by Graham Ison
‘She seems to make a habit of that,’ observed Kate. ‘It’s all very interesting, but what did you do?’
‘I went down to the local pub and got pissed. The landlord’s a mate of mine, you can ask him. Anyway, he threw me out at about eleven and I went home. To an empty flat.’
‘Your fiancée didn’t come home that night, then,’ said Dave.
‘No. I don’t know where she went. I didn’t see her again until I got home the following night and she was there, all full of contrition for having stormed out, I suppose.’
‘Did you ask her where she’d been?’
‘No, I just left it. I didn’t want to reignite the previous night’s row.’
‘What was the row about?’
‘Stupid really. Sophie wanted a church wedding with all the trimmings and a honeymoon in Barbados, but I said that would cost the earth and we’d be better off saving the money to put down on a house, but when I suggested a registry office wedding she went up like a can of petrol.’
‘Show Mr Roper the photographs, Sergeant Poole,’ said Kate.
‘I am now showing Mr Roper the stills from the videos shot at the wine bar frequented by Rachel Steele. These were shot over a period of three weeks prior to her murder on or about the tenth of June this year,’ said Dave for the benefit of the recorder and, placing the camera on the table, slowly displayed each of the stills in turn. ‘Do you recognize any of these men, Mr Roper?’
‘That one,’ said Roper, as Dave reached the third print. ‘I know him.’
‘Mr Roper has indicated the still taken from the video on Friday the twenty-fourth of May,’ Dave said, again for the benefit of the recorder. ‘And who is he, Mr Roper?’
‘His name’s Tony Miles.’
‘How d’you know him?’
‘He’s a good friend of mine. Actually, we work together.’ Roper was now so anguished that he was prepared to point the finger at anyone he thought might redirect suspicion from himself. Even if it incriminated a friend.
‘Doing what, Mr Roper?’ asked Kate.
‘We’re in human resources. We work in central London, but we both live in this area.’
‘Give my sergeant Mr Miles’s home address, please, Mr Roper,’ said Kate. ‘And your own.’
For a moment Roper hesitated but, seeing the determined look on Kate’s face, he relented and wrote down the addresses.
‘Have you ever been in the Isabella Plantation in Richmond Park, Mr Roper?’
‘Never,’ said Roper unhesitatingly.
‘One last question. What brand of cigarette d’you smoke?’
‘I don’t smoke,’ said Roper piously, as though Kate had just made an improper suggestion to him.
‘I’ll now admit you to police bail to return to this police station in one month’s time, unless you hear from me that you are not required.’ Kate glanced at the clock. ‘Interview terminated at twenty thirty hours. You’re free to go, Mr Roper. But before you do, give Sergeant Poole your mobile phone number. Oh, and while you’re at it, give him your fiancée’s full name and phone number too.’
‘Why d’you want that?’ asked Roper suspiciously.
‘To check what you’ve just told me is the truth,’ said Kate.
Roper furnished Dave with the requisite information; his fiancée’s name was Sophie Preston. ‘But why are you releasing me on bail?’ he asked, sounding mildly indignant. ‘I’ve told you all I know.’
‘So you say, Mr Roper, but we have certain scientific evidence that we have to check against your DNA.’
‘Oh, I see. A formality.’ Roper stood up and paused at the door of the interview room. ‘I don’t suppose you could have a word with Sophie, Inspector, and tell her that this business with the video was all quite innocent.’
‘Goodnight, Mr Roper,’ said Kate.
‘We found one of the guys on Rachel’s smartphone, Harry,’ said Kate when she reported to me the following morning, and she gave me a rundown on the interview with Max Roper.
‘What was your gut reaction?’
‘I’ve got an open mind.’ Kate’s face assumed a wry expression. ‘He was a bit arsy in front of his fiancée, who is probably his ex now, but when we took him to the nick he suddenly became desperate to prove his innocence. Anyhow, I’ve admitted him to bail for a month, and we’ll see what the DNA has to say. He denied smoking, but he might be lying. If his DNA tallies with what we hope to find from the discarded cigarette, he’ll have some serious questions to answer.’
‘If he hasn’t done a runner,’ I commented gloomily. ‘Pity we can’t lock ’em up until we know for sure.’
‘Talking of which, is there anything back from the airports about Daniel Steele’s disappearance, Harry?’
‘Not a word,’ I said, ‘but it’s early days yet. These people never seem to realize that something like this is urgent. What really interests me is to discover if Stephanie Payne was travelling on her own passport or a bent one.’
‘If Stephanie Payne really exists,’ said Kate. ‘For all we know, he might’ve made up the name to shield her real identity.’
‘You have a point, Kate.’ I phoned through to the incident room and asked Colin to get hold of Charlie Flynn.
‘He’s just come in, sir,’ said Wilberforce. ‘And the commander would like to see you.’
‘Charlie,’ I said when Detective Sergeant Flynn came into my office. ‘I want you to go up to this place in the City.’ I handed him the card that Daniel Steele had given me. ‘Speak to a woman called Jessica who seems to be in charge of the trading floor. Daniel Steele, the victim’s estranged husband, works there.’ As a result of daily briefings, Flynn knew about Steele’s hurried departure, and that he was accompanied by a woman the neighbours believed to be Rachel Steele. ‘Have a word with Jessica, Charlie, see if any of their female traders disappeared on the same day as Steele and if they’re still adrift. You could probably do it on the phone if you want to save time.’
‘No, I’ll go up there, guv,’ said Flynn. ‘I like to see their facial expressions when they lie to me.’
Once Flynn had departed I made my way to the commander’s office, prepared to tell him as little as I could get away with.
‘Ah, Mr Brock.’ The commander closed the file in front of him with apparent reluctance. The commander adores paper, revels in it, and the more that passes across his desk the happier he is. From our point of view, it has the advantage of preventing him from wandering out to the incident room and interfering with police work. Consequently, the teams under his command have learned to snow him with paper, in addition to the unnecessary emails with which mischievous malcontents flood his computer.
‘You wanted to see me, sir?’
‘Tell me about the suspicious death of the woman found in the Isabella Plantation in Richmond Park on Tuesday, Mr Brock.’
Unlike so many of the governors I’ve worked for in the past, the commander would never use my first name, presumably in case I used his in return; he couldn’t cope with that. He also irritated the real detectives by referring to a case that was palpably one of murder as a ‘suspicious death’ until it was proved beyond all reasonable doubt that it was a murder we were dealing with. But the commander was the beneficiary of what is known in the Job as a sideways promotion. The Uniform Branch having tired of him interfering in perfectly good traffic schemes and inventing new ways of dealing with football hooligans that usually resulted in more violence rather than less, he was eventually pushed across to the CID for what was supposed to be a purely administrative role. Unfortunately, he now believed he was a detective, and didn’t hesitate to express his views about how we should go about an investigation. He even had a copy of Hans Gross’s Criminal Investigation on his bookshelf. Perhaps he took it home for bedtime reading.
‘Early days yet, sir. We are awaiting the results of various DNA tests on items of evidence found at the locus in quo.’
‘Quite so, quite so,’ said the commander, reaching hungrily f
or another file in his in-tray. ‘Keep me informed, Mr Brock.’
I knew from the slight frown that flitted across his brow that he hadn’t a clue that locus in quo meant ‘the place in question’. And neither had I until Dave had told me what it meant.
It was later on that morning that DS Flynn returned from the City office where Steele worked.
‘You were right, guv,’ he said. ‘There is a woman who’s adrift. Her name’s Sarah Parsons. She disappeared the same day as Steele and hasn’t returned yet.’
‘Same initials as Stephanie Payne, who I suspect is one and the same as Sarah Parsons.’
‘Saves buying new handkerchiefs if you’ve got your initials on ’em,’ commented Flynn.
‘Did you get a description, Charlie?’
‘Did better than that, guv.’ Flynn took a photograph from his pocket and placed it on my desk. ‘They keep photographs of everyone who works there for their security passes.’
I glanced at the photograph of a good-looking, long-haired blonde. But it was not a face I recognized. Yet. ‘File it in the incident room, Charlie. We might need it one day,’ I said. ‘Did they have an address for this woman?’
Flynn referred to his pocketbook. ‘Yes, it’s in a block of upmarket apartments in Hampstead called Drover Court, which unsurprisingly is in Drover Street.’
‘Good. Follow it up, Charlie, but somehow I doubt you’ll find her there. On your way back, drop in on Mrs Natasha Stephens. She’s the Steeles’ next-door neighbour and the Neighbourhood Watch coordinator. Show her that photograph and ask her if that’s the woman she knows as Rachel Steele.’
FIVE
By the time he was twenty-eight, Detective Sergeant Charles Flynn had been married and divorced, and was now in a relationship with a woman police officer stationed at Bishopsgate police station in the City of London. But even that was an on-off sort of affair because Flynn had an eye for the ladies, and they for him. He had, at various times, been described as raffish, cocky, debonair, and dismissed as an East End wide boy with all the finesse of a street-market trader. None of this, however, detracted from his ability as a police officer. In fact, it was what gave him his natural flair for sweet-talking reluctant female suspects or witnesses into telling him all he needed to know. His three years as a member of the Fraud Squad had honed an already keen brain to the point where it was capable of analysing facts in a comparatively short space of time.
When Flynn reached the modern apartment block at Drover Court in Hampstead, he rang for Apartment C on the first floor using the entry phone, but predictably there was no answer. He rang for Apartment D instead and was let in.
The woman who answered the door of the apartment was probably in her sixties, silver-haired and immaculately dressed. A pair of spectacles hung from a gold-coloured chain around her neck. She gazed at Flynn with a quizzical expression but said nothing.
‘I’m a police officer, ma’am,’ Flynn began, and produced his official identification. ‘I’m terribly sorry to disturb you.’
‘Oh, I hope there isn’t any trouble,’ said the woman, raising her spectacles so that she could read Flynn’s warrant card.
‘No, no, nothing like that,’ Flynn said soothingly, ‘but I wondered if you could help me.’
‘Well, of course. Please come in. As a matter of fact, I was about to make a cup of tea, and I’m sure I could persuade you to try a slice of my homemade seed cake. I’ve never known a policeman yet who would refuse a piece of seed cake.’
‘I adore seed cake,’ said Flynn, who detested it, but was prepared to eat just about anything in the pursuit of information.
The woman showed him into her cosy sitting room and went into the kitchen. When she returned with a tea tray she put it down on the occasional table that Flynn had thoughtfully moved into place for her.
‘Thank you. That’s very kind of you,’ said the woman, and smiled her gratitude. ‘Are you from the local police station?’
‘No, ma’am, I’m from Scotland Yard. Detective Sergeant Flynn.’
‘Yes, I saw the name on your warrant card,’ said the woman, proving that she was sharper than Flynn had at first thought. ‘I’m Grace Booker.’
‘Well, Mrs Booker …’ Flynn paused. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said smoothly, ‘I just assumed that—’
‘No, I never married,’ said Grace Booker, handing Flynn a cup of tea and a large slice of seed cake, ‘although it wasn’t for the want of offers,’ she added coyly. ‘My life was spent in the ballet, first as a dancer, then as a choreographer, but I retired last year. Now I just pop across to the school in Richmond Park and help out occasionally. But you’re not here to listen to my life story. How can I help you, Mr Flynn?’
‘Are you acquainted with the young lady who lives opposite you, Miss Booker?’
‘Sarah, you mean? Sarah Parsons.’
‘Yes, that’s her.’
Grace Booker lowered her voice almost to a whisper, even though there was no one else in the apartment. ‘She used to entertain a lot, you know.’
‘Really?’ Flynn leaned forward. ‘Parties and that sort of thing, you mean?’ he asked earnestly, as though Miss Booker had immediately grasped the reason for his visit.
‘No,’ said Grace. ‘Men!’
‘Good gracious!’ exclaimed Flynn, giving the impression that such behaviour genuinely shocked him. ‘Not different men, surely?’
‘Oh, but they were. Until just about a year ago, when she told me she was moving out.’
‘Are you saying she no longer lives there?’ queried Flynn, wondering if he’d been wasting his time, to say nothing of having to eat seed cake.
‘Not exactly,’ said Grace Booker. ‘That’s the funny thing. She told me she wasn’t giving up the apartment because she’d be back eventually. It was all very mysterious.’
‘I must say it sounds very strange,’ agreed Flynn with false gravity. ‘So no one lives there at all at the moment?’
‘That’s right.’ And then Miss Booker posed a question that she should have asked some time previously. ‘As a matter of interest, why d’you want to speak to her, Mr Flynn?’
‘We think she might be a material witness to a crime that we’re investigating.’ Flynn decided not to mention the murder of Rachel Steele. ‘I can’t say any more than that,’ he continued, ‘for legal reasons.’ Apart from not wanting the story to be circulated all around the apartment block, and possibly among Miss Booker’s ballet friends, it would take too long to explain.
‘Oh, I quite understand.’
‘Thank you very much for the tea, and for your delicious seed cake, Miss Booker. And I’m sorry to have disturbed you.’ Flynn didn’t bother asking her to phone the Yard if Sarah Parsons returned. He knew that she would anyway.
‘Not at all, Mr Flynn. It’s nice to have someone to chat to. It does get rather lonely here, you know, with all the neighbours being out to work.’
Flynn paused at the front door. ‘Did Sarah Parsons have a job?’ he asked.
‘Oh, yes,’ said Miss Booker. ‘She had some high-powered job in the City of London. She was quite jubilant about it, but she said she’d had to break through a glass ceiling to get it. It sounded a very dangerous thing to have to do in order to get a good job. But the odd thing is that she didn’t have any cuts or scars on her.’
It was half past four by the time Flynn reached Superior Drive in Camden Town.
‘You must be Mrs Stephens?’ said Flynn when the attractive young woman opened the door.
‘That’s me. Who are you?’
‘Detective Sergeant Charlie Flynn, Mrs Stephens.’
‘Please call me Tash. Are you one of Mr Brock’s friends, Sergeant Flynn?’
‘Yes, I am. But do call me Charlie.’ Flynn decided that this was not the time to explain the rank structure of the Metropolitan Police, and that DCI Brock was his boss rather than a friend.
‘Come through, Charlie,’ said Tash, and led Flynn into the sitting room at the front of the house
.
‘Oh, what a charming room,’ said Flynn, gazing around. ‘Did you do it all yourself?’ The tiny room had been decorated in Victorian style with brown velour drapes and net curtains and the sort of clutter with which parlours of the nineteenth century were filled. He thought it looked hideous.
‘Yes, it’s all my own work,’ said Tash, with a gay laugh. ‘I bought a lot of the stuff from charity shops, you know,’ she added in matter-of-fact tones. ‘Now, I suppose Mr Brock’s got more questions about the Steeles.’ She sat down opposite Flynn, ran her hands through her long hair and smiled.
‘Mr Brock spoke very highly of you, Tash, and suggested I had a word with you as a reliable person. In fact, his exact words were, “Speak to Tash because she’s got her finger on the pulse”.’
‘Oh, how nice of him,’ said Tash, and ran her hands through her hair yet again. ‘How can I help you, then, Charlie?’ She giggled. ‘To live up to my reputation.’
‘I hope you realize that everything I say now will be in the strictest confidence,’ said Flynn, adopting a serious expression, ‘but as the Neighbourhood Watch coordinator, I know you can be trusted.’
‘Of course,’ said Tash. ‘It happens all the time,’ she added airily, as though she was about to be made privy to a top-secret dossier about weapons of mass destruction. ‘Our local bobby often pops in for a chat and a cup of tea during the day.’
I’ll bet he does, thought Flynn. ‘I want you to look at this print, Tash, and tell me if it’s anyone you know.’ He produced a copy of the photograph he’d obtained from Jessica, the trading-floor manager at Steele’s place of employment.
‘That’s Rachel Steele,’ said Tash, without hesitation.
‘Oh dear, oh dear!’ said Flynn theatrically, and shook his head.
‘Isn’t it her, then?’ Tash suddenly looked very interested, even conspiratorial.
‘I’m afraid it’s someone called Sarah Parsons, Tash, a work colleague of Dan Steele’s.’
‘D’you mean they aren’t married, Charlie? How wonderfully decadent.’
‘Not as far as I know.’ There were so many unmarried couples living together these days that Flynn thought it hardly worth Tash’s comment. ‘But you will keep this to yourself, won’t you?’ he asked.