The Murder List

by Roger Silverwood

  There was uproar from them. ‘That’s not fair. We’re speaking for the people, we’ve a right to know. It’s not safe to sleep in our beds at night.’

  Angel held up a hand to speak. Out came the microphones again.

  ‘What I will do is hold a press conference this afternoon at the police station at 1600 hours, when I will be as forthcoming as I can. Now please pack up and leave here now. Thank you.’

  Then he turned round, patted the back of the PC on duty there, put his hand on the door handle, pushed open the door and went into the little terraced house.

  On hearing the door of 62 Cemetery Road open and close, one of the SOCO team members came through from the back. ‘Oh. Good morning, sir. DS Taylor and Dr Mac are upstairs where the victim is situated.’

  ‘Thank you. Have you finished the vacuuming and print taking?’

  ‘Yes, sir. You won’t need gloves.’

  Angel nodded and made for the stairs. When he had reached the top, he said, ‘Is it all done? Can I come in?’

  ‘Of course, sir,’ Taylor said.

  Taylor and Mac looked at the inspector as he opened the bedroom door.

  ‘And I am ready for off, Michael,’ Mac said.

  They moved back from the bed in the little room to let Angel see the victim.

  The body was that of a skinny woman in a nightdress, sitting upright. It was in the bed, propped against the bed head with pillows. There was blood all over the nightdress and a cauliflower in her lap.

  Angel went close up to her and looked in every direction. Then he leaned back, pursed his lips, and looked at the doctor.

  ‘All right, Mac,’ he said. ‘What have you got?’

  Mac said, ‘Married woman, aged sixty, stabbed three times in the heart. Exactly the same as the other two. Been dead approximately six or seven hours. That means she was murdered between five and eight o’clock this morning.’

  Angel nodded then said, ‘I see the cauliflower. What about the rice?’

  Mac said, ‘Oh yes. A gullet and a mouth full of rice.’

  He turned up his nose and shook his head. He looked at Taylor. ‘Was access the same as Fay Hough?’

  ‘Yes, sir. A crowbar round the lock on the back door.’

  He rubbed his chin. ‘And is there a note?’

  Taylor said, ‘I’ve got that, sir.’

  Mac said, ‘Can I have the body?’

  Angel wiped his chin with his hand. ‘I don’t see why not, Mac,’ he said. ‘Yes, of course. Soon as you like.’

  Mac nodded, took out his mobile and went out of the room onto the landing.

  Angel turned back to Taylor. ‘I want to see that note.’

  ‘It was tucked down the neck of the nightdress,’ Taylor said. ‘We opened it, and I copied it out. If it’s all right with you, we’ll x-ray this paper and see if that tells us anything new.’

  ‘Good idea, Don, but let me read what it says.’

  He passed Angel his notebook, holding it open at the page where it was copied.

  ‘There, sir,’ Taylor said.

  Angel looked at it and then read it out aloud:

  Felicity Lunn was too much fun,

  Nasty, dirty, and had to be done.

  Felicity is third, and there are three more to go.

  He read it again silently then handed it back. He was thinking … the note said, three more to go. He gritted his teeth at the thought of it.

  He looked round the tiny room. He had to squeeze between the double bed, the bedside cupboard, the dressing-table and the wardrobe. As he passed the window, he looked out at the view of the cemetery and at the street below. There were still cars and people hanging around. He wasn’t pleased.

  Angel stuck out his chin and the muscles of his jaw and neck tightened. He thrust his hand into his pocket and took out his mobile.

  ‘Just look at them, Don. Like ghouls,’ he said. ‘There’s a bit of a throng outside. I’ve tried to thin it out.’

  He went out of the room and ambled across the landing into a tiny single-bedded room, the only other room upstairs besides the bathroom. He left the door open and sat on the bed.

  He opened the phone and scrolled down to Inspector Asquith at the station. He was in charge of the uniformed branch of the force at Bromersley.

  ‘Hello, Michael, what’s up?’ Asquith said.

  ‘Haydn, the young constable you have on the door of 62 Cemetery Road needs some assistance, also there is a build-up of the media outside the place and the pathologist wants to collect the body soon. Could you send some lads round and sort it out?’

  Asquith said, ‘You couldn’t have called at a worse time, Michael. I’m six men down away on a course, three off sick and those Sheffield Road traffic lights are not working.’

  ‘Well, do what you can, Haydn, please.’

  ‘I’ll sort it. Cheers.’

  Angel closed his phone. He ruminated quietly, rubbing his chin for a few moments, then he stood up, and went back into the bedroom where the murder had been committed. Taylor was standing, looking down at the clipboard he was holding.

  Angel said, ‘Well, Don, have you anything else unusual to tell me?’

  Taylor looked round. ‘No, sir. Nothing pertaining to the attacker has been vacuumed from the body.’

  Angel glared at him. ‘Nothing?’ he said.

  Taylor stopped the searching and turned round to look at Angel. ‘Nothing that we can be certain came from her attacker.’

  Angel wrinkled his nose. ‘You are methodically searching the bins, Don, aren’t you? And checking for prints on anything that could have been left by the killer?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Taylor said. ‘In this instance, we have emptied the rubbish into a large evidence bag and we are taking it back to the station where we can examine it item by item more easily.’

  Angel nodded then put a hand to his forehead and rubbed it with his fingers. ‘Where was the husband when all this was happening?’ he said.

  ‘He has a perfect alibi, sir,’ Taylor said. ‘He’s a bus driver and he was on a scheduled service, taking forty-four passengers on an early shift to work at that massive warehouse they’ve built at Little Copton.’

  ‘Oh,’ he said, pushing out his lower lip. ‘Where is he now?’

  ‘With his married daughter, at her house.’

  Angel’s mobile rang out.

  ‘Excuse me,’ he said, then he turned back to the open door, went back into the little bedroom and sat on the bed. He took the phone out of his pocket, opened it. He saw who was calling him. He pressed the button and said, ‘What is it, Ahmed?’

  ‘If it’s not convenient, sir—’ Ahmed said.

  ‘No, it’s fine, lad. What is it?’

  ‘You wanted to know about Gladys Grant’s husband, Philip Grant, who had lived at 83 Sebastopol Terrace, sir.’

  ‘Yes. What have you got?’

  ‘He left Bromersley in 1986, sir, Gladys divorced him in 1987. I lost him for a while, but then he popped up applying for a licence to sell wines and spirits at a corner shop in Leeds in 1988. Lived there until he died in 2005 aged fifty-four.’

  ‘He’s definitely dead?’

  ‘I’ve got a copy of his death certificate, sir. Under cause of death, it says, atheroma, myocarditis and broncho-pneumonia. Dates and addresses all fit.’

  Angel sighed. Another dead end, he was thinking. ‘Right, Ahmed. Thank you,’ he said. ‘Good work.’

  ‘And you wanted to know about Lance Hough, sir. Well, I phoned Mixendon’s and they said that he was in Paris, staying at the Hotel La Fayette, and calling on a customer close by. But he has left there and they don’t quite know where he is. They think he must be on his way back home.’

  Angel rubbed his forehead gently with his fingers. ‘All right, Ahmed. Thank you. Now, there’s something else. I’ve told the media that there’ll be a Press Conference this afternoon at four o’clock. Will you make sure the parade room will be available? We’ll need about forty chairs and a table at th
e front. You’ve seen how we do it, haven’t you?’

  ‘Oh yes, sir,’ Ahmed said. ‘Will do.’

  ‘Right,’ he said, ‘I’ll leave it with you.’

  He ended the call, closed the phone and put it back in his pocket. It rang out immediately. He pulled it out again, saw that it was Scrivens calling. He pressed the button and said, ‘Yes, Ted?’

  ‘I have found a witness, sir, he’s the actual newsagent. He does the early morning deliveries to Monserrat Flats himself. He says boys are no longer reliable.’

  Angel blinked. Possibly good news, he thought. ‘Great. What did he see?’

  ‘He said a queer-looking woman in a long sheepskin coat passed him, rushing down the steps leaving, as he went into the building,’ Scrivens said.

  Angel’s eyes narrowed. ‘Did he comment on the woman’s hair or anything else about her?’

  ‘No, sir. I pressed him as much as I could.’

  ‘Why did he describe her as “queer-looking”?’

  ‘I’m not sure, sir.’

  ‘I’d better see him. What’s his name and where is he?’

  ‘Alec Moore, sir, and his shop address is 77/79 Sheffield Road.’

  SEVEN

  Angel stopped the BMW outside Moore’s Newsagents on Sheffield Road. He locked the car and went into the shop.

  Alec Moore was straightening the newspapers on the counter.

  Angel introduced himself and said, ‘Thank you for assisting us, Mr Moore. What I would like to know is if you saw the woman’s face.’

  ‘No, Inspector,’ he said. ‘She never turned to look at me. She was in too much of a hurry to get away from the building.’

  ‘What colour was her hair?’

  Moore frowned. ‘I’m not sure. Grey, I think. She was certainly no chicken, but she could move fast when she wanted to.’

  ‘Was she a big woman?’

  ‘Well, yes. She certainly wasn’t skinny. Yes. I suppose you’d say she was well-made.’

  ‘I understand that you told my sergeant that she was “queer-looking”. What did you mean by that? You told me that you didn’t see her face.’

  Moore ran a hand over his face. ‘Ah, yes,’ he said. ‘It’s hard to explain, Inspector. I didn’t see her face. I suppose what I meant was that there was something incongruous about her age, her size and the speed she was able to make down those steps.’

  Angel frowned. He didn’t think he was going to get any additional information from him so he thanked him, came out of the shop and returned to the police station.

  He drove the BMW onto his allocated parking space at the back of the station and made his way through the back door, past the cells and down the corridor.

  Ahmed saw him through the open door of the CID room and ran out into the corridor.

  ‘Excuse me, sir,’ Ahmed said. ‘There’s a Mr Lance Hough in reception waiting to see you.’

  Angel stopped. ‘Lance Hough?’ he said, then he pursed his lips. He wanted to see him. He looked at his watch. It was twenty past three. ‘Is everything ready for the press conference, Ahmed?’

  ‘Yes, sir. Would you like to have a look?’

  ‘I had hoped to use the next half hour or so to prepare what I wanted to say,’ Angel said.

  ‘Mr Hough has been waiting about half an hour, sir.’

  ‘You’d better bring him down, Ahmed. You’ll have to make it quick.’

  ‘Right, sir,’ Ahmed said and he dashed off.

  Angel went into his office. He picked up the phone and dialled a single digit. It was soon answered. ‘SOCO, DS Taylor.’

  ‘Ah, you’re back, Don,’ he said. ‘I will shortly have Lance Hough in my office. You want his prints for elimination purposes, don’t you?’

  ‘Oh yes, sir,’ Taylor said.

  ‘I’ll send him up to your office in the next twenty minutes or so.’ Angel returned the phone to its holster and quickly piled the papers on his desk into one heap which he then slid across to the far corner.

  There was a knock on his door. It was Ahmed with a smartly dressed, sun-tanned man in his sixties.

  ‘Mr Hough, sir,’ Ahmed said.

  ‘Thank you, Ahmed,’ Angel said, then he turned to the man and said, ‘Come in, Mr Hough. Please sit down.’

  The man chose the chair nearest the desk and sat down.

  Ahmed went out and closed the door.

  Angel said, ‘Let me say how sorry I am, Mr Hough. And assure you that my team and I are doing our best to find your wife’s murderer.’

  ‘Thank you. I regret being away from home. If I had been here this would never have happened. I have presented myself here to you as soon as I could get here, to see if there is anything I could do to assist in your inquiries.’

  ‘Thank you very much for that. Not many next of kin are as helpful as that. How did you find out about your wife’s passing?’

  ‘I phoned Fay this morning about eight o’clock, your time. There’s was no reply. I tried several times but there was still no reply. I was worried, so eventually I rang our friend, Delia Ivory. She told me what had happened. Naturally, I dropped everything there and made a bee line for home. I saw Delia. She told me that you were dealing with it. I was pleased about that. I’ve heard of your reputation. Now what can I do to help?’

  ‘Well, firstly, we’ll need your fingerprints for elimination purposes.’

  Hough leaned back in the chair and put a hand to his chin. His forehead creased as he said, ‘Oh, is that absolutely necessary?’

  Angel said, ‘It’s only used to determine prints left by you. After all, you live there and your prints are bound to be all over the place. Of course, when the case is over, all the elimination prints taken are torn up and burned.’

  ‘Are they really?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ Angel said. ‘Now, I heard you say that you’ve been back to your flat, Mr Hough. Did you have a good look round? Did you find that anything had been taken?’

  ‘I didn’t notice anything missing. My silver golf trophies were all there. We don’t have any cash, or silver or gold or works of art or anything of that sort, Inspector.’

  ‘Did you find anything that had been left by the killer?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Can you think of any reason why anyone would want to murder your wife?’

  ‘No. I can’t. Certainly not.’

  ‘And where exactly were you at 5.30 this morning?’

  ‘I was in bed asleep in room 414 in the Hotel La Fayette, in Paris.’

  ‘Do you have a witness who can corroborate the fact?’

  Hough blinked. He thought a moment and said, ‘I wasn’t sharing my bed with anyone, Inspector.’

  ‘I didn’t for one moment think that you were, Mr Hough. But you may have had room service attend to you during the night, or a porter may have given you an early morning call.’

  Hough shook his head. ‘No, I didn’t see anyone during the night.’

  Angel rubbed his chin. ‘Pity,’ he said.

  Hough’s lips curled with anger. He clenched his fists. ‘I had dinner in the hotel last night,’ he said, ‘so I was in the restaurant until about 9.30, and breakfast there at 7.30 this morning. The staff would confirm that, I’m sure. I hope you don’t think that during the night, I got a taxi to Charles de Gaulle airport, then a plane to Leeds/Bradford, and a taxi to Bromersley, killed my own darling wife, then taxied back to Leeds/Bradford airport, flew to Paris and took another taxi back to the hotel. Taking the requirement to pass through security, passports and customs four times, I’m not even sure that there would have been sufficient time.’

  ‘Of course I don’t, Mr Hough. But I have to check. And what were you actually doing that required you to be there?’

  ‘It was to do with my work. I was sewing up a deal with the fashion house Le Bon on behalf of Mixendon’s Glass Works. We are to supply them with uniquely shaped and tinted bottles for their top of the range perfumes.’

  ‘Right, Mr Hough. I think that’s about it
for now,’ he said, reaching out for the phone. He tapped in Ahmed’s number.

  ‘Will you take Mr Hough up to SOCO? Don Taylor is expecting him.’

  ‘Right, sir.’

  Angel replaced the phone. He looked at Hough and said, ‘Thank you for coming in.’

  They stood up.

  ‘Detective Constable Ahaz is on his way. He will show you where you need to be.’

  ‘Thank you, Inspector. I hope you find the bastard who murdered my wife.’

  In his heart of hearts, Angel thought, ‘So do I,’ but he actually found himself saying, ‘We will, sir. We will.’

  They shook hands.

  It was 3.55 p.m. and the parade room at Bromersley Police Station was buzzing with reporters, photographers, and men with videotape cameras on their shoulders. There was an air of excitement and lots of loud chatter among the people in the business of news gathering.

  Ahmed was standing by the open door.

  At exactly 4 p.m. Angel arrived. He stopped at the door and glanced at the crowd. He was pleased with the turnout.

  He looked at Ahmed and said, ‘Everything all right, lad?’

  ‘I think so, sir,’ Ahmed said. ‘Is there anything you want? Have I forgotten anything?’

  ‘Everything looks fine. When you’re ready, close the door.’

  Angel crossed to the table, looked round the room and nodded to several familiar faces. He saw the jug of water and upturned glass tumbler on a sheet of kitchen roll, the dozen or so microphones, and the innumerable recording devices that had been placed in front of him on the table. They made him mindful of what he must not say. He ran a hand over his mouth and chin, then sat down behind the table.

  Ahmed went out into the corridor to see if there were any latecomers. There weren’t any, so he went back into the room and closed the door.

  The chattering died down to silence, then Angel stood up and said, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I want to thank you all for coming.’

  Then he told the journalists the facts of the three murder cases in detail and highlighted their several similarities, including the fact that all three murders had been executed between 5 and 8 a.m. He also pointed out that the murders were always executed when the victim was alone. However, he studiously avoided mentioning the sighting of a grey-haired woman in a long sheepskin coat seen leaving two of the three crime scenes shortly after the time of death.