The Snuffbox Murders

by Roger Silverwood

  NINETEEN

  ‘Great stuff, sir,’ Flora Carter said. ‘Congratulations.’

  ‘Thank you, Flora,’ Angel said.

  ‘What I don’t understand, sir, is how the statue became worth so much so quickly.’

  ‘The statue was sold to Alec Underwood by phone for a thousand pounds so nobody knew he owned it. If they had known, honest people would have run a mile. After that he kept putting it into more important auctions, one after another, secretly selling and buying it back himself, by private arrangement with the auctioneer, gathering publicity all the way until the item had an apparent value of more than a million pounds. No capital had to be paid to the auctioneer. He owned it, so it only cost him the auctioneer’s commission at each sale. His activities also brought the true romantic story of the love of Dorothea Jordan and the eventual William IV to a TV company. You know how the public loves true romances, especially if they are royal and a bit spicy, so that added to the hype.’

  ‘He was lucky, sir.’

  ‘We were luckier. I am glad to get shot of those two. Now I’ve got to find these snuffboxes, get this Razzle case sewn up and Farleigh permanently behind bars, then find the leader of this country-house gang. Who is manning the obbo on Edward Street?’

  ‘Ted Scrivens and John Weightman, sir.’

  ‘Is anything happening down there? I can’t keep that going much longer. We are going to be sussed.’

  ‘All I hear is that she wants money from him for housekeeping and board. He says he has nothing. She says when is the next job. He says he doesn’t know. She is turning nasty and he gets angry back. The rows get more frequent and louder.’

  ‘Doesn’t either of them go out to the shop or the pub or somewhere?’

  ‘No, sir. No money.’

  ‘Anything in the post or on the phone?’

  ‘Only people selling stuff or chasing money. Nothing helpful to us.’

  ‘We’ll stick with it another day. Something might give.’

  ‘Right, sir,’ she said and made for the door, then she stopped. She came back up to him with a fetching smile. She didn’t know it, but a smile like that from a pretty face always put Angel on his guard.

  ‘Now what?’ he said, his eyes narrowed.

  ‘You were going to tell me the significance of that date you used as the code number you put on Razzle’s workshop door. Number 130864, thirteenth of August 1964.’

  He wrinkled his nose. ‘There isn’t time now,’ he said.

  ‘Please, sir,’ she said.

  Against his better judgement he relented and said, ‘Well, all right. Briefly, it was supposed to be the date that marked a turning point in British people’s attitude to criminals in this country. Instead of dealing with brutal murderers in this so-called civilized society by hanging, a serious attempt was instigated to discover the causes and try to improve conditions. And the date of the hanging of the last two men in this country for the joint murder of a man was on the thirteenth of August 1964. The two murderers were Peter Anthony Allen in Preston and Gwynne Owen Evans in Strangeways. They were hanged at the same time, 8 a.m.’

  Flora Carter looked at Angel, her mouth open. She didn’t say anything. He thought he must have shocked her.

  ‘All right?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Right now,’ he said. ‘Crack on with that job.’

  She hesitated. ‘Yes, sir,’ she said, and went out.

  Angel shook his head and shrugged. He now had the opportunity to finish looking at the Farleigh papers. He would like to get them finished that day. He opened up a desk drawer and took out the envelope marked EVIDENCE.

  There was a knock at the door. ‘Come in.’

  It was Taylor.

  Angel looked up. He pulled a pained face. ‘What is it, Don? Enjoy your day at the seaside?’

  ‘Hardly saw it, sir. I’ve brought that painting back, and had a good look at it.’

  ‘Yes?’ Angel said, looking at him expectantly. ‘Anything of interest? Tell me, quickly.’

  ‘It had been wrapped very carefully in several layers of corrugated waterproof paper, sir, heat-sealed so that the painting and frame were bone dry. It is in perfect condition, even though it was recovered from the rocks and had been in the sea.’

  ‘It was hanging on a wall in a house in Buckinghamshire until the sixteenth of May, so it could have been in the water any time up to a month. Anything else?’

  ‘Hadn’t been in the sea long, sir. There are quite a few smudged fingerprints. I have taken some of them off, but there are none that can be matched. And I found a pungent smell of diesel oil in the wrapping. I think for whatever reason, after it had been sealed, it had been sprayed with diesel oil.’

  Angel pulled at his ear. ‘Diesel?’

  ‘But I couldn’t find anything else that might be useful, sir.’

  ‘Right, Don. Thank you.’

  Taylor went out and closed the door.

  Angel thought a few moments about the careful wrapping of the painting and the strong smell of diesel surrounding it, then he picked up the phone and tapped in Trevor Crisp’s number.

  ‘DS Crisp,’ came the answer.

  ‘Ah, Trevor,’ Angel said. ‘Don Taylor is back, and he reports that the wrapping round the Rubens painting reeks of diesel. Now the painting is huge. A fishing trawler’s diesel tanks are also surprisingly huge. That’s because they might be away from a diesel supply pump for weeks or months at a time. Now, Trevor, I think the country-house gang steal the antiques. Waterproof them and pack them in the fuel tank of a fishing trawler. It meets up way out of the English Channel with a boat, possibly a large private yacht. The treasures are transferred. Big money changes hands, and some millionaire or president of an oil-rich country acquires irreplaceable treasures that can only increase in value. That’s why we never – well, hardly ever – recover the property. On Monday, a fishing trawler from Bridlington was involved in an accident in early-morning mist in the North Sea off Flamborough Head. It had been holed by a huge foreign container ship. Now the trawler’s fuel tank may have been damaged and some of the illicit cargo spilled out into the sea, including that very valuable Rubens that floated up to Whitby. Anyway, go to Bridlington. Clear this with the North Yorkshire police then speak to the coastguard. Find that trawler. Look in the fuel tank. Insist that the top is removed. Then, wrapped in waterproof under the diesel level, I am confident that you will find various antique treasures from the house of Sir Jack Prendergast. Anyway, the timing fits. You’ve got the list. Then interview the skipper.’

  ‘Right, sir,’ Crisp said. ‘Can we do anything about the boat the antiques are transferred to, sir?’

  ‘I don’t know. I suspect the offending yacht will be the Golden Mistress, owned by that chap, Moses Van Hassain, Secretary of State to Omanja. He’d be taking them back to Africa, possibly to curry favour with his president. If you get anything out of the trawler skipper, it might need Interpol or the Foreign Office to intervene. If we can get the skipper banged up then that line of traffic will come permanently to an end, which could only be good.’

  ‘Right, sir. I’ll start that on Monday?’

  ‘What?’ Angel yelled. ‘No. You’ll start right away. The evidence might have disappeared by Monday.’

  ‘But it’s Friday, sir. It’ll probably take me over the weekend.’

  ‘It probably will. Now crack on with it.’

  He replaced the phone.

  He sighed and reached out for the EVIDENCE envelope and the Farleigh papers when the phone rang. His face creased with annoyance. He reached out and picked it up. It was the civilian on reception. ‘There’s a young lady on the phone asking to speak to you, Inspector. Her name is Jessica Razzle.’

  He sighed. ‘Put her through, please,’ he said.

  ‘Hello, Inspector. I have received that summons this morning, and I have to attend the magistrates court in a fortnight regarding that assault on the first of June.’

  ‘Yes, Jessica. Wh
at about it?’

  ‘I wondered if I could get out of it in some way. I mean I don’t want to have to say anything unkind in public about Rosemary. It’s bound to be reported in the local paper … and because of her celebrity status, it might hit the nationals. And I don’t think she was entirely to blame. Also I want to return to the States and continue my life where I left off. There’s no way in which I can persuade you to drop the case, is there?’

  Angel rubbed his chin. ‘Have you been talking to her?’

  ‘She phoned me up. She sounded genuinely concerned as to how I was. We had a good long serious talk. It was a surprise, I must say.’

  ‘Has she put you up to this?’

  ‘Certainly not. But I was thinking. Dad would be very upset if he knew we were fighting like alley cats. If it’s a matter of a fine, or something, can we not pay it, apologize and get on with our lives?’

  ‘Where is she now?’

  ‘She doesn’t want me to say. She doesn’t want the newspapers to find out.’

  ‘If she’s not broken the law, Jessica, she has nothing to fear from me.’

  ‘Well, she’s drying out in a clinic in Zurich, but for professional reasons, she doesn’t want that to become common knowledge.’

  Angel nodded. He had suspected that she was on the bottle. ‘Her secret’s safe with me, Jessica. I’m afraid there’s no simple way I can drop the case, but the police will not be vindictive in this case, you know. I simply want the best thing to happen for all concerned. I advise you to talk to your solicitor, and get Rosemary to speak to her solicitor. They’ll advise you the best thing to do.’

  ‘All right, Inspector. Thank you. Goodbye.’

  Angel replaced the phone, sighed and reached out for the EVIDENCE envelope and the Farleigh papers again. He hoped for no more interruptions. He looked again at Farleigh’s bank statements with the tiny handwritten appendages to all the entries. He recalled noticing the only direct bank entry of forty pounds a quarter for ‘S & S’ charges. Although he didn’t think the charges unreasonable, he didn’t understand the debit and decided to look further into it. It was probably unimportant. He found the bank telephone number from the top of the statement and tapped it into his phone. He was soon speaking to the assistant manager.

  ‘The two letters, ‘S & S,’ simply stand for storage and service, Inspector. It will mean that the client has a deed box or a package being stored in the bank vault for him. That’s all.’

  Something in the bank vault stored for him? It could be the twenty-eight gold snuffboxes and the end of a long road, or it could simply be another dead end.

  Angel felt as if he had a belly full of toads.

  Ten minutes later he was at the bank counter. He had had to give half a dozen signatures and prove his identity and authority before the clerk would hand over a locked metal box about twenty-four by sixteen by six inches, with carrying handles at each end. It had a simple blue label with the name ‘Mr B. Farleigh’ and an account number handwritten on it.

  Angel slid it off the counter top. It was quite heavy, and as he walked towards the door of the bank, he felt a tingle of excitement across his chest down his arms to his fingertips. He couldn’t get to the station quickly enough to get the box open. He arrived in his office, put the box on his desk, looked at the keyhole with the brass surround and picked up the phone.

  ‘Ahmed, go to the stores and ask for the envelope containing Brian Farleigh’s personal possessions on being admitted. There is a bunch of keys in there. Sign for them and bring them to me.’

  ‘Right, sir.’

  Angel sat at his desk looking at the deed box, hoping that the collection of snuffboxes was in there and that it didn’t contain old account books. He wasn’t at all certain that there was a key on Farleigh’s bunch that would unlock the box, but he thought that there very likely was.

  Ten long minutes passed before Ahmed arrived with Farleigh’s bunch of keys.

  Angel took the bunch from Ahmed, found the only a key that might fit and inserted it in the lock.

  Both men stared at the box.

  The key went in easily. Angel then tried to turn it. It turned first try. There was a click. He lifted the lid. It appeared to be filled to the top with twenty-pound notes wrapped in £1000 bundles.

  He stared at it, speechless. He had never been so close to so much money. He looked at Ahmed. He was also staring at the money. His eyes were bright, his mouth open.

  After a few moments, Angel’s face changed to disappointment. He had been hoping for a box or a bag of twenty-eight gold snuffboxes. Though all this money might have been stolen, if he couldn’t prove positively that it came from Razzle’s safe, he would have to let Farleigh go free.

  Eventually Ahmed was able to speak. He grinned and said, ‘Wow, sir, what are we going to do?’

  ‘Count it,’ Angel said and he began to unpack the box by taking out bundles, four or five at a time, and tossing them into the lid. He also wanted to check that the notes were all twenties and all wrapped in bundles of £1000. He was about halfway down when he felt something different. It was a cardboard box. He brushed away the bundles of notes from the top of it and pulled it out. It was about as big as a shoe box.

  Ahmed stared at it.

  A small powerful engine began to bang away in Angel’s chest. His face was red. His fingers were tingling.

  The box had an elastic band round it to keep the lid secure. He sprang it off and opened the box. Inside were some old leather boxes about twice the size of a ring box; underneath them were similar shaped items in small linen pouches with drawstrings. He reached in, snatched at a box and opened it. Inside was a beautiful yellow shiny gold container with diamonds and sapphires on the lid.

  Ahaz said, ‘A snuffbox, sir.’

  Angel’s eyes glowed.

  He reached in for another and opened that. It was a beautiful gold box decorated with seed pearls and turquoise. He opened more … They were all snuffboxes in the shoe box and they were all magnificent.

  He sighed with relief. At last. There were the snuffboxes from Razzle’s safe. There was Farleigh’s motive for murdering Charles Razzle.

  Angel left the counting and repacking of the deed box to PC Ahaz, and leaned back in his chair deep in thought. Now the charge of murder against Farleigh was absolutely safe and the CPS could move on that without delay. He must phone Twelvetrees.

  ‘Excuse me, sir,’ Ahmed said. ‘Didn’t you say there should be twenty-eight snuffboxes, sir?’

  Angel’s eyes flashed wide open. ‘Don’t tell me there are any missing.’

  ‘Oh no, sir,’ Ahmed said. ‘There’s none missing. But there are forty-eight snuff boxes, not twenty-eight.’

  Angel jumped to his feet. ‘Forty-eight? Show me, lad.’

  Ahmed opened the box and put the snuffboxes in eight rows of six on the desk top.

  Angel quickly opened each box and each bag to be sure that there was a snuffbox in every container. Ahmed was indeed correct.

  Then Angel sat down slowly and said, ‘You know what these means, Ahmed.’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘The extra twenty were stolen from Sir Jack Prendergast’s house last month. It means that Brian Farleigh is not only the murderer of Charles Razzle, he is also leader of the country-house gang, and murderer of Stefan Muldoon and Aimée Polditz.’

  Suddenly Angel’s door was thrown open causing it to bang noisily on the chair against the wall. Standing motionless in the doorway was the constable who had been acting as duty jailer. He looked strangely uncomfortable. His hands were down by his sides but his shoulders were hunched up. His face seemed inexplicably paralysed. Only his startled eyes moved. They traversed jerkily from left to right.

  Angel’s pulse began to pump faster. He rose to his feet.

  ‘What do you want, lad?’ Angel said.

  The constable didn’t reply. He just stood there, frozen to the spot.

  Angel and Ahmed looked at each other, then back at the constabl
e.

  Then Brain Farleigh’s head bobbed from behind the young man’s head. His eyes were staring, his head jerky, his hair dishevelled. ‘There you are, Angel. I’ve been looking for you.’

  Angel’s heart began to pound.

  Farleigh pushed the constable into the office. ‘Go inside, lad,’ Farleigh said. ‘Hurry up. The Inspector wants to know how I got out of the cell. Shall I tell them or will you?’

  Then Angel saw that he was holding something in his hand that looked dangerously like a Glock G17 handgun. That model had a magazine that held seventeen rounds. It was fast, accurate and could kill at sixty yards. Farleigh waved it around dangerously in every direction.

  Farleigh then quickly closed the door and turned the key. ‘That’s cosy. Just the four of us.’ He prodded the constable from behind and said, ‘Well, tell him, lad.’

  ‘I don’t know how he got the gun, sir,’ the constable said. ‘I took him in a cup of tea and he pulled it on me. Then made me tell him which was your office.’

  Angel sighed and said, ‘All right, Constable.’

  Angel had been worried for some time that prisoner’s visitors had not been adequately searched. It seemed his fears had been justified.

  Farleigh suddenly saw the deed box, the money and the snuffboxes on Angel’s desk. His eyes nearly popped out of his head. ‘Here, Angel, that’s mine.’ He was going to come forward to get a better look, but stopped. ‘Well, that’s fine. You’ve saved me a job. It’s amazing, Angel. You’ve already been into my deed box and my money. Were you going to share it out among yourselves?’

  He turned to PC Ahaz and said, ‘Pack all those snuffboxes up, lad. And all that money. Quickly. Put it all back in the box and lock it up.’

  Ahmed hesitated. He glanced at Angel.