Naked Flames Read online

  ‘Well, if he didn’t go there with a woman, sure as God made little apples he hooked up with one while he was there.’ Mrs Sharp sounded cynical but then, based on what she’d been telling us, she had every right to be. ‘She’ll be one of a long line. I almost feel sorry for the poor little bitch, whoever she is.’ She paused thoughtfully. ‘What’s going to happen about the funeral?’ she asked, as the practical realities of her situation became apparent to her.

  ‘That depends on when the coroner releases your husband’s body,’ said Dave, ‘but we’ll let you know. May I have your first name?’

  ‘It’s Holly. Well, I won’t be able to pay for a funeral. Bob left us on our beam ends with his crazy money-making schemes and his womanizing. He never seemed to worry about me or the boy and I’ve got another one on the way. As far as I’m concerned, the council can bury him. I don’t owe him anything.’

  ‘What money-making schemes were they?’ I asked.

  ‘Oh, one week he was going to make a fortune out of buying and selling antiques. When that didn’t work out, he had some stupid scheme about opening an upper-class holiday camp in the Caribbean. None of it came to anything. His schemes never did, but that was Bob all over.’

  ‘We’ll be in touch, Mrs Sharp,’ I said, and we left Sharp’s widow. Not a grieving widow, but one who was very bitter about the way she’d been treated by a philandering pipe-dreaming husband. And, I suspect, her troubles were not over yet. The rent was almost certainly in arrears already and I’d no doubt that she would be evicted before long.

  According to Ginny Davis, Madison Bailey wouldn’t be home until after midday. That gave me the opportunity to spend Monday morning in the office attempting to catch up on the avalanche of paperwork that was routinely inflicted upon us. The concept of the paperless society that had been promised to a previous generation of coppers with the arrival of the ubiquitous computer has actually had the opposite effect.

  However, it wasn’t long before I received the first phone call from our press bureau regarding the questions raised by representatives of the media about the death at the Pretext Club. These earlier requests came mainly from journalists of the gutter press to whom the combination of death and nudity had the makings of an irresistibly prurient series of articles with double entendres abounding.

  I decided to release the name of the victim in the hope that it might bring fresh information from people we didn’t know existed. Based on what we’d learned so far about Robert Sharp, I told the press bureau that we would like to speak to anyone who knew him or had met him. As ever, with requests of this nature, the only problem would be the resulting avalanche of information that would descend upon us, taking up our time and very often proving to be of little or no help to our investigation. But it had to be done.

  Once that phone conversation was finished, I ventured into the incident room.

  Detective Sergeant Colin Wilberforce, the incident room manager, had already set up a computer file regarding Robert Sharp’s death. It was a file that could easily be expanded if it turned out that Sharp had been murdered rather than having died accidentally. If it had been the result of a tragic accident, then we would pass the matter to the local CID or the Uniform Branch to handle. But it all hinged on Marty Dawson’s opinion of the cause.

  Wilberforce was a great asset and never had to be told what to do. He was one of those officers with a natural talent for police administration and organization. Although his name had never appeared in the media for having arrested a murderer, his smooth operation was the framework upon which the investigation depended. Without it there would be no form to it and we’d be running around like headless chickens.

  It would be a sad day if he ever decided to apply for promotion. I know that’s a selfish view, but guys like him are difficult to find. That said, he seems quite happy where he is. He has a settled married life and lives with his wife Sonia and their three teenaged children in Orpington.

  He is willing to swap duties with anyone who will give him a Saturday afternoon off so that he can play rugby for the Metropolitan Police when he displays the same ruthless and calculated efficiency on the rugby field as he does in the incident room. Heaven help any individual who interferes with his ordered management. And that includes the commander but, given that that worthy hardly ever emerges from his office save to go home, there is little danger of him even being able to find the incident room.

  ‘You might be interested to know, sir,’ said Wilberforce, ‘that Robert Sharp was listed on the Police National Computer as wanted on warrant by the Devon and Cornwall Police, the Hampshire Constabulary and the Sussex Police.’

  The PNC is a useful tool that is shared by all the UK police forces and enables them to discover, among many other things, if any force in the country, or even Interpol and Europol, has an interest in a particular name or a vehicle or a modus operandi.

  ‘What was he wanted for, Colin?’

  ‘It appears that he specialized in passing off imitation antiques as the real thing. Most times, the potential purchaser suspected that he was a con man and didn’t fall for his spiel, but with Houdini-like skill, he always managed to escape the moment the police started to look for him.’

  ‘Still an offence, whether the mark believed him or not. I wonder if a disgruntled punter set fire to him, Colin. What was the value of the cons he did pull off?’

  Wilberforce swung back to his computer and scrolled up the relevant page. ‘One of them is a Sussex Police job, sir. A couple of years ago, Robert Sharp conned a woman in Brighton into buying a fake Ming vase by claiming it was the real thing. He took her for three hundred pounds. Apparently, she reckoned herself to be an expert as she owns an antique shop and thought that it was worth at least a grand. But when she tried to sell it on for a profit, she found out that it was one of many cheap imitations knocked out in Birmingham and was worth about a fiver at most. A case of the biter bit.’

  ‘Gives an entirely new meaning to the phrase “sharp practice”,’ I said.

  ‘There’s a bit more to it, though, sir. According to the local CID, that particular victim had a brief but torrid affair with Sharp. But by the time she discovered she’d been had over with the vase, Sharp was long gone. Incidentally, the local police said that there was some local scuttlebutt that she’d become pregnant shortly after Sharp’s vanishing act and, although never admitting it to police, it was probably Sharp’s child. Anyway, she had a termination and she didn’t tell the police about that either.’

  ‘Don’t tell me all that’s on the PNC, Colin.’

  ‘No, sir, but I had a chat with the DC at Brighton who dealt with the job.’

  ‘I think I’ll have to talk to this woman, Colin. Do we have a name and address?’

  ‘We do, sir, and I’ll give you the name of the Brighton CID officer dealing.’ Wilberforce glanced at his computer monitor and then scribbled the details on a slip of paper. ‘The victim’s name is Sadie Brooks and her shop is in The Lanes, if you know that part of Brighton. As for the other two jobs – Devon and Cornwall, and Hampshire – it was much the same sort of scam, and although they were rarely successful, there were one or two punters who were relieved of money. One particular lady was ripped off for three thousand by him. That was in Hampshire. There may have been others, of course, but the losers were probably too embarrassed to report it to the police.’

  ‘Common enough reaction, Colin. What sort of things did he try to flog?’

  ‘Most times it was a vase of some sort, sir, or candlesticks, pottery figurines, that sort of stuff. Apparently, tea caddies were a source of income for him at one time. I was surprised to find that some can fetch over a thousand pounds. Presumably small items were more easily portable than, for example, a Victorian wardrobe.’ Wilberforce chuckled at the thought of Sharp struggling through the streets of Brighton humping a wardrobe or a George II dresser on his back and going from door to door in an attempt to sell it. ‘By the way, sir, the commander would like a wor
d.’

  I tapped on the commander’s office door and waited for his peremptory ‘Come!’ before entering the great man’s presence.

  ‘You wanted to see me, sir?’

  ‘Ah, Mr Brock. Tell me about this suspicious death you’re dealing with.’ Reluctantly, because the commander loves paper, he closed the docket in front of him and placed it in his out-tray.

  One of his many irritating habits was to describe a murder or manslaughter as a suspicious death until the jury’s verdict had said it was one or the other, and that verdict had been ratified by the Court of Appeal. In this case, however, it turned out to be the truth; it was a suspicious death, although I was moving ever closer to believing it was a murder. I outlined what we had learned so far, but rather frustrated him when I said that I couldn’t tell him anything else until I got the report from Martina Dawson, the fire investigator.

  ‘Well, I suggest you tell the woman to get a move on, Mr Brock. These laboratory people need to be reminded of the urgency of murder cases.’

  ‘She’s not a police officer or a member of the forensic science service, sir. She belongs to the fire brigade.’

  ‘Keep me posted, Mr Brock,’ snapped our paper-tiger commander, plucking another of his beloved files from the in tray. He was clearly annoyed that Martina Dawson was not under his command and there was absolutely nothing he could do to hurry her up.

  FOUR

  Dave and I arrived at the Harlington flat shared by Jeanette Davis and Madison Bailey at about two thirty that afternoon.

  ‘Hello. I’m Madison Bailey and you must be the policemen. Ginny left me a note to say that you’d be coming to see me.’ If this confident young woman had been Robert Sharp’s latest squeeze, I could quite see why he would have been attracted to her. She had smooth coffee-coloured skin, a perfect figure, shoulder-length jet-black hair and an engaging smile. Her denim shorts and scarlet crop top completed the picture of a young woman who was sexually attractive and knew she was. But I was cynical enough to believe that this and her confident approach were all part of an air stewardess’s stock-in-trade.

  I introduced us and she invited us into the sitting room where we had interviewed her flatmate, Jeanette Davis. Waiting until the girl had seated herself in an armchair, we sat down on the settee opposite her.

  ‘We are investigating a fire that took place at the Pretext Club, Miss Bailey,’ I began. ‘I understand that you were there last week.’

  ‘Oh, call me Madison, please. When did this fire happen?’

  ‘As far as we know at about three thirty on Saturday afternoon,’ said Dave. ‘There was something about it in this morning’s papers, at least in the online editions.’

  ‘I’ve not had a chance to look at anything yet. We don’t get much time to read anything when we’re working. And I don’t usually bother with papers, anyway – I just catch the TV news from time to time or pick it up on my tablet.’

  ‘What time did you leave the Pretext Club?’ I asked.

  ‘First thing on the Saturday morning because I was on duty at six that evening, and I only got back at midday today. Was anyone hurt?’

  ‘A man died in the fire,’ I said. ‘His name was Robert Sharp.’ I sat back and waited for the reaction.

  ‘Really? Good gracious. I’d met Robert.’ Madison’s response was unemotional and she remained perfectly composed. ‘Funnily enough we both arrived together on the Monday. That would’ve been …’ She paused as she tried to remember the date.

  ‘The fifteenth of July,’ prompted Dave.

  ‘That’s right,’ she said, and afforded Dave another of her engaging smiles. ‘He seemed a nice guy and we spent quite a bit of time together. We were both keen swimmers and we spent most of our time in the pool.’

  ‘D’you have a car?’ Dave asked.

  ‘Yes, a Mini convertible. I bought it this year as a matter of fact. I was lucky enough to get nought per cent finance.’

  ‘And you used that to travel to the Pretext Club, I suppose.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘We’re checking all the cars that were in the car park, Madison. I suppose one of them would have been yours.’

  ‘Oh, quite definitely.’ Madison laughed. ‘It’s too much of a risk leaving a car like that in the street, especially for three or four days. No, I parked it in the club car park. They don’t charge members to park.’ She paused. ‘Well, they don’t charge me, anyway.’

  ‘Did Robert Sharp say what he did for a living, Madison?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes, he said that he was in the antiques business. As a matter of fact, he told me that he had a shop in King’s Road, Chelsea, opposite a pub nearer Sloane Square than World’s End, I think he said. I must admit that he was a bit vague about it. He said the shop was being looked after by his manager while he enjoyed a few days of being free of everything, including clothes.’ Madison giggled at some secret thought, doubtless involving a naked Sharp. ‘It was a view of life we both shared. Wonderfully carefree. You should try it sometime,’ she said, glancing at Dave. There was no trace of embarrassment at having spent a week at a naturist club, but why should there have been? We seem to live in an age when many of the old inhibitions have been cast aside. Some for the better, some for the worst.

  ‘I imagine he must have been very wealthy if he could afford to take a week off and leave a manager in charge,’ said Dave. ‘And trusting, too.’

  ‘He was certainly wealthy if his conversation was anything to go by. He told me all about the frequent holidays he had in the south of France, and the villa he owned on some Caribbean hideaway. He actually offered to take me on holiday to one of those places. Oh, I’d almost forgotten …’ Madison leaned over the side of her armchair and picked up a tan suede hobo bag. ‘Before I left on Sunday morning, he gave me his card. Would you like it? If the poor man’s dead, it won’t be of any use to me now, will it?’ she said, and handed me a piece of printed pasteboard. ‘And no exotic holiday, either,’ she added, contriving an expression of regret.

  I glanced briefly at the card. It had Sharp’s name, the name of a well-known gentlemen’s club in central London and a mobile phone number, but no private or business address. What a surprise! I gave it to Dave. ‘Did he ever mention opening a form of holiday village for the very rich in the Caribbean, Madison?’ I asked.

  ‘Not that I recall.’

  ‘The people at the Pretext Club seemed to think that you were his wife.’ Dave stretched the truth quite a long way in his attempt to find out whether Sharp had admitted to having a wife or even if he’d suggested taking his new-found friendship with Madison any further.

  ‘No, he was single,’ said Madison adamantly. ‘He made a point of telling me that he was divorced. He said that married men at places like the club or on cruises – or even on online dating – would often pretend to be single and spin a tale to girls in the hope of persuading them into bed. But he needn’t have worried; in my line of business we learn very quickly how to spot a married man.’

  But you didn’t spot this one, I thought.

  ‘Did he show you any photographs of the places you mentioned, Madison?’ I asked. ‘The south of France or the Caribbean?’

  ‘Yes, he had them on his iPhone. They looked wonderful.’

  ‘I imagine they did.’ I’d recently learned from Lydia that it was the simplest thing in the world to download such scenes from online brochures. It was, however, difficult to tell whether Madison had believed Sharp and his stories. Perhaps common sense told her that she was being played along but she was so enamoured of the man that she was prepared to cast reason aside.

  ‘Were there any shots of Sharp actually in the photographs he showed you, Madison?’ Dave asked.

  ‘No, there weren’t, come to think of it,’ she said pensively.

  I didn’t think there would have been. The more I learned of Robert Sharp the more he was proving to be a typical confidence trickster and that broadened the field of those who would want to do him harm.<
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  ‘Where were you when Robert Sharp showed you these images, Madison?’ asked Dave.

  ‘At the Pretext Club.’

  ‘But I thought members had to hand in phones or cameras or anything that took photographs.’

  ‘Oh. I … um …’ Madison faltered. ‘He must’ve smuggled his in.’

  ‘But if he wasn’t wearing any clothes, where was he hiding it?’ Dave’s questioning was pleasantly relentless rather than aggressive, but he was proving that Madison Bailey had either met Sharp elsewhere than the club or she had spent time in his room where he’d secreted his smuggled phone. It didn’t matter unless there was an underlying reason for her not telling the truth.

  ‘I can’t remember,’ said Madison eventually, but she was clearly flustered.

  Dave wisely left it with that final question.

  ‘We may need to see you again, Madison.’ I handed her one of my cards. ‘If you think of anything that might be helpful, perhaps you’d give me a call.’

  ‘Of course.’ She smiled again. At Dave.

  ‘What d’you reckon, Dave?’ I asked as we drove back to central London.

  ‘She was very confident of herself, guv, but I suppose that goes with the job she does. I’m inclined to believe most of what she said, but she’s pretty clever at disguising her feelings and she did lose it a bit when I started asking where she was when she saw Sharp’s phone. Mind you, I’m not sure that she was taken in by him to the extent that she led us to believe. Perhaps she’s a con artist herself and was going to take him for all she could get and then abandon him. Unfortunately for her, I doubt he’d got any money at all, but having seen her new Mini convertible he thought that she had. I wonder what sort of yarn she spun him.’

  ‘One thing’s pretty obvious, though, Dave. Your questions proved that she wasn’t telling the whole truth.’

  ‘There’s a report from Martina Dawson here for you, sir,’ said Wilberforce, the moment I stepped into the incident room.

  ‘Now perhaps we’ll be able to get on with it.’ I invited Kate and Dave into my office, and spent several minutes scanning the report. ‘It looks as though we’ve got a murder on our hands,’ I said eventually. ‘Marty’s report states that she found evidence of an accelerant, namely petrol, and confirms that the seat of the fire was immediately beneath Robert Sharp’s bed. The report also says that the bed was wooden and the mattress was not made of fire-resistant material. That’s an offence in a place like the Pretext Club and Marty’s referred it to the Commissioner of the London Fire Brigade.’