by Tim Ellis
‘I don’t think so.’
‘Good.’
He walked along the corridor to the toilet, washed and dried his hands and face, spiked his hair – although he thought he was looking a bit lived-in, and his hair was far too long for spiking really. He desperately needed a haircut, and decided to go and see Wally – his old barber – tomorrow morning before he had to stuff it into a ponytail. He made his way down the stairs to the briefing room.
The noise fell to a whisper in the briefing room as he sat down and poured himself a glass of water.
He smiled with his mouth. ‘Ladies and gentlemen . . .’
‘Steve Bamping from NBC Europe, Inspector. Can you tell us what happened in Hainault last night?’
‘Surely you should be speaking to officers from the Met, Mr Bamping. If I’m not mistaken, Hainault is the Met’s responsibility.’
‘They won’t tell us a damned thing.’
‘And you expect me to?’
‘You and DC Richards were filmed leaving Butterfield Spire early this morning.’
‘We were visiting friends. It was a long night. If something else happened, I suggest you speak to DCI Annie Wyatt from the Met. Now, if we could focus on the reason why we’re all here?’
‘Nicki Jacobs from the Chigwell Herald. Do you have any suspects yet?’
‘We certainly do, Miss Jacobs. Of course, we’re at a very sensitive stage of the investigation. I can’t say any more for the moment, but an arrest is imminent.’
‘Clare Tindle from the Redbridge Camera,’ a ginger-haired woman said, waving her arm about frenetically. ‘Have you discovered who the father of Miss Golding’s baby is yet?’
‘DNA comparisons are being made, Miss Tindle. I’m waiting for a phone call from the pathologist.’
‘Mark Horton from the Mission Daily. Rumours are beginning to circulate that Catrina Golding was the latest victim of a serial killer. What can you tell us about that, Inspector?’
He was sure there was a leak inside the station. Someone was making money by passing on information to the press. He’d like to get his hands on whoever it was.
‘You know I don’t react well to news of rumours, Mr Horton. The idea of Catrina Golding being the victim of a serial killer is preposterous.’
‘Colin McPhail from the Southend Echo. I have it on good authority that you’ve arrested a man called Edgar Beasley, Inspector.’
‘Good authority? What does that mean?’
‘You know I can’t reveal my sources.’
‘Well, I can tell you that Mr Beasley is not a suspect. He’s merely helping us with our enquiries.’
‘Raffi Wilson from the Identity Channel. I’ve been doing my own research, Inspector.’
‘Really? I would have paid good money to have seen that.’
There was a ripple of laughter.
‘It seems that Miss Golding was a member of a website called SEX GODDESS, and . . .’
‘We’re well aware of her online activities Ms Wilson, and we’ve eliminated the contacts she made online from our enquiries.’
‘Becky McKeever from U>Direct. I mentioned the possibility of a serial killer at an earlier briefing, and now Mark Horton has made a point of mentioning the rumours that won’t seem to go away. Are you sure you’re not lying to us, Inspector?’
‘You know me better than that, Miss McKeever. I can’t do anything about rumours except to reiterate that this case has nothing to do with a serial killer.’
Fisheyes was standing directly in front of him. ‘Where’s Detective Richards, Inspector?’
‘Otherwise engaged in essential work. What’s your name? Which media outlet do you work for? And why do you want to know about Detective Richards?’
The flash from a camera blinded him momentarily, and when his sight returned fisheyes was gone as if he never existed. He stood up. ‘Thank you for coming, ladies and gentlemen. There’ll be another briefing tomorrow at the same time.’
On his way up the stairs he received a phone call from Doc Riley.
‘Hello, Doc. Looking forward to a relaxing weekend?’
‘I used to know what a weekend was until I came to work here, and I can tell you that your murders don’t help with my workload either.’
‘They’re hardly “my murders”, Doc.’
‘Catrina Golding.’
‘Yes?’
‘Paternity tests.’
‘Yes?’
‘Martin Marples.’
‘No!’
‘Yes.’
‘He’d had a vasectomy.’
‘I can only tell you what we found.’
‘Thanks, Doc. Oh, by the way . . .’
‘Yes?’
‘For your information only.’
‘Of course.’
‘It looks as though Catrina Golding was killed by a serial killer.’
‘I’m not surprised.’
‘Oh?’
‘If you and Richards are involved, there’s bound to be a serial killer lurking about somewhere.’
‘Well, enjoy yourself, whatever it is you’re doing over the weekend, Doc.’
‘Thanks. And you.’
He ended the call. A holiday – that’s what he needed.
***
Rosanne Catalano opened the passenger door and Jen nearly died of fright.
‘Oh God!’ she said clutching her chest. ‘I thought . . .’
‘What? It was my cheating bastard of a husband come to murder you while you were sleeping on the job?’
‘Something like that.’
‘Does he know you’re following him?’
‘I don’t think so.’
Rosanne put a spade on the back seat and scrambled into the passenger seat. She held the door open with her knee to let some air in. ‘I’ve brought egg mayonnaise sandwiches and a flask of tea – that all right with you?’
‘Very all right, Sarge. Lunch didn’t work out so well.’
‘Rosanne. Seeing as you’re intimate with my marital problems, you can call me Rosanne.’
‘I’m Jen.’
‘And you work at Southend?’
‘Yes. In Missing Persons.’
‘Any good?’
‘I like it.’
‘And you’re Rowley’s fiancée?’
‘Yes.’
‘He’s an okay guy.’
‘I think so.’
‘Let’s hope he doesn’t cheat on you. Although, in my vast experience – all men are the same.’
‘Rowley’s different.’
‘Yeah, every woman says that about the guy she’s in love with, but in the end they’re all the same – cheating lowlife bastards.’
‘Rowley wouldn’t cheat on me, Rosanne.’
‘He will – sooner rather than later – they all do. What did the woman my husband was slobbering over look like?’
‘She was really attractive – sorry. Not that you aren’t . . .’
‘It’s all right, you don’t have to be polite. I’ve been through the wringer a few times. But not so long ago, Bobby Catalano couldn’t keep his hands off me, couldn’t wait to marry me and spend the rest of his life keeping me happy . . .’ She began to cry.
Jen rested her hand on Rosanne’s thigh. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘It’s not your fault. I wanted to know, and now I do. She’s younger than me, isn’t she?’
‘Not by much I’d say. To be honest, I thought she was a bit skinny. She had straggly brown hair, and wasn’t wearing a bra. I thought her breasts sagged too much not to wear a bra, and she wore a wedding ring.’
‘She was married?’
‘I guess so.’
‘I thought the bastard would have gone for someone a lot younger than me, with perky breasts and a tight arse.’
‘Here he comes,’ Jen said.
They both squirmed down into the seats.
Roseanne but her sunglasses on. ‘I’ll keep low, so he doesn’t spot me.’
Jen turned the key in the ignition and the engine
burst into life. She watched and waited. The subject turned left out of the works’ car park again and headed towards Old Nazeing Road. She let three cars pass by before following him.
‘Well, he’s not going home – that’s for sure,’ Rosanne said.
‘Maybe he’s going to meet the woman at the Kingsmead Hotel again.’
‘Maybe, but why hasn’t he disposed of the black plastic sacks in his boot?’
Jen pulled a face. ‘I don’t know.’
Instead of carrying on towards the Kingsmead Country Hotel, the subject turned right down Green Lane, and because there were no other cars about, Jen had to drop a long way back so that it wasn’t obvious she was following him.
‘Where’s he gone?’ Rosanne asked as the turned a bend.
Jen had lost him.
‘Stop, and reverse back up.’
She wasn’t very good at reversing, but she put the car into reverse anyway and began slowly snaking backwards. Eventually, they came to a dirt track.
‘Here,’ Rosanne said. ‘Pull off the road further along and park up. Don’t slam the door when you get out.’
Jen did as Rosanne said.
They crept through the woods until they came upon Bobby Catalano burying the three black plastic sacks in a clearing, stamping the dirt down level, and then covering the disturbed ground over with dried leaves, twigs and pine cones until it looked no different from the surrounding forest. He then put the spade in the boot of his car, slammed the boot shut, climbed into his VW Polo and drove back along the dirt track to Green Lane.
‘We need the spade,’ Rosanne said.
‘I’ll get it,’ Jen volunteered.
Rosanne peered along the dirt track. ‘We’ll both get it. I want to be sure Bobby has gone.’
They walked back along the track to the road. The red VW Polo was nowhere to be seen. After getting the spade off the back seat they walked back along the track to the clearing where the subject had buried the three black sacks.
Rosanne began digging.
‘Do you want me to dig?’ Jen asked.
‘I’ll start. We’ll take turns.’
It took them twenty minutes to uncover the first sack, which reeked of rotting meat.
They both stared at the top of the sack.
‘Should I open it?’ Jen asked.
Rosanne didn’t answer, but fell to her knees and pulled at the cord tied around the top of the sack. ‘Fucking, Jesus!’ she said, throwing herself backwards.
‘Oh God!’ Jen said when she looked at what Rosanne had uncovered.
There was a man’s bloody severed hand and the right side of a blackened face on the top of the sack. The eyeball had popped out on its stalk, and was being devoured by maggots.
Rosanne called the police.
They walked back to Jen’s car and waited for forensics and the police to arrive.
Jen poured both of them a cup of tea from the flask and passed one to Rosanne. ‘They won’t send anyone from Hoddesdon, will they?’ she said.
‘No, I shouldn’t think so. They’ll probably give it to Hatfield Police Station in Hertfordshire. Not all the stations have a murder team.’
‘Do you think that’s what happened?’
‘You don’t chop people up and dispose of their bodies in a forest for no reason.’
‘I suppose not,’ Jen said.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Stanley Thomas, who lived at 57 Monkswood Avenue in Waltham Abbey, was eighty-seven years old. Mrs Avril Pertwee – a registered carer – came in twice a day to look after his needs and make sure he took his tablets. Meals-on-wheels arrived around four-thirty in the afternoon to deliver a substantial hot meal that had already been cut up ready to eat, together with a pudding of either jam roly-poly or apple crumble for afters.
‘You don’t have a son or a grandson, do you?’ Stick enquired from the comfort of an ancient sofa. As he shifted on the sofa he could hear the spiral wire compression springs creak and twang, and the sounds jerked his memory back to a lonely childhood.
‘I have a daughter – Lucile. Lives in Taunton, never comes to visit. Married a doctor and thinks she’s too good for her working-class father now. She has two sons, but they’re called Rupert and Manfred. I mean, who calls a child either of those names?’
‘You don’t know of anyone else called Stanley Thomas, do you?’
‘Can’t say I do.’ He laughed. ‘They broke the mould when they made me. That’s what Mabel used to say before she passed. God rest her soul.’
‘How long have you been on your own?’
‘Fifteen years. She died of cervical cancer that the doctors failed to spot.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that.’
He shrugged and winced. ‘It is what it is.’
‘Is there a young man living around here who walks with a limp and rides a motorcycle?’
‘Not to my knowledge, but then I don’t get out much now.’
Stick stood up. ‘They don’t make sofas like that anymore.’
‘That’s for sure.’
‘Avril – Mrs Pertwee – says it’s a fire risk and I should get rid of it. I’ve had it for thirty-seven years and it hasn’t self-combusted yet I tell her. When I die they can get rid of it. I won’t care one jot then.’
‘Thanks for your time, Mr Thomas. Sorry to have bothered you.’
‘Welcome anytime, son. Got plenty of time, and ain’t too bothered who I spend it with.’
Outside, he stared into the dying sun. Now what?
‘All right if we go now, Sarge?’ Susan Jackson asked.
‘Yes, of course. Sorry to have wasted your time.’
‘No problem,’ she said.
They climbed back into the squad car and drove away.
He pulled out Richard Jackson’s business card. The old man’s home address – 12 Mulberry Close in Wormley – was on his way home. He’d give it one last try, and then he’d call it a day.
Mulberry Close was full of bungalows that overlooked the Lea, Railway and Boot Pit Aqueducts, which fed into the River Lea Navigation system.
He knocked on the door.
An old woman with what looked like a tea cosy on her head opened the door. She was stooped over, had white wispy hair sticking out beneath the cosy, and large thin-rimmed glasses. ‘Jehovah’s Witness?’
He shook his head. ‘No, they come round in twos.’ He showed his warrant card. ‘Detective Sergeant Gilbert from Hoddesdon Police Station. I spoke to your husband earlier at his shop, and I’d like another word with him, if that’s all right?’
‘You spoke to him?’
‘Yes. He had an ear trumpet.’
‘The bastard.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘He said he’d lost it. Now I know, he took it to work so he didn’t have to listen to me whisper sweet nothings to him.’
‘I probably shouldn’t have said anything.’
‘Too late now, young man. I’ve got the fucking bastard by the short and curlies. You’d better come in then.’
He stepped inside. It smelled of old people. In fact, the bungalow had the same smell as Stanley Thomas’ house, and again his memories were pulled back to his childhood. Not long before his parents had died, they’d taken him to see a bony old woman that they introduced as his one remaining grandmother on his mother’s side of the family. She had smelled the same. Up until then, he hadn’t realised he still had any grandparents. Not that it made any difference – within two weeks she was dead anyway.
‘Tea?’
‘Yes, please.’
‘He’s in the living room reading the subtitles on the news. Go on in, but don’t bother asking him any questions. You’ll have to write your questions on the pad on the coffee table in front of him.’
‘Thank you.’
‘No, thank you.’ She grinned a toothless grin like a giant fossilised Galapagos tortoise. ‘I’m going to make the bastard’s life a living nightmare now.’
It seemed like he’
d dropped the old man in it. He went into the living room. Mr Jackson waved at him, and glanced at the door.
‘You didn’t tell her we’d been speaking earlier, did you?’
Stick pulled a face and nodded.
‘Oh, my God. You have no idea what you’ve done. You didn’t tell her about the ear trumpet, did you?’
He nodded again.
The old man’s eyes rolled up into his head like someone possessed. ‘I’m a dead man.’
Stick picked up the pen and pad.
‘Sorry.’
‘Ha! Lot of good that will do me when I’m up to my neck in the sulphur pits of hell.’
Mrs Jackson came in with the tea and biscuits. ‘I see the bastard knows. Good, it’ll make tormenting him that much more enjoyable.’
‘Did I get any tea and biscuits, my little swamp monster?’
She smiled at him. ‘It won’t be long, my heart,’ Mrs Jackson said. ‘The arsenic crystals need time to dissolve.’
He nodded as if he had heard what his wife had said, then turned to Stick. ‘Did you arrest Stanley Thomas?’
Stick shook his head, and wrote on the pad: The buyer gave you a false name and address.
‘I’m sorry to hear that. Some people have no scruples.’
Is there anything else you can remember about him?
‘Not really.’
Stick didn’t see any point in hanging around. He ate the chocolate digestive, washed it down with the tea and stood up. ‘Thanks for your hospitality,’ he said to Mrs Jackson. ‘And please don’t take my slip-of-the-tongue out on your husband.’
‘Don’t worry, the bastard is in safe hands with me,’ Detective Chief Constable.’
‘It’s . . .’
‘I remember something,’ Jackson shouted.
Stick stared at him.
‘He arrived on a motorcycle.’
Stick wrote on the pad: YES?
‘Casualty Clearing Station 540V.’
What does that mean?
The number plate was: CCS 540V. I remember it because of the acronym.’
The registration number was CCS 540V?
‘Yes.’
Stick kissed the old man on the top of the head, and then wished he hadn’t. He wrote on the pad: You deserve a medal.
He phoned the Duty Sergeant.
‘Colleen, it’s Rowley.’
