All Quiet on Arrival Read online

  Dave is married to a charming white girl who’s a principal dancer with the Royal Ballet. Rumour has it that she occasionally assaults Dave, but given that Dave is six foot tall, and Madeleine is only five-two, that story is put down to canteen scuttlebutt. Mind you, it’s well known that ballet dancers of both sexes are possessed of a strong physique.

  Gail stretched again. ‘What is it?’ she asked in her most beguiling voice.

  ‘I’ve got to go out,’ I replied, trying not to concentrate on Gail’s body. ‘A murder apparently.’

  ‘Oh, another one,’ said Gail. ‘Dammit!’ She’s obviously getting used to my bizarre occupation. She pulled up the sheet, turned over and went to sleep again.

  For some reason best known to themselves, uniformed officers of the Chelsea police had closed Tavona Street completely. The red and white tapes of the fire brigade, and the blue and white of the police vied for precedence, and a PC stood guard at the door of number twenty-seven. Or what remained of it.

  ‘Who’s in charge?’ I asked, waving my warrant card.

  ‘Our DI’s inside, sir,’ said the PC, ‘talking to your DS Poole.’

  But before I could enter, Linda Mitchell, the senior forensic practitioner – wonderful titles the Job comes up with – stopped me, and presented me with a set of overalls and shoe covers.

  Once suitably attired, and having reported my arrival to the incident officer, I made my way through an inch of water, stepping carefully over pieces of debris. I found Dave Poole in what had been the kitchen, but which was now completely gutted.

  I introduced myself to the local DI who was chatting to Dave. ‘Where’s the body?’

  ‘First floor front, guv. Doctor Mortlock’s giving it the once over as we speak.’

  ‘We’d better have a talk with him before we go any further, Dave,’ I said, and made my way towards the staircase. It was badly charred, but apparently still reasonably secure.

  ‘Watch the staircase, guv,’ volunteered Dave. ‘It’s a bit dodgy in places.’

  I can always rely on Dave to inject an air of pessimism into any investigation, but we reached the first floor without mishap.

  Dr Henry Mortlock, a Home Office pathologist, was on the point of leaving. ‘Nice of you to drop by, Harry,’ he said, as he finished packing his ghoulish instruments into his bag.

  ‘My pleasure, Henry. What’s the SP?’ I asked, culling a useful bit of jargon from the racing fraternity. In detective-speak it’s another way of asking for a quick summary of the story so far.

  ‘You don’t have to be a pathologist to determine cause of death, Harry,’ said Mortlock. ‘She was stabbed several times in the chest and abdomen, six or seven times, I’d say at a guess, and she bled profusely.’ He stepped aside so that I could see the body lying in a pool of blood. ‘It’s ruined the mattress,’ he added drily. Henry Mortlock has a macabre sense of humour that rivals that of any CID officer. But, given the nature of our respective jobs, that’s hardly surprising. ‘Expensive bed that,’ he continued. ‘The sheets and pillow cases are black silk. Must’ve cost a fortune.’

  The dead woman was naked and lying on her back. She was, or had been, an attractive woman with a good figure and short blonde hair, and appeared to be in her mid-forties. It looked as though she spent a lot of her time and money at a beauty salon.

  ‘How long has she been dead?’ I asked.

  ‘Rough estimate, about five hours, but I’ll have a better idea when I get her on the slab. There don’t appear to be any defensive wounds. Here, see for yourself.’ Mortlock held up one of the woman’s hands, and I could see that her well-manicured nails did not seem to have been used to fight off her assailant. He glanced at his watch. ‘I was supposed to be playing golf this morning,’ he complained.

  ‘After you’d been to church to pray for your soul, I suppose, Doctor,’ said Dave.

  Having exhausted the customary badinage that takes place between the detectives and the pathologist at a murder scene, Henry Mortlock departed, whistling some obscure aria as he descended the staircase.

  Having decided that there was little else to be learned from the corpse, I glanced around the bedroom. It was sumptuously equipped. Carpet, curtains, furniture and bed linen were carefully co-ordinated, and undoubtedly had cost the owner a huge amount of money.

  Dave summed it up. ‘There’s a bit of cash here, guv,’ he said.

  ‘Any idea who she is, Dave?’

  ‘The local DI said that the house belongs to a Mr and Mrs Barton: James and Diana. Presumably, that’s Diana Barton.’ Dave waved a hand at the body. ‘If it is, that makes James Barton her husband.’

  ‘Any sign of him?’

  ‘No,’ said Dave. ‘The fire brigade are satisfied that our dead body was the only one in the house.’

  ‘We’d better let Linda get on with it, then,’ I said, and we returned to the ground floor.

  Linda Mitchell entered the house followed by her team of fingerprint officers, video-camera recordists, photographers, and all the other technicians of murder. I never quite knew what they all did, but the results were always outstanding.

  By now, a few members of my team had arrived, having been called out by Gavin Creasey.

  Standing on the pavement outside the house was Kate Ebdon, one of my DIs, and the one with whom I work the closest. Kate is an Australian, and a somewhat fiery character. She came to us on promotion from the Flying Squad where, it is rumoured, she gave pleasure to quite a few of its officers. Male ones, of course. She usually wears a man’s white shirt and tight fitting jeans, a mode of dress that looks great, but doesn’t please our commander who doesn’t have the bottle to tell her about it. When she first arrived, he asked me to ‘discuss’ her mode of dress with her, but I preferred not to risk it. Kate herself is blissfully unaware that she’s making a mockery of the commander’s oft-quoted desire for the ‘officer-like comportment’ I’ve already mentioned.

  ‘How many have you got, Kate?’ I asked.

  Kate looked around at the assembled detectives. ‘Six, guv.’

  ‘Good. Get them on house-to-house enquiries,’ I said, and gave her a brief rundown on what was known so far.

  Dave and I stopped for breakfast on the way back to Curtis Green, and arrived at the office at about half past eight. That gave us an hour and a half to get organized before the commander arrived. The commander, a sideways import from the Uniform Branch who thinks that he really is a detective, could be relied upon not to arrive before ten o’clock, and would leave not a minute later than six. There is a theory among the troops that Mrs Commander nags him, but if the photograph of the harridan that adorns the commander’s desk were actually of his wife, I’d be inclined to stay out all night.

  Dave obviously knew what I was thinking. ‘At least the commander won’t be in today, guv.’

  ‘Why not, Dave?’ I wondered if our boss was on annual leave.

  ‘It’s Sunday, guv.’

  You see what I mean about Dave thinking of things I don’t think of?

  Colin Wilberforce, the incident room manager, and an invaluable administrative genius, had already begun the task of documenting our latest murder. So far, he had declined to take the inspectors’ promotion examination, even though I keep encouraging him to do so, but only half-heartedly. It will be a sad day for HSCC West if ever he’s promoted and posted elsewhere.

  ‘Message from Doctor Mortlock, sir,’ said Colin. ‘Post-mortem is at twelve noon at Horseferry Road.’

  ‘But I’ve no doubt he’ll have managed to get his eighteen holes in,’ said Dave.

  ‘What have you to tell me, Henry?’ I asked. We’d arrived at the mortuary at twelve only to find that Mortlock had completed his examination.

  ‘Bloody disaster, Harry,’ said Mortlock, peeling off his latex gloves.

  ‘In what way?’ I asked innocently. After all these years, I should have known better.

  ‘I sliced into the rough at the very first hole, and it just went downhill from
then on.’

  ‘Should play on a level golf course, Doctor,’ observed Dave quietly.

  ‘Tough,’ I said, ‘but what about her?’ I pointed at the body of the woman we believed to be Diana Barton.

  ‘As I said at the scene, Harry, death was due to multiple frontal stab wounds, and my original assessment of death having occurred about five hours previously still stands.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Yes.’ Mortlock smiled a lascivious smile. ‘She’d recently had unprotected sexual intercourse.’

  ‘How recent?’

  ‘Sometime during the two or three hours preceding her death, I’d say. And before you ask, I’ve recovered a semen deposit.’

  TWO

  ‘Tell me about this suspicious death that you’re dealing with, Mr Brock.’ On Monday morning the commander appeared in the incident room on the stroke of ten o’clock. He would never call a murder a murder just in case it turned out to be manslaughter or suicide, or was eventually proved to be an accident that did not call for police action. In common with real detectives, I call a murder a topping, but the commander is not only a careful man, he is one who abhors slang. He would never call me Harry either. I suppose he was afraid that I’d address him by his first name, and that would probably cause him to have a seizure.

  I explained what we knew of Diana Barton’s death, which wasn’t very much. In fact, we weren’t even sure that she was Diana Barton. Linda Mitchell had taken fingerprints from the body, but there was no match in the central records. No surprise there; I didn’t expect her – assuming it to be Diana – to have any previous convictions.

  ‘Doctor Mortlock has recovered semen from the body, sir,’ I told the commander, ‘and we’re awaiting the result of DNA tests.’

  ‘House-to-house enquiries?’ asked the commander loftily, as though he were thoroughly conversant with what we call ‘first steps at the scene of a crime’.

  ‘Enquiries are ongoing, sir,’ I said. ‘The only witnesses, if they could be called witnesses, were a man called Porter who lived next door, and a Donald Baxter who lived opposite. He was the one who called the fire brigade.’

  ‘Good, good. Keep me informed,’ said the commander, and turned on his heel, doubtless to take refuge in his piles of paper. He loves paper, does the commander. I doubt that he’d be much good in the field of criminal investigation, but he can write a blistering memorandum when the mood takes him.

  What I hadn’t told the commander, because he would immediately think of disciplinary sanctions, was that Mr Porter of 25 Tavona Street had earlier called the police to a disturbance at the Bartons’ house.

  I was now awaiting, with eager anticipation, the arrival of the two officers who had attended. They were off duty today, but murder enquiries take no account of officers’ welfare. First thing this morning, Dave Poole had sent a message to Chelsea police station demanding their attendance at Curtis Green at three o’clock.

  At five past three, Dave ushered the two PCs into my office.

  ‘PCs Holmes and Watson, sir,’ said Dave, a broad grin on his face.

  ‘You wanted to see us, sir?’ asked one of the PCs nervously. Both were dressed in what passes for plain clothes among young coppers today.

  The PC’s apprehension was understandable. There is a constant fear among policemen that whenever a senior officer from another unit sends for them, they immediately think ‘complaint’.

  ‘Are you really called Holmes and Watson?’ I asked, as I indicated that Dave should remain.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said Watson.

  ‘How come you finish up doing duty on the same instant response car? Coincidence, is it?’

  ‘No, sir,’ said Holmes. ‘It’s the duties sergeant’s idea of a joke. Unfortunately, whenever I say I’m PC Holmes, and this is PC Watson, people think we’re having them on.’

  I laughed, and putting aside the Chelsea duties sergeant’s impish sense of humour, got down to the business in hand. ‘Which one of you called at twenty-seven Tavona Street on Saturday night? Or did you both call?’

  ‘It was me, sir,’ said Watson. ‘And it was actually Sunday morning. We got the call at twelve ten and arrived on scene at twelve sixteen.’

  ‘I’m the driver, sir, and I remained in the car,’ said Holmes, ‘in case there was another call.’ He seemed pleased at having made such a decision now that Watson’s actions were being questioned.

  ‘Of course,’ I said, and turned to Watson. ‘So tell me about this disturbance.’

  Having heard that a dead body had been found at 27 Tavona Street not long after he had called there, Watson was justifiably anxious. I suppose he could visualize disciplinary proceedings for neglect of duty, and everything else that went with such a charge. He was probably wondering whether he should ask for the attendance of his Police Federation representative. Believe me, once an investigating officer starts digging, you’d be surprised what he can come up with. Like incorrectly completed forms, inaccurate incident report book entries, a disparity between the times in said document and in the car’s logbook, and Lord knows what else. I know because I’ve been on the wrong end of a disciplinary enquiry, and it’s not a comfortable experience. And to think that the public is convinced that we whitewash complaints.

  Personally, I felt rather sorry for Holmes and Watson – there but for the grace of God et cetera – but their commander would probably take an entirely different view once the facts were laid before him.

  ‘A man called Carl Morgan answered the door, sir,’ said Watson, referring to his notes.

  ‘Did you verify that name?’ I asked. ‘Did you ask for proof of identity, for example?’

  ‘Er, no, sir. I didn’t think it was necessary.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘The man Morgan was wearing jeans, and was stripped to the waist. Oh, and he was holding a woman’s bra, sir.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘He apologized for the disturbance, and told me that it was now quiet, and that most of the guests had left the house. Then a woman appeared, sir. She was dressed in a thong and nothing else. Oh, and she had two butterflies tattooed on her stomach.’

  ‘Did the bra he was holding belong to this woman?’ asked Dave as though it were of vital importance.

  ‘I don’t know, Skip.’ Watson, in common with many others, including me, didn’t always appreciate when Dave was exercising his sense of humour. ‘Anyway, the man Morgan called her Shell, presumably short for Shelley. She only stayed at the door for a minute or so, and then went back into the house.’

  ‘How old was this woman?’ I asked.

  Watson thought for a moment or two. ‘Middle to late twenties, I should think. She had long black hair, shoulder-length,’ he added, as though that might help. ‘And she had a bit of meat on her. Good figure, not like some of those anorexic models you see in women’s mags.’

  ‘And I suppose you didn’t take her full name,’ suggested Dave, with sufficient scepticism in his voice to imply that Watson had not done his job properly.

  ‘No, Skip.’ Watson was beginning to look quite miserable by now. Meanwhile, Holmes stood silently aloof, undoubtedly thankful that he’d stayed in the car while Watson was making his enquiries. Even so, he probably wasn’t too hopeful that he’d escape any flack that was going. He knew instinctively that once an investigating officer started issuing Forms 163 – notice of complaint – that he’d get one too.

  ‘And you marked the log “All quiet on arrival”, did you?’ I asked, well knowing the answer.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said Watson unhappily. I imagined that he was thinking how easy it was for blokes like me to be wise after the event. ‘It’s all right for the bloody guv’nors’ is a phrase often heard among ‘canteen lawyers’.

  ‘We’ve not told the press that this is a murder enquiry, so I don’t want them to hear about it from you. Understood?’ Regrettably, there were coppers who’d happily part with confidential information for the price of a large Scotch,
but perversely would be outraged by the offer of a straightforward bribe.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said the two PCs in unison. They were probably hoping that no one else would hear about it either for fear that a finger, most likely mine, would point in their direction.

  I turned to Dave. ‘Take these two officers into the incident room, and get as full a description as possible of the two people at Tavona Street he spoke to.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said Dave, and frowned. He always called me ‘sir’ in the presence of strangers: police and public. If he called me ‘sir’ in private it usually meant that I’d made a ridiculous comment. As for his frown, I assumed that was because I’d ended a sentence with a preposition.

  ‘And then take Watson to the mortuary. I want to be certain that the woman he spoke to was not the woman whose body was later found in the master bedroom.’

  ‘From Watson’s description, sir,’ said Dave, ‘there would appear to be quite a disparity in the ages of the two women.’

  ‘I know,’ I said, ‘but from what we know of Watson’s action so far, he could have been mistaken about that, too.’

  Watson looked decidedly dejected, as well he should.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said Dave.

  As Dave and the PCs departed, Colin Wilberforce came into my office. ‘I’ve just taken a call from Chelsea, sir. A Mr James Barton went into the nick about ten minutes ago, wanting to know why his house was boarded up, and what had happened.’

  ‘Tell Dave Poole to hand over those two PCs to someone else to take descriptions, Colin, and to get hold of a car. Oh, and tell him not to bother about getting someone to take Watson to view the body. At least, not yet. I think we might be about to solve that particular problem.’

  Minutes later we were on our way to Chelsea police station.

  James Barton was a tall, spare, silver-haired man of advancing years. He stood up when Dave and I entered the lobby of the police station. We escorted him into an interview room.