Ayala, as he had promised via text, was waiting in the Foodhouse Restaurant on the lower ground floor. Rafferty found him sipping Tchibo coffee and reading The Impartial.
‘Look busy. The boss is coming.’
‘What? Morton? Where?’ Ayala hastily folded his newspaper, shoved it roughly into the bag at his feet, and downed the remnants of his coffee.
‘Easy, Bertram, I was kidding.’
‘Damn you. I was enjoying that.’
‘Too bad. What happened to you this morning?’ Rafferty said, and then added with a grin, ‘Or should I say, what happened last night?’
‘My partner and I went out dancing.’
‘On a school night? I never knew you were such a rebel.’
Ayala’s shoulders sagged. ‘How pissed off is he?’
‘On a scale of one to ten? I’d say a four. He was a bit distracted this morning, what with his son getting engaged.’
‘What? Nick? No. Stephen?’
‘Stephen. He turned up at lunch with some girl in tow and dropped a bombshell before dessert. But enough chat. Let’s go find some nurses.’
‘I found some. They were too busy to talk. I cornered a few as they were smoking out front, but none of them had a bad word to say about Ebstein. Besides, he worked in the Accident and Emergency department. All of his colleagues are miles too busy to talk for long.’
‘Oh, ye of little faith, Bertie boy,’ Rafferty said. ‘You don’t nab the nurses who are working. You nab the ones who aren’t.’
‘The nurses who aren’t here, you mean?’
‘Exactly.’
‘I’m not following.’
‘Pretend you’ve had a stressful day. What do you do to relax afterwards?’
‘Pretend?’ Ayala said. ‘I’d go for a pint.’
‘And where’s the nearest pub?’
***
It turned out that the nearest pub was the one Morton had passed the day before. Ayala and Rafferty found more than a few Royal London staff winding down after a hard day’s labour. They made themselves popular by liberally buying drinks, being careful to keep the receipts back.
‘For expenses,’ Ayala said.
Their break came when one of the nurses clued them in to the shift rotation. At four o’clock the shift in the A&E department turned over, and a surge of Ebstein’s colleagues flooded into the pub.
Rafferty cornered a rather handsome male nurse at the bar. ‘Can I buy you a drink?’
‘That’s a new one. I’ve never been offered a drink by a woman before. Go on, then. I’ll have a pint of Pride.’
Rafferty signalled for the barman to pour two pints of London Pride, took a sip, and set hers down on the bar.
‘I’m told you work with Doctor Ebstein.’
‘Oh.’ The nurse looked crestfallen. ‘This isn’t a chat-up, then?’
‘Sorry.’
‘I guess a free drink is a free drink,’ the nurse said. ‘What do you want to know?’
‘What’s he like?’
‘He’s nice enough. He knows what he’s doing; he works hard for his patients. He doesn’t really socialise with us.’
‘But you like him?’
‘Yeah. Why wouldn’t I? I even volunteered to get tested when he needed it a few years back.’
‘Tested?’ Rafferty said.
‘He had kidney failure a few years back. There were no matches on the transplant list, so we all volunteered to be tested.’
‘Did they find a match?’
‘Yeah. A really good one. One of the staff saved him. I don’t know who. Thank God they did. Think how many lives he’s gone on to save.’
Chapter 48: The Paperwork
Tuesday April 21st 08:55
The forgery expert, Radley Freeman, arrived early on Tuesday morning. Morton collected him from the main reception and whisked him up to the incident room.
‘I’m not paying you for the extra five minutes.’
‘I wouldn’t expect you to. Those extra minutes are built into my rate.’ Radley Freeman spoke with a big, booming voice. He was a jovial man, an ex-con who had turned his considerable talent to helping the police – in return for a fee almost as hefty as the man himself.
Radley quickly set to work at the conference table. Out came all his equipment: ultraviolet lights, magnifiers, and several sample documents. He set an expensive-looking camera on the desk and plugged it into his laptop via mini USB cable before setting out a document folder at right angles to the edge of the desk. Every movement was precise, deliberate, and intended to put on a show.
‘This is a genuine NHS record,’ Radley said. ‘When you told me what I’d be looking at, I hightailed it down to find someone willing to hand over a sample in return for cash.’
‘Seriously. You’re not supposed to tell me that.’
‘Calm down, Morton. I’m just messing with you. It’s all legal. Anyone ever tell you you’re wound up tighter than a banjo string? Chill.’
‘Just get to work.’
‘You’re the boss. I see you’ve got three documents. They’re not identical, but I wouldn’t expect them to be. The first one’ – Radley placed the implant documentation from Primrose Kennard in the centre of the desk – ‘looks pretty good. The paper is the right weight, 80gsm. It’s the right colour. The ink matches up.’
‘The ink matches up. It’s black. How can that give you anything?’
‘No ink is black. We call the ink we buy black, but it’s really just very very dark. This here is what we call “rich black”. It’s a layer of black ink placed over the top of another CMYK colour.’
‘How do you get that?’
‘100% black ink, 50% cyan, 50% magenta, 50% yellow. If you play with the percentages, you can get cooler shades of black, warmer black and blacker black.’
‘The wonderful world of ink. Fascinating,’ Morton said.
‘No need for sarcasm. The combination of the paper and the ink is unique. This combination is what I’d expect, given the samples I acquired from the Royal London Hospital yesterday. The paper is consistent with their paper. The ink is consistent with their ink.’
‘So, it’s real?’
‘I can’t definitively say that. I can only say it’s consistent. If it’s a forgery, it’s a damned good one.’
‘Then, what about this one?’ Morton pushed the Frederick Kennard documentation to the fore.
Radley took a few minutes to examine it. Once more he ran the UV light over it, weighed it, took a photograph with his single lens reflex camera and examined the macro shot on his laptop.
‘This looks like it was printed with a rich black ink on a laser printer. The paper matches up. The placement and font usage is identical. I’d say this is probably genuine.’
‘You mean consistent.’
Radley grinned. ‘I do.’
‘And this one?’ Morton passed over the Christopher Kennard documentation.
Radley took longer this time. He photographed it and stared in silence at the magnified photo for a good ten minutes. ‘Hmm.’
‘Hmm?’
‘This is... inconsistent. The paper is perfect. The font is right. The details are OK. But the ink is off. The others are laser printed.’
‘Those big commercial machines?’
‘They can be rather compact these days, but, yes, they bond toner to paper. This has not been printed that way. As far as I know, all the document repositories at the NHS use communal laser printers.’
‘What was this printed on?’
‘This appears to have been printed by an inkjet printer. It’s an outstanding forgery.’
Just as you’d expect from an inside job, Morton thought. ‘Like someone might have at home?’
‘Or in a small office.’
Morton thought back to his meeting with Ebstein. There was a small printer in his office. ‘If I get you the printer that I think this was printed with, could you match it up?’
‘I could tell you if it was consistent. T
he odds are the printer is a fairly generic big-name brand. I can get you as far as the model, but unless it’s a model with tracking dots implemented, I won’t be able to give you the exact printer.’
‘Tracking dots?’
‘Many modern printers put a small mark in one corner to denote which printer the printout came from. It’s like a fingerprint.’
‘And they do this deliberately?’
‘Some manufacturers do. Some don’t. Some have some products in their line-up use dots, and others not. Do you happen to remember which brand the printer you’re thinking of was?’
‘No. Sorry.’
‘Where is this printer? In a home or office?’
‘In a doctor’s office,’ Morton said.
‘Oh-ho. Now, this is getting interesting. At the Royal London Hospital?’
‘Let’s say, hypothetically, yes.’
‘Then I know the model. The NHS bulk-buys their printers, so all the doctors have the same one.’
‘And does it have the tracking dot encoded in the printout?’ Morton waited with bated breath.
Radley opened up Google, brought up the Electronic Frontier Foundation website, and navigated to a page listing printer models. It showed which models had been tested and whether deliberate tracking information had been found.
He scrolled down until he found the manufacturer and model number he was looking for. ‘Nope. No tracking data.’
‘Damn.’
Chapter 49: Sickbed
Tuesday April 21st 14:00
Morton was fast running out of leads. The elusive Dr Ebstein had jumped to the top of his suspect list, with the twins quickly slipping down to number two. It didn’t seem possible that the twins could have killed Amoy Yacobi – they had never even met him – and so, if Morton’s gut feeling that this was one serial killer was correct, they had to be ruled out.
There was one potential witness that Morton had yet to speak to. The anaesthetist named on the paperwork was the same for all three members of the Kennard family. There was nothing suspicious about that in isolation, but once Morton knew that Christopher Kennard had never been operated on, it became apparent that the only person who could testify to that who was not a suspect was the anaesthetist.
Doctor Byron Carruthers lived in Victoria in a terraced house on Vauxhall Bridge Road, a brisk ten-minute stroll south of New Scotland Yard. Traffic roared past the front door at terrific speed.
The house looked almost out of place. It was one of a row of a dozen terraced houses sandwiched between commercial properties. They were a hangover from a bygone era when families had lived in such central locations. Each house was three storeys tall, with a set of four symmetrical windows looming over a single doorway which was always set on the left-hand side of the house.
Morton was shown in quickly by Carruthers’ wife, Fenella. He guessed that she was around his age and highly educated. She spoke with a clipped, cut-glass accent that marked her out as one of the upper middle class. She showed Morton to the living room and then disappeared to make tea.
The doctor appeared on crutches. He staggered over to the sofa opposite Morton and sank into the cushion.
He looked older than his wife. Morton knew this to be a matter of perception, for he had researched the doctor before arriving. Perhaps he was in less than perfect health.
‘You’re a policeman.’
‘I am. DCI Morton, Metropolitan Police. I’d like to talk to you about Doctor Isaac Ebstein.’
‘What about Zac?’
‘Do you know him?’
‘I work with him,’ Carruthers said.
‘At the Royal London Hospital?’
‘Yes, and elsewhere. We’re both consultants, and we do the entire London circuit as well as occasionally working in the home counties.’
‘Do you like him?’
‘Enough to give him a kidney,’ Carruthers said. He gave a short, phlegmy laugh that ended abruptly with the doctor hacking and wheezing.
‘You gave him a kidney?’ So, he’s the mysterious donor from among the staff.
‘I thought I had one to spare.’
Mrs Carruthers appeared carrying a silver tray laden down with a bone china teapot and two sets of cups and saucers.
‘You have a lovely home, Mrs Carruthers.’ It was a beautiful house with high ceilings, wooden flooring and large windows that doused the living room in sunshine.
She set the tray down on the table in silence, lightly touched her husband’s arm, and then produced a biscuit barrel as if from nowhere.
Morton nodded his thanks before she left. ‘Do you remember a Primrose Kennard?’
‘Not particularly. Should I?’
‘She had a lung transplant last year.’
‘I don’t remember the specific operations. I tend to remember the patients. I have to monitor them to make sure they stay out for the duration. If you give me her age, weight and height, I might remember.’
It would take a doctor to work out how to knock someone out... and both Kennard and Hogge were expertly dosed. Ebstein would know how to do that.
‘She was in her early sixties, five foot six inches tall, and weighed perhaps twelve stone,’ Morton said.
‘She rings a bell,’ Carruthers conceded. ‘What about her?’
‘She was murdered last month.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that. How does this reflect on Zac? You can’t think he killed her?’
Morton adopted a diplomatic approach. ‘We’re pursuing all lines of enquiry at this time.’
‘So, he is a suspect, then. That is pure folly. He’s a doctor. He saves lives. He doesn’t end them.’
‘And yet someone did. Someone with medical training. Someone who had access to Primrose Kennard. Someone who knew she didn’t receive a lung lobe from Christopher Kennard.’
‘Impossible. The nurses would have checked the boxes. We don’t put the wrong parts in the wrong people, Mr Morton.’
‘Not by accident.’
Byron coughed again. ‘Then, it sounds like you need to arrest poor Zac and put this whole charade to bed. He isn’t a killer, Detective.’
Chapter 50: Watford to London
Wednesday April 22nd 11:00
This time the NHS paper-pushers from Watford made the trip down to New Scotland Yard, accompanied by their lawyers – six of them, all dressed in three-piece suits with natty ties and over-polished Italian leather shoes.
They sat in concert around the conference table in the incident room. Synchronised sitting, Morton wanted to call it. Doctor Sinclair sat off to one side, beadily eyeing up Morton but letting the lawyers speak for him.
‘We’ve reviewed the allegation you made,’ the lawyer in the middle said. This guy had a streak of grey running through his beard that caught the light just wrong. ‘We’d like time to investigate in-house.’
‘And we’d like to make progress in a murder investigation,’ Morton said.
‘We appreciate that, Detective. You wanted to know if there was commonality among your four victims.’
‘I did.’
‘There isn’t,’ the one Morton had nicknamed Greybeard said.
Damn. ‘Then, what are we doing here?’
‘Three of your victims do share a medical link. It’s statistically unlikely, and we can’t explain it,’ Greybeard said with a frown. ‘But it isn’t criminal.’
‘What’s the link?’
‘The blood that Mr Yacobi and Mr Stapleton received, and the bone marrow that Ms Hogge received, all come from one donor.’
‘That is incredibly unlikely.’
‘It’s less improbable than you think. This donor, and no, I’m not going to divulge his or her identity, is a repeat altruistic donor. They have donated numerous times. We’ve even cleared this individual through the NHS Ethics Committee for their approval. We do not believe that they have any connection to your case.’
‘I think that’s for me to decide. I’d like to see the paperwork for these “donations
”.’
They had anticipated his request. Greybeard nodded to Doctor Sinclair, and a folder was passed down the conference table to Morton. He opened it to find the documentation for each donation – with the donor name redacted.
‘This isn’t good enough.’
‘It’s going to have to be. It’s all you’re going to get, Detective. The link is not the NHS Blood and Transplant, nor is it the British Bone Marrow Registry. There’s something else that connects your victims. I suggest you find it.’
Chapter 51: Papers
Wednesday April 22nd 15:00
Radley Freeman was hastily recalled at great expense to confirm that the papers the NHS Blood and Transplant lawyer had given Morton were genuine.
When he proclaimed they were, it left Morton in a bind. It had all seemed to fit. The four victims were different ages, genders, and from markedly different walks of life.
Could he be wrong?
Morton had to trust his gut. One serial killer choosing victims seemingly at random was much more likely than there being multiple criminals with such a penchant for the macabre.
There was only one thing for it. Without a warrant for the rest of the documentation, and with no other suspects or witnesses forthcoming, Morton would have to work with what he had.
He had to arrest Isaac Ebstein.
Chapter 52: An Early Start
Thursday April 23rd 05:00
In retrospect, a dawn raid wasn’t strictly necessary. The few hours between sunrise and breakfast would have made scant difference, especially as Ebstein had already been given ample opportunity to dispose of evidence after the first chat in his office. Nor was he likely to put up much of a fight.
The use of an entire team to surround his small apartment building in Pimlico and storm in had seemed like a scene from a movie. His front door had been kicked in and a smoke grenade tossed inside.
Ebstein had yelped, then screamed, and finally wet himself. The team gave him a moment to change out of his pyjamas and then dragged him out in cuffs.
The DCI Morton Box Set Page 42
