by Ford, P. F.
Chapter 23
Rustins Removals was the only real removals company in Tinton. There were a couple of one, or two-man operations, but Rustins went that bit further with a large factory unit that incorporated office space, a storage facility, and garaging for several vehicles. They also employed enough staff to cope with the demand their service generated.
When Slater had phoned earlier to ask if anyone could help with their enquiries, he had been pleasantly surprised to find the foreman, Ted Pearce, who had supervised the Bressler’s move, was still with the company. Although close to retirement, he now worked in the unit looking after the storage containers and doing whatever needed doing to keep things running smoothly.
“I read about them bodies being found in the newspaper,” he told Slater and Norman as he made three cups of tea. “They said she’d moved here from the Midlands 15 years ago. I remembered we’d done a job moving a lady and her daughter back then, and they’d disappeared not long after. I figured it couldn’t be a coincidence, so I thought I’d have a look back through the records to see.”
He handed a worksheet to Slater.
“I thought you might want this. That’s her signature at the bottom of the sheet,” he told them.
“You must have a very good filing system, Mr Pearce,” said Norman, suitably impressed.
“Certainly better than anything we’ve got,” admitted Slater, as he studied the worksheet.
“It never used to be,” said Pearce. “But it gets a bit boring around here some days, so about a year ago I set myself the task of sorting it all out. Now I can put me finger on just about anything within five minutes. I didn’t think I’d ever need to, it was just something to keep me occupied, you know?”
“You did a good job, Mr Pearce.” Slater smiled, beginning to feel human again now. “You’ve probably saved us a lot of time. I know it was a long time ago now, but can you remember anything about the job that was unusual?”
“The fact that we went up there to move them down here was different,” said Pearce, scratching his balding head thoughtfully. “Usually it was about us moving people from this area away to somewhere else. But other than that I honestly don’t remember much.”
“What about Mrs Bressler?” asked Norman. “Do you remember anything about her?”
“I remember she was a nice looking girl,” Pearce said. “Very nice. Set all the lads’ pulses racing that day, she did. Mine too.”
“Good figure, huh?” Norman asked, encouragingly.
“Oh yes.” Pearce nodded wistfully. “Lovely face, long blonde hair, long legs and-”
“Big boobs,” finished Norman.
“That’s right,” Pearce said, nodding enthusiastically. “She had the lot, and she was really nice with it, you know? Not stuck-up like some rich girls. She was happy to make us tea all day. She even made us breakfast when we got there because we’d had an early start. She was a good ‘un. I couldn’t believe it when I heard she’d run away a week later.”
“You thought that strange?” asked Slater.
“Well, you can’t ever get to know someone well in a few hours, can you?” said Pearce. “But she didn’t seem like she was planning on leaving to me. She was more like someone who was coming home, for good.”
Norman fumbled in his jacket pocket and produced two photos. He laid the photo of Sandra Bressler on the table.
“Is this her?”
Pearce looked at the photo.
“It was 15 years ago,” he said cautiously. “It probably is, but I couldn’t swear to it.”
“What about this one?” asked Norman, placing a photo of Cindy Maine on the table, next to Sandra Bressler’s.
Ted Pearce frowned in concentration as he looked from photo to photo.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I don’t want to let you down. But it was a long time ago, and these girls all look the same to me. Don’t you agree? It’s like they all come out the same mould or something.”
“Don’t worry. It’s okay,” Norman reassured him. “That’s kind of what I’m thinking. I have a theory that it’s very hard to remember faces from many years ago. Like you say, when they have the same hair and figure, they do tend to all look the same.”
Pearce looked relieved.
“I do remember the little girl,” he said. “She was a pretty little thing, just like a mini version of her mum. I seem to recall she was very shy, but the thing that really sticks in my mind and makes me remember her so well, is that she had very pale skin, with lots and lots of freckles. And she had lots of long ginger hair. It reached halfway down her back. Lovely little thing, she was.”
He had a faraway look on his face as he remembered the little girl from 15 years ago.
“Well, thanks for sparing us your time, Mr Pearce,” said Slater, pushing his chair back and getting to his feet. “We really appreciate it.”
“Can we keep this worksheet?” asked Norman.
“Of course you can,” Pearce said, smiling. “And it’s no trouble. If you need to ask any more questions I’ll do my best to help.”
As they made their way back to the car, Slater’s mobile phone began making weird noises. He stopped and dragged it from his pocket.
“Slater,” he said into the phone.
He listened for a few moments, said “brilliant”, and then listened a bit longer.
“Well done, Jane. Can you text it to me, please?”
“Sorry, no,” Slater continued. “You can’t go home early. But you can give Steve Biddeford a hand looking into Bressler’s background.
“No, no, no,” he said finally. “You only had to spend the night in with Norm if you failed. Yeah, I know, a fate worse than death. But I’ll tell you what, you’ve done so well, we’ll both take you out!”
He was smiling broadly as he ended the call.
“That was Jolly Jane,” he said, beaming. “She’s only managed to find the taxi driver who picked Sandra up that day! She’s just going to text me his address. Apparently it’s not far from here. We can call in on the way back.”
“Now that is good news,” agreed Norman. “You know, I think that girl’s far more resourceful than we give her credit for.”
They climbed into the car, both listening for Slater’s phone to herald the arrival of the taxi driver’s address.
“I have a complaint,” said Norman, as they waited.
“What?”
“Next time I offer Jolly Jane the chance to spend an evening with me as a reward for a job well done, do not suggest it’s a fate worse than death, and do not try to gatecrash by inviting yourself. Okay?”
“She wouldn’t spend an evening with either of us, you fool,” said Slater. They both knew Jane Jolly was devoted to her husband and kids.
“That’s not the point,” said Norman. “When someone is offered the chance of a lifetime, like that, they don’t want to hear you’re coming along too. You know you’ll just spoil the whole thing for them, right?”
Slater looked at Norman, who was trying hard, but failing, to maintain a serious expression.
“Yeah, right, Norm. Whatever you say, mate.”
Slater’s mood improved even further when he discovered it was going to take just 10 minutes to drive to the home of Arthur Deadman, the taxi driver who had collected Sandra Bressler on the day she disappeared. However, it was a short-lived improvement, as it soon became clear Mr Deadman was not going to be anywhere near as helpful as Ted Pearce had been.
Arthur Deadman was 83 and was not a well man. He was deaf as a post, his eyesight was going, and his memory was so hazy he didn’t even seem sure what day it was. Slater was pretty sure that if the old man’s wife hadn’t been there to look after him, he would have been unable to fend for himself and would have been in a care home.
Norman instinctively took the lead once Mrs Deadman had let them in, his natural patience and easy-going charm immediately putting her at ease. Slater was happy to take a back seat and look on admiringly as Norman worked his magi
c.
Luckily for them, Mrs Deadman proved to have a pretty good memory, and she could remember the time in question quite well. It turned out her husband had been keen to make a statement to the police at the time to make it clear that whatever might have happened, it was nothing to do with him.
“It was terrible,” she told them. “Arthur was retired, really. He was only working that day to help out because they were short of staff. He was just doing his job, that’s all. He went to the police station to make a statement and then suddenly they were asking all sorts of questions about where he’d taken them and what he’d done to Mrs Bressler and her daughter. By the time they’d finished, they made him feel as though they thought he’d done away with them.”
Slater felt a certain amount of pity for the Deadmans. He knew DS Nash, who had led the inquiry back then, and he knew just how unpleasant Nash could be when it suited him. His nickname had been “Nasty Nash” and with good reason.
“Just to make sure we’ve got our facts right,” Norman said, patiently. “Can you tell me where he took them that day?”
“To Gatwick airport,” Mrs Deadman said. “Mrs Bressler, the little girl, and several suitcases. I remember him complaining about all the cases. He had to load them all onto a trolley and push them inside for her.”
“Did he say anything about Mrs Bressler? About her behaviour?”
“I remember he said she was quite unpleasant, and not at all grateful for his help with the cases. She didn’t even give him a tip.”
Slater leaned forward involuntarily at this little snippet, and out of the corner of his eye he saw Norman do the same.
“I don’t suppose there’s any point in showing him a photo to check if he recognises her?” Norman asked.
“Sorry,” Mrs Deadman said, sighing. “That would be a complete waste of time. I know he said she was very nice looking. ‘Well bred’ was the expression he used. I think that’s why he was so upset by her being so unpleasant. He thought someone like that should know better.”
“Would this woman fit the bill?” asked Norman, producing the photo of Sandra Bressler.
“Oh yes. I’m sure that’s the type,” she said, quite definitely. “Is that her?”
“Yes. That’s Sandra Bressler,” said Norman. “Did your husband ever mention the little girl who was with Mrs Bressler?”
“Oh yes.” She smiled at the memory and clasped her hands together. It was almost as if she could see the conversation back then and listen in to it.
“He thought she was wonderful,” Mrs Deadman continued. “A right little chatterbox, he said. Never stopped talking, even though her mother kept telling her to stop. She told him how they were going on holiday but she had to keep out of the sun, because she had pale skin and burned easily.”
“Do you know if she had red hair?” asked Norman.
“That’s right,” she said, clapping her hands together. “He told me she had red hair. Lots, and lots, of curly red hair.”
“Pale skin, and red hair,” said Norman carefully, clearly trying to coax as much detail as possible. “So lots of freckles.”
“It’s funny you should say that,” she began. “Because I clearly remember him saying she didn’t have any freckles at all. He thought that was odd, because pale skin and red hair usually means freckles, doesn’t it?”
“So what do you make of what we’ve learnt this morning?” asked Slater when they got back in their car to head back to the station. “Does it confirm your ‘second woman’ theory?”
“What ‘second woman’ theory?” asked Norman.
“Come on, Norm. Give me some credit here. I’m not an idiot. You showed Ted Pearce both photos because you figured he wouldn’t be able to tell one gorgeous, leggy, blonde, with big boobs and long hair, from another. Am I right?”
“It’s just an idea I think might be worth looking into,” Norman said. “Don’t you?”
“I think it’s an idea we have to look into,” Slater said, nodding. “Especially as we’ve just had two people give us totally opposite personality descriptions. For both mother and daughter.”
Chapter 24
“I see PC Jolly’s done as you asked,” said Norman, as they came back into the incident room. He nodded towards the new whiteboard that now stood alongside the others.
“Now that’s more like it,” Slater said, following his gaze.
They both stopped in front of the board to admire Jolly’s handiwork. In large block letters, the board was devoted to: Victim Number Two – Rose Bressler, Age – five years. A nice big photograph clearly showed the slightly anxious smile of a shy-looking but pretty five year old with lots of freckles and long ginger hair that cascaded down over her shoulders.
“Well, I suppose you could turn straight hair into curly hair easy enough,” said Norman. “But there’s no way you could hide those freckles. So, if this is Rose, who’s the kid who got in the taxi?”
“And, even more important, who was the woman with her?” added Slater, tossing the removals worksheet onto his desk.
“We must try to keep open minds on this.” Norman said, still looking at the whiteboard. “We’ve only got Mrs Deadman’s word for it, and she wasn’t even there.”
“I haven’t forgotten that,” Slater said. “But you have to agree it all adds up. Someone murders Sandra and Rose, and then impersonates them to make it look like they ran away. It works for me.”
“It takes Bressler out of the frame then.”
“Not if he had an accomplice who looked like Sandra,” argued Slater.
“What about the matching kid? That would be just a little too convenient, don’t you think?”
“But that’s just the point,” Slater said, smiling. “It wasn’t a matching kid, was it? If Mrs Deadman is right, it was close to being a match, but not quite close enough.”
“We need some way of confirming her story.” Norman sighed heavily. “Maybe if we can find out which flight they got on at Gatwick we’ll get lucky.”
“Didn’t the original investigation say they never traced the flight?” asked Slater.
“Well, yeah,” said Norman. “But how hard do you think they looked?”
“Good point,” agreed Slater. “That’s the sort of job Steve Biddeford’s good at.”
As they were talking, Jane Jolly appeared.
“Nice work on the board.” Slater pointed at the picture of Rose.
“Thank you, sir,” she said, but she looked a bit uncertain.
“You didn’t come in here seeking praise, did you?”
“I’m afraid not.” She shifted uncomfortably. “It’s the boss. Big Bob. He left a message saying he wants to see you, in his office, just as soon as you get back.”
“What? Both of us?” asked Norman.
“Uh, uh,” said Jolly, shaking her head. “Just DS Slater.”
Slater began to get an ominous feeling. He’d been taken to task for speaking his mind before, but he was sure he hadn’t spoken out of turn recently. Even so, this sounded suspiciously like he was going to get a bollocking for something.
“Did he say what I’ve done wrong?” he asked.
“No,” said Jolly. “But he definitely didn’t sound very happy. Not even a ‘please’ or a ‘thank you’.”
“Shit,” muttered Norman. “Now that does sound bad.”
Bob Murray was renowned for his sometimes old-fashioned ways, which included good manners. He only ever forgot them when he was in a seriously bad mood.
“I’d better go face the music,” said Slater, grimly. He picked up the jacket he’d just taken off and turned to go.
“Good luck,” said Norman. “While you’re gone I’ll see if I can track down Biddeford and get him going on the flight search. Maybe he’ll be in a better mood now he’s had time to cool down.”
Norman watched Slater make his way from the room, feeling slightly worried for his colleague and friend.
“Anyway,” he said to Jolly, keen to lift the mood. “You se
em to be the only person who knows what’s going on around here, so where can I find Steve Biddeford?”
“Don’t know,” she said. “No one’s seen him since his little outburst this morning.”
“Really?” asked Norman. “That’s so unlike him to play the spoilt kid. He’s usually Mr Reliable. I wonder what’s eating him today.”
Jolly was looking distinctly uncomfortable, and studiously trying to avoid Norman’s gaze, but Norman was an old hand. He knew guilt when it was stood right in front of him.
“You know something about this, Jane, don’t you?”
She looked even more uncomfortable.
“Don’t make me pull rank, Jane. This is about holding the team together and keeping people happy. We’ll never solve this thing if there’s infighting going on, you know that. If you know something you need to tell me.”
“It might be nothing,” she said quietly.
“If it is, it’ll go no further than me, I promise.”
“I feel like a gossip,” she said, unhappily.
“Look. I’m known for my ability to keep a secret.” Norman sighed, impatiently. “If it turns out to be nothing, I won’t tell anyone and then no one will know you told me. Now come on, out with it.”
“Like I said, it might be nothing, but when Phillipa Flight phoned in sick this morning, she called from Steve Biddeford’s home phone number. I think she must have slept with him last night.”
“Ahhh. I see,” said Norman, very slowly and thoughtfully. “That could explain quite a lot.”
He could have said a whole load more, and Jolly looked as though she was expecting him to explain, but he figured she probably had no idea about Flight’s night-time hobby, and now certainly wasn’t the right time to tell her.
“Right,” he said decisively. “You know nothing about this, okay? I’ll speak to Dave when he comes back and we’ll work out what to do for the best. In the meantime, you get back to your work. I’ll speak to you later.”