Mrs Dallimore left the café and walked the short distance across the High Street and down Handcock’s Alley. She arrived at the canal and considered her options. If everyone believed that the least likely escape route was on foot travelling east, then the perpetrator or perpetrators would know that too. What if they had deliberately gone that way to throw their pursuers off the scent? It was so often the case in fictional cop and spy dramas that the villain did exactly the opposite of what the authorities would expect. And if, as some believed, Tremens and his accomplice, or kidnapper, were dressed as Miss Cutter, they’d probably attract very little attention whichever way they went. The sight of several groups of Millies already combing the westbound towpath for anything that might have been overlooked by the police decided her. Eastwards it was. It wasn’t yet 5 p.m. and she had a good two hours of daylight to play with; two hours to find the evidence she needed to show the naysayers that she was more than just a hack author.
She set off at a good pace, baggy shorts flapping against her thin bony knees and her stout walking boots clumping on the path as her eagle eyes scanned the ground for any form of clue. And then, quite to her surprise, she found one.
The arrival of a hearse to collect the victim’s body raised the excitement among the festival-goers to a whole new level. Blount supervised the removal and then faced the inevitable barrage of questions. There were more cameras and microphones than ever and he grimaced inwardly at the thought of the national and possibly international exposure that his detective work would soon receive as the result.
‘Do we know who the victim is yet?’ asked a reporter from the Bowcester Mercury.
‘Is it true that the killer was dressed as Miss Cutter?’ asked a lady from the BBC.
‘Do we know what Andrew Tremens was going to reveal?’ asked Miss Joscha Ambrose-Leigh, editor of ACDC, the Agnes Crabbe Detective Club magazine.
‘I’m not at liberty to answer any questions at this time,’ said Blount. ‘There will be a short press conference at five fifteen in front of the library. I’d be obliged if you could give us space to conduct our investigation. Thank you.’ He made his way next door to his Incident Room feeling quite pleased with his performance. He’d exhibited just the right balance of authority and reassurance, he felt.
His staff was hard at work. Banton was on the phone chasing up results from the police laboratory at Coxeter and Jaine was interviewing the caretaker of the village hall who had quickly been eliminated from enquiries as he’d been part of the morris-dancing side performing outside the Masonic Hall at the time of the incident. Mr Cuckolde had also revealed that, other than his own set of keys and the set that he’d loaned to Mrs Dallimore, there was a third set that had been specially cut for Andrew Tremens to use. They had not yet been found. A detailed examination of the hall had revealed no signs of forced entry, which suggested that Andrew Tremens had let the killer in. Or had given his keys to a third party. Or was the killer himself. The latter was a theory that the investigation team had heard many times from the constant flow of Millies who had been coming into the library throughout the day to make witness statements and to share their theories. There were so many of them that additional CID officers from Bowcester – DC James and DC Carr – had been seconded to the investigation. They sat to one side of the main operations area, wearily listening to the fans’ ever more extravagant hypotheses and making a record of them all.
‘It was Miss Tradescant’s partner dressed as Miss Cutter. What better way to anonymously kill off your fiancée, eh?’
‘Andrew Tremens was going to reveal some dark secret – like maybe Agnes was a child molester or something – and Brenda tried to stop him and they got into a fight . . .’
‘I heard that the victim could be Esme Handibode. If so it could have been her husband that did for her. I’ve heard that they’re estranged these days . . .’
‘Tremens wrote this supposedly new Agnes Crabbe novel himself. Or maybe Brenda worked on it with him – she was a writer, you know – and Esme found out so the two of them killed her . . .’
‘They never found Lord Lucan . . .’
Blount sat himself down behind the librarian’s desk, having taken advantage of his rank to bag the biggest and most comfortable chair, and attempted to purge from his mind the slew of theories he’d heard. He fretted at a jagged fingernail. Things were not going well. He’d looked forward to an early arrest or, at the very least, a definite suspect, a strong motive and some credible witnesses with which to work. But, at the moment, he had nothing. If he continued to have nothing for too long there was a good chance that HQ would take the case away from him and assign it to a more senior and experienced investigator. His heart sank as he realised that the most likely person to inherit the case would probably be DCI Gavin Quisty; the man that his own team had called a genius and ‘like Sherlock Holmes’. Although Quisty had only been a DI for half the time that Blount had, his sharp intellect and greater range of experience had landed him the promotion to Detective Chief Inspector that Blount had set his heart on. Admittedly he had been the better candidate, but this was scant comfort to Blount and he was damned if he would let his first homicide case get passed to his rival. Or, for that matter, let some show-off ex-London detective like Shunter get a toehold on the investigation. He needed to up his game.
He stood, his balding head colliding with a cardboard mobile of witches and black cats that hung from the ceiling, and paced the room, his long legs allowing him to do so in just a few strides. He needed a suspect and he needed one fast. Hopefully the forensics people would return some results soon and a post-mortem would reveal exactly how the victim had died. Massive head trauma was the most obvious cause of death but then there was the matter of the eight stab wounds to the chest. Had she been stabbed and then bludgeoned, maybe in a clumsy attempt to disguise her identity? If so, why would the killer then leave personal effects with the body, including identifying documents like the victim’s driving licence? Alternatively, she could have been bludgeoned first and then stabbed, but what would be the point of that? She’d have quite clearly been dead before any knife was used. And eight stab wounds smacked of a deranged killer. Blount hoped that there was no ritualistic or cultish element involved, as several Millies had suggested. That would be a definite cause for a handover to a senior officer, maybe even to some specialist from New Scotland Yard.
‘Guv, we have some fingerprint results back for the knife,’ said Banton, finishing her call.
‘At last,’ said Blount, excitedly.
‘It’s an odd result, though. Most of the fingerprints were too smudged to be of any use but we did get a hit on a partial. It belongs to Brenda Tradescant.’
‘So now we’re saying that she smashed her own face in and then stabbed herself eight times?’ snipped Blount.
‘I didn’t say anything of the sort,’ said Banton, irked by the DI’s sarcasm. ‘I’m just reporting the facts. The print is hers. We have her on file. She got convicted several times during the eighties for obstruction, breach of the peace, assault on police, that sort of thing. She used to be an active anti-nuclear campaigner. Greenham Common, CND, etc.’
‘There are definitely no other prints?’ asked Blount.
‘Nothing usable.’
‘Maybe Tradescant is the murderer rather than the victim?’ said Jaine.
‘Maybes are no good to me,’ said Blount. ‘I have a press conference coming up. Is that all we have?’
‘Forensics is a dead end, I’m afraid, until the body has had its fingerprints taken at the mortuary,’ explained Banton.
‘What? Why haven’t they done it yet?’
‘It’s the weekend so there’s only a skeleton staff on and—’
‘Skeleton staff! Ha!’ said Jaine.
‘Then hurry them up!’ said Blount. He bit at his jagged nail again. It tore across the quick and began to bleed.
Frank Shunter and Molly Wilderspin threaded their way through the stew of excitable Milli
es and ducked down Handcock’s Alley, a name that brought a wry smile to Shunter’s lips. Local tradition was that the alley had once been a favourite haunt of boatmen and barge operators who would enjoy a ‘thruppenny upright’ or a ‘below job’ with the prostitutes who operated out of the Happy Union pub. As much a brothel as it was an alehouse back in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the pub was notorious across the county and its cheeky name had been quite deliberate. But then, in 1766, a puritanical priest called Sleight had famously climbed the tall post that supported the pub’s hanging sign and defaced it. The resultant ‘Happy Onion’ so amused the locals that they had adopted it and, in time, so had the licensee who had quickly come to realise that you can’t fight public preference. The pub had kept the name ever since.
Handcock’s Alley led from the High Street to the village hall car park and the canal. It also provided an access point into a confused jumble of cottages called The Butts, a name that added yet another delicious layer of double entendre to this part of the village. Several Millies were in the alley. One was leaning over the police-incident tape and trying to peer into the hall through a side window. Two others were comparing notes.
‘How long would it take to remove the whole pane and replace it? More than five minutes?’
‘Not if the putty had been removed first.’
‘It’s double-glazed, dear.’
‘Oh. Maybe the killer didn’t get in that way.’
‘Unless he was a window fitter . . .’
‘So, you said that she might have gone to see Andrew Tremens for legal advice?’ Shunter asked Miss Wilderspin.
‘Yes. But the more I think about it the more it seems unlikely,’ she replied. ‘After all, he was just about to host a big event and he would have been very busy organising things.’
‘But, given the mood she was in, would she have considered that?’
‘She was very distracted just before she walked off. She kept rummaging in her bag, like she was looking for something. Perhaps she left something behind when we were exploring The Butts? Oh, but that wouldn’t explain why she’s gone missing.’
‘Unless she walked into something that was happening at the rear of the building,’ suggested Shunter. ‘The timings are right for her to have caught people leaving.’
‘Oh dear.’
‘I’ll tell you what, why don’t we go and have a nose around? I’m not entirely sure what that pompous stick insect of a DI’s problem is but we won’t be hampering his investigation if we’re just looking for a lost umbrella or something, will we?’
‘Really? That would be very kind of you.’
‘Truth be known, I could do with a break from the hustle and bustle. Reminds me too much of London. So, let’s retrace your route from earlier.’
‘Then we start at The Butts,’ said Miss Wilderspin.
*
Blount could feel the panic rising in his chest. He had just lied to his Chief Superintendent and, now that he’d had a minute or two to reflect on his actions, he was cursing himself for his own stupidity. There had been no need to lie. He was being methodical and he hadn’t deviated from established procedures or force policies. He was faced with a tricky and complex case and, understandably, it would take a little time to unravel the truth. He’d only been on the case for an hour or so, for goodness’ sake. He had done nothing wrong, and he had nothing to be ashamed of. So why then, when his boss had called him for an update, had he said that he had a suspect and was prepared to name them at the press conference? He had no such thing. He hadn’t even officially identified the victim yet. He should have said that the investigation was proceeding along approved guidelines and that more evidence was bound to surface soon and left it at that. But he hadn’t because he knew that his Chief Superintendent would be under pressure from the Chief Constable to get results and that she would be under pressure from local politicians who, in turn, would have the Home Secretary breathing down their necks. And so, insecure and desperate to keep the case, he had lied. He turned to Nicola Banton and asked anxiously, ‘Anything?’
‘Not really,’ said Banton. ‘The search teams have completed a grid-by-grid search along the towpath and the helicopter has done the length of the canal from Oxford to Bowcester and all of the countryside around it. Nothing to report.’
‘At least fifty drunk or unreliable witnesses. We have several partial registration numbers, most of which disagree with each other, so we have nothing to circulate. And there was nothing to distinguish it from any other box van. There are thousands of them on the roads.’
‘But it was being driven by someone dressed as a woman.’
‘Women do drive vans these days, guv.’
‘You know what I mean,’ said Blount. ‘I mean a man dressed as a woman.’
‘Most of the men in Nasely right now are dressed as women,’ said Banton. ‘I’ve circulated that fact too, but hats and wigs can be removed. Without more information, we’re stymied. Are you sure you want to run a press conference so soon? I mean—’
‘Just . . . keep digging. Find me something I can tell the public,’ said Blount and he headed towards the toilets.
Mrs Dallimore had barely begun her walk when something had caught her eye. Partially hidden in the long grass that skirted the towpath was a battered and well-thumbed paperback copy of Agnes Crabbe’s Swords into Ploughshares. It was barely a hundred yards from where the suspicious van had been parked, which suggested that any police officer who had passed this way had either missed it or assumed it to be simply litter left behind by some irresponsible river dweller or festival visitor. Mrs Dallimore had discovered that it was something much more interesting. She flicked through the pages, seeing the handwritten notes crammed into every header, footer and margin, and wondered which obsessive fan it belonged to. But then, inside the front cover, she found a printed sticker bearing the name of Esme Handibode and an address in Oxford. The discovery had made her smile. So, the old battleaxe had been on the towpath some time during the day, had she? And just a short distance away from where the white van had been parked too. That, in itself, didn’t prove anything but the thought that this information might implicate the bombastic old cow in the murder was a very pleasant one indeed.
She wondered whether she should tell Blount about her find; it was only a short walk back to the library after all. But then she remembered how readily he had dismissed her insights. He would laugh at her, she was sure. Besides, she couldn’t actually be certain that what she’d found was evidence anyway. No, she would tell the police about the book upon her return by which time, with a bit of luck, her detective skills would have turfed up something more concrete and credible. She considered taking the book with her but then decided against it. It wouldn’t help her in her investigations and she didn’t fancy being accused at a later date of removing or tampering with evidence. And if a police officer found it in the meantime, all the better. Mrs Dallimore wiped the book clean of her fingerprints and put it back in the grass in a position where it was very likely to be seen by anyone walking past. She felt no guilt; Esme Handibode had it coming.
As the bus hissed to a stop, Savidge slid off his seat, ducked below window height and peered over the sill. As he’d expected, there were Cutters patrolling the streets around the Empire Hotel, although not as many as he’d anticipated. More surprisingly, there seemed to be a lot of police activity around the village hall. The Cutters didn’t seem at all perturbed by this and many had gathered outside of the taped-off area. Did this mean that the police service was in cahoots with their mistress? If so, no one could be trusted and he would have to be doubly careful. He moved in a curious crouched waddle to the other side of the bus and, hunkering down behind a seat, he peered out of the open door. There were fewer Cutters on this side of the bus.
‘Are you getting off or what?’ snapped the driver. ‘We have
to at least appear to try to stick to a timetable, you know.’
Savidge glared at the man and jumped off the bus. He hit the ground running and sprinted towards some industrial-sized wheelie bins standing by the side of the hotel in Bowler’s Lane.
‘Bloody loony,’ said the driver, shaking his head. The doors closed and the bus spun slowly around and headed back up the Coxeter Road, the driver grumbling audibly about the closure of the High Street and his awkward change of route.
Savidge considered his next move. He could hardly organise an assault on the Queen of the Cutters without being armed in some way but, short of burgling one of the local farms where there might be a shotgun, he could see no easy way to get his hands on a firearm. But did he need one? After all, it wasn’t the weapon that mattered but the skill and the resolve of the person handling it. In the right hands, the most innocuous and harmless item could become a deadly weapon. Scenes from several Jackie Chan films inserted themselves into the confused narrative in his mind as he took his Swiss Army knife out of his pocket and unfolded several of the blades. One by one, he felt them with his thumb and wondered whether the fish hook disgorger, the saw or the largest of the flat blades would be the most effective. None of them were particularly threatening but all of them could do some damage if he decided to use them. He folded the knife shut, put it back in his pocket and peered out from behind the bins at the bustling High Street. The world had become a dark and sinister place peppered with threats and traps to snare the unwary soldier and he would need all of his wits, or those that remained to him at least, to avoid falling victim. For just a moment there were no Cutters in sight. Seizing his opportunity, he dashed down the alleyway.