Sham

by Roger Silverwood

  ‘You’ll have heard the news?’

  ‘About Rossi?’

  The corners of Strawbridge’s mouth turned further downwards.

  ‘Yes. He’s been released. All charges dropped.’

  Angel nodded grimly. ‘It was inevitable as soon as Grady’s body was found.’

  Strawbridge jumped to his feet.

  ‘It doesn’t make acceptance any easier!’ he bawled and pointed a finger at him. ‘I want to make something quite clear to you, Angel. If your personal, private snout comes up with anything that will help me bottle Rikki Rossi, I want to know about it. Straightaway. Understand?’

  ‘Right, sir,’ Angel said, but there was a big fat zero’s chance of him telling the superintendent anything that Helpman (or any other source) might provide in connection with that family of murderers, if it didn’t precisely suit Angel’s plans. An idea was well in hand for dealing with the Rossis, and the fewer people that knew about it, the better chance of its success.

  Strawbridge settled back down in the swivel chair; he wiped his perspiring neck with his handkerchief; opened the middle drawer in his desk, threw a ruler into it noisily and slammed it shut. With a shaking hand, he stuffed the handkerchief roughly into his top pocket and then turned back to Angel.

  ‘How are you getting on with that Schumaker case?’

  ‘Difficult, sir. Difficult.’

  ‘Of course it’s difficult,’ he snarled. ‘If it was easy, they’d employ chimpanzees to do it and pay them in bananas! That’s why you’re paid big money.’

  The skin on the back of Angel’s hands tightened. He didn’t consider that his salary could be described as ‘big money’.

  ‘So tell me about it,’ Strawbridge said icily.

  Angel blinked.

  ‘Well, we have a witness who saw the murderer — rather close up, as it happens — and insists that he had a tattoo of a skull and crossbones on the back of his hand. CCTV shows that only three men seemed to be in the building at the time of the murder; none of them has the qualifying tattoo. I am hoping that the newspapers will help us to find the man. Also the body of a misper, Tania Pulman was found hidden in Richard Schumaker’s house. It isn’t yet clear how she died; I am awaiting the PM report, on her.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Lots of details, sir. There’s the strange performance of the murderer before he actually stabbed the victim.’

  ‘I’ve read it. That account from a witness?’ ‘Yes. Eloise Macdonald. Young woman in her twenties, works at Cheapos.’

  ‘And you only have her word for it?’

  Angel nodded.

  ‘There’s a missing mobile phone, isn’t there? The victim’s?’

  ‘We think so.’

  Strawbridge frowned and shook his head. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well, she’s the only one who saw the mobile phone. The victim was said to have used it in her presence. Nobody else saw it or can throw any light on it.’

  ‘Where is it now?’

  ‘We don’t know. The girl said she was unconscious — she fainted — when the murder was taking place. It is presumed that the murderer stole it while she was out. It was the manager of the club who woke her up.’

  ‘And he’s one of the three men, the suspects, in the building, I assume?’

  ‘Yes. Martin Tickell. The other two are, Walter Flagg, the chef, and Louis Dingle, a waiter.’

  ‘Nothing known, I suppose.’

  ‘Clean sheet. All of them.’

  ‘What are your lines of inquiry?’

  ‘I am following up the peculiar situation of two empty lucky bag packets found hidden in Richard Schumaker’s house.’

  Strawbridge stared at him with piercing small eyes.

  ‘Can’t see what lucky bag packets have to do with a murder.’

  It would be difficult trying to explain. In the mood he was in Angel wasn’t even going to try.

  ‘Not certain, myself, sir. Also, there’s a missing coat from the cloakroom at the club; I am assuming it was taken by the murderer to cover his blood-stained clothes.’

  ‘Hmmm. Doesn’t that suggest that the murderer left the premises immediately after killing Schumaker?’

  ‘It’s possible, sir. But if he did, he would have to leave by the kitchen delivery door to avoid the CCTV on the main doors. Any such person would have been seen possibly by the waiter, and almost certainly by the chef who was in there preparing for a big function that night. Of course, they are both possible suspects themselves, anyway.’

  ‘Hmmm. So, what are you doing about it, then?’

  ‘Routine inquiries. Leg work. Checking on everything.’

  ‘You don’t know what you are doing, do you?’ Strawbridge said, his wet lips grinning in a strange sort of way. ‘You are dragging this case out, hoping that something will turn up.’

  Angel’s face went scarlet; his lips tightened. ‘I know exactly what I am doing, sir. And I’ll have this solved and passed on a plate to the CPS while you’re still …’ He stopped. If he had continued and said what was really on his mind, he would have been drummed out of the force.

  ‘While I’m still what?’ Strawbridge said heavily.

  ‘While you are still the Detective Superintendent here at Bromersley,’ Angel said smoothly.

  ‘Right. Yes. I am that. I am, and don’t you forget it.’

  *

  Angel parked his car under the portico at Frillies Country Club, behind a tractor which had a low trailer hooked to it. On the trailer were twelve dustbins with metal lids on the tops resting at various angles.

  As he pulled himself out of the car, an unpleasant smell assaulted his nostrils and he looked curiously at the vehicle and its load.

  A scruffy, bearded man smothered in an old army greatcoat, a scarf, thick gloves and Wellington boots strode animatedly out of Frillies’ front door immediately followed by the manager, Martin Tickell. The man in khaki was waving his hands all over, in an agitated manner. Tickell had an unhappy face, appeared to be saying nothing and avoided looking directly at the man.

  ‘The vet’s bill alone will be over a hundred pounds!’ the man bawled out in a crisp Welsh accent you could slice leeks with. ‘Where do you think I am going to get that from, boyo? Eh? Come over here. I show you.’

  The man went up to the trailer, reached over to a dustbin at the rear of it and whisked off the lid. He glared back at Tickell and said, ‘There! Look you, in there!’

  Tickell tried to see inside the bin without moving towards it.

  Angel couldn’t resist his curiosity and approached the two men. Tickell noticed him for the first time and passed a hand across his mouth in embarrassment.

  ‘Oh, Inspector Angel! Did you want to see me?’

  The Welshman looked up.

  ‘Inspector, did you say? Inspector of what?’ he asked gruffly.

  ‘I am a police inspector, what’s the trouble exactly?’

  ‘It is nothing. We can sort it out,’ Tickell said, looking from one to the other.

  ‘I’ll tell you, Mr Inspector,’ the Welshman said loudly. ‘I buy throw-out food from these premises. I pay a good price for food for my pigs, for edible waste. Edible, mark you! What did I get the other day, but a raincoat complete with buttons! Plastic buttons. What sort of nourishment is that for pigs, I ask you? One of my piglets ate some of it and is mighty sick. Now I have to decide whether to put it down or not. And, to boot, I have to pay a veterinary’s fee as long as your arm.’

  Angel’s eyebrows shot up.

  ‘Is the raincoat in there?’ he asked, pointing to the dustbin.

  ‘And what a tattered mess it is, yes! That’s evidence, isn’t it, Mr Inspector? That’s proof positive.’

  ‘Can I see it? Will you pull it out for me?’

  The Welshman eagerly pulled up his coat-sleeve and pulled out a khaki, sludgy mess, which he shook several times to unfurl and it slowly was revealed to be the remnants of a man’s grey raincoat with a huge hole torn
out of the front. He draped it over the other bins in the trailer.

  ‘Can you see if there is a label in the back of the neck.’

  The smell of ammonia began to have an effect on Angel’s eyes. He pulled back from the trailer.

  The Welshman found the shop’s logo and read it out.

  ‘It just says Challender’s. What difference does that make, boyo?’

  Angel wiped his eyes with a handkerchief.

  ‘Anything in the pockets?’ he muttered through the linen.

  ‘I never looked, you know,’ the Welshman said, his eyebrows shooting upwards. ‘I never looked.’ He ferreted away and eventually waved a yellow glove in the air.

  ‘Ah,’ Angel declared. ‘Is there one in the other pocket?’

  The man did some more ferreting and produced the other.

  There was no doubt about it: it was the missing raincoat.

  ‘I’ll have to take the coat as evidence, sir,’ Angel said to the Welshman. ‘Can you tell me how you came by it.’

  Tickell moved his hand from across his mouth and nose and said, ‘The missing raincoat, Inspector. Of course.’

  Angel nodded at him.

  The Welshman noticed the exchange, rubbed his beard and said, ‘I leave my bins here at the rear, of course, and the kitchen staff fill them with any left-over food that must be edible, naturally. I collect the full bins usually every day, swop them over for empty bins. And I settle up every month with this man here, Martin Tickell.’

  Angel nodded.

  ‘When did you collect the bin which, you say, had the raincoat in it?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ he said jeeringly. ‘And it did have the raincoat in it. All I know is that I have a mighty sick piglet and this coat was being dragged round the sty by another of them.’

  Angel shook his head.

  The Welshman saw him and suddenly roared, ‘Here! What am I doing involving the police? I don’t want the judiciary involved in this. I’m doing nothing wrong. I just want compensation. What’s right, you know. That’s all.’

  ‘That’s all right,’ Angel said. ‘Have you come across anything else that … well, shouldn’t have been there in the bins?’

  He rubbed his beard again.

  ‘No. Once found a soup ladle in and among.’

  Angel made a decision. He dug into his pocket, pulled out his mobile and dialled a number. There was a click and it was answered.

  ‘I want SOCO. Is that Don Taylor?’

  Angel organized the immediate searching of the Welshman’s trailer, his food stores, his pig sties, and the bins at the rear of Frillies. He told the reluctant farmer that his vehicle must stay where it was until the bins on the trailer had been searched. Angel’s intervention in the dispute between Tickell and the Welshman had strangely subdued the farmer and brought the two men together. They retired to Tickell’s office quietly, no doubt to settle the matter over a pot of tea.

  A few minutes later, the SOCOs’ van arrived. Angel instructed DS Taylor and a DC who immediately began examining the trailer and its contents. He then made his way through to the restaurant and into the kitchen where young Walter Flagg was checking his cooking in one of the big gas-fired ovens. He was in his whites and traditional chef’s hat. Perspiration was running down his face.

  Flagg glanced across at the door, then back at the oven. ‘Hello there, inspector. I’m very busy. Big do tonight again. Masonics. Two staff off with flu.’

  ‘There’s a man at the front, a Mr Davies ...’

  ‘Yapping about his sick pig, I know. I know,’ he said without looking back. ‘I’ve had it all morning. Don’t know how the coat got into the pigswill, though. I’m not necessarily convinced it came from here. He might have picked it up at some of his other calls. I know he collects from The Feathers, in town.’

  Angel pursed his lips.

  ‘No. No. It came from here all right. Will you show me where the bins are kept?’

  Flagg nodded. He closed the oven and made for the back door of the kitchen, down two steps, then to a small lean-to outhouse. The door was wide open. He pointed at it. Angel peered inside. There were four bins lined up against the wall.

  ‘There,’ Flagg said, indicating them.

  ‘Is this door open all the time?’

  ‘It’s locked at night.’

  ‘Who’s got the key?’

  ‘I have one and Martin Tickell has one.’ ‘You lock it every night?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said firmly. ‘Want to see any more?’

  ‘No.’

  They went back into the kitchen.

  Flagg moved straight across to another oven and opened the door.

  ‘Yes, but who had access the day of the murder?’

  ‘I can’t remember now specifically, but everybody, I suppose,’ he said, reaching up for a big spoon to baste the meat.

  ‘Who’s everybody? You, I suppose. The waiter fellow, Louis Dingle, and the manager Martin Tickell.’

  ‘Yes, and the others who work here in the kitchen and those who serve in the restaurant and the bar of an evening. Part-timers, you know.’

  Angel sniffed and rubbed his chin.

  ‘Have you a mobile phone, Mr Flagg?’

  ‘Yes, of course. Hasn’t everybody?’ he said throwing the spoon in the sink and closing the oven door.

  ‘Can I see it?’

  Flagg frowned.

  ‘Of course.’

  He turned towards a bank of lockers at the far end of the kitchen, opened the first one, reached into a pocket in a coat hanging in there and handed it to him.

  Angel hardly glanced at it and handed it back.

  ‘Thank you. Had it long?’

  ‘A couple of years … what’s all this about?’

  Angel made a face that was supposed to be a reassuring smile.

  ‘It’s all right. Where’s Mr Dingle?’

  ‘He’ll be around in the restaurant or the bar or the cellar.’

  ‘Thank you very much.’

  He pushed the swing door back into the restaurant.

  ‘Good luck, inspector,’ Walter Flagg called after him.

  Angel wrinkled up his nose in response then shook his head. He had been telling himself that luck had nothing to do with it. Now, he wasn’t so certain.

  He looked round the restaurant. All the tables were set and the glass and silver glinted on the crisp white tablecloths. He heard bottles rattling accompanied by heavy breathing from behind the bar.

  Angel ambled over to it.

  ‘Hello. Anybody there?’

  A face came up between beer pump handles. It was Louis Dingle.

  ‘Ah. Inspector Angel, what can I do for you, sir?’

  ‘A few questions.’

  He was in his white shirt and black trousers, bow tie, with his coat draped across the back of the chair at the nearest table.

  ‘Phew! I could do with a rest. Let’s sit down a minute.’

  Dingle came from behind the bar, strode over to the table, pulled out a chair and sat down.

  ‘I’ve been at it all morning. I’m fair whacked.’

  Angel pulled out a chair and sat opposite him.

  ‘What can I do for you, Inspector? I take it you haven’t found the murderer yet?’

  ‘No. Not yet.’ He sighed, pursed his lips and said, ‘Just a few bits and pieces to tie up,’ he said misleadingly. He always believed in conveying the impression to suspects and parties directly involved that detection of the guilty was only a matter of time and diligence. He licked his lips slowly and said, ‘Richard Schumaker’s young lady, Eloise Macdonald, said that his mobile phone rang on two occasions during the meal, that he answered it and spoke for a little while each time. Did you see him speaking on a mobile at all while you were serving them?’

  Dingle seemed perplexed at this question. He looked down at the table in front of him and moved a fork about a tenth of an inch as if it was out of position, and then he moved it back again. He shook his head and looked up at him.

>   ‘I’m sorry, Inspector. I don’t actually recall seeing him with a mobile phone. Wasn’t there one found in his pocket?’

  ‘That’s the funny thing, Mr Dingle. No phone was found on him or anywhere in the conservatory either. I was thinking, he didn’t leave it by any chance in here, did he? Didn’t fall out of his pocket or … ?’

  ‘I didn’t see him with a phone, or speaking on a phone. Of course, I was in and out. He could have. I didn’t find a phone. Nobody handed a phone in. Sorry, can’t help there.’

  ‘Do you have a mobile?’

  ‘Yes. Of course.’

  ‘Had it long?’

  ‘About a year,’ he said and pulled it out of his trouser pocket.

  Angel glanced at it and nodded.

  ‘There’s a man who collects food for his pigs.’

  Dingle pulled a face. ‘Mr Davies. Yes. I heard. He says a coat was dumped in one of the bins from here.’

  ‘Yes. I wondered if you could explain how the coat got into the pigswill?’

  ‘No idea.’

  Angel shook his head again. Nobody knew anything about anything. He pursed his lips.

  ‘Well, if an explanation occurs to you, perhaps you’ll let me know.’

  ‘Sure thing, Inspector.’

  Angel stood up.

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Good luck, Inspector.’

  Angel stared at him then growled something under his breath. The second word was off, and the first word sounded like sugar, but was not as sweet.

  He made his way out of the restaurant, down the plush corridor to reception and tapped the bell on the counter.

  Martin Tickell came through the archway still looking ill at ease. ‘Oh it’s you, Inspector. What now?’

  ‘Where’s your farmer friend?’

  ‘He’s gone, and he’s no friend of mine. He’s expecting the club to pay his vet’s bills. I have agreed to put it before the grand council, but there’s no chance of that, I can tell you. Have your men finished here? Members don’t like police around; gives the club a bad name.’

  ‘That’s tough,’ Angel said irritably. ‘We’re going to be here as long as it takes, so you’d better get used to it.’

  Tickell licked his lips nervously; maybe he had spoken too brusquely. He didn’t reply.