“What d’you make of it, then?” Mac’s focus was on his plate but the question didn’t relate to the state of his breakfast. He and Bev were in the canteen, grabbing a bite before the brief. She’d opted for the full Monty, too. Giving away last night’s fish and chips might’ve been good for the soul, but her body had paid for it. Since the early shout she’d been running on empty, felt dizzy and nauseous at one stage. Though that could’ve been the sight of Masters’s body when she’d nipped upstairs to have a word with Pete Talbot.
Not normally given to spouting Shakespeare, soon as she’d entered the bedroom a quote had sprung to mind. Now it just slipped out. “Who’d have thought the old man had so much blood in him?” Well it was close enough.
Mac jabbed an admonitory sausage. “Masters was fifty-five. That’s not old.” Mac was fifty-two.
Bev rolled her eyes. “Ignorant pillock.”
He shrugged. “I see where you’re coming from, though. What was it Overdale said? Fourteen, fifteen wounds?”
“She reckons the post mortem might reveal more.” Bev spread Daddies’ sauce on a fried slice, added bacon, egg and tomato. “Frenzied attack is what the papers’ll call it.”
“They’d be right, wouldn’t they?” Mac hadn’t seen the body. There’d been no point both of them entering the crime scene.
“First time for everything.” Satisfied with the filling, she topped it with another piece of bread. They ate in silence for a while. The place was filling up: uniforms, support staff, plastic plods – dick-lites as Bev called them. She spotted Sumitra Gosh at the counter, lifted a fork in greeting. Maybe Sumi hadn’t noticed. Maybe Sumi had other things on her mind. Mac clearly had. “The press’ll crucify Byford.”
That they would. She’d spoken briefly with the guv earlier. The big man looked as if he was weight-lifting as in world on shoulders. “He’ll cope.”
“Reckon the wife’s away with the Mogadon fairies every night?” Mac asked.
“Uh?” Byford’s missus had been dead ten years. Then the penny dropped. Diana Masters. Maybe she only needed help sleeping when she was alone in the house; maybe she was a chronic insomniac. Bev shrugged; who knows? It was on a growing list of things to find out. She gulped a mouthful of tea, scraped back the chair.
“Where you off to, boss?” Mac glanced up. There was still half a pig on his plate.
“Catch you at the brief.”
“Hold on. ’fore you go.” He offered her a napkin.
She scowled. “And that’s for...?”
He pointed at her chin. “Out, out damn spot.”
Mac quoting Lady M. There’s a thing. Bev was still smiling when she sat at her desk, tapped a few keys and waited for the screen to come up with the goodies. Stone me. They say you shouldn’t speak ill of the dead but by God Alex Masters was no oil painting. And she was studying a pic on the barrister’s own website. Even in the rudest of health he was an ugly squat little bloke. Savile Row’s classiest pin-stripe three-piece wasn’t gonna disguise the pot belly. The head looked too big for the body, the hair was like wire wool, the squashed nose needed re-setting and the face could do with ironing. OK, beauty was skin deep but Bev bet the bloke had a hell of a big... bank balance.
She hit a few keys, waited for a page to download, mused a bit more. Was it money that made guys like Masters attractive? Or was it Henry Kissinger’s theory about power being the ultimate aphrodisiac? The widow’s grief had seemed genuine enough, maybe she saw beyond the surface. Not Bev, though. Give her a looker any time. Like the guy in the Fighting Cocks. If he didn’t do drugs and it didn’t go against her recently adopted rules of engagement she’d see Jagger lips again, no sweat.
Bingo. Here it was. She remembered seeing the article before. According to The Times on-line, Alex Masters had power, presence, charisma, call it what you will, in spades. Skimming the article, she reckoned you could make that pick-up trucks. Before marriage to Diana Scott, he’d sown more oats than the Archers. Professional strike rate was on a par. In legal circles he was known as The Raptor: razor tongued, cutting wit, sharp suits. Nowadays he was mostly associated with high profile court cases where A-list celebs were fined peanuts for offences ordinary mortals mostly got sent down for. In the past though he’d been a top criminal prosecution lawyer. Big bank balance? Masters was minted.
Footsteps in the corridor, banging doors, busy buzz building up. The brief. Shit. She grabbed her bag, put on a topcoat of lippie, gathered the stuff she’d printed out. “Sorry, mate – gonna be late.” Masters’s coarse features vanished from the screen as she closed the page.
Lucky to get a seat, or what? Bev glanced round a packed incident room, spotted a spare next to Carol Pemberton by the window. Bag dumped at her feet, she had a closer butcher’s. It wasn’t quite standing room only – two-thirds of the available officers were out in the field. Or the park.
One theory had the burglar gaining access by scaling the railings at the back of the Masters property. No CCTV coverage there. Luck or judgement? Bev knew where she’d put her money. The perp had certainly entered the house through a kitchen window. A pane had been removed with cutters, glass covered in perfect dabs and DNA. Yeah right.
The squad would hear the minute anything broke. FSIs were still on site, area search was underway, uniforms were knocking doors. Information was being called in, filed back. The clack from printers was pretty constant, ditto ringing phones. Jack Hainsworth was co-ordinating it, making sure it was disseminated. The Inspector collated and cursed in roughly equal measures. Bull-necked and big-mouthed, he hailed from Leeds but was no archetypal Yorkshireman. Hainsworth was less bluff more bolshie-bugger. And he didn’t issue threats, he meant every word. Highgate’s Mr Nice Guy. Not. But he was a sharp operator. And every member of the team knew he or she had to raise their game. Cos the guv had just finished telling them. Alex Masters’s murder had upped Operation Magpie’s ante. And then some.
As usual Byford was perched on the edge of a desk. The swinging leg indicated how keen he was to get on with the job. “Do we know if anything was stolen, Bev?”
Hadn’t had time to ask. “Don’t think so.”
“Think isn’t good enough,” he snapped. “You spoke to the widow, didn’t you?” Below the belt, the big man must be feeling the pressure.
Bev tensed. “She was wearing her old man’s blood. We didn’t talk about baubles. Sir.”
Byford clenched his jaw, let the dig go, gave a terse nod when he noticed Mac had his hand in the air. “From what Mrs Masters said, guv, it seems unlikely the perp had time to nick anything. She woke around two a m to find him attacking her husband. Way it looks, Alex Masters caught him in the act. The alarm going off would’ve panicked the guy and he fled empty-handed.” Not quite. Bev pursed her lips. The burglar had taken his own belongings. Not so much as a grain of sand had been left.
“Why wasn’t the main alarm on?” Question from a new-ish DC. Bev was about to answer when DI Pete Talbot piped up. Despite his bulk, she’d not noticed him hiding away at the back. He’d still been at the scene when Bev left, now looked as knackered as she felt.
“My guess is because Alex Masters was in the house. He was in his dressing gown, which makes me think he may not have been in bed when the perp entered. We know he arrived home after midnight.” Next door’s security camera had footage. “Maybe he felt like unwinding after the drive, fancied a nightcap, a bit of music. He wasn’t expected back at all that night according to what the wife told Bev.”
“That’s right.” She nodded. “According to Diana, he split his working week between London and Birmingham. Apparently followed the same pattern for a couple of years. A neighbour said the same. Obviously we need to run checks, but it looks as if anyone who knew the family...”
“Or made it their business to find out.” Byford glanced round then tasked two DCs with tracing Masters’s movements on the day he died. The Sandman would almost certainly have known them. Serious players didn’t just show up in a striped jumper carrying a swag bag. They recced a location for days, weeks sometimes, recorded comings and goings, established habits. Everyone has a routine – not just comedians. And the Sandman was no joker. Seemed to Bev the burglaries had been planned to the last detail, carried out to the nth degree. Unless... She straightened, eyes narrowed, finger against lip.
“What is it, sergeant?” Byford recognised the pose.
Sergeant? Still pissed with her, then. “He cocked it big time last night, didn’t he? Instead of finding Diana Masters on her own, the perp comes face-to-face with her old man. He was lucky not to get collared. Now he’s looking at a life sentence.”
“And?” Byford’s leg swing had gone up a gear.
“What if it’s not the same guy? What if some wannabe picked up the MO in the papers? Within hours of details about the mask etcetera being in the public domain – our man goes from hot-shot to toss-pot. Strikes me as weird, that.” Encouraging copycats had been a factor in the guv’s original decision not to release the information.
“Could be,” he said. “Might just be coincidence. Either way, the killer’s still out there.”
“Not for much longer, mebbe.” The Yorkshire accent carried across the room. Every head turned. Jack Hainsworth had a smug look on his face and a sheet of paper in his hand. “CCTV opposite the house? Guess who’s been framed?”