the convoy made its way through town, the van veered off and Angel allowed a green car to take its place in between them.

  Queegley was making his way out of town in the direction of Barnsley. The convoy was passing a row of bungalows when Queegley suddenly braked hard and turned left through the gates into the drive of one of them. The green car had to brake and swerve out towards the middle of the road, before continuing. Angel noted the number 29 painted in white on the gatepost and sailed straight past. He drove as far as the next roundabout, circled it and came back towards the bungalow. About a hundred yards before he reached the bungalow, he pulled the BMW into the side of the road and stopped. He reached into the glove compartment, took out a pair of binocu
lars just in time to see the tall, black-clad figure of Alec Underwood open the bungalow door and Queegley step inside.

  EIGHT

  It was 8.28 a.m. on Friday morning, 29 May.

  Angel arrived at the station and went straight down to the stores to withdraw three rounds of ammunition and the handgun, the Walther PPK/S, the actual weapon that was used to kill Charles Razzle. The duty stores sergeant gave them to him separately wrapped in two sealed envelopes. Angel tore open the paper, checked them, pushed them into his pocket, and signed the receipt and the list of standard conditions permitting the gun to be in his possession. It was, after all, a lethal weapon and an important piece of evidence.

  He then drove the BMW down to The Manor House on Creesforth Road and parked on the drive behind DS Carter’s Ford. He went through the unlocked front door, straight down the hall to the kitchen, through the basement door and down the steps. The heavy workshop security door was wide open and the lights were on. A shaft of electric light shone outwards on to the basement floor. He went into the workshop.

  DS Carter and PC Ahmed Ahaz were bending down in front of the robot arranging two sandbags on the floor where the body of Charles Razzle had been.

  The blue robot seemed to acknowledge Angel’s arrival. Three tiny coloured lights in its blue translucent head kept flickering on and off in an irregular sequence suggesting that it was capable of thought as well as indicating that it was switched on.

  Carter heard Angel arrive and looked up. ‘Are these sandbags all right here, sir?’

  ‘Aye. They’ll do fine,’ he said.

  ‘Did you put tapes in the CCTVs?’

  ‘Not yet, sir. I brought two new ones. They are here,’ she said, taking them off the top of the safe and handing them to him.

  Angel took them, glanced at them and said, ‘Ahmed, put these tapes in the cameras and make sure they’re running.’

  ‘Right, sir,’ Ahmed said and rushed out.

  Angel looked at Carter, pointed at the robot and said, ‘Where’s the remote control for that thing?’

  ‘On the desk, sir.’

  Angel looked round, found the large, cumbersome control and said, ‘Does it work?’