Morton spotted the bingo caller walking back into the hall. Lunchtime was over.
‘Thanks for your time, ladies. Have a good day.’
Chapter 10: Unworthy
Thursday April 9th 10:00
The first time I killed a man, I didn’t feel a thing.
It was almost as if nothing happened. He was there one minute, gone the next.
No doubt the next one will be the same.
I’ve been watching him for a week now. Boring. That’s the only word for Niall Stapleton.
Or so I thought.
Today felt different. Niall wasn’t the office drone he had been all week. No; now he seemed possessed of manic energy. He walked with purpose. He was keeping his head down, not making eye contact with anyone, which was fortunate for me because I was just three seats away from him on the tube to Chancery Lane.
I almost missed him getting off the tube. Every other day he’d carried on to his insurance brokerage’s main office in Marble Arch, but this time he hopped off at Holborn Station.
The rain came pouring down as we came out onto High Holborn. I flipped up my umbrella, a boring black thing with no distinguishing features, and bowed my head against the rain as I followed Niall.
The crowds provided ample opportunity to hide as we made our way east. It wasn’t until we turned off onto Hatton Garden that I had to be careful. There were still people around. The jewellers of Hatton Garden were bound to be on high alert for anyone looking too suspicious, and I could not risk attracting their attention.
I kept on him, trying to stay far enough away that he wouldn’t notice me, but close enough that I could see him. I paused at the occasional window display, just another shopper.
Just past Greville Street, Niall disappeared. He ducked under an archway and out of sight.
I sped up. The gap narrowed in no time. Fifty feet. Forty. Twenty. Ten. I came to a halt by the archway and glanced through the gap. There was just one door down a short alleyway. When I reached it, I found it unlocked. I turned the handle and the door opened with a tiny creak.
I paused, held my breath and strained to listen for any sign that I had been rumbled. When all was quiet, I left the front door open and followed the light at the end of the hallway.
Niall was standing inside a small office lit by an elegant chandelier hanging from a high ceiling. Blueprints were taped to the wall behind him. On a table against the far wall there were a variety of weapons laid out in a neat row. A gun. A knife. A rope. Explosives.
I knew it.
Niall Stapleton was not the boring office worker he pretended to be. I drew from my breast pocket a scalpel and stepped into the room. While Niall was busy studying the blueprints, I crept up behind him – and slit his throat.
Chapter 11: Another Body
Thursday April 9th 13:00
Morton had thought his week so far had been bad, but Thursday was destined to be much worse.
Shortly after lunchtime he received a call that a body had been found hanging from a chandelier in Hatton Garden. At first, he thought it sounded like a garden-variety suicide. None of his business, thank you very much. That was, until he learnt that the man’s throat had been cut.
He found the place easily enough. A uniformed officer was standing discreetly just inside an archway off Hatton Garden, blocking off access to the crime scene. He needn’t have bothered. No passer-by would pay much heed to the dingy little alleyway when there were shop windows full of sparkling gemstones to ogle. It was, Morton thought, an opportune location for murder.
Morton greeted the officer as he approached. ‘DCI Morton. Who’s inside?’
‘Just Dr Chiswick so far, sir.’
‘Who was our tipster?’
‘Mr Archibald Frey. He owns the lapidary business next door. He came by to welcome the new tenant to the building, found the body, and called us first of all.’
‘Us?’ Morton asked.
‘Holborn Police, sir. I’m PC Buchanan. I’m the designated point of contact for the merchants of Hatton Garden.’
‘They’ve got their own contact? I guess money does talk.’
Buchanan scowled. ‘It’s not that so much, sir, but that they’re an obvious target for robberies and the like.’
‘Right. If you’ll excuse me, I’m not going to fit through the alleyway at the same time as you.’
Buchanan shuffled forward to allow Morton to pass and then snapped to attention once he had done so.
Morton headed towards the door, paused to pull on his evidence booties, and called out for the pathologist.
Chiswick’s voice boomed back at him immediately, echoing down the long hallway. ‘In here, David! The room at the back.’
Morton followed the sound of the pathologist’s voice until he found him standing beneath a body hanging from the ceiling. The room was a large office decorated with thick, textured, golden wallpaper and a plush carpet which was covered in tiny shards of broken glass. In the middle of the room, a pool of blood was slowly radiating outwards from beneath the body. There had to be at least eight or nine pints of blood on the floor.
‘Afternoon, Doc. How’s it going?’
‘Oh, you know, just hanging around.’ Doctor Larry Chiswick looked up at the body and cracked a mischievous grin.
Morton rolled his eyes. ‘You’ve had an hour in here alone to prepare a line, and that’s the best you could come up with? You should be ashamed.’
‘Ah, but, in my infinite wisdom, I have deduced the name of your victim.’
‘How on earth did you manage that?’
Larry held up an evidence bag. ‘Found his wallet. It looks like the killer strung him up from the ceiling and let all his possessions fall from his pockets onto the floor.’
‘Ballsy. Who’s the victim, then?’
‘Mr Niall Stapleton. Fifty quid in his wallet, and the key fob attached to his car key suggests he drives a Fiat.’
‘And that’s relevant because...?’
‘It’s not,’ Chiswick replied. ‘I just found it interesting. Shall I cut him down?’
‘It’s your party.’
‘Give me a hand, then.’
Chiswick gestured to the rope above him, which had been tied around the victim’s ankles, then looped around a pipe near the floor. He laid out a plastic sheet to lower the body onto, snapped a quick photo of the body in situ, and then gestured for Morton to cut the rope above the knot so as to preserve it for forensics.
Morton fumbled with the knot and then braced as he felt the weight of the body pull on the rope. Niall Stapleton had to be close to fifteen stone, though he looked much trimmer.
‘Easy does it.’
Chiswick dragged Niall by the shoulders to one end of the plastic sheet and waited while Morton slowly eased up on the rope, allowing the body to sink to the floor. Once Niall Stapleton was laid flat on his back with the rope removed, Chiswick leant in close to examine the neck.
‘Looking for a needle mark?’ Morton asked.
‘No sign of one. Mr Stapleton had his throat cut, and the killer hung him upside down afterwards. It looks like a clean cut from a razor-sharp blade. That explains the arterial spray. He’d have bled out in no time.’
Morton stared at the wall. ‘Interesting.’
‘The blood spatter? Nothing to it. Simple arterial spray.’
‘Not that. Look underneath. Those are blueprints to a vault,’ Morton said. ‘This looks like a robbery gone wrong to me.’
Chiswick turned to look. For a few minutes the men stared at the wall, entranced by the hand-drawn blueprints which had been neatly laid out on plain white A4 paper. The length of each wall was marked, and so too were the doors and lights, but there was no building name or address to be seen.
‘Which building is that for?’ Chiswick asked. ‘That’s no bank. The reception area is much too small.’
Morton rolled his eyes. ‘We’re in Hatton Garden. I’ll give you fifty-to-one odds that the blueprint is for one of the j
ewellers around here.’
Footsteps echoed down the corridor. Morton could hear Ayala arguing with Rafferty as they approached. Ayala appeared first, dressed immaculately as always. Rafferty trailed him in, crowding up the doorway.
‘Afternoon, boss. Bit busy in here. What do you want me to do?’
Morton pointed at the blueprints. ‘Find out which building those are for. Start with the nearest jewellers and work your way along Hatton Garden. You take the north end of the street. Rafferty, you go south.’
***
Archibald Frey’s workshop, the next building over from the crime scene, looked nothing like the blueprints on the wall. The front-of-house was more like a consultancy office than a sales room floor.
After Morton buzzed at the door, he was allowed to enter the antechamber, a rather claustrophobic affair that acted as an airlock between the street and the many jewels on display within. A second security door let him through to the main office.
‘My apologies, Mr Morton,’ Frey said as Morton entered. ‘Can’t be too careful.’
‘I understand. You found the body?’
‘I did. I heard someone opening up the office next door this morning. It’s been vacant for a little while, so I thought I’d go and introduce myself to the new tenant. I had a client with me at the time, so I went over a few hours later during my lunch break with a bottle of wine. I’m afraid I dropped it in my shock.’
‘That explains the broken glass,’ Morton muttered.
‘I do apologise. I hope that won’t impede your investigation. It fell from my grasp when I saw the...’
‘The body?’
Frey nodded. His big grey eyes had begun to water behind his spectacles.
‘You said you were with a client. What do you do?’
‘I’m a lapidary. I cut gemstones for a living. Most of my gems are cut for the other traders, but I like to take on a few special projects – one-off stones for engagement rings and the like. The gentleman I was with this morning brought in a rather unusual bi-colour tanzanite for me to cut for his bride-to-be–’
Morton cut him off. The old man looked like he wanted to chew the cud, and Morton didn’t have the time to waste. ‘Do you have a vault?’
‘Naturally.’
‘There were blueprints on the wall next to the body. They looked like this.’ Morton pulled up a photo on his phone. ‘Do you know which building these plans are for?’
Frey bit his lip and studied the blueprints. ‘I’m afraid not. It’s not my building. That’s all I can tell you. Is there anything else I can do for you?’
‘When you found the body, was the front door open or just unlocked?’
‘Open,’ Frey said firmly.
‘And were the lights on?’
‘Yes.’
‘And is there any CCTV that covers the entrance?’
‘I don’t think so,’ Frey said. ‘I’ve got CCTV covering my front doorway, if that’s any use to you.’
‘I’ll send a constable by to collect it. Thank you.’
***
‘And you’re sure this isn’t your shop, Mr Mehtani?’ Ayala asked for the fourth time.
The stout man with the shiny bald head and pristine suit cocked his head to one side. ‘It could be. It could not be.’
Ayala bristled. ‘Those are the options, yes.’
‘Sorry, I cannot help you.’
‘If you think of anything, give me a call.’ Ayala tossed a business card onto the counter between them, and then he stormed out, silently cursing the dour shopkeeper. The man had been polite almost to the point of obsequiousness, but had evaded every question with the careful practice of a diplomat.
All of the shopkeepers had been much the same. None of them wanted to talk to him. None admitted to recognising the floor plan from the blueprint.
Rain pelted Ayala as he emerged from Suresh Mehtani’s shop. It was three doors down from the crime scene and seemed to fit the blueprint, but Mehtani was having none of it.
Ayala dashed back into the alleyway that led to the crime scene. The officer from earlier, PC Buchanan, was still standing guard.
‘No luck, Detective Ayala?’ Buchanan asked.
‘None. They’re secretive, these jewellers, aren’t they?’
‘Wouldn’t you be? They’re guarding the treasures of the wealthiest people in the world. Some say there’s more gold buried beneath Hatton Garden than in the Bank of England itself. Discretion has always been the order of the day around here.’
‘You know a lot about them.’
‘I should. My dad ran a watch repair shop out of Leather Lane for nearly forty years. I grew up here.’
Ayala’s eyes glazed over. He didn’t need a trip down memory lane. He needed a lead.
‘Can you do me a favour? Tell Morton that I’m heading over to forensics.’
Buchanan nodded and then resumed his guard at the entrance of the alleyway.
Chapter 12: The Last House on the Left
Thursday April 9th 16:00
The gym card in the victim’s wallet proved fortuitous. A quick call from Rafferty to the gym, and they had Niall Stapleton’s home address.
It was an end-of-terrace on the outskirts of Balham, miles away from the tube station, and thoroughly unlike central London. Here the roads were lined with houses rather than flats, and no tower blocks loomed overhead for what seemed like at least half a mile. Morton parked up outside Stapleton’s home and heard Rafferty slide her car in neatly behind his.
‘Ayala not with you?’ Morton asked once they were both standing on the pavement.
‘Nope. Buchanan said Ayala’s taken evidence over to forensics,’ Rafferty replied.
‘What evidence?’ He should be here, Morton thought.
Rafferty shrugged and began to walk in step with Morton towards the house.
Niall Stapleton’s home was the last house on the left in the row of terraced homes. Farther to the left, the road carried on underneath a railway bridge and out of sight while homes stretched to the right for as far as the eye could see.
Niall’s front garden had a ring of conifers running around the perimeter and a low wall along the front where the property met the road, giving it an unusually private air; the greenery shielded the home from the rest of London, and once the gate had opened with a creak, Morton found himself in a small front garden which was neat if somewhat sparse, with a rockery taking up the lion’s share of the space. A gravel path led Morton through the rockery up to the front door.
Morton knocked on the door. No answer.
‘Let me, sir,’ Rafferty said, and stepped forward, plainly intending to pick the lock.
‘No need,’ Morton said as he turned the door handle. ‘It’s open.’
The front door opened directly into Niall Stapleton’s living room. A large leather sofa ran the length of the left-hand wall, and a television was mounted in the far right corner above a bookcase.
The room was in a chaotic state, as if a fight had broken out, and detritus covered every available surface. The coffee table in the middle of the room had one leg torn off, and the sole chair had fallen over backwards so that it leant against the window, which had cracked from the impact.
The floor, which was scuffed and dirty, was littered with cable ties and personal possessions. A smashed photograph lay next to a small trestle table by the door. Niall Stapleton was pictured with his arm wrapped around a young woman, a cheesy smile plastered across his face.
‘What in God’s name has gone on here? It looks like they’ve been robbed!’ Rafferty said.
Morton held a finger to his lips to beckon for silence, pointed at the flat screen on the wall, and then whispered: ‘No thief would leave behind the television. We need to clear all the rooms.’
They hunched low and shuffled forward towards the door to the rest of the house. Morton opened it slowly and then paused to listen for any signs of life. When he was satisfied that he could hear no signs of an intruder, he shuffled forw
ards and beckoned for Rafferty to follow.
The hallway led them through to a stairwell and another door.
‘You take the ground floor. I’m going up.’ Morton pointed to himself and then the stairwell. Rafferty nodded her acknowledgement and shuffled past him.
Morton crept up the stairs slowly. As he approached the landing, he could see two doors. The left-hand door, which was open, led through to a small bathroom. Morton peeked inside briefly to check that no one had hidden behind the shower curtain, then proceeded to the door to the master bedroom.
He gently pushed the door open, waiting for someone to leap out at him at any moment.
But nothing happened. The upstairs was empty.
Figuring that Rafferty ought to have finished clearing the rooms downstairs, Morton yelled out, ‘Clear!’
Rafferty’s voice echoed his almost immediately. Nobody was in the house.
Morton breathed a sigh of relief and looked around the bedroom. It was small but cosy, with lace bedding draped across the bed that had to have been chosen by a woman.
There were more pictures of Niall on the wall. In most of them he was pictured with the girl from the sitting room. She was a pretty woman in her mid-thirties with long, thick eyelashes and a smile that showed every tooth. It was plain to see that she and Niall had been very much in love.
The odd thing about the room was the lack of mess. Where the living room looked like a bomb site, the rest of the house was immaculate.
A stair creaked. Morton spun on the spot, his muscles tensing. The house was clear, wasn’t it?
‘Don’t worry. It’s just me,’ Rafferty called out.
‘Jesus, woman! Don’t do that to me.’
‘Sorry. My bad, boss.’ Rafferty bit her lip. ‘Find anything?’
‘Nope. It’s immaculate up here. What’s the rest of downstairs like?’ Morton said.
‘The same. Except the bathroom. Someone’s pissed all over the floor and left the seat up.’ Rafferty coughed loudly, ‘Men.’
‘Excuse me?’
The DCI Morton Box Set Page 30
