DCI Isaac Cook Box Set 2

by Phillip Strang

  ‘I know. Somehow, I find it romantic, but then I was always the first to cry if there was a love story on the television, you know the type, where one of them dies young, the other left on their own.’

  ‘Do you understand why Mr Lawrence would have wanted his wife there?’

  ‘Oh, yes. They never wanted to be apart, neither of them. If he was late coming home, or she was, the other one would be fretting.’

  ‘But what concerns us is that you were there twice a week, and Mrs Lawrence was buried in the cellar. After that, Mr Lawrence had to prepare his wife’s body, and that is not the easiest of the processes. There must have been some odours, and not pleasant either.’

  ‘Maybe there were, but I wouldn’t have taken any notice.’

  ‘Why’s that?’

  ‘Hyposmia, virtually no ability to smell. I’ve had it since I was young. It’s no use talking to me about the smell of a flower. Once, I nearly gassed myself. The oven hadn’t lit, and I was trying to find out why. I almost passed out until Mrs Lawrence came and pulled me free.’

  ‘Your friendship with Mr Lawrence?’ Larry said.

  ‘Ralph was trying to make something out of it, but he was young and adolescent. His hormones and his imagination were getting the better of him. And besides, I had no need of a man or a woman. Never have, never wanted to. I just want my routine, the chance to sit down at the end of the day and turn on the television.’

  ‘How could the man have kept away from you? You must have seen him occasionally.’

  ‘Maybe I did, but he wanted to be alone. Once he left the door unbolted, so I snuck in for a quick look.’

  ‘How long after he had gone into seclusion?’

  ‘One, two years. I don’t remember exactly, but it was a long time ago.’

  ‘And what did you see?’

  ‘Nothing. It was dark with the shutters closed and very dusty. I might not be able to smell very well, but my hearing was fine. I could hear a sound from upstairs, so I returned to my part of the house. After that, I never tried to look again.’

  ‘Did he know you’d been in there?’

  ‘It was never mentioned, although, as I said, he always wrote his instructions down for me. The door was never open again while I was in the house.’

  Both Isaac and Larry could not fault the woman, although no physical contact, no conversation, made no sense.

  ‘Let’s go back to when he needed a dentist. What did he sound like, look like?’

  ‘He was quiet, as though he hadn’t spoken in a long time, which I suppose he hadn’t. I made the appointment, and he left when I wasn’t in the house. All I know is that three hours later, he was back in the house. After that, I never spoke to him again.’

  ‘The dentist?’

  ‘Brian Garrett. I’ve got his phone number. I suppose he must have seen more of Mr Lawrence than me.’

  ***

  Gary Frost, unscrupulous and on the periphery of crime, knew what he had with Ralph Lawrence. A man who had come to him five months earlier needing money. It wasn’t the first time he’d seen men such as Lawrence, men who lived on the edge, scoundrels more than criminals.

  Frost understood that Ralph Lawrence was weak, not like his father, Gilbert. He did not tell the son that he already knew of the father. Frost had done further research, not difficult considering the amount of interest in the man’s murder. It made for great headlines – England’s own Howard Hughes, dead with a knife in the back. The reclusive billionaire with his wife dead in her bed, the battle for his fortune.

  The estimates of the dead man’s wealth varied from one billion up to somewhere close to infinity. No one, certainly not Ralph and his sister, knew precisely how much. The only person who seemed to have any idea was the father’s former solicitor and his only confidante.

  Frost was reclining on a chair, taking in the sun through the window in his penthouse flat. The flat was big enough to double as his accommodation and his place of work. It was on two levels, the lower one for his office and his support staff. With Frost, an agreement to lend money came with a handshake and an email setting out the terms and conditions: the money to be transferred to any nominated location, either a deposit into a bank account or cash. The payment schedule, principal plus interest of ten per cent per week, payable on demand. Default penalties, not included in the email but given in person or by phone, were simple. Non-payments or delays in adhering to the agreement would be settled by extreme violence.

  ‘It’s sure-fire, can’t lose,’ Ralph had said when told of the conditions of the loan.

  Frost remembered his words only too well. If it was sure-fire, it could only mean that it was not strictly legal, and it would either make a fortune or it wouldn’t. But then men such as Lawrence were all too ready to play into the hands of men such as him. And now he had the son of Gilbert Lawrence. What could be achieved? He needed his man in the prime seat, but there were problems. Even without the media, Frost could see delays, also the possibility of Ralph being sidelined and receiving none of the fortune, or so little as to render him irrelevant. Frost could not allow that to happen. If Lawrence was entitled to half of his father’s wealth, then that was what he would get.

  Ted Samson, small, barely five feet four inches, his name not indicative of the man, stood before his boss. He was dressed casually, yet expensively. The ideal man for going here and there without raising suspicion.

  ‘I’ve got a job for you,’ Frost said.

  ‘Whatever you want,’ Samson said.

  ‘Ralph Lawrence. He’s not seen you, has he?’

  ‘Nobody sees me unless I want them to.’

  ‘Good. I want you to keep a watch on him, never let him out of your sight.’

  ‘Twenty-four hours, seven days a week?’

  ‘Exactly. Your brother can take over when you need a break.’

  ‘And what do you want, boss?’

  ‘Don’t let him out of your sight, report back all that he does. And if he attempts to do a runner, well, you know.’

  ‘Call you, and then grab him.’

  ‘Exactly, but don’t let him know that you’re keeping watch.’

  ‘You can trust me, boss.’

  ***

  Chief Superintendent Goddard was under pressure, which meant that Isaac Cook and the entire Homicide team were as well.

  ‘It’s like this,’ Goddard said as he sat in Isaac’s office. ‘Gilbert Lawrence is receiving a lot of press interest, understandable given the man’s lifestyle, and his wife upstairs.’

  ‘Not to mention the fact that he owned a lot of property,’ Isaac said.

  ‘The man’s will, has it been resolved?’

  ‘Not to everyone’s satisfaction. The only problem is that the main beneficiary appears to be Lawrence’s solicitor.’

  ‘Complicated, but why? Normally the children would inherit the majority.’

  ‘That’s the problem. Lawrence wasn’t normal, was he?’

  ‘Who gained from the man’s death?’

  ‘The solicitor. Lawrence’s daughter inherited five million pounds, and her two children one million each. Ralph Lawrence, his son, nothing, although there were conditions under which he could inherit.’

  ‘Cut out of the will?’

  ‘Without question, and Ralph’s son is an anarchist, as well as a drug addict.’

  ‘Dead within a month, if the drug addict got hold of some of the money. Anarchists would have no issue with Gilbert Lawrence being murdered.’ Goddard said.

  ‘They’re only pretend anarchists. A brick thrown at a bank, a demonstration somewhere else. Just assorted ratbags, although their leader, Professor Giles Helmsley, is a unusual character.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Academic, well-spoken, and up until six years ago, a member of the faculty of the London School of Economics.’

  ‘Any reason to suspect him of the murder of Gilbert Lawrence?’

  ‘No proof. That’s the problem, the man is killed, nobod
y sees anything, nobody hears anything. The housekeeper is not a suspect either.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘No motive. She’s been working for the family for decades, even before Lawrence went crazy. And she received a million pounds in the will.’

  ‘If she knew about the wife upstairs, she could have felt the need to do something.’

  ‘No one had been up there, not for a very long time, apart from the dead man. The CSIs have been over the place with a fine-tooth comb. We had a concern about what Molly Dempster may have known, but we’ve not come up with anything. The off-licence where he used to go once a week is not in the best area. Someone could have followed him home, seen the opportunity to accost the man, steal some money.’

  ‘Did the people in the street, the off-licence, know who he was?’ Goddard asked.

  ‘Some would have.’

  ‘And nothing from the CSIs?’

  ‘There was a clear sign where the housekeeper had walked, as well as the postman, but nothing more.’

  ‘Then it’s not someone off the street, is it?’

  ‘Gilbert Lawrence sent a letter to everyone important outlining certain facts, including why his wife was upstairs. No document has been received with accounts, real estate holdings, passwords. Everything is with Dundas.’

  ‘And Lawrence is certified as sane?’ Goddard said.

  ‘We’re checking, but we’re expecting Ralph Lawrence to dispute the will. He may be a con artist, but he’s got a point. An evaluation of sanity can only be based on the facts presented. And not one of these experts knew about how he had taken his wife, buried her in the ground underneath the cellar floor for some months, and then exhumed her, removed what he could of the excess skin and internals, and then had her remaining body eaten by dermestid beetles until she was virtually only bone.’

  ‘But she could have been murdered?’

  ‘It’s possible. Unprovable, though.’

  Isaac realised he’d given his senior very little. As soon as he’d left he called in his team.

  ‘What do we have?’ Isaac said.

  ‘Ralph Lawrence met with his sister,’ Wendy said.

  ‘How do we know?’

  ‘I’ve been keeping a watch on him after I found him at another hotel. Since meeting with her – they met at a restaurant – he’s moved out of the hotel and back into something decent.’

  ‘What about Dundas and his daughter? Any movement there?’

  ‘They’ve done nothing wrong that we can see,’ Larry said.

  ‘Yet they have gained the most from this.’

  ‘On the face of it.’

  ‘Larry, we need to go and interview the postman who found Gilbert Lawrence,’ Isaac said.

  Chapter 11

  ‘I still had to deliver the mail,’ was not the comment that Isaac and Larry were looking for.

  Jim Porter, the postman, had been found at his home five miles from where he had discovered the body of Gilbert Lawrence. Judging by the condition of the flat he lived in, he was a slovenly man. He had not been pleased to see two police officers at his door, although it was a block of flats which the local police would have been only too familiar with. It was grim, low rent, and definitely not the sort of place that Isaac liked. His small flat in Willesden was not much larger than the postman’s, but it did have a pleasant outlook, whereas the view from where the three men stood was of an old industrial site.

  ‘They’re putting up some fancy high-rise for the wealthy, not for us,’ Porter said as he looked out of the window.

  ‘Gilbert Lawrence was wealthy,’ Isaac said. ‘You must have been tempted.’

  ‘Who wouldn’t be? I’d heard stories about the man: reclusive, never spoke, the smell of rotting fish.’

  ‘Rotting fish?’

  ‘That’s what they said at the off-licence.’

  ‘Who else have you spoken to about him?’ Larry said. He looked around the flat, realised his wife wouldn’t have crossed the threshold. He had to admit his wife looked after him, the children, and the house well, and with her, there were no dirty cups in the sink, no magazines thrown haphazardly across any vacant space.

  ‘Nobody, not really, but sometimes people liked to talk, and old man Lawrence was as good a subject as any other.’

  ‘Molly Dempster?’

  ‘She liked to talk, but if I asked about him inside, she’d clam up. I was never sure what to make of her.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You’ve been in the house; didn’t you feel it?’

  ‘Feel what?’

  ‘As though it was evil, which I suppose it was.’

  ‘You had been in?’

  ‘Only as far as the kitchen. Sometimes she’d ask me in for a cup of tea. I always got the impression that she was glad of the company.’

  ‘Did you ever see Lawrence?’

  ‘Not me. Once I heard a noise from inside, as though something had fallen over and smashed on the floor, and once or twice the sound of footsteps. I’m not squeamish, far from it, but I never wanted to stay there for long. Do you reckon Molly’s all there?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I don’t know. It’s just the feeling that something wasn’t right. Now we know it wasn’t, but Molly, she must have known something.’

  ‘According to her, she hadn’t. She served the family all her adult life, that was all.’

  ‘I read in the newspaper that Lawrence had given her a house and money.’

  ‘He had. For loyal service to him and his family.’

  ‘But he never saw his children.’

  ‘Not since he locked himself away. Had you ever seen them there?’

  ‘I saw the daughter once or twice, but she only ever spoke to Molly from the footpath outside the front gate. The son, Ralph, he never came around, but Molly said he was a lovely child, not so good when he grew up.’

  ‘You never saw him?’

  ‘Not me. Molly may have, but she didn’t say much, although I could tell she was fond of the man inside the house. Supposedly at night, he’d come out into the kitchen, eat his meal and then retreat back to his place.’

  ‘For a postman, you seem to know a lot about Gilbert Lawrence and his family history.’

  ‘Just snippets over a few years. I saw him once shuffling down to the off-licence. I walked past him, said hello, but nothing.’

  ‘Why did you talk to him?’

  ‘Just curious. He didn’t reply, didn’t even look my way. What would have happened if someone got in his way? Would he have reacted?’

  ‘Porter, at some time we’ll find out the full story of Gilbert Lawrence, who killed him and why. We’ll also find out if you’ve been lying or failing to tell us the full story. If you didn’t kill him, then it would be better to be honest now. Later on, you could be charged with obstructing justice. Do you understand this?’ Isaac said.

  ‘I understand, but I’m just the postman, a bit too nosy sometimes for my own good. You’d be surprised what I’ve seen over the years, but Lawrence, I don’t know what to say. I didn’t kill him, and no doubt you’ve checked, but there’s no criminal record against me.’

  ‘We’ve checked. You’re clean, but you must have seen something of the man, seen something that would help us with our enquiry.’

  ‘Once or twice, when I was delivering letters along Lawrence’s street, I’d see a man standing by the post box, looking in the direction of his house.’

  ‘Checking the house?’

  ‘I don’t know. It only happened a few times in the weeks before his death, and it wasn’t always the same man. I know what I saw, but why they were there, and what they were after, I can’t tell you.’

  ‘Would you recognise these men if you saw them again?’

  ‘Probably, but if one of them is a murderer, I’m not too keen.’

  ‘We’ll give you protection if it’s needed.’

  ‘And when’s that? When you find me dead? Whoever they were, they weren’t there to mak
e sure the old man was well and in good spirits.’

  ‘It’s more than that,’ Larry said. ‘The man did leave the house on an occasional basis. If they had wanted to do him harm, they could have then.’

  ‘Anything else?’ Isaac asked.

  ‘His letterbox used to fill up occasionally, and I always pushed the letters through. I couldn’t go back to the post office and say that I couldn’t deliver them when there was a letterbox in the door of the house, could I?’

  ‘You could have given them to Molly Dempster.’

  ‘I could have if she would have accepted them, but she wouldn’t.’

  ‘Any idea why?’

  ‘She never said. Anyway, there was this one time. It was about a year ago, and don’t ask me the date, as I can’t remember back that far. The letterbox was full, and I’ve got a letter to push through. It’s thick and in a padded bag. So I give the letters a shove, and they fall out of the back of it and onto the floor inside. I kneel down to hold up the flap on the letterbox to push the letter through. Now, most letterboxes have a weak spring on them, but Lawrence’s is heavy duty, and it’s hard to hold open.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘I’ve got the flap open, and I have the letter halfway through when it was snatched from me.’

  ‘Gilbert Lawrence?’

  ‘It had to be.’

  ‘Did you see him?’

  ‘I did. He was kneeling down on his side. Our eyes made contact. Nothing was said, he grabbed the letter, the flap closed, and I grabbed my bag and beat a hasty retreat. Not before I took a second look, though.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Maybe it’s too many horror movies, maybe not, but I was scared.’

  ‘But nothing happened.’

  ‘I know it didn’t but looking back at those eyes scared me.’

  ‘Did you see anything else?’

  ‘He swore, but to himself, not to me. I had seen inside the house, and I saw him standing ten feet, maybe fifteen, back from the letterbox.’

  ‘Why didn’t you just put the letter through and leave?’

  ‘Curiosity. I couldn’t help myself. I kept looking, and then he disappeared. After that, I never looked again.’