Death in Profile

by Guy Fraser-Sampson

  “No, of course not. I was here alone after Kathy went out, like I told you. Why should I need an alibi? I’m not a suspect, am I?”

  “Just routine, sir,” Allen said soothingly. “I’m sure you’ll appreciate that we have to ask these questions, if only to have something for the file.”

  Bob Metcalfe came back into the room, pushing the door open with his elbow and holding a tray with three mugs of tea on it. He broke the awkward silence by saying “Here you are, sir” as he handed the doctor one.

  “This is another difficult question,” Allen went on as Metcalfe flipped his own notebook open again, “but I’m afraid I have to ask. Were you aware of your wife seeing anybody else, another man, I mean?”

  “No, not at all.” There was a short silence. “Not as far as I was aware, anyway.”

  “Any family, other than the sister?”

  “Her father died some years ago. Her mother lives in south London, but they’re not close. Hardly ever even speak, let alone see each other. So far as I know, Angie’s all there is. Certainly nobody else from her side came to the wedding, apart from a few girlfriends from work.”

  “So she did work at one time, then?”

  “Yes, but she gave it up when we got married a couple of years back.”

  “What was it – her work, I mean?”

  “She was a secretary with a firm of solicitors – a big one in the City. Or executive assistant, I should say. She was always very insistent about that. Executive assistant to one of the partners.”

  “Did she miss not working?”

  “She claimed not, but actually I’m pretty sure she did. She’d always liked the idea of being a ‘lady of leisure’ as she called it, but she was used to being busy at work all day, and when she was at home she didn’t have anything to take its place. I sometimes used to think that was part of her trouble – boredom, I mean. Sitting around at home all day with nothing to do, and then giving me a hard time when I got in.”

  “Did she drink at all?”

  “Not during the day, I don’t think. Unless perhaps she was meeting a girlfriend for lunch. But definitely a bit too much in the evenings. That’s when the rows usually start – started, I mean.”

  “How would you describe your relationship with your wife, sir?” Metcalfe asked very politely.

  “Very good,” Barker gave a quick snort of a laugh that turned into a gasp. “I suppose that must sound pretty funny coming after what I’ve just been saying, but we’ve always loved each other. It’s just that she has – had – a very quick temper, which has always been made much worse by booze. Every time she’s gone off at night, she’s always come back some time the next day, suitably apologetic.”

  “But not this time,” murmured Allen, almost to himself.

  “No,” said Barker flatly.

  “I’m sorry, sir, I didn’t mean to distress you, nor with all these questions, neither. I think it’s time we left you in peace. Just a couple of points to go over with you first, though.”

  He glanced at Metcalfe, who sat with a ballpoint poised in readiness.

  “First, could you please let DI Metcalfe have your home and surgery phone numbers. As I said, we will have to arrange a time for you to identify the body, but there’s no hurry about that. Second, we’ll also need your sister-in-law’s address and telephone number so we can find out if your wife really did attempt to go there last night.”

  There was a pause while this information was found and recorded.

  “Just one more thing, Doctor,” Metcalfe said, with a glance at Allen. “Do you happen to know if your wife kept a diary? There wasn’t one in her handbag.”

  “Yes, she did. I think it’s in the kitchen.”

  “I thought as much, sir. To tell the truth, I came across it while I was making the tea. Would this be it?” He showed a blue pocket diary inside a plastic bag to Barker, who nodded.

  “Do you mind if we hang onto it for the moment, sir? Again, you’ll get it back.”

  “Yes, of course, no problem.”

  “Thank you, sir.” Metcalfe slipped the bagged diary into an inside pocket of his jacket.

  As they walked through the hall, Barker suddenly asked where his wife’s body had been found.

  “I’m not supposed to answer that question, really, sir,” Allen replied. “But since it’ll be all over the newspapers and the telly by lunchtime, I don’t think there’s any harm in you knowing. She was found in Wood Green, and, if my geography is correct, very close to her sister’s flat. I should also tell you, since you’ll find out anyway, that we believe she may have been the victim of a serial killer who we’ve been hunting for some time.”

  As he exited the flat through the front door, he thought sardonically that Metcalfe would have said “whom”.

  Lyndhurst Gardens was not far from the operations room at Hampstead police station. The location was a source of some inconvenience and much black humour, as the station was slated for closure under a raft of proposed economy measures, and Allen was constantly being called to attend committee meetings, both within the police and at the local authority, to discuss if and when his team should be moved.

  There was an obvious reluctance to disturb the team while in the middle of a serious case, and such a high profile one into the bargain. Yet, as the investigation had dragged on into its second year, voices began to be heard, both in seriousness within management, and in banter within the operations room, that if things looked like dragging on indefinitely then perhaps the move should be postponed no longer.

  At the same time, there were those within the local authority and the wider community who opposed the closure of the station on principle and who seized on any excuse, including the ongoing murder inquiries, to delay the inevitable. Frequent demonstrations outside the station by local residents in support of the “no closure” lobby only complicated matters still further. While Allen bitterly resented the time all this took up – time which he would far rather have spent on the investigation – he accepted reluctantly that such commitments were an inevitable part of modern policing.

  There was an incongruous air of gaiety about the exterior of the police station, looking as it did like a perfect cardboard model in a toyshop window. Once inside the operations room, however, the mood was sombre. Morale was already close to rock bottom after nearly eighteen months of pursuing a serial killer with no real lead to go on. This new murder threatened to plunge the team to whole new depths of despair. Despite all their training on remaining detached and objective, it just wasn’t possible when the team felt powerless to stop this maniac, loose on the streets killing women seemingly at will. As far as they were concerned, this was personal, and they felt each new failure keenly. Had they been able to catch the killer already, this new victim would still have been alive today.

  There was no need for Allen to call for silence. The room was still, and the dozen or so occupants sat waiting for him to begin. He stood in front of a large whiteboard onto which the photos of the first four victims had been fixed.

  “Well, you’ll all have heard the news, but yes, it looks like we could have victim number five. DI Metcalfe will brief you on what we know so far. Bob?”

  “Our fifth victim is Katherine Barker, known to all as Kathy, married to a Dr Colin Barker who lives right here in Hampstead, in Lyndhurst Gardens. Body found in an alleyway beside some shops in Wood Green early this morning by a passing workmen, who was alerted by a dog barking. Dog belonged to a homeless guy, who has been interviewed but had nothing useful. He’d been sleeping round the corner all night, drunk and possibly on something as well.”

  “Same MO?” came a voice from the back.

  “As far as we can tell, yes, but as usual we need to wait for the formal forensic report before we come to any firm conclusions. Still, I think we can work on the assumption for the time being that this was indeed the work of our friend the condom killer.”

  “Do we know what she was doing in Wood Green? Assuming she was
killed there, that is?” Detective Constable Karen Willis had joined the team recently.

  “The husband says that she left their flat after a row about 11.30pm last night, most likely to go to her sister’s flat in Wood Green to cool off. Apparently that was quite a common sequence of events. We have the sister’s details and obviously the first thing on the list is to interview her and find out whether she heard or saw anything of our victim last night. The husband believes she was out, probably working a nightshift, but that doesn’t explain why the victim was out on the streets, since she had a set of keys to her sister’s place.”

  He picked up two plastic bags on the table.

  “Two sets of keys found in her handbag. We checked one of them on the front door of Lyndhurst Gardens and they fitted. We assume the others are to the sister’s flat, but we’ll need to check that. Andrews and Desai, you can arrange to interview the sister later today and check the keys at the same time.”

  “As to the place of death,” cut in Allen, “the pathologist’s first impression is that she was probably killed at the scene, and that brings us to the next point. That alleyway leads down into a service area, which is behind a load of flats over the shops. There’s a good chance that someone must have seen or heard something, so I’m asking the local plod to lay on as many uniforms as possible for house-to-house enquiries, starting at 4pm this afternoon. Apart from Andrews and Desai, we’ll leave one person here to man the phones, and the rest of you will get over there to join in. We need as many bodies on this as possible.”

  There was no response to this. House-to-house enquiries were one of the most boring and frustrating aspects of police procedure, and for this reason usually left to the woodentops, but they all knew that it was necessary. Somebody out there might have witnessed the one little detail that could open up a new line of inquiry, without which they were dead in the water. All their previous ones had led them nowhere.

  “We should also,” suggested Metcalfe, “check with the neighbours in Lyndhurst Gardens to see if anyone witnessed Karen leaving home last night. It’s a quiet road, so someone may have heard something, particularly if they were shouting at each other – their upstairs neighbours, for a start.”

  “Agreed,” said Allen. “But let’s go quietly on that one, Bob. After all, it’s not that we disbelieve what the doctor said, only that we need to have it confirmed if possible. A couple of plain clothes knocking discreetly on doors ought to do the job. But after we get Wood Green sorted; that’s our priority right now.”

  “Excuse me, sir.” A uniform from the front desk put his head round the door. “Superintendent Collison from the Yard is downstairs. Wonders if he could have a word?”

  “Oh, hell,” Allen replied resignedly. “OK you lot, off you go. If I’ve got to stay anyway I can just as easily man the phones as anyone. Report back here at 0900 tomorrow, got it?”

  The team shuffled from the room, and Allen asked for his visitor to be brought up.

  CHAPTER 2

  “Hello, Tom.” Detective Superintendent Simon Collison edged into the room. He was a slim man, and young for his rank.

  “Hello yourself, Simon,” Allen said in some surprise. “I didn’t know you’d made Super. It seems only yesterday I heard you were a DCI.”

  “It was nearly three years ago, actually,” said Collison, slightly awkwardly. He was conscious that, as a law graduate, he had been one of the first Met officers to be fast-tracked for promotion. “I’ve been on secondment in Manchester for a while, and when I finished up there the Chief Constable was kind enough to recommend me to the Commissioner for a leg-up.”

  “Well, congratulations anyway.” Allen had been a DCI for seven years, a DI for five years before that, and knew very well that he was unlikely to progress further. He reached into his jacket for a cigarette and then remembered both that this was now a no-smoking building, and that he was supposed to have given up. The hardest thing, he found, was knowing what to do with his hands. He stuffed them into his trouser pockets and perched on the edge of a desk.

  “So what brings you here?”

  “Mind if I close the door?” Without waiting for an answer Collision crossed the room and did so. Then he moved opposite Allen and also sat on a desk, facing him.

  “I hear you’ve found another one. What does that make it now – six?”

  “Five,” Allen responded defensively. “And this time we have some hope for forensics. She was found quickly, and it hadn’t been raining.”

  There was a pause. On Collison’s part because he was thinking how best to phrase what he had to say next. On Allen’s part because he was beginning to realise, with a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach, what it might be.

  “I’m afraid I’m here officially,” Collison said, answering Allen’s unspoken question. “I was with the Assistant Commissioner Crime yesterday evening. He’s asked me to take a fresh look at this case. No criticism implied, Tom, but it’s been dragging on for a long time now. The ACC wants to be sure that there aren’t any other angles that we should be considering.”

  “What other angles? This is a serial killer we’re hunting, Simon, for Christ’s sake. All we can do is look for clues and then follow them up – and by the way, this guy doesn’t believe in leaving clues.”

  “I know, I know,” Collison said soothingly. “Absolutely no criticism of you is intended, Tom. I want to make that clear. I’m sure the ACC thinks you’ve been doing a great job here. But he’s under pressure to show some results, unfair though that may seem.”

  “You mean the press,” Allen said heavily. It was a statement, not a question. Two leading Sunday newspapers had independently run stories on the hunt for the killer in recent weeks, in each case setting out the timeline to date and, while being careful not to single anyone out for express criticism, implying that the case might not be being handled as well as it might.

  “The press have played a part, I’m sure.” Collison was careful to be diplomatic. “I did say it was unfair, Tom.”

  “So what does he want, precisely? Me to brief you on the case and let you sit in on all our team meetings?”

  “Ah,” said Collison, with more than a hint of embarrassment. He was hoping that the older man would have caught on by now, but clearly he hadn’t. “No.”

  “No? What do you mean, no?”

  “No, that’s not what he wants. He thinks a fresh pair of eyes would be a good idea. You’ve been working on this for a year and a half now and you haven’t taken any leave in that time – he’s checked. You must be tired, Tom. I can see you’ve got a bad cold, for a start, which is a classic sign of being run down. Any rate, you’re due a break. He wants you to take it, with his thanks for all your efforts.”

  Allen was staring at him dully. “You mean you’re here to fire me?”

  “I certainly wouldn’t put it like that,” Collison said briskly. “For one thing, it’s totally untrue. The ACC is simply rotating command of a case to prevent people going stale. Actually, these days it’s regarded as good practice in policing circles. There’s been a lot of research in America, for instance –”

  “Sod America,” Allen cut in quietly but intensely. “What it comes down to is that I’m off the case. You can call that what you want. I call it being fired.”

  “Tom,” Collison pleaded gently. “I know how upset you must be, but please be reasonable. Believe me, the ACC wouldn’t be doing this if he felt he had any choice. I shouldn’t be telling you this, but he’s under pressure himself from upstairs.”

  There was no answer. Allen was staring off into the distance in an unfocused sort of way, somewhere over Collison’s left shoulder.

  “And for goodness sake, don’t use the word ‘fired’, Tom. The only person it can damage is you, particularly if the press get hold of it. You’re simply taking some long overdue leave, after which you will report back to CID for assignment to a new case in the usual way. I assure you, there’s nothing more to it than that.”

  Slowl
y, Allen got off the desk and reached for his raincoat. “There’s a team meeting at 0900 tomorrow,” he said without any emotion at all. “You can introduce yourself to the troops then. In the meantime, all the files are in this room. I assume you’ll want to study them.”

  At the door, as he was shrugging himself into his raincoat, he turned to look at Collison. “You’ve done well, Simon,” he said reflectively. “I always knew that you would. Good night.” With that, he left the room.

  He was halfway to Hampstead tube station before he became fully aware of where he was or what he was doing. The High Street was, as usual, thronged with people and he turned off into a little alleyway on the right to try to collect his thoughts. He took out his mobile and thumbed the speed-dial for Metcalfe.

  “Bob,” he said as soon as Metcalfe answered. “I’m off the case.”

  “What d’you mean, guv?”

  “Just that,” Allen snapped curtly. “Look, there’s a little cafe in Belsize Park that opens for breakfast. Opposite the station and down the hill to the left.”

  “Yes, I know it.”

  “Can you meet me there tomorrow at 8? That’ll give me time to think things out.”

  He rang off without waiting for an answer and headed on up the hill. Almost without thinking about it, he turned right again and wandered into the Flask. Somehow he knew that what he needed was a beer.

  Phrasing that desire in the singular was undoubtedly misleading, however, which Metcalfe was quick to notice the following morning as he burnt his mouth on a red-hot cup of coffee.

  “Bloody hell, guv,” he said, “you look awful.”

  It was meant sympathetically, but whether Allen took it in that vein or not was unclear. “Never mind about that,” Allen said abruptly. “Tell me what you found.”

  “In a word, nothing. Nobody seems to have seen or even heard our victim. Mind you, that’s not entirely surprising. It’s the sort of neighbourhood where most people sit around their tellies all evening, and have them blaring at full volume too, even late at night.”

  “So we have no independent verification as to whether Kathy made it to her sister’s flat or not?”