The Sound of Broken Glass

by Deborah Crombie

  Rashid crossed to the bed.

  Gemma watched as the pathologist gently probed and prodded. Just behind her, she could hear Melody’s breathing. DI Bell had stayed back by the kitchen, watching the proceedings from a distance.

  “The flat’s cool but not cold,” Rashid said as he manipulated the victim’s head. “Rigor is just beginning to pass off in the neck and jaw, so I’d estimate time of death at roughly twelve hours—give or take a couple, of course. Possibly between ten and midnight last night.

  “I don’t want to remove the scarf until I get him on the table, so I can’t say anything definitive about strangulation, although the thing was certainly tied tight enough. However, from the smell of him, there was a good deal of alcohol involved.” He leaned down to look more closely at the sheet. “And—”

  “Vomit,” said Gemma, realizing what had been lurking beneath the stronger odors.

  “Yes. He might have choked on it. But there’s no trace on the bed, and I didn’t see any evidence of a drinking binge as I came through the flat. So if he drank enough to be sick, how did he get home? And undressed?”

  “And where is the damned smell coming from?” asked Melody. There was a slight tremor in her voice.

  Straightening, Rashid scanned the room. “Ah.” He went towards the bathroom, which, from the layout of the flat, Gemma guessed must be tucked beneath the hall stairs. Rashid had a dancer’s grace, and Gemma watched, fascinated as always, as he moved around the crime scene without seeming to disturb a molecule.

  He stopped at the door of the bathroom, however, and stood looking in. “Someone undressed him. He was sick on his clothes—probably somewhere outside the flat. And it looks like there’s a trace of vomit in the sink as well.”

  “How can you tell it was someone else?” asked Melody.

  “The clothes are in a pile. Think about it. You come home blind drunk, so drunk you’ve been sick. You stumble around the bathroom, pulling things off and dropping them wherever they land. You’re sick again. Chances are you don’t get everything off before you stagger back into the bedroom and fall—probably crossways—onto the bed. You don’t drop your clothes neatly atop one another in a pile. Wait a minute—” Rashid peered more closely into the bathroom, then turned back to them, looking pleased with himself. “I’ll need blood work, but there may have been more to it than alcohol. There’s a bottle of Valium on the sink. But”—frowning, he gazed at the body on the bed—“mixing Valium and alcohol doesn’t usually cause that severe a reaction. I’d like to get him on the table as soon as possible. All right if I get my photos, Laurence?”

  “I’m logging you, but be dainty, will you?” the tech replied.

  “As a bloody butterfly.” Rashid grinned and took his camera from the bag he’d left by the door.

  “You have to appreciate a man who enjoys his work,” murmured DI Bell as they moved back into the sitting room. “Or maybe I should just say ‘appreciate,’ full stop.”

  “I take it you haven’t worked with Dr. Kaleem before,” said Gemma, suppressing a smile.

  “I haven’t had the pleasure.” Bell’s Scottish lilt was more apparent when she was relaxed. Now she studied Gemma, looking puzzled. “I know you, though, don’t I? Have we met on a case?”

  “You worked a case with my husband some time ago. A warehouse fire in Southwark. Only we weren’t married then. Detective Superintendent Kincaid.”

  Watching Bell color, she suspected the detective remembered her now, and the gaffe she had made.

  But Bell said, “Doug Cullen’s guv’nor?”

  “Yes.” Gemma wasn’t going to go into the current circumstances of Duncan’s leave and Doug’s reassignment.

  “How is he?” asked Bell. “Doug, I mean.”

  Melody stepped in. “He broke his ankle over the weekend, but he’s doing fine. Want me to give him a message?”

  “You’re—” Bell looked confused.

  “His friend. I’ve been looking after him.”

  “Och. No, that’s all right. But thanks. Maybe I’ll give him a ring—”

  “Ma’am,” called the constable on the door. “There’s a neighbor wants to speak to you.”

  “Be right there,” said Bell, with an air of great relief.

  Kincaid was almost back to the house with Charlotte when his phone rang. If it was Gemma wanting to know if he’d spoken to Tam, he’d have to make up an excuse. He was relieved to see that it was Doug, and answered with such a cheerful “Hullo!” that there was a moment’s silence on the other end of the line.

  Then, “What’s wrong with you?” said Doug, sounding very aggrieved. “It’s Monday morning, for God’s sake. Nobody should sound like an advert for sunshine and roses.”

  “I’ve just had a very productive meeting, the details of which must remain a deep, dark secret for the moment.”

  “A secret?” said Charlotte, tugging on his hand. “I wanna know a secret.” The rain had stopped, so that sans umbrella, he was able to hold the phone in one hand and Charlotte by the other.

  “You haven’t talked to that manager chap yet, have you?” asked Doug.

  “No. Why?”

  “I want to go with you.”

  “You’re off work with a broken ankle, mate, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

  “Doesn’t mean I can’t get in and out of a car,” Doug said truculently.

  “I thought you were supposed to be keeping that ankle elevated for the next couple of days.”

  “I can prop it up wherever I am. Come on, man, I’m going bonkers here.”

  As he thought about the logistics, Kincaid realized there were unforeseen advantages to driving the old Astra estate car. He could put Charlotte in the very back, and Doug could sit sideways in the middle seat.

  “Okay,” Kincaid agreed, thinking that trying to conduct an interview with a cripple and a three-year-old would have to go down on his list of firsts. Especially when the interviewee was a friend. “I’ll pick you up in about half an hour. We’ll get lunch.”

  “Right-ho.” Doug sounded only marginally more cheerful.

  “Doug, what’s bothering you? You’re not just bored.” Kincaid walked on, waiting for a response.

  He’d begun to think the line had gone dead when Doug said, “There was something . . . The way Melody talked about that guitar chap yesterday—did you notice? I didn’t like it. Something’s up, and I want to know what it is.”

  Melody was still shaky with relief as she followed Gemma and Maura Bell out of the flat. Not that she’d suspected Andy of having anything to do with Vincent Arnott’s death—of course she hadn’t. But the fact that she’d been consorting—consorting? Good God. The very word made her damp down a hysterical desire to laugh.

  Whatever she chose to call it, she’d crossed the line with someone connected to their investigation, and the fact that she knew that Andy Monahan had a solid alibi for the time of this victim’s death made her feel both giddy and horribly awkward. If the subject of Andy’s whereabouts came up for any reason, she was going to have to come clean with her boss. She flushed at the thought.

  And God forbid someone mentioned it to Doug. Not that she and Doug had that kind of relationship, but she’d let him down last night, and even without that, she knew that he would think less of her.

  How she felt about what she’d done, she had yet to figure out. In the meantime, however, she’d better concentrate on the business at hand—although even that admonition didn’t stop the little shiver of remembered desire that ran through her.

  Gemma and DI Bell were talking to a woman who stood behind the low iron railing of the flat next door. She was stout, gray haired, and tweedy, and in her arms she held a Yorkshire terrier with a pink bow in its hair.

  “It’s Verne,” she was saying, her honking voice raised to a decibel level that indicated she suffered from hearing loss. “Myra Verne. Lived here since 1972. The garden flat. Cheap in those days, the flats round here, though you wouldn’t think it now.”<
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  “Mrs. Verne,” said Gemma, “if you could—”

  “It’s Miss. Never married. Never saw the point in being saddled with a man to look after.”

  “Quite right, I’m sure, Miss Verne.” Gemma gave her a conspiratorial smile. “But about last night—”

  “Something’s happened to that young man next door, hasn’t it? The one in the ground-floor flat. Spells his name S-h-a-u-n instead of S-e-a-n. Bloody pretentious, if you ask—”

  “Miss Verne,” interrupted Maura Bell, “if you could just tell us—”

  “That’s exactly what I’m doing, young woman.” Myra Verne’s tweedy shoulders stiffened in offense, and the Yorkie gave a sympathetic growl that might have been mistaken for a mosquito whine.

  Gemma gave Bell a quelling look. “Miss Verne, you were saying?” Accustomed, Melody knew, to the boisterous good nature of her own dogs, Gemma reached out to stroke the Yorkie.

  “Princess doesn’t like strangers,” warned Miss Verne. “She didn’t like him, either.” She jerked her head towards the next-door flat. “He had the nerve to complain about her barking in the garden. It’s her garden, isn’t it? She has every right.” She clutched the dog to her bosom more tightly. “Yuppies,” she added with venom, and it took Melody a moment to realize she didn’t mean the dog. “They’ve taken over the square, with all their flat conversions and German appliances.”

  Gemma tried again. “Miss Verne—”

  “So what sort of fix did he get himself into? I know there’s something, with that woman coming out of the flat this morning howling like a banshee and then the cavalry arriving in full force.”

  Melody could see that even Gemma was losing patience. “Miss Verne,” said Gemma firmly, “we’re not at liberty to say. Did you see or hear anything last night that led you to think that Mr. Francis might be in some sort of trouble?”

  “He was off to the pub when I went out to put my rubbish in the bin. About seven or half past, when I’d finished my supper. Every night he was there, even on a Sunday. I think he ate all his meals at the place, too.” Miss Verne sniffed in disapproval.

  “You mean this pub?” Gemma gestured towards the pretty place in the corner of the square. “The Prince of Wales?”

  Having seen the appealing menu on the pub’s outdoor blackboard, Melody shuddered to contemplate Miss Verne’s idea of a proper meal.

  “It used to be a nice quiet place. But now, even in the winter, people bring their dogs and carry their beers into the square as if it was a public park. It drives Princess mad.”

  “Quiet, all right,” muttered Maura Bell. “Supposedly in the sixties it was the hangout of the Richardsons, the rival gang to the Krays. If you ask me, the lawyers and politicians are an improvement, although maybe not any more honest,” she added.

  Gemma gave Bell a startled glance. “Lawyers?”

  “It’s all lawyers and MPs round here these days,” answered Miss Verne. “As I was saying. Damned yuppies.”

  “Shaun Francis was a lawyer?”

  “Trainee barrister, or so he said. Although I don’t see how a trainee barrister could have afforded that flat.”

  “Barrister?” Gemma repeated faintly, looking at Melody. “Surely not—” She caught herself and turned back to the neighbor. “Miss Verne, will you excuse us? You’ve been most helpful and we will want to get a full statement from you in writing, if you’ll just bear with us for a few minutes.”

  She walked away before their witness could protest, motioning Melody and Maura to follow. When they were out of Miss Verne’s hearing, she hissed, “Another barrister? Strangled? Dear God. This is turning into a royal balls-up. What the hell is going on here?”

  “Something Shakespeare would have loved,” said Melody.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Spitalfields takes its name from the hospital and priory, St. Mary’s Spittel that was founded in 1197. Lying in the heart of the East End, it is an area known for its spirit and strong sense of community. It was in a field next to the priory where the now famous market first started in the thirteenth century.

  —www.spitalfields.co.uk

  When Kincaid had rung Tam, asking if they could meet, Tam had suggested not his and Michael’s flat near Columbia Road, but the Canteen restaurant at Spitalfields Market.

  Kincaid had insisted on leaving Doug and Charlotte by the Lamb Street entrance while he parked the car, to put less stress on Doug’s ankle, and now as he caught them up and they crossed the central space in the market, he could see Tam seated in the outside area of the restaurant. Because the market was covered and at least partially enclosed, the restaurants were able to maintain a semblance of pavement cafés, with a little help from outdoor heaters.

  “Will this suit?” asked Tam, standing. He pumped Kincaid’s hand, then Doug’s, then shook Charlotte’s hand and Bob the elephant’s plush paw very solemnly.

  He’d already had the staff bring a booster seat for Charlotte, and as he lifted her into it, he said, “I think there’s a wee surprise for you, lassie.”

  Carefully arranged at Charlotte’s place were an activity book, crayons, and a paper lion badge. “See, there’s a place to put this fellow in the book.” Tam showed her where to put the lion. “And the next time you come, you can get a different animal to add to your collection.”

  “There’s a place for an elephant,” said Charlotte, entranced. She looked at Kincaid. “Can we come again soon, Papa? I might get the elephant.”

  “I should think we could manage that.” Kincaid gave Tam a curious glance. “What did we do to deserve such largess, Tam?”

  “Ah, well, it’s not entirely in your honor, I have to admit.” Tam settled his faded hat a little more firmly on his head. “But I felt the need for a celebration, and who better to share it with than such friends? But let’s order—I could eat a horse.”

  The restaurant specialized in traditional English food, so after some discussion on the nature of rarebit—Kincaid assuring Charlotte that it was a cheesy sauce and had nothing to do with rabbits—he chose the Welsh rarebit with a poached egg for her and the smoked haddock for himself. Tam and Doug went the whole hog—so to speak—for the roast pork of the day.

  When the waiter had taken their orders, Kincaid scrutinized his friend. “So, what’s all this, Tam?” A spark of hope flared. “Is it Louise? Some good news about her diagnosis?”

  Tam’s face fell. “No, things are just the same there, I’m afraid. Michael’s cooking for her every night. We’ll rub along as best we can.”

  “What, then? You’ve won the lottery?”

  Tam grinned, although his Scottish dental work was a sight perhaps best not seen too often. “Close enough, maybe, for my business. Maybe as close as I’ll ever come, and I’ve seen a good few musicians come and go over the years. But this time, Duncan, I just may have hit the pot of gold.”

  “Someone new?”

  “No, it’s my lad Andy. I got him a gig playing guitar for a girl singer, and her manager filmed them—just rehearsal time, mainly, and a bit yesterday in the studio. He did some editing, then put it up on YouTube just to see what kind of response it would get.” Tam shook his head. “I’d never have believed it. The bloody thing is going viral. In a day. We’re scrambling now to get the contracts in place so we can get the song up for downloads. It’s— I’ve never seen anything like it.” For a moment, Tam looked as if he were going to cry. “I havenae even told Michael yet. Afraid to jinx it. That’s why I didn’t want you to come to the flat.”

  Kincaid saw that what had seemed a simple enough errand had suddenly become much more complicated, not to mention that at Tam’s mention of the guitar player, Doug had begun to glower.

  He plunged in. “Tam, I didn’t ring you about Louise. In fact, it was Andy Monahan I wanted to talk to you about.”

  Tam stared at him. “You’ve seen the video already?”

  “No. It’s about the man who was murdered in Crystal Palace. The one that Andy had the row with in
the pub on Friday night.”

  “What?” Tam stared at him. “There wasn’t any row. The daft bugger came up and shouted at Andy during the break.”

  “Did you actually see it?”

  “No.” Tam sounded less certain. “I just came in on the aftermath. I’d walked Caleb—that’s Caleb Hart, the girl singer’s manager—to his car. Andy had blown him away in the first set, in spite of the other two acting like prize pillocks.”

  “The other guys in the band, you mean?”

  “Oh, they’re all right, those lads, but they’re not in the same league and they know it, and everyone was out of sorts over a gig that was meant to showcase Andy. Look, Duncan, what’s this all about? We’ve already spoken to that sergeant lassie that came to the studio on Saturday—bit prim, but the lad seemed taken with her. And I thought you were off work looking after the wee one here.” He glanced at Charlotte, who was still immersed in her activity book.

  “Tam, it’s Gemma’s case. I told her I’d talk to you.”

  “And that ‘sergeant lassie’ is Detective Sergeant Melody Talbot,” put in Doug, obviously offended on Melody’s behalf. Kincaid was tempted to kick him under the table.

  “But I don’t understand.” Tam’s buoyant mood had evaporated like a pricked balloon. “What do you want with Andy?”

  They all fell silent as the waiter brought their food. Kincaid helped Charlotte make a start on her Welsh rarebit, but no one else touched their steaming plates. “The thing is,” Kincaid said, “Andy Monahan was the last person known to have had any contact with the victim—Vincent Arnott—before Arnott was found dead. Are you sure he didn’t know the man?”

  “Why would he? I only booked the band in that pub because Caleb Hart asked me to.”

  “What about Caleb Hart? Could he have known Arnott?”

  Tam frowned. “Well, he didn’t say so. But I suppose it’s possible.”

  “You said Hart left the pub after the first set. Do you know where he went?”

  “He said he had a meeting. But, Duncan, you can’t think Caleb Hart had anything to do with this.” Tam sounded horrified.