A Life for a Life: (Parish & Richards #1)

by Tim Ellis

  They were on their way to the Croatian Bank on the High Street in Redbridge to open Graham Pearson’s safe-deposit box when Parish’s phone grunted in his pocket.

  ‘You need to change that ring tone, Sir – it sounds disgusting.’

  He scrabbled in his pocket to reach the phone. ‘If you change anything else about me, I won’t be able to find myself when I get lost.’

  She had no opportunity to reply before he was speaking to the caller.

  ‘Parish.’

  ‘Thanks for the donuts, Inspector – very tasty.’

  ‘Glad you liked them, Doc.’

  ‘That’s not why I rang, though.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘I’m at 12, Ingleby Mansions in Chigwell Row.’

  ‘A bit early in the day for a party, Doc, and not really the weather for a barbecue.’

  ‘Neither of those pleasant pastimes are what brought me here, Parish, as you well know. Lance Hobart has been stabbed in the heart and a token with the number 55 stamped on it is sitting on his tongue like a parasite.’

  ‘This is getting beyond a joke now, Doc.’

  ‘Tell me about it, Parish. Due to the recession I only have so many shelves in my freezer and you’ve been using them all up on your own. There’s no room for the people who die from accidents and natural causes anymore. I’m having to double-up and that’s not what they pay National Insurance for.’

  ‘You could start means testing them, Doc. I know the current government would applaud your initiative. You might even get a gong or a peerage out of it. Lord Michelin of Chigwell has a nice ring to it, don’t you think?’

  ‘You should have been a stand-up comic, Parish.’

  ‘I’ve often thought I might travel down that road one day, Doc.’

  ‘This should be the last victim shouldn’t it?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well, according to that look-a-like on the news, you’re going to arrest someone tomorrow, aren’t you?’

  ‘That’s the plan.’

  ‘There’s a plan? Excellent, then there shouldn’t be any more bodies.’

  ‘Let’s hope not. We’ll be with you in about an hour.’

  ‘An hour, Parish?’

  ‘Got to open a box first, Doc.’ He disconnected the call as Richards stopped outside the Bank of Croatia and parked on the double yellow lines.

  A parking attendant darted over as they climbed out of the Mondeo. ‘It’s more than my job’s worth to let you park there.’

  Parish flashed his warrant card, but said nothing.

  ‘I’m sorry, but you know the law better than me. Not even the police are allowed to park on double yellow lines.’

  ‘Listen, jobsworth, if you don’t go and harass someone else, I’ll arrest you for impeding a police investigation. I’m trying to catch a murderer and all you can do is bleat on about parking restrictions. Get the hell out of my way.’

  The overweight attendant shifted to one side to let Parish pass.

  ‘Wise decision, jobsworth,’ Parish said.

  ‘He was only doing his job,’ Richards said as they entered the bank through the automatic doors.

  ‘Don’t defend parking attendants, Richards. They’re worse than local politicians and should have excrement thrown on them.’

  ‘They uphold the law like we do.’

  ‘You’re not saying that us superior beings feed from the same trough as parking attendants and local politicians, are you? Next, you’ll be arguing that we should throw excrement over ourselves.’

  They had to cease the banter because they’d arrived at a desk where a dark-haired young woman wearing a blue skirt and jacket was standing in front of the red and white Croatian chequered coat of arms hanging on the wall.

  ‘How can I help?’ she said.

  Parish was glad she spoke English, because his knowledge of Croatian was limited to Ožujsko, which was a beer made at the Zagreb Brewery and sponsored the Croatian national football team. With nothing better to do, he’d once got drunk on it at a party towards the end of his degree at university.

  He showed her his warrant card and handed over the search warrant. ‘Detective Inspector Parish,’ he said. ‘That is a warrant to look in one of your safe-deposit boxes.’ He pulled the key from his pocket and examined it. ‘Number ninety-seven, which belonged to a Mr Graham Pearson.’

  Just before she disappeared through a security door, she smiled and said, ‘Just one moment, Sir.’

  She came back accompanied by a tall man with thinning hair. He extended his hand towards Parish and said, ‘Victor Valdez. I am the manager, please follow me.’

  He led them through the security door he had appeared from. After walking along a corridor they descended a set of marble stairs. A uniformed security guard stood up as they approached and opened a metal gate at a nod from the manager. They passed through the gate into a medium-sized room. In front of, and attached to, each of the four walls was a cabinet containing 8 x 8 inch doors with a keyhole in the centre of each. Victor Valdez opened the door to number ninety-seven, pulled out the box inside and placed it on the table in the middle of the room. He nodded and said, ‘I will wait outside should you need anything else, Inspector.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Valdez.’

  ‘Come on, Sir,’ Richards said. ‘I can’t stand the suspense.’

  ‘Your middle name isn’t Pandora, is it?’

  ‘Did my mum tell you?’

  ‘A wild guess.’

  He put the key in the lock and turned. The mechanism clicked and he stepped to one side. ‘Do you want to do the honours?’

  Her eyes opened wide. ‘Do I?’ she said, pulling the oblong box towards her. She lifted the lid and all of the excitement drained from her face.

  ‘Surprise me, Richards,’ Parish said.

  ‘It’s empty.’ She put her hand inside and felt the smooth interior as if she couldn’t believe what her eyes were telling her brain.

  ‘So much for your theory about blackmail.’

  She banged the lid closed. ‘No, Sir.’

  ‘No? Don’t say “no” to me.’

  ‘Pearson must have paid the safe-deposit box monthly charge for a reason.’ She called out for Mr Valdez to come in. ‘Do you have records of when Mr Pearson last accessed his box?’

  ‘It will be on computer, Miss. Please follow me.’

  They followed him upstairs to a small office. He sat at the desk and logged on to the bank’s network. Eventually he said, ‘Yes, here it is. Mr Pearson came into the bank and accessed his box on the 17th of December last year.’

  Richards screwed up her eyes. ‘When was the last time he accessed the box before then?’

  ‘Never. He purchased it in 1991 shortly after we opened a bank here, and apart from his monthly payments we have had no further contact with him.’

  ‘Pearson kept something in the box,’ Richards said to Parish, ‘which he must have removed last month.’

  ‘What is this something? And where is it?’

  ‘I don’t know what, but if he was blackmailing Squires then maybe we’re looking for photographs or videotapes. If he took them out of the box last month, then maybe they’re at his house. Maybe we missed them, but maybe Paul found something.’

  ‘There are a lot of maybes in there, Richards. Maybe you should give your fiancée a ring and ask him if he found any photographs or videotapes at the house.’

  ‘You’re being really mean. I’ll phone Paul in the car.’

  They thanked Mr Valdez for his help and left the Bank of Croatia. When they reached the car there was a parking ticket under the windscreen wiper.

  Parish looked around and saw the fat parking attendant waving at him from across the road.

  ‘I’ll drive, Richards. Killing someone with a car is still classified as a road traffic offence. I’ll probably get three points on my licence for squashing a parking attendant.’

  ‘You will not drive, and don’t think I’m going to pay the parkin
g fine either. You’re the Inspector, so you keep telling me, so you can pay it. You should never have talked to him like that, and you know you’ll only have to pay £30 if you pay it within the next fourteen days.’

  He screwed the ticket up and thrust it in his pocket as he climbed into the car. ‘Haven’t you rung Toadstone yet?’

  ‘I’m going to.’ She pulled out her phone. ‘Hello, Paul.’

  Parish glared at the parking attendant as he walked along a line of parked cars, liberally writing tickets. In fact, he thought, excrement is too good for parking attendants.

  ‘No, that’s all right, Paul. You just frightened me, that was all. The Inspector and I have just opened the safe-deposit box, and there was nothing in it. Pearson took whatever was in there out last month. Did you find any photographs or videotapes in his house?’

  ‘He says no.’

  ‘Well, tell him to go back and have another look. They could be hidden somewhere.’

  ‘He says he’ll do that, Sir.’

  ‘This afternoon, tell him.’

  ‘Thanks, Paul. Maybe – let’s wait until I’ve solved this case.’

  She disconnected the call. ‘He heard you.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘He’s at the Hobart crime scene, but he says he’s finished what he was doing and he’s on his way back to Pearson’s house now.’

  ‘Good. So, you’re going to solve this case are you? I may as well take some leave and go somewhere hot with your mum so that she can wear her skimpy bikinis and I can drink beer all day by the pool.’

  ‘Sirrr.’

  ‘Drive, Richards. We don’t want to keep Doc Michelin waiting, do we?’

  ***

  It was two forty-five when they scrambled out of the Mondeo at Ingleby Mansions in Chigwell Row, entered the block of flats and climbed the stairs to number 12.

  ‘Go and knock on some doors. Find out if anyone heard or saw anything. I’ll be in the flat picking Doc Michelin’s brains.’

  ‘Okay.’

  Parish found Doc Michelin in the kitchen drinking Hobart’s tea and eating his chocolate biscuits.

  ‘Bored, Doc?’

  ‘You’ve noticed, Inspector. I could have been back at the mortuary an hour ago catching up with my post-mortems if it wasn’t for the fact that I had to wait for you and… Where’s that beautiful partner of yours?’

  ‘Knocking on doors.’

  The Doc put his head in his hands. ‘And you deprive me of her smile as well. It was a cold day in hell when I met you, Parish.’

  Parish sat down opposite the Doc at the small kitchen table. A dog barked.

  ‘Oh, yes, Lance Hobart had a dog. We’ve called the RSPCA and they’re on their way.’

  Coco was standing on its back legs up against Parish’s legs, staring at him. He picked the dog up and sat it on his lap.

  ‘I always wanted a dog, Doc,’ he said, stroking Coco’s head.

  ‘Take that one.’

  ‘Unfortunately, my current situation prevents me from making life-changing decisions without consulting her indoors.’

  The Doc nearly choked on a mouthful of his chocolate biscuit. ‘You’re not married, Parish.’

  ‘I know. Yet, I find myself under the yoke of feminine wiles.’

  ‘Sounds painful.’

  ‘I’m sure I’ll get used to it. So, anything for me?’

  ‘Same old, Parish. This killer is meticulous to the point of boring. Apart from that mistake he made in the lift at Redbridge, he never does anything different.’

  Parish saw a white-suited forensics officer and waved him in. ‘A word?’

  ‘Yes, Sir?’

  ‘Who did Mr Toadstone leave in charge?’

  ‘Me, Sir.’

  ‘And you are?’

  ‘Sally Vickers.’

  Parish was taken aback. He hadn’t noticed he was talking to a female. She was shapeless in the white suit and her voice behind the mask sounded male. Maybe it was him. Maybe when you agree to live with someone you lose the ability to distinguish between the sexes. ‘Have you found anything?’

  ‘We’ve found lots of things, Sir. What specifically did you have in mind?’

  ‘Specifically, items that a paedophile might keep, such as photographs, tapes, a computer full of downloaded images of children – that type of thing.’

  ‘We’ve found photographs, Sir. He had a computer and we’ll be taking that back with us to analyse.’

  ‘Okay, thanks.’

  ‘You’re welcome.’

  Richards strolled into the kitchen. ‘Hello, Doc.’

  ‘Hello, Constable. Your smile makes my day worthwhile.’

  ‘That’s very nice of you to say so’

  Parish put the dog down. ‘Come on, Richards – we’ll take a quick look at the body and then get over to Beech Tree Orphanage.’

  Richards squatted when she saw the dog. ‘Ah, it’s a dog.’

  ‘I do know what a dog looks like.’

  She picked it up and cuddled it. ‘I love dogs.’

  ‘Then why haven’t you got one?’ he asked her.

  ‘It wouldn’t be fair when my mum and I are both out at work all day.’

  ‘Put it down, Richards. Let’s do what we have to do and go on our way.’

  She put the dog down. ‘You have no heart, Sir.’

  ‘That useless organ was removed a long time ago.’

  They walked through into the living room. Parish crouched down and pulled back the sheet covering the corpse. Lance Hobart was a man of about sixty, with a crew-cut, a cardigan and an expanded waist.

  Coco waddled up beside Parish and barked at her master’s dead face. Richards picked the dog up and covered its eyes. ‘Poor thing must be traumatised,’ she said.

  ‘It’ll probably need counselling,’ Parish suggested and smiled.

  ‘Stop being mean.’

  ‘What have I told you about that mean word, Richards?’

  ‘That was yesterday.’

  ‘Stop splitting hairs.’ He stood up. ‘Right, put the dog down and let’s go. Our work here is done.’

  ‘You didn’t do any work, Parish,’ Doc Michelin said.

  ‘Work comes in different shapes and sizes, Doc.’

  ‘Oh, by the way, when I was doing Martin Squires’ post-mortem this morning, guess what I found?’

  ‘A token?’

  ‘You’re no fun at all, Parish. Number 37. The killer had pushed it right back into Squires’ throat. I only found it by accident.’

  ‘You know what that means?’ Richards said.

  ‘The killer works at Redbridge Council.’

  ‘Yes, Sir.’

  It was only when they were sitting in the car and Coco barked from the back seat that they realised they had a stowaway.

  ‘I thought I told you to put that dog down. I certainly didn’t say bring it with you.’

  ‘It followed us.’ She picked it up and took it back inside.

  During the journey to the orphanage, Richards said, ‘What did you send to the Chief Constable about CI Naylor, Sir?’

  ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’

  ‘I think you do. Whatever you sent him I think Paul helped you and it went via China like he said.’

  ‘Haven’t you got anything better to think about?’

  ‘No.’

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Peter Rushdon arrived shortly after Parish and Richards reached Beech Tree Orphanage. Rushdon had two helpers in white jackets who scrambled out of the Volkswagen Caravelle first to remove the wheelchair from the back of the vehicle and prepare it for use. There was also a young man carrying an attaché case who climbed out of the front passenger seat and moved to one side. Parish assumed he was an assistant.

  The driver remained in the van. He kept the engine running and the lights on because as well as day making way for night, snow had begun to fall again. At first, the weather wasn’t sure what it was doing, but then the snow became heavier and heavier u
ntil it was nearly a whiteout. It was below freezing and Parish was glad there was no wind.

  With the help of a walking stick and one of his helpers, a wrinkled bag of skin in a hooded, quilted coat tottered down from the vehicle and sat in the wheelchair. From an array of bottles and wires strapped to the back of the chair, Peter Rushdon was passed an oxygen mask, which he pressed to his face, and began taking deep breaths. The helpers wrapped blankets about his shoulders and legs.

  ‘Inspector Parish?’ the young assistant asked with an American accent.

  Parish stepped forward. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Parish. And you are?’

  ‘Roger Anderson,’ he said, extending his hand. ‘Mr Rushdon’s personal assistant.’

  Parish shook it and introduced Richards. He then stepped up to the old man in the wheelchair. ‘You must be Peter Rushdon.’

  The old man nodded and coughed, but ignored Parish’s proffered hand.

  ‘Please excuse Mr Rushdon, Inspector,’ Anderson said. ‘His excuse for being rude is that he’s dying.’

  Anderson walked up to the ivy-covered metal gates and put a large key into the bulky lock holding a thick chain together. It took him some time, but eventually the lock came apart and the chain clanked on the ground.

  Parish went up to help him drag the gates open. It was, after all, his idea that they go into the orphanage.

  Feelings of despair and hopelessness washed over him as he lifted his head and stared at the brick and concrete single-storey buildings that made up Beech Tree Orphanage. It was hard to see, but everything appeared to be covered with ivy and snow.

  ‘Welcome to Hell, Inspector,’ Peter Rushdon said. ‘The building straight ahead of us is the administrative block. All the other buildings are either male or female dormitories, except the one on its own to the left, which housed the medical centre, the laundry and the kitchen and dining room.’

  The paths were all overgrown. Parish realised that he and Richards had come unprepared. They’d forgotten torches and they probably should have worn boiler suits, wellies, hard hats and breathing masks.

  ‘Come on you two useless bastards, push.’ Peter Rushdon was talking to the two helpers who had now donned winter coats. One of them had a hefty rucksack slung over one shoulder. They began to push the wheelchair through the deep frozen snow with considerable difficulty towards the administrative block.