What Would Wimsey Do?

by Guy Fraser-Sampson

  It gradually dawned on the two men that she had said “we.” Somehow it didn’t seem strange.

  “It goes without saying, Karen, that we’ll back you in whatever you decide to do,” Collison said gently.

  “Of course,” Metcalfe concurred. “Er, what would we have to do exactly?”

  “We’d have to act out the fantasy, of course,” Collison said, “so you’d better do your research on Dorothy L. Sayers PDQ, Bob. Peter seems to think that I’m Parker, so that’s all right. I think I can carry that off. Karen is clearly Harriet. Lady Mary I think we’ll fudge by saying she’s away in America or something, but if necessary I suppose Caroline could be pressed into service. She loves the books anyway.”

  “What about me?” Metcalfe asked.

  “I’m afraid, Bob, that you must be Bunter, Lord Peter’s valet.”

  Metcalfe looked dubious.

  “Bunter was Lord Peter’s sergeant during the War—that’s the First World War of course—and became his manservant afterwards. He’s a dab hand at photography and at eliciting information from pretty housemaids, though I doubt we’ll have much call for the latter.”

  “Don’t worry,” Karen said quickly. “We’ll try to keep you out of the way as much as we can. I’ve told him you’re away visiting a relative at the moment.”

  “How do you want to play this, then?” said Collison.

  “Well, I think the best thing is for him to meet Parker and get involved in the investigation,” she said slowly, “but the question is how and when? After all, sir, you’re going to be busy getting the enquiry re-opened.”

  “No time like the present,” Collison replied. “Give me the address and I’ll come round at seven this evening.”

  Priya Desai walked back into the room. It seemed clear from her demeanour that she had hoped never to see it again.

  “Welcome back,” Metcalfe said sardonically. “Delighted,” she replied with equally heavy irony.

  “Hello, sir,” she greeted Collison. “I thought you might like to see the afternoon papers.”

  “I doubt that,” he said, but took them anyway.

  The headlines were predictable: “Police Got The Wrong Man” and “Innocent Man Dies In Prison” competed with “Thud And Blunder At The Yard.”

  “Are you going to have to be interviewed, sir?” Willis asked anxiously.

  “No. Not for a while anyway. The ACC has told the press office to deal with it—that’s what they’re for, after all.” He tossed the papers onto the table. Nobody else bothered to pick them up. “The ACC feels,” he went on, “that dealing with the press would be a distraction from the task at hand, which I’m sure I don’t need to remind you is to catch a serial killer before he strikes again.”

  “We should be up and running by the morning, anyway,” Metcalfe informed him, “though we’ll be shorthanded for a while. Most of the team were happy to get off the case and nobody’s anxious to be assigned to it now.”

  “Well, we’ll just have to make the most of what we’ve got,” Collison said philosophically. “And after all, we do have a secret weapon. Nobody else at the Yard has the assistance of Lord Peter Wimsey.”

  Desai stared at him blankly, to which he returned a rather sad smile.

  “What time would you like to make a start tomorrow, guv?”

  “Team meeting at nine, Bob. Let’s get straight back in the saddle. Karen, or should I say Harriet, I’ll see you later.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Hello Wimsey, old man,” Charles Parker said as he came into the book-lined room carrying a bulky folder. “How are you?”

  “Tolerably spiffin’, I thank you,” Wimsey replied, “but let’s talk about you, my dear chap. This wrong man stuff don’t sound good, do it? Not at all good, in fact.”

  “I know, it’s the devil, isn’t it?” Parker agreed as he sat down opposite Lord Peter, the folder dropping to the floor with a dull but substantial thud. “I was rather hoping you might be able to help out a bit.”

  Harriet placed a glass of whisky before him, and then went and sat on the sofa next to Peter.

  “Always delighted to be able to help the Yard, naturally,” Wimsey said, “though perhaps it’s a shame you didn’t call me in earlier.”

  “Well, it seemed like such an open and shut case,” Parker said, with a glance at Harriet that looked very much like a distress call, “that we didn’t want to bother you.”

  “And anyway you were away sorting out that thing for the Foreign Office in Romania,” she said. “Surely you remember? You’ve only just got back.”

  “Have I?” Wimsey mused vaguely. “Of course, that would explain it.”

  “So in your absence,” Parker explained, “we spoke to this profiler fellow, and do you know, old man, he really did an awfully good job. What happened wasn’t his fault, not at all.”

  Harriet glanced at him and frowned. Clearly things were moving too far too quickly. “Why don’t you give Peter the background to the case?” she suggested.

  “Exactly what I came to do, of course,” Parker said, picking up the file and handing it over. “I’ve brought you a copy of the barrister’s main briefing bundle from the trial. Careful, it’s damned heavy.”

  “Appropriate enough for a serial killer, I suppose,” Lord Peter said, “to persist in doing wrong.”

  “Beg pardon?” Parker looked at Harriet again.

  “Thus to persist in doing wrong extenuates not wrong, but makes it much more heavy,” Wimsey said, looking hard at him. “Do buck up, Charles, you normally guess Shakespeare straight away, and anyway I may want to use him again this evening. Not one of my better quips though, I must admit.”

  “You’re quite right, I should have caught that,” Parker said. “Though I’d rather this particular chap didn’t persist in doing any more wrong, whoever he might be.”

  “Quite so, old man, quite so. Not in the best of taste perhaps. I suppose there’s no doubt that it is just one chap we’re lookin’ for?”

  “Well, it’s exactly the same MO in each case and all the underwear was found together, so I’d say yes, absolutely,” Parker said firmly.

  “And that’s one aspect of this case which really is puzzlin’, old fruit. The blessed underwear.” Wimsey cradled the unopened folder on his lap. “If it really did belong to the murdered women, and it seems that it did, then the only person who can have had access to it, at least initially, is the murderer.”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “Well, then, how do you explain the fact that it turned up at our man’s flat, since we now know the poor blighter was not the murderer?”

  “Well, we’re going to begin a complete review of the case tomorrow…” Parker said defensively, “and I’m sure that will be one of the first things we consider.”

  “And you need to, Charles old bird, you need to. Bit of a poser, what?”

  “Yes,” Harriet interjected. “You’re onto something there, Peter. Logically it can only have been put there by the murderer, or someone to whom it was given by the murderer.”

  “Yet it wasn’t a public place,” Parker pointed out. “So if we draw up a list of everyone who had access to the property then one of those people must be the killer, or at the very least know who he is.”

  “There’s something else you need to consider,” Wimsey said. “Was the location of the hiding place random or deliberately chosen?”

  “What do you mean exactly, Peter?” Harriet asked.

  “Well, I think it makes a difference, don’t you know. If it was randomly chosen then it was selected simply because it seemed like a good hiding place and our chap, whoever he may be, had access to it, so it was convenient. If, on the other hand, the evidence was specifically planted there then it looks like someone was deliberately trying to frame the poor devil who lived there—and successfully too.”

  “In which case,” said Parker, catching on, “we also need to consider anyone who may have had a grudge against him. I say, Peter, that’s
rather good.”

  “Lulled in the countless chambers of the brain,” he replied, “our thoughts are linked by many a hidden chain.”

  Parker counted the syllables on his fingers and said “Pope” triumphantly.

  “Now that’s cheating,” Harriet said reprovingly.

  “Buck up and play the game, old man,” Wimsey said. “You know the rules.”

  “Sorry,” he apologised. “It’s a bit late in the day to be spotting heroic couplets.”

  “And anyway,” Wimsey continued, “I believe that was a pure guess on your part. It could just as easily have been Dryden.”

  “Well, it’s never too late in the day for iambic pentameters,” Harriet said playfully. “Why, I read them in bed.”

  “True,” Wimsey said with mock solemnity, “though not entirely apposite. All heroic couplets are iambic pentameters, but not all iambic pentameters are heroic couplets.”

  “I know that, silly,” she responded. “I did go to Oxford too, you know.”

  “Then you should know better than to read them in bed,” Wimsey said. “They can induce the weirdest dreams.”

  “Not the Shakespeare sonnets, surely?” interjected Parker, knowing that for once he was on firm ground.

  “Oh Lord, I knew we would get back to Shakespeare sooner or later with you around, Charles. I’ve never been able to work out if it’s your reading habits that are deficient, or simply that there is no breadth to your imagination. The former I suspect; all that readin’ the Police Gazette must be very limitin’ for a man.”

  Parker got up with a laugh. “Well, fortunately, Peter, there seems to be no limit to your imagination. You’ve given us a couple of good points to follow up.”

  “Consider it as nothing,” Wimsey said, waving languidly. “By the way, how are the little Parker birds? Well, I trust? And Mary?”

  “The children are enjoying robust good health,” Parker replied, trying to remember how many of them there were. “Mary is up at Duke’s Denver visiting His Grace your brother.”

  “What, Gerry, that old fathead!” Wimsey exclaimed. “Wonder what he wants.”

  “Nothing in particular, I don’t think. Not unless there’s some new problem with Gherkins, that is.”

  Wimsey frowned. Mention of his nephew rarely found him in good humour. “Gerry at least has every excuse for being a fathead,” he said with an air of judgment. “He can’t help it. His son is another matter. A chap could be forgiven for thinking he’s a professional troublemaker whose one objective seems to be to drag the family name through the mud. If there is a problem with Gherkins, Mary should feel free to tell Gerry that I would be perfectly happy to step in and deal with him.”

  “I shall pass that on,” Parker said.

  “By the way, Harriet,” Wimsey said as Parker moved towards the door, “I think we’d better summon Bunter back from wherever he is. Can’t investigate a bally murder without him now, can we? Think how miffed he’d be when he found out.”

  Harriet and Parker exchanged concerned glances.

  “Alright, Peter,” she said quietly. “I’ll see what we can do.”

  The next morning Metcalfe buttonholed her when she arrived in the incident room.

  “Have you said anything yet?” he asked quietly.

  “No.” She looked at him guiltily. “I’m sorry, Bob, but it’s impossible right now while this Wimsey thing is going on.”

  “Thank God,” he said in relief.

  She gazed at him quizzically. “I thought you’d be mad at me that I hadn’t…”

  “No, on the contrary, I was feeling hugely guilty thinking that maybe you had, and that it was that which had brought all this on.”

  She glanced round to see if anyone was watching and then laid her hand briefly but firmly on his arm. “You’re a very fine man,” she murmured, looking him straight in the eye for a moment.

  “Oh, I don’t know about that,” he mumbled.

  “So you’re OK with hanging fire for a bit?”

  “Yes, of course. You’ve got more than enough on your plate right now—I mean the two of you.”

  “Here’s Collison now,” she said warningly, looking over his shoulder.

  “Morning, guv,” he said, turning.

  “Morning,” Collison said briskly. “How are we fixed, Bob?”

  “Incident room’s fully operational. We have eight bodies at present, with the promise of two more to come, but only Priya was on the team before. Everyone else has been reassigned to new teams—”

  “…and isn’t keen on transferring back again,” Collison broke in. “Yes, I get the picture. Well, let’s get going.”

  Metcalfe called for silence, but it was hardly necessary. Most of the new team had never met any of the others before, and so had been standing around warily scanning their new colleagues. A hush had fallen as soon as Collison entered the room.

  “Morning, everybody,” Collison said. “I’m Detective Superintendent Collison and I’m in charge of this investigation. I assume that you’ve already met DI Metcalfe here.” He felt the awkwardness of a room full of individuals not yet ready to merge into a group. It was always like this when a new team was forming. At least he had been spared the experience on this case initially, although taking over Tom Allen’s team had posed challenges of its own.

  “You all know why we’re here,” he went on, “so let’s make a start. I’m glad to see that DI Metcalfe and DC Willis have reinstated the whiteboard overnight. They were both members of the original investigation team, as was DC Desai over there.” He gestured in her direction. “We’re also hoping to be able to recall DS Andrews.

  “The sequence of events is also set out in the folders which you have in front of you,” he went on. “As I’m sure I don’t have to report, Gary Clarke was convicted of these murders not long ago, only to be apparently cleared by alibi evidence which was not presented at the trial. This was duly checked out by DI Metcalfe and appears to be kosher, which means that ordinarily we would have been recommending to the Home Office that he be released pending an appeal which the Crown would not oppose.

  “Unfortunately,” he continued flatly, “Gary Clarke was attacked in prison as soon as he was moved from the remand wing, and later died in hospital.”

  He felt that nobody in the room wanted to meet anyone else’s eyes, least of all his own.

  “So where are we going to restart this investigation from?” he asked rhetorically. “Well, we could do a complete cold case review, going through every single interview note and witness statement, but I’m going to suggest a different approach, unless anyone disagrees with that.”

  Metcalfe smiled wryly. It was unlikely that anyone would take issue with a suggestion made by a Detective Superintendent.

  “Something emerged last night in discussion with DC Willis and—and an expert who’s been helping us with the case, our profiler Peter Collins. Dr Collins spotted that we now have a key avenue of enquiry to pursue which we did not have available before, and one which should logically lead us straight to our killer, if we can only do it right. I’ll ask DC Willis to explain.” He nodded to her and moved aside.

  “As you can see here,” she began, pointing to a photograph of the loft opening which had been affixed to the whiteboard, “damning evidence was found in this loft space outside Clarke’s flat by DS Collison and DI Metcalfe, namely the murder weapon and underwear belonging to the victims, which we can only assume was removed and kept as a trophy—quite common behaviour in serial killers.

  “In the light of this evidence there seemed little justification for seeking further suspects, particularly as there was strong circumstantial evidence incriminating Clarke. In hindsight, of course, we clearly got it wrong as it transpires that he did have an alibi for one of the killings after all. Perhaps if he had told us about it or if he hadn’t been such a fantasist, things might have been different.”

  “Let’s not go there, Karen,” Collison said sombrely. “We got it wrong. Simple as t
hat. Now it’s up to us to put it right—so far as we can, of course.”

  “Yes, sir,” she replied, flushing a little. “Well, the point is this. We know that only the killer would have had access to those items—initially at least. So whoever put them there must either have obtained them from the killer, or actually be the killer themselves.”

  Desai put her hand up. “Just thinking aloud,” she ventured, “but could our murderer have had an accomplice?”

  Willis looked at Collison.

  “A sensible point, Priya, which Dr Collins also raised and which we ought to bear in mind,” he acknowledged, “though it is unlikely as most serial killers work alone, isn’t that right, Karen?”

  “Correct,” she confirmed. “It would be very unusual but as you say, sir, it’s worth bearing in mind.”

  “So it comes to this, then,” Collison said, realising to his horror that he was beginning to talk like Alistair Partington, “if we can identify all the people who could possibly have had access to the common parts of that building, then one of them ought to be our killer.”

  “DC Gates, sir,” said a rather spotty young man, raising his hand. “Even if we can do that, how will we know which is our man?”

  “Good old-fashioned police work,” Collison answered briskly. “He won’t be able to produce an alibi for any of the nights in question. He is also likely to fit—though I don’t want to place too much weight on this—the profile provided previously by Dr Collins, which you will find in your folders. But bear in mind that the profile is not evidence, just a guideline which may make our task a little easier.”

  Metcalfe stepped forward. “The building in question was originally a house which has been converted into four flats: one on each floor and one in the basement. How do we go about identifying all the people we need to speak to?”

  He picked up a marker and started writing on the board.

  “This being Hampstead, not a single one of the flats is occupied by its actual owner. They’re all ‘buy to lets,’ so for a start we need to identify not just the owners of each flat, but also their tenants. Then of course, the tenants will mostly have cleaners, who may well have keys to the building. Then there may be the freeholder, their managing agents and perhaps a contractor or two retained by the managing agents. Finally, we need to be sure we have accounted for every set of keys, which means not just owners and tenants but also any friends, family members or lodgers. So, not as easy as it sounds. The chances are there may be five or six sets of keys for each flat, each one including a key to the main front door.”