by L M Krier
The home had the same airlock system of doors as Snowdon Lodge. The outer one was open, leading into a medium-sized porch, with a visitors' book. The inner door was locked. Jezza rang the bell then looked through the book while they waited a few moments for anyone to appear. It was a rather harassed-looking woman in a dark blue tabard-style overall.
Ted and Jezza both had their warrant cards out. As instructed, Jezza did the talking.
'DC Vine, DI Darling,' she said brusquely. 'Is it possible to speak to the manager?'
The woman looked immediately anxious. When she spoke, her English was strongly accented.
'She busy. I go find her. Please to wait here.'
The layout was similar to Snowdon Lodge. There were elderly people in armchairs and wheelchairs in various parts of the large vestibule, many of them dozing quietly. An open doorway to one side showed more of them sitting in another room, where a television droned away to itself loudly in one corner. There was no sign of any visitors. It was perhaps early in the day for the visiting to start.
They were kept waiting for several minutes, with no sign of any staff about. Jezza was looking round observantly.
'It looks like no one can just walk in off the street. They would need to ring the bell, if that door is always kept locked.'
'Or wait for a chance when someone was just arriving, or just leaving, as I did the first time at Snowdon Lodge,' Ted told her. 'I must ask Professor Nelson what quantity of cake it would take for these poisonings. We've had enough time already to get someone to eat a fair bit.'
'Has anyone gone through the visitors' books in the different homes, checking them for names that appear more than once?' Jezza asked him.
'Not as far as I know,' Ted replied. 'It would be a very long shot. Certainly in Snowdon Lodge, there was no one signed in at all to visit Mrs Jones on the day she was poisoned. Nor on any other day. Only her daughter ever signed in. I'll get someone on to it, though, it might be worth a go.'
He always referred to his mother and grandmother formally, without any reference to his relationship to them, when talking to the team.
At that moment, a woman came towards them from a side corridor. She was tall and well-built, with a wide moon face, large glasses and the appearance of slightly too many teeth. She headed instinctively towards Ted, clearly the older of the two officers.
'I'm Mrs Watson, the manager. What can I do for you, officers?'
They both produced their warrant cards and Jezza replied, 'We're here to ask you about Mr John McAlpine.'
The woman looked at her, as if doubting she really was a police officer, despite the warrant card. With her ripped jeans and air of having just come back from an all-night rave, she certainly did not look like a typical officer.
'You'd better come to my office,' she said grudgingly. 'We hopefully won't be disturbed there.'
She ushered them in, saw them seated and went to a filing cabinet against the back wall. She found a folder, which she put on the desk in front of her, then sat down.
'We're investigating Mr McAlpine's poisoning as a possible attempted murder,' Jezza told her. 'I'm sure you already know that a resident in one of your group's other homes, Snowdon Lodge, died in similar circumstances recently. We're particularly interested in anyone who may have visited Mr McAlpine while he was in this home.'
The manager was looking through the file.
'There's no mention here of any relatives or frequent visitors,' she said. 'I wouldn't really know if he did have visitors. This is a big home, lots of residents. I'm not always aware of who comes and goes. They have to sign in when they visit, you could look in the book to see who comes to see him.'
'This person may not necessarily sign themselves in, and certainly not with their own name. Who is his named carer?' Jezza asked.
The manager looked again at the file before replying, 'Sandy Dennison.'
'Is she on duty today?'
Mrs Watson picked up her desk phone and made a quick call.
'She is, she'll be here in a moment.'
There was a brief knock at the door and a woman came in. In her mid-fifties, by the look of it, wearing a dark blue tunic and trousers. She looked worried, glancing from the manager to the visitors, both of whom produced their warrant cards in a reflex gesture.
'We're here about Mr McAlpine,' Jezza told her. 'I presume you heard what happened to him? Can you tell me about any regular visitors he has, or anyone he talks about?'
'There's just his niece, who comes about once every week or two,' the woman said. 'Angelique. She's very kind to him, usually bakes him something nice. She was in early last week. I had to tell her about the food ban, so she took the cake away with her. She said she'd freeze it for next time.'
'Can you describe her, please?' Jezza asked.
'Always smart, well-spoken. In her late thirties, I'd say. It's hard to be sure.'
'Anything more you can remember about her? Height, build, hair colour?'
'About your height, perhaps,' the carer said, looking thoughtfully at Jezza. 'Hard to say, she was usually sitting down with John when I saw her. Medium build, quite smartly dressed. I don't know about hair colour really, she always wears a hat of some sort.'
'Do you have any idea where she lives?'
The woman shook her head.
'None at all, I'm afraid.' She looked pointedly at the manager as she added, 'We're kept very busy. We have no time to chat to visitors or even to the residents.'
The manager was looking through the file again but raised her head to throw a warning glance at the carer.
'There's no mention of a niece on his records,' she frowned.
The carer looked puzzled.
'She said she was his niece. John wouldn't know. He doesn't know who anyone is, bless him. But he always seemed pleased to see her. They'd have a good natter and a laugh together.'
'Was she informed about his hospitalisation?' Jezza asked the manager. 'I'm presuming not, if you don't have her on your records. You won't have any contact details for her, is that right?'
'Yes, she did know,' the carer chipped in. 'She popped back later in the week, to see if he was allowed the cake yet. She said it was his favourite. I told her he'd had a turn and been taken to hospital. She said she'd go and visit him there.'
Ted and Jezza exchanged looks.
'If you think of anything else, anything at all, please contact us at once,' Jezza said, standing up to leave. 'And please do make sure the food ban stays in place until further notice.'
As they walked back to the car, Ted said, 'That was good work. So, we now have an Angelique, who knew that Mr McAlpine had been moved to the hospital. That's one coincidence too many for me. Somehow, we have to hope that she appears soon at Cottage Row and that you can get something, a car number or anything, to point us towards her.'
Ted phoned Honest John's social worker when he got back to his office, just to make sure he got the help he needed to get his phone working again. He knew that meant more phone calls confessing to crimes, but he didn't like to think of the alternative, of him being marooned without contact.
Then he phoned Jim Baker. He wanted to tell him that Trev had got the all-clear, and to invite him and Bella to dinner at the weekend. He felt he owed them both more of an apology, after his behaviour at their dinner party. Trev had been delighted at the suggestion. He loved cooking and entertaining.
Ted also wanted to ask Jim something which he was sure would not go down as well as a dinner invitation.
'Bloody marvellous, Ted,' Jim boomed with delight when Ted told him the good news. 'And I'm sure we'd love to come to dinner. I'll have to check with Bella first, obviously, in case she has anything planned. I'll let you know soon as.'
'Just one more thing, Jim,' Ted said warily. 'Now don't go off the deep end …'
'Why do I know I'm not going to like this?' his former boss growled.
'I need to get one of the team to talk to Bella, so can you give me her contact details?'
He
could hear that Jim was about to explode so he went on hurriedly, 'She's not a suspect, Jim, she's a potential witness. You know that. I wouldn't be doing my job if we didn't interview her. We'll be talking to anyone who regularly visited the homes, and she told me she does visit them.
'The Chief Constable already wants to use my hide for a rug on his office floor. Can you imagine what he would say if he found out I hadn't had her questioned, just because of her relationship to you?'
Jim made a low rumbling noise. It sounded like a volcano which had not yet decided whether or not to erupt. Eventually, he said, 'Morgan. Bella Morgan. And she's not a serial killer, Ted. I'm going to ask her to marry me. I'd like you to be my best man. So I don't want you appearing at the wedding with handcuffs.'
Ted chuckled as he took down the telephone number and address, in Heaton Mersey, which Jim gave him. He took it through and put it on Mike's desk, with a note to get someone to check it out. The main office was empty, all the team out following up leads from the morning briefing. He hoped at least one of them would bring an advance, no matter how small, in the case.
His next phone call was to his mother, to find out if she was free at the weekend. Trev and Bizzie had arranged their day out on the bike up to the Lakes for Sunday, so Ted wanted to find out if his mother was working that day.
She sounded thrilled at his phone call, and even more delighted at his suggestion that he take her out.
'Oh, Teddy, that's so kind of you,' she said emotionally. 'It's my day off. I'd love to go for a little run out, if it's not too much trouble for you.'
'It's no trouble. It would be nice to spend some time together.' He was surprised to find that he really meant what he was saying. 'We could go to Roman Lakes?'
Oh, Teddy!' she exclaimed again, and he could hear that she was close to tears.
Somehow, now that he knew that Trev was going to be all right, he not only felt better about the case, but was suddenly determined to take some time to get to know his mother. Especially after his contact with Trev's. It made him appreciate her all the more, despite what had happened in the past. He was taking Trev's advice to heart. Carpe diem. Seize the day. Or as Trev had so eloquently put it, 'Go for it!'
Chapter Thirty-four
From the grins on the faces of some of the team the next morning, Ted knew there was at last going to be some progress to report with the enquiry. He asked Rob O'Connell to kick off the briefing, as he was clearly bursting with some news.
'Well, we don't yet have anything concrete to tie Mandy Griffiths in to any of the poisonings,' he began. 'But now we've finished going through the paperwork we collected from her home, we have a very good paper trail to a pretty nasty fraud and theft.
'With the excuse of supposedly helping an elderly woman in the same road, it seems she's been robbing her of most of her pension and savings. Best of all, we can prove it. Armed with that, I think that if we bring her in and confront her with the physical evidence, she may just start singing about anything else she knows.'
Ted nodded in satisfaction.
'Excellent, good work. Go and bring her in as soon as you can. Ask Inspector Turner if he can spare you an officer to go with you to arrest her, and an area car too, if he can. The sight of a uniform and some blue lights at the home may just rattle a few cages. What else?'
Virgil Tibbs spoke up next.
'I got a lead from talking to relatives who lodged complaints in the past about non-availability of beds. Those where they were convinced that the lack of a bed had led to someone dying.
'One in particular was very sad. The parents of a young lad, just eighteen. He and a mate had been to a party and drunk too much. The driver should never have been at the wheel, but he was. He walked away unhurt from the crash he caused. The other lad was seriously brain injured. He died while they were waiting for a bed to be found for him on intensive care.
'The parents were understandably devastated. More so because they were convinced the lack of a bed was the cause of his death. So they made a formal complaint. I can't imagine how they must have been feeling. But it was just a knee-jerk reaction to grief. Once they came to terms with it, they accepted that he would not have survived, even on life support, and withdrew their complaint.
'But they do remember a woman talking to them at the time. Ranting, they put it. Her husband had just died, too, and she was going on about there not being a bed for him, either. The interesting thing for us is that they remember her saying that a bed had been found for an elderly patient who had come in at the same time as her husband, but not for him. She told them he died on a trolley in a corridor.'
'Angela?' Ted asked.
'It could just be, boss. They couldn't remember anything about her, just her ranting. They were too overcome by their own grief at the time to take much notice. But the man did remember her saying that her husband had died of meningitis.
'Now, we have the dates for when their son died. If we can check hospital records to see if there was a death from meningitis the same day, or maybe even a few days before, we could just have our first lead to who Angela might be.'
There was a general air of anticipation from all the team members at the news. It was the closest they had come so far in the enquiry. Only Jezza was not showing much reaction. The dark smudges under her eyes spoke of yet another night of not enough sleep.
'Mike, that might be one for you and me,' Ted said to the DS. 'It's not easy getting information from the administrator at the hospital. Perhaps if we go in mob-handed, we might do a bit better. I'll also check with our newly friendly local reporter, to see if that story rings any bells with him.
'Right, let's get to it. Rob, go and bring in the Griffiths woman again. Then you and Sal question her, see what you can get out of her. Keep looking for anything at all that links her to any of the other victims.'
Ted stood up and headed to his office, saying to the DS as he went, 'Mike, have you got a minute, please?'
The DS followed him into the room and closed the door behind him. Ted nodded to him to sit down.
'This is a delicate one, Mike, so I want you to handle it,' Ted told him. 'The Big Boss's newly intended, Bella Morgan. I put the details on your desk but I wanted to explain further. I need her checking out in detail, please, with kid gloves on. I hope she's not our Angela. I don't even really think it any more, after behaving like an idiot when I met her. But I'm between a rock and a hard place.
'If I check her out, I risk being crossed off Jim's Christmas card list and not being invited to the wedding. If I don't, I'm not doing my job properly. And if by any chance she is connected, then I really can kiss my career goodbye for good.
'Please treat her as a potential witness, not a suspect, initially. Go and see her, don't bring her in. But she has been to some of the homes we're interested in, doing their books. She might just have seen something.
'She works mornings only, like our Angela seems to, so you need to call round in the afternoon. That's one of the things that had me convinced she could be our Angela,' he added ruefully. 'And then I had to sit there and eat some of her cooking.'
'No worries, boss, I can do diplomatic,' Mike smiled. 'I'll get in touch with her after we've been to the hospital.'
'What do you think about Jezza?' Ted asked, changing the subject. 'She always looks as if she's short on sleep but she doesn't seem to want to talk about the possible cause.'
'She looks like one of the undead to me. Are we sure she should be out in daylight?' Mike joked. 'I can't make her out at all. She's as prickly as a hedgehog. I'm almost afraid to speak to her in case she accuses me of harassment or something. But we can't have someone who's not reliable on the team. And I'm suspicious of her real reasons for being absent at the weekend. Do you want me to rota her on again next weekend?'
'Leave it for now, wait until it's her turn again. I agree with you, let's not be accused of harassment. I still have high hopes that she might be the one to get the first real lead on Angela, through
Cottage Row.
'I'll just phone everybody's favourite journalist then we'll get off to the hospital, see what we can find out. I think we might just get more cooperation if we turn up in person.'
As Mike left the room, Ted picked up his phone and braced himself.
'Alastair! Ted Darling here. How are you?' he asked, with enforced joviality.
'I'd be a lot better if you had a little something for me, something to make the front page,' the familiar wheedling voice replied.
'Nothing definite as yet, but I'm just calling you with an early heads-up,' Ted told him, trying to keep his voice neutral. 'We may not be in a position to charge the suspect I mentioned to you in connection with the sudden deaths. But I just wanted to let you know that there may be other charges of a serious nature coming out of our enquiries, on a different matter. One which might make your front page.'
As the journalist started to ask questions, Ted interrupted, 'That's as much as I can give you for now. But if and when there is a remand hearing, I promise you will be the first to know. Now, did you have anything for me in exchange? Anything to do with your articles on relatives complaining of lack of beds?'
'I've honestly been trying to think of anything else on that woman I told you about. I really want to help you, now you're being so helpful to me.'
His smarmy voice made Ted cringe. It was precisely the reason he had always avoided any direct contact with him, preferring to refer him instead to the Press Office.
'I did talk to her a bit, but I can't find my notes from then. The only thing that I did remember was that she said she lived up near Dooley Lane somewhere. Well, up that way, anyway, going towards Romiley. I remember thinking at the time it was very apt. She struck me as completely doolally, so Dooley fitted very well.'
'Thank you, Alastair, I appreciate that, really helpful,' Ted said, feeling he should cross his fingers for the lie, then hanging up with relief.
Ted and Mike were met with the same initial wall of non-cooperation at the hospital, the insistence on patient confidentiality which prevented personal details being given out. It meant another frustrating delay while permission was sought from higher up to give them the information they needed. They came away with nothing much, just a promise to contact them as soon as anything was known.
