The Body in the Boot: The first 'Mac' Maguire mystery

by Patrick C Walsh

  A very young man with a dark blue turban smiled broadly at him from the far end of the room.

  ‘Okay we think we have something to have a go at. Adil tell us what you’ve found.’

  The sergeant stood up, notebook in hand, and took Dan’s place at the white board.

  ‘We’ve been trying to track down any friends of the girls who might be able to substantiate the facts here and hopefully add to them. So far everything we’ve found out checks with the facts and dates on the board. Mary looked for any known associates of the first girl who went missing, Mandy Stokes, Buddy took Barbara Mason and I took Angela Moran. We found something, or rather someone, that might link Mandy and Angela. They were both users, especially Angela, who her friend said would take anything she could get her hands on. Anyway, not long before she disappeared one of her clients offered her something as a sort of tip. They were white pills, her client said they were something new and she was stupid enough to take them.’

  He consulted his notebook.

  ‘Her friend said she was hyperactive for two to three days, taking all the clients she could and seemingly enjoying the sex, only problem was she then crashed and slept for nearly three days straight. Her friend said when she first found her she thought she was dead. She tried to wake her several times but couldn’t. Angela finally came around but was groggy for quite a time. She described the man to her friend as being in his thirties or early forties, balding and having an American accent. Mary.’

  Mary Sullivan stood up and took over.

  ‘While talking to one of Mandy Stokes’ friends she also mentioned an American man who’d been one of her clients. She remembered Mandy being furious about being offered some white pills by him which she threw away. She thought he was trying to fob her off with aspirin or something. This friend of Mandy’s, she calls herself Divine but her real name is Elizabeth Eversley, said that Mandy had told her she’d seen this American again. He was walking down Church Street talking to two young men who she said looked like students. One of them called him ‘Professor’. Mandy also said that, although he dressed younger, he must have been around forty, that he was losing his hair at the front and also that he’d been circumcised.’

  Mary sat down and Dan Carter took over again.

  ‘Okay, we’ve contacted the university and they’ve got several staff members from North America, two Canadians and three Americans. Two of them are women which leaves us three. They’ve sent me the photos from their staff IDs and out of the three only one is balding and his name is Asher Grinberg, a professor working at the Business School. Martin has checked with our US colleagues and the professor has some previous for drugs but only minor stuff when he was a teenager. If these pills he’s giving out like Smarties are the hibernation drug or have contributed in some way to Henrietta Lewinton’s condition then we may have just have cracked the case. If not then we need to know what he’s pushing and, if it is a class A or something hazardous, we need to get him and his pills off the streets. I’ve been given the green light to go ahead with a raid on Mr. Grinberg’s flat, however, Martin’s found out that he’s attending a university theatre production this evening so I suggest that we delay any action until early tomorrow morning.’

  Dan looked at the expressions on his team’s faces. They all looked more than up for it.

  ‘Adil, arrange for the Support Unit to meet us here at four thirty and I’ll brief them. Everyone else I’ll need you here at four for your briefing. I’d suggest, unless there’s something urgent you need to do, that you get straight home and get some sleep. See you tomorrow.’

  Dan went straight to Mac.

  ‘That doesn’t include you of course Mac.’

  ‘I’d still like to be here for the briefings if that’s okay?’

  Mac knew his condition meant that his raiding days were over but he was still surprised that it irked him so much.

  ‘Of course. Did you find anything of interest today?’

  Mac shook his head.

  ‘Nothing definite but we’ve got some top medical people asking around so you never know.’

  ‘What do you think of the lead?’

  ‘Looks like a good one, especially liked what you said about ‘contributing’ to Henrietta’s condition. It’s always possible that she took two or three things that, perhaps by themselves might not have been so harmful, but together sent her into that weird coma. What are your thoughts on Mr. Grinberg? Do you think he’s our driver?’

  ‘Probably not. I’m not sure if stealing cars is on the Business School curriculum but what if he gave Henrietta something that caused or contributed towards her condition? Perhaps her pimp found her, thought she was dead and was trying to dump the body.’

  Mac nodded, he had to concede there was an outside chance he might be right.

  ‘And what about the other five girls?’

  ‘That’s where any theory involving the professor probably falls down. He may have been peddling something but it wasn’t heroin and if the girls all died of massive heroin overdoses then, no, I don’t fancy him for that. Could it be that Henrietta’s case and the other five girls aren’t linked after all? Anyway even if we don’t fancy him as a serial killer, as he was such a good customer of at least two of the girls, he might know something, who knows?’

  ‘It’s worth a shot. So while you’re away breaking down the professor’s door would it be okay if I reviewed everything we have so far?’

  ‘Good idea, I’ll get Adil to round up all the paperwork we have and I’ll get Martin to give you access to the database, although I’ve found it’s usually quicker to ask him rather than try and find anything yourself.’

  It was only just past five o’clock and Mac decided to see how Hetty was getting on before going home. Her mother was still sitting by the side of the bed, holding her daughter’s hand. There had been little change in Hetty’s condition but her mother was still being positive.

  ‘They’re still in the dark about what’s caused it but she’s alive, Mr. Maguire, which is more than I could have hoped for when I saw her on that slab last Monday. While there’s life, there’s hope, isn’t there?’

  Mac could only agree.

  ‘Where are you staying?’

  ‘I’m in a hotel, it’s only a short walk from here and I’ve booked it for two weeks just in case. Not that I’ve been there much.’

  ‘We’re working hard to find out what it was that put Hetty in this coma. If we can it might help the doctors find a cure.’

  ‘Even more hope then,’ she said, trying to smile.

  Mac couldn’t think of anything else to say. She promised to phone Mac if there was any change.

  After leaving the hospital Mac rang Tim. They had a bite to eat and a few drinks in the Magnets as Mac described the events of the day. Tim thought his friend was looking more and more like his old self but he kept this thought to himself.

  Even though his team was playing in a local derby that night Mac left the pub early and was tucked up in bed by eight thirty. For once he had no trouble falling asleep.

  Chapter Eight

  Thursday 8th January

  Mac beat the alarm clock by five minutes. He turned it off and lay there for a few minutes allowing a strange dream about climbing a giant tree while attempting to phone a call centre about a faulty cooker, exit stage left. It was five to three and, once he’d shaken the remnants of the dream off, he felt wide awake and ready for the day ahead.

  He stood up gingerly, checked his pain levels, and said a little prayer of thanks that it was still within limits. He changed his patch and made coffee. While it was brewing he checked the football results on his tablet. He wasn’t surprised to find that his team had lost, a goal scored in the eighty-ninth minute.

  He poured coffee into his travel mug, and drove out through the dark, empty streets to Luton Police Station. Although he wasn’t taking any actual part in the raid he still felt a sense of excitement. He thought back over previous raids that he’d been
involved in, most of which had been brilliant successes. Mac and his team had always tried to cover every angle and they felt that time spent planning would be handsomely repaid by limiting the number of surprises. Regardless of that, a few still turned out to be absolute disasters, being more like something from a comedy sketch than serious police work. Mac made a mental note to share some of them with Tommy.

  He walked into the room at ten to four and the whole team was there. A jug of coffee and paper cups were on a side table and he helped himself. Tommy came over and poured himself a cup.

  ‘How many raids have you been part of so far?’ Mac asked.

  ‘Just the one as a detective, a suspected burglar, but I was part of the Support Unit for a few months, must have done seven or eight with them. It’s different as a detective though isn’t it? I mean our work starts when the Support Unit’s finishes. I used to be quite envious of the detectives as they’d get to investigate and find out the whole story. It was like only being shown the first page in a book, know what I mean?’

  ‘I do. There’s something very satisfying about following an investigation all the way through.’

  Dan called them to order.

  ‘The Support Unit will be here in about fifteen minutes. Martin have you got all we need in terms of photos and maps of Grinberg’s flat?’

  Martin nodded without turning his head and put his hand on a stack of printed pages.

  ‘Good,’ Dan continued. ‘Our job is really simple, we just stand by and watch the Support Unit gain entry and then we arrest anyone on the premises. Tommy and Buddy, I want you to wait at the scene and work with Forensics should they need help. They’ll be on site at five thirty to conduct a search and we’ll lend them a hand should they need it. Make sure you both take a fresh set of coveralls. I want you to stay until Forensics are finished, no matter how long it takes, and I want to know within the second if they find anything. While the search is underway the rest of us will make it back to the station where we’ll start interrogating any suspects. Any questions?’

  ‘How many suspects do we think there might be and what are we using to take them back?’ Mary asked.

  ‘We think it’s highly likely it will be just the one, unless he has someone staying overnight. Just in case he’s had a party we’ve got a van that can take up to eight and a couple of the Support Unit team will drive the suspects back to the station. Anything else? No? Okay, make sure you’ve got everything you need and we’ll assemble in the car park in twenty minutes. The canteen is open for coffee and Danishes so if you haven’t had anything to eat yet this may be your last chance for a while.’

  Mac walked with Tommy to the canteen. The coffee was from a machine and the Danish pastries were on plates wrapped in cling film, probably put there the night before Mac thought. None the less they both went down very well.

  ‘Mac, how many raids have you done?’ Tommy asked.

  Adil, Buddy and Mary came nearer.

  ‘I honestly don’t know but it must have been hundreds. I was just thinking about it on the way here. You know it doesn’t matter how hard you plan, how much thought you give to the different scenarios or how good your team is, it can still turn out to be a bloody fiasco.’

  ‘Tell me about one,’ Tommy asked as he bit into a vanilla crown.

  The rest of the team came even closer.

  ‘Okay, it must have been about fifteen years ago now. The suspect was a doctor, a GP in Ruislip who we suspected of helping along two of his older patients, a bit like Shipman but nowhere near on the same scale. Anyway we’d disinterred the two old ladies and found very high levels of diamorphine and, as the doctor had been generously mentioned in both of their wills, it seemed like we had a good case. So we set up a raid on his house for early in the morning, just like this, in the hope that we could find a secret stash of diamorphine and other incriminating evidence. I had someone stake out the house for the whole of the day before. They discretely asked all the neighbours and only the doctor appeared to be in residence. So we break down the door and the doctor gives us no resistance but we were unaware that his mother had been visiting him. She must have been at least seventy and hadn’t left the house since she’d arrived so not even the neighbours were aware that she was staying with her son. So there were we thinking ‘job done’ when this old lady flew out of her bedroom with a metal topped walking stick lashing out at everyone around her and her dog biting anything that moved.’

  Mac stopped to pick up another Danish and to create a bit of suspense.

  ‘We finally disarmed her and locked the dog in another room but by then three of our team had been injured. One had severe concussion, one had his nose broken and one was bleeding profusely from a bite wound on his inner thigh. The doctors said if the dog had bitten a few inches to the right he might have been singing soprano for the rest of his life. The funny thing is that the very next raid we carried out was on a notoriously violent gang leader and on that raid there were also injuries. Two of our team got splinters in their hands from a damaged bannister. That’s the thing about raids, even with the best of plans, you can never be quite sure how they’ll turn out.’

  The team all smiled.

  ‘Thanks for that Mac,’ Adil said. ‘Come on team, time to go.’

  Mac got back to the incident room just in time to see the Support Unit leave. Dan gave him an excited smile as he walked out behind them. In his heart Mac would have given anything to be with them. As it was he walked back into the silent incident room. Martin was there but he still felt alone.

  Adil had left him a pile of files so Mac got to work.

  Firstly he read everything the police had on each of the six girls. They all had records but Angela Moran’s was the most impressive. She’d been charged with soliciting and drug use no less than sixteen times over the past three years. They were mostly cautions but the year before she’d gotten nine months and served five. She was caught injecting heroin while sitting on a bench in an indoor shopping mall and the magistrate hadn’t taken kindly to that. She’d been caught on CCTV so it was an open and shut case.

  He looked at a picture of her. Even slumped dead in the corner of a car park he could see that she’d been very pretty. He wondered what sort of life these girls had before going on the street. He looked again at Angela Moran’s file. No sign of a dad, mom was an alcoholic and she ended up in care at the age of nine. For some reason the name of the children’s home seemed familiar.

  ‘Martin can you do me a favour?’

  ‘Sure,’ Martin replied without looking up.

  ‘The Bradeley Grange Children’s Home. See if you can find anything.’

  Martin’s fingers flew over the keys.

  ‘It used to be in Shepherds Bush, London. Closed down four years ago when several of the staff were jailed for child abuse. It had been going on for years according to this news article.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  Mac felt quite sad picturing a little nine year old girl, all alone and being regularly abused. He could almost understand why Angela ended up as a prostitute, she needed the drugs to help her forget and to get the drugs she needed money. But what about Henrietta? What had made her go down the same road as Angela? Mac opened her folder.

  Just two cautions for soliciting. The first one was while she was still at university, the second just a month ago. There was nothing in the folder that would explain why a well off university girl would choose to hang around on street corners selling herself to anyone with enough money. Was it just the drugs? Mac wondered why some people seemingly couldn’t live without them while most people had no problem leaving them alone. He remembered interviewing a user once and he’d asked him that exact question.

  He’d just shrugged his shoulders.

  ‘There’s this big gaping hole, just here,’ he’d replied, putting his hand on his heart. ‘Nothing in the world will fill it, not even drugs. They just help me forget it isn’t there for a while.’

  Mac wondered if her father d
ying when she was so young had left Hetty with a similarly gaping hole that she just couldn’t cope with.

  He looked through the other papers. The latest forensic reports on the car and Hetty’s clothing were a complete dud as Mac had predicted. All the prints and DNA they found in the car either belonged to Hetty or to the family who owned it, the dress was new and only had Hetty’s DNA on it. There were also some maps which showed where the girls had lived and where they’d usually worked. They were all in more or less the same area but that would be expected given their line of work. There were also some analyses around drug use in the area, but nothing leapt out at him.

  He suddenly realised that his back was getting stiff so he stood up and stretched. He felt like he’d been struck by lightning. A blinding bolt of white hot pain shot down his left leg. It made him gasp but, thankfully, it only lasted a split second. He looked over at Martin who was still glued to his computer screen. Mac was grateful that he hadn’t noticed anything. He gingerly sat down again.

  ‘Sciatica is it?’ Martin asked without looking over.

  ‘What?’ Mac replied in some surprise.

  ‘The pain just now.’

  Mac looked over again at Martin. There was obviously more going on underneath the straight up hair that he’d given credit for.

  ‘Yes, it was sciatica. How did you know?’

  Martin turned and looked at Mac.

  ‘My dad’s had it for years. He used to be a policeman but, unfortunately for him, he got involved in a crowd disturbance at a local football match and got trampled on. His back was no good after that and some days he can hardly walk.’

  ‘How is he now?’ Mac asked, finding himself more than interested in hearing the answer.

  ‘Still in pain but still going and, you won’t believe this, he still goes to all the football matches.’

  ‘Good for him!’ Mac exclaimed with some emotion. ‘How come you don’t get to go out with the rest of the team?’

  ‘I’m not into the rough stuff. I’m a Forensic Computer Specialist and my crime scene is in there somewhere,’ he replied pointing to his laptop. ‘I’m helping out Dan’s team, it’s a pilot to see if computer specialists can improve team performance but I’m also working on two other cases at the same time, one’s a computer fraud and the other a suspected theft of data from a company by an ex-employee.’