Final Act

by J M Gregson

  ‘He died from a single bullet to the temple, probably nine millimetre calibre. Almost certainly it is still lodged within the skull, since there is no sign of an exit wound. I’ll have him on the table and complete my examination before the day’s over. You should have my full findings by this evening. Crimes like this one take precedence.’

  ‘You’re certain it was murder?’

  ‘As certain as I can be, at this stage. I wouldn’t go into court with what we have here, but I’m giving you my firm opinion. It’s what you always ask me for.’

  Lambert smiled grimly as he gave a tiny nod. ‘Tell me why it’s murder, Dr Patterson.’

  ‘Principally because there’s no sign of a weapon. A single, efficient bullet through the head from no more than three inches and then the weapon is taken away, by person or persons unknown. It’s my guess that you’ll never see it again.’

  ‘Could this be a professional killer? A hired hit man?’

  ‘More your field than mine, Lambert, but I’d say yes. It has the hallmarks. Efficient, anonymous, almost clinical. And in the sort of isolated place with a notable absence of witnesses which a professional killer might choose. Are there people among your suspects who might have the opportunity and the funds to employ someone like that?’

  Lambert sighed. ‘I expect so. There are more and more hit men around and more and more people willing and able to employ them.’ The police and the law hated professional hit men, because they were the most efficient as well as the most ruthless of killers. Experience told, in this as in other fields. Practice made, if not perfect, highly efficient. And hit men were unemotional, demanding a large fee for their services but not usually acquainted with their victims, which meant they were unaffected by the love, anger or hate which characterized so many killings and provided clues as to their motivation.

  Bert Hook said, ‘We didn’t think the murder of Sam Jackson involved a hit man; a professional killer would have chosen a different time and a different place – somewhere far less public and more anonymous than his caravan on a location film site. Are we saying that this killing is by a different person? It’s stretching credulity to say these two deaths aren’t connected.’

  Lambert grinned at the pathologist. ‘Bert is my voice of sanity. He tries to counteract the natural pessimism which goes with the rank of chief superintendent. He’s refused the chance to become a detective inspector at least three times; I think he feels it might compromise his natural optimism and sunny outlook on life.’

  The pathologist looked doubtfully at the stolid Bert Hook. Like others before him, he was confused by the occasional ironies of this unlikely double act. ‘I must be on my way. I wish you well on this one. The press boys will be here shortly to make a meal of it.’

  ‘And of us, no doubt, if we allow it,’ said Lambert. ‘Can you give us a time of death?’

  ‘Almost certainly last night rather than this morning, from the temperatures I’ve recorded. If you can check when this fellow last ate, my analysis of stomach contents later today will give you a reasonably accurate idea of when he died. Meantime, I hope the car provides you with some significant clue as to who might have done this. The angle of the wound and everything about the position of the corpse indicates that he was shot from the front passenger seat.’

  John Lambert watched the SOC team dusting door handles inside and out for fingerprints. ‘The young woman who raised the alarm this morning opened the driver’s door,’ said the head of the team with a shake of the head, as if deploring the lack of professionalism he met so often in the public.

  ‘Good job she investigated. The poor sod might still be sitting here waiting to be discovered if she’d been as determined to mind her own business as so many people are nowadays.’ Lambert looked at the driving keys, which had already been dusted. ‘Were those left in the ignition overnight?’

  ‘Yes. Well, I presume so. They were here when we arrived.’

  ‘Probably not a hit man, then. He’d almost certainly have locked the car and taken the keys away – anything to delay discovery and make our job a little harder. Have you found anything which might be significant yet?’ The SOC officer was a civilian but an ex-policeman, who knew exactly the sort of detail which might be significant for CID.

  ‘We’ve bagged hairs and clothes fibres from floor and seats. But most of them probably pre-date last night. This is a nice motor, but it’s quite a while since the interior was cleaned.’

  ‘And we’ll probably need an arrest before we can match up your trophies. We’re in no position to demand a DNA sample from everyone staying in the hotel who might have a connection with this.’

  Lambert looked sourly, even resentfully, at the body of Ernie Clark, as if it was the victim’s fault that he couldn’t provide them with better guidance as to his killer.

  The news of the body in the car park had been broken to the cast and ancillary staff of Hertfordshire Horrors at breakfast, which was around eight o’clock for most of them. The tradition of theatricals rising late after long nights in the theatre and hours of unwinding before retiring to bed late in the night dated from a situation which was now rare rather than characteristic. When you were involved in location shooting for a television series, you had to be on the site early; you caused highly expensive delays if you were not and were likely to find yourself redundant at the end of your present contract.

  John Watts heard about the death at twelve minutes past eight. By twenty past eight, he had been down to the end of the car park and found the scene of the crime already fenced off from public access. But he had confirmed that the victim of this latest outrage was in fact Ernest Clark. By just after nine o’clock, he was completing his third phone call stemming from this knowledge. ‘I’m not scrambling for funds, Mr Armitage. I’m offering to let you in on a good thing. Yes, I’m demanding complete control, but I’m suggesting to you that that is the most efficient method of securing a proper return on your investment. I know exactly what is going on in this series. I have directed every episode since the outset and I know what is planned for the future. I’m demanding complete control because that is the most efficient way forward for everyone – for the new investors we shall need as well as for everyone who will remain involved in the Inspector Loxton series.’

  Watts put down the phone and smiled. Armitage was interested – more than interested. Once you stripped away the financial-speak of the theatrical investor, he was positively eager. He’d be stupid not to be. The Ben Loxton series was the nearest thing to a guaranteed financial return you could be offered in the uncertain worlds of theatre and television. Armitage would be in, if he had the money available, and so would the others he’d rung before him. And he’d make sure there was a strong holding for himself in whatever scheme was eventually adopted. He’d pour in every pound he had and he’d up his own salary as director. You had to look after number one in this game. Not everyone was as adept at that as John Watts. Theatrical tycoon as well as respected director, the show business pages would be saying by the end of the year. You had to take advantages of opportunities when they offered themselves, whether unexpected or otherwise.

  The anonymous grey van which the police knew as the ‘meat wagon’ was preparing to remove the body of Ernest Clark from the Jaguar which had given him much pleasure before becoming the scene of his death. The photographer was crouched at a very strange angle in the car, taking a last picture of the body and where it was slumped. All of this would probably prove irrelevant, but you never knew in advance what pictures or what samples might become vital supporting evidence in a court of law. The job of a scene of crime team was to cover all possible options with the evidence from the spot which might support them.

  The Jaguar was at the very end of the car park, whence it would shortly be removed for intensive forensic examination in the police laboratories. Lambert and Hook walked out to the road beside it and looked down at the Wye, running low and peaceful past this spot where a man had died so violent
ly. Lambert said suddenly and unexpectedly, ‘Simon James is a fly fisherman, isn’t he?’

  Hook was surprised. Simon James was a sergeant, but he was uniform, not CID. Bert didn’t think the chief would even have registered his name, so preoccupied was he with serious crimes like the present one in his final detective years. But John Lambert registered all sorts of information and he rarely forgot a name. Bert said, ‘He’s very keen, is Simon. I fished with him a couple of times myself, before you made me take up golf. But I was never in his class. He fishes this area of the river – right down to Ross-on-Wye, I think.’

  ‘He’ll probably know this stretch well. There are a couple of very inviting pools just north and south of here. It’s a long shot, but I’d like him to come out here with a single police frogman and take a quick look for the weapon which killed Ernest Clark. They should confine themselves to a hundred yards north and south of here. It doesn’t merit any more resources, because it’s such an outside chance, but there isn’t that much deep water on this stretch.’

  ‘You think the killer might have flung away his murder weapon so close to the scene of the crime?’

  ‘I’d want to get rid of it as soon as I could, if I’d just shot someone. If I was driving away, I might look for a foolproof spot miles away from here, but my present guess is that it was someone staying in the hotel who did this. I’d have wanted to be rid of an incriminating firearm as quickly as possible. It’s worth a try, that’s all. I’m hoping Simon James has expert knowledge of this stretch, which might help him to pinpoint the search.’

  Bert Hook phoned the station and spoke to Sergeant James himself. That solid officer was surprised, but only for a moment. The idea of directing a police frogman obviously appealed to Simon James. He’d be up here by early evening, he hoped, when he’d recruited a frogman who was a fellow angler and knew this stretch of the Wye almost as well as he did. At the very latest by tomorrow morning, which was Saturday. Any surprise had left his voice by now. The ways of detective chief superintendents were strange indeed, and largely a closed book to Station Sergeant James.

  DS Hook reckoned as they walked back to the hotel that John Lambert must be feeling more than usually baffled by this second death. Neither of them knew that at that very moment, a police search of Ernie Clark’s house was revealing information which would prove significant in this baffling pair of murders.

  Lambert decided that they would continue to use the murder room they had already set up at the location site for this second murder also. It would enable the expensive location filming which was such a matter of concern to the crew to continue whilst the detective team studied any significant or suspicious actions on the part of those involved.

  Before their first interview, DI Chris Rushton brought in information he had taken in a phone call from the detective sergeant and team who had searched the small house occupied by Ernie Clark on the outskirts of Gloucester. ‘I’m about to put this on the files I’ve compiled on the people concerned, sir. I thought you might like to have the gist of it as quickly as possible.’

  Lambert nodded his thanks. He had scarcely time to register the first significant facts before David Deeney knocked quietly at the door and came into the murder room. He sat in the chair set ready for him and said, ‘Bad business, this. None of us liked Sam Jackson, as you’ve no doubt gathered by now, but Ernie Clark was a different sort of man. He didn’t go out of his way to offend you for no reason other than an innate nastiness, as Sam did.’

  He was nervous, tumbling out words to fill the silence he felt was threatening him. That was unusual among these actors, who seemed experts in deception, even when they had nothing really important to hide. John Lambert found the man’s anxiety curiously reassuring and normal, so that when Deeney finally came to a halt he let the silence stretch for a moment. Then he asked quietly, ‘Did you arrange to meet Mr Clark in the hotel car park last night?’

  ‘No, of course I didn’t.’

  ‘There’s no “of course” about it, as far as we are concerned, Mr Deeney. Mr Clark wasn’t staying at your hotel, but at his home in Gloucester. It seems almost certain that someone arranged a meeting with him last night. Not in the hotel, because they would have been seen there and no one has reported a sighting. A secret meeting, then, at the point of the car park furthest from the hotel. That’s where the car and Mr Clark’s body were discovered this morning.’

  ‘And the person who arranged this meeting is the person who killed Ernie?’

  ‘That seems at the moment highly probable, as I’m sure you’d agree. Is there anyone available to support your story that it wasn’t you who asked him to come?’

  ‘No. It’s difficult to prove a negative. You must be able to see that.’

  ‘Difficult but not impossible. If you were with someone else for most of the evening, for instance, that would be helpful to you and to us. Or if a member of the hotel staff could confirm that you were in one of the bars or even in your room for most of the evening, we would be delighted to record that. We haven’t yet been able to pinpoint a time of death, but we may be able to do that in the next few hours.’

  ‘I was alone in my room for most of the evening. I do not have a witness to that.’

  Bert Hook made a note of this, then looked up into the anxious brown eyes beneath the carefully parted black hair. ‘Why are you staying in the hotel, Mr Deeney?’

  ‘What do you mean? We’re all staying there. All the cast and many of the support staff.’

  ‘Ernie Clark wasn’t staying with you. Someone had to get him to come here so that they could kill him.’

  ‘Ernie had his own house in Gloucester. It was natural that he should stay there. He had Sam Jackson staying there with him until someone decided to kill Sam on Tuesday.’

  ‘Just as you have your own house in Oxford. Most of the cast are London-based and need accommodation here, but your house is scarcely more than an hour’s drive from here. I’m surprised you didn’t elect to stay with your partner there and travel each day for the location filming.’

  David was uncomfortable. He stared at Hook’s weatherbeaten, unmenacing face as if he could scarcely believe his embarrassment stemmed from this source. ‘It’s not easy getting out of Oxford in the mornings. The rush hour’s a nightmare.’

  ‘But much easier journeying out than journeying in. And you didn’t have to be on this site at the crack of dawn. On only one of the days this week were you scheduled to be shooting the first scene here.’

  ‘Why this sudden interest in my domestic arrangements, DS Hook?’

  A bland smile from the bland face. ‘We become interested in all sorts of apparently inconsequential things when there is a murder, sir. Had you been at home in Oxford last night rather than installed in the hotel by the River Wye, you would have been in no position to arrange a meeting there with a murder victim.’

  David Deeney looked hard at him for a moment, then said, ‘There’s another reason for staying in the hotel with the rest of the cast. An actor’s reason. Probably one you wouldn’t understand.’

  ‘Try me, Mr Deeney.’ There was no trace of a smile in Hook’s amiable features.

  ‘Team spirit. When you’re part of an ongoing series where many people appear in successive episodes, you become a team and have the advantages of a team. We call it ensemble playing. It’s not that we all become bosom pals, but if you keep together as a cast you gain certain indefinable advantages.’

  ‘Indefinable?’

  How absolute the knave was! It was almost as if he was having fun, but there was still no trace of a smile on the dutiful, unchanging face. David had a sudden inspiration. ‘You’ve played cricket at a high level, I believe, Detective Sergeant Hook. You must be aware how the general performance lifts when you have the team ethic operating.’

  ‘Indeed, yes. But clustering round the bat and catching everything doesn’t seem quite the same as acting a scene on stage or film.’

  ‘Not quite the same, but with sim
ilar elements. You help each other and set up effects for each other, when you’re used to playing scenes together. You get to know each other’s idiosyncrasies as actors. Ensemble playing lifts a scene and gives it things it wouldn’t have if we were all strangers to each other.’

  ‘And you feel the ensemble effect is enhanced by your staying in the hotel rather than being at home with your partner.’ Hook nodded slowly, making this sound the unlikeliest of reasons for Deeney to be in the hotel where murder had been planned and delivered. ‘You feel you know your fellow actors involved in Herefordshire Horrors quite intimately, then?’

  David said with what dignity he could muster, ‘I know them a little better than if I had gone home to Oxford each night rather than staying with them in Herefordshire. I hope that might lead to a tiny improvement in what we produce collectively. That is all I’m claiming.’

  Bert Hook, who knew all about ensemble playing and admired it when he saw it in the theatre, looked suitably dubious. ‘I understand, sir. But you found on Wednesday, the day after our first murder, that you had something sufficiently pressing to take you on a flying visit to Oxford. In the middle of the day, between two different scenes you were filming on the location site here. The strength of the ensemble does not seem to have been your priority on Wednesday.’

  David was shaken by the detail they knew about his movements. Perhaps that was why they allotted such huge teams to murder enquiries. He said as lightly as he could, ‘You’re making more of this than is warranted. I simply found that the shooting schedules on Wednesday left me with three hours to myself in the middle of the day. I thought it would be a good opportunity to zip home and see my partner, Trevor Fisher. It was an impulse after my first scene had gone well, There was no more to it than that.’

  ‘One of our officers spoke to Mr Fisher yesterday. It’s standard procedure to check with partners, when we’re checking the movements of people involved in murder investigations.’