A knock at the door saved Angel’s blushes. ‘Come in.’
It was Scrivens. He was carrying a big plastic bag.
‘What is it, lad?’ Angel said, looking up.
Scrivens held open the bag. ‘It’s these tennis balls, sir. The ones we took from Laurence Smith’s hut. They’re still in my locker. I can’t move for them. I want to know what to do with them. And you said you’d tell me about the tennis ball scam.’
Angel smiled. ‘Very well. Listen up. In old property, such as the Victorian-built houses where Smith lives, the guttering and the pipes are a bit far seen into. If you’re handy with a set of ladders, you can climb up on to the roofs of these houses and drop a tennis ball down each of the fall pipes. Then after the next heavy downfall of rain, there will be a whole street full of people with flooding problems, needing their pipes attending to. At the critical moment, you can knock on their door in overalls and carrying a bag of tools and, at today’s prices, you can clean up about 300 quid a house. And you even get your ball back. Got it?’
Scrivens stood there, his eyes bright, his mouth slightly open. Eventually he said, ‘Yes, sir. Thank you. I never knew that.’
Angel said: ‘Right, lad. Now off you go.’
Scrivens stood his ground. ‘Yes, sir, but what shall I do with these balls?’
Angel looked back at Gawber and said, ‘The sergeant will tell you what to do with them, lad, won’t you, Ron?’
Gawber stared at him.
The phone rang.
‘Off you go. The pair of you. Sort him out, Ron, will you?’ he said.
The door closed.
Angel picked up the phone. It was DS Taylor.
‘Yes, Don?’
‘I’m at Munro’s house, sir. Thought you’d like to know that there are examples of female hair on the bedding that look very much like Felicity Santana’s. Same colour, same texture as the samples taken from the hairbrush in her caravan at the studio.’
The bees started buzzing round in Angel’s chest. ‘Great stuff, Don.’
‘There’s more, sir.’
Angel was so excited he wasn’t certain he could take any more. ‘Yes?’
‘Her fingerprints are all over the shower door and the taps.’
He replaced the phone.
He had a smile as big as the sun.
The BMW seemed to drive itself to Angel’s house and into his garage.
Mary called out from somewhere in the sitting room. ‘Hello. Is that you, love?’
‘No,’ he called back, then assumed the gruff voice of a pantomime villain. ‘It’s that big, bad womanizer from Bromersley nick, and I’m coming to get you!’
She pretended to scream and spoke an octave higher. ‘Oh! No. No. I’m only thirteen.’
‘I’m not superstitious,’ he growled.
‘But my mother wouldn’t like it,’ she said.
‘Your mother’s not going to get it.’
‘I’ll tell the vicar.’
‘I am the vicar,’ he said and he arrived in the room with a beer he had taken from the fridge en route and looked round for her.
She was seated in the chair, reading a book.
‘You silly fool,’ she said with a big smile. ‘You’re in a good mood.’
He leaned over and gave her a big kiss on the lips.
‘You’ve solved the pig in the bed thing?’ she said.
He lifted up his head and said: ‘Yes.’
‘And you want to tell me about it.’
‘No,’ he lied. ‘Not if you don’t want to know about it.’
‘I do. I do. I want to know all about it,’ she lied. ‘But—’ She suddenly looked very sternly at him. ‘There is something very important that we have to deal with first.’
He frowned then sipped the beer. His mind raced round, trying to think what it was.
Her face was as straight as a Bible. ‘Look at you,’ she said. ‘You’ve forgotten already.’
He screwed up his eyes. ‘What?’ he said.
‘You’ve forgotten about little Timmy’s wedding present. The wedding’s next week. We’ve got to send them something … something really nice.’
It suddenly dawned on him what she was talking about. ‘Oh yes,’ he said. ‘Of course. All taken care of.’
She looked at him closely, her mouth dropping open.
Her face brightened. She smiled. ‘That sounds … nice, Michael. Expensive.’
‘A cuckoo clock.’
‘Unusual.’
‘Yes,’ Angel said. ‘As it happens I’ve bought one. It’s in the car. Already boxed up.’
Mary beamed at him.
He smiled back at her and emptied the glass of beer.
By the Same Author
IN THE MIDST OF LIFE
CHOKER
THE MAN IN THE PINK SUIT
THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING HONEST
MANTRAP
SALAMANDER
SHAM
THE UMBRELLA MAN
THE MAN WHO COULDN’T LOSE
THE CURIOUS MIND OF INSPECTOR ANGEL
FIND THE LADY
THE WIG MAKER
MURDER IN BARE FEET
WILD ABOUT HARRY
THE SNUFFBOX MURDERS
THE DIAMOND ROSARY MURDERS
THE BIG FIDDLE
THE FRUIT GUM MURDERS
Copyright
© Roger Silverwood 2014
First published in Great Britain 2009
This edition 2014
ISBN 978–0–7198–1457–0 (epub)
ISBN 978–0–7198–1458–7 (mobi)
ISBN 978–0–7198–1459–4 (pdf)
ISBN 978–0–7090–8797–7 (print)
Robert Hale Limited
Clerkenwell House
Clerkenwell Green
London EC1R 0HT
www.halebooks.com
The right of Roger Silverwood to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988