It was only the second time it had ever happened.
All the European, Chinese, Russian, Sikh and Japanese constables, sergeants and detectives were lined up in the foyer of Central Police Station waiting for them as they arrived.
Danilov and Strachan took off their hats as soon as the clapping started. Danilov looked at his feet, noticing a spot of dirt on the wooden floor. Strachan flushed bright red.
‘Well done, Inspector.’ A beefy Sikh constable in a blue turban patted him on the back with a hand the size of a club.
Danilov pushed his way through the crowd.
Another inspector seized him by the hand, pumping it up and down. ‘You saved the old girl; I was beginning to miss her.’
Danilov nodded and pushed his way through the swing doors. Strachan was behind him, still revelling in the unaccustomed adulation.
‘Come on, Strachan, we have work to do.’
‘Yes, sir.’ Strachan shook one last hand and hurried after the inspector. ‘Didn’t know Miss Cavendish meant so much to everyone, sir.’
‘She’s the heart and soul of this place, Strachan. Where’s Chief Inspector Rock?’
They were standing in front of his empty office. ‘See what I mean? Without her we’re lost.’
They eventually found Chief Inspector Rock in the Ongoing Investigation Room with Meaker and Cartwright.
‘Ah, Danilov, you’re back. How is Miss Cavendish?’
‘Distressed and unhappy, sir. She’s in Lester Hospital under sedation.’
‘Have you interviewed her yet?’
‘Not yet. She’s in no state…’
The Chief Inspector turned away before Danilov could finish his sentence. ‘Interview her as soon as you can, Danilov. It would help if we could get a physical description of the perpetrator.’
‘I intend to interview her tomorrow morning, when she has recovered sufficiently to be questioned.’
‘Good.’ He pointed to something written on the blackboard. ‘Come in and sit here, will you? Meaker and Cartwright have come up with something interesting.’
Danilov and Strachan edged into the room, taking a seat on the chairs in front of the blackboard. The room still had all the notes about the case on easels at the front. He noticed more information had been added since they were last there. A new easel with a picture of Miss Cavendish at the top and the details of her disappearance below.
‘But before we get to their discoveries, can you add anything to our knowledge?’ Chief Inspector Rock stood with his pen poised at the easel.
‘Miss Cavendish was found in the basement of the Canidrome, sir.’
‘In French Town?’ asked Meaker.
‘Yes.’
‘Everything seems to happen there; fits with what we discovered.’
Chief Inspector Rock stood in front of the map. ‘Where did you say this place was?’
‘The Canidrome. It’s a dog-racing track owned by the French. It’s just where your left hand is, sir,’ said Cartwright.
‘Here?’
‘Exactly, sir. Right next to the Morriss estate.’
‘Isn’t he the man who owns the North China Daily News?’
‘And the rest, sir.’
The Chief Inspector placed a picture of Miss Cavendish next to the Canidrome on the map. It joined the other pictures of Lieutenant Deschamps and Rossana Gurdieva at the War Memorial, the unknown man at the Shanghai Country Club, and Sally Chen at the river.
Danilov stared at the map. The victims had been found in both the International Settlement and the French Concession. But why were they placed there?
‘How did you find Miss Cavendish?’ asked Meaker.
‘Through interpreting the clues in the newspaper.’
‘Those poems? I told you to forget them, Danilov,’ said Rock.
Danilov paused for a moment. ‘If I had ignored them, sir, Miss Cavendish would be dead. The poems were a clue from the killer. He’s taunting us, playing a game with us. A deadly game.’
Chief Inspector Rock coughed. ‘Well, we’d better make the winning move, hadn’t we, Inspector?’ Rock glanced at Cartwright and a brief smile passed between the two.
Something was going on. Rock was far too smug at the moment.
‘Anything else, Inspector?’
Danilov held up a small paper bag. ‘We found another chess piece at the scene. Another queen.’
‘He does like to leave these things afterwards, doesn’t he? A calling card, perhaps?’
‘I think it’s more, Chief Inspector. I think it’s another clue.’
‘You and your bloody clues, Danilov,’ Cartwright sneered.
Chief Inspector Rock ignored the interruption. ‘Is there any writing on it?’
‘None I can see, sir.’
‘Is it special, one of a kind?’
‘I think I can help, sir.’ Cartwright smiled. ‘We looked into the chess pieces and checked all the shops selling chess sets. We thought this was the correct procedure as the pieces were obviously new and unused. Unplayed with, I should say.’ Another smile from Cartwright, returned by Rock. ‘Anyway, to cut a long story short, we found identical sets being sold at Wing On Department Store. We checked with their sales manager,’ he looked at his notes, ‘a Miss Chiang, and they sold forty-two of the sets in the last three months. Unfortunately, there are no records of who they sold them to.’
Another smile from Rock. ‘Well done, Inspector. A good piece of follow-up detective work.’
‘But, of course, we don’t know these particular pieces were bought in Shanghai, so we dug a little deeper.’ Cartwright paused here for dramatic effect. ‘They are manufactured in Canton by the Morally Bright Games Company.’ He looked up for a second and smiled once more. ‘I don’t know where they get these names from, sir.’
Rock laughed. ‘Quite, Inspector, quite…’
‘The names come from the Analects of Confucius. They usually refer to the correct way in which you should live your life,’ said Strachan.
‘That’s as may be; still sounds pretty daft in English.’
‘In Chinese, it has a poetic ring…’
‘More poetry, Strachan? I think we’ve had enough poetry for one day, don’t you?’ Rock stared at the detective sergeant. ‘Carry on, Inspector Cartwright.’
He coughed and looked at his notes. ‘Anyway, we contacted them and they sold 1,472 chess sets of that design in the last three months. Apparently, they distribute all over China.’ He looked up again. ‘I didn’t know that many Chinese knew how to play chess.’
Danilov could feel Strachan bristling with anger beside him. He placed his hand on the detective sergeant’s arm.
Chief Inspector Rock carried on anyway. ‘Thank you, Cartwright, an excellent piece of work.’
‘I still think the chess piece is a vital clue, sir.’
‘Perhaps, Danilov, but we have neither the time nor the manpower to check up on all 1,472 purchasers of chess sets.’
‘And that’s only in the last three months, sir. Although the chess piece is new, it could have been bought long ago and kept under wraps until today.’
‘Quite, Inspector Meaker. No, Danilov, I think we’re barking up the wrong tree there.’ Again, a smug smile spread across Chief Inspector Rock’s face. ‘But, Inspectors Meaker and Cartwright have a couple of other things to interest us.’
‘We’ve managed to ID the victim at the Country Club. The fingerprint boys found a match with a Hank Chettle.’ Cartwright coughed. ‘An American sailor. We’ve had him in here a couple of times for drunk and disorderly, the usual stuff. Nothing else, though; no major convictions.’
‘What shall we do with a drunken sailor, Inspector Cartwright?’ Rock laughed at his little joke. Cartwright just carried on reading from his notes.
‘Went missing three days ago, apparently, early in the morning. Last seen by his mother. She reported him missing yesterday.’
‘An American – you were right, sir.’
Danilov ignored Strachan; he had no interest in being proven correct. ‘Where was he going when he went out?’
Cartwright checked his notes again. ‘Some club down in Blood Alley called the Four Sisters.’
‘Is that the link, sir?’
‘Look into it, Strachan. See if the club is connected to any of our past investigations.’
‘What link?’ asked Chief Inspector Rock.
‘One of the victims of Allen also went missing from a club,’ replied Danilov.
‘You’re still floggin’ that dead horse. Give it a rest, Danilov.’
‘Enough, gentlemen.’ Rock struck the desk with his wooden pointer. ‘Inspector Danilov. You shot this man Allen twice, did you not?’
Danilov nodded.
‘Well, please tell me how a dead man can still be alive and committing our murders?’
‘I don’t know, sir, but…’
Rock held his hand up, cutting Danilov off. ‘Tell them what else you discovered, Inspector Cartwright.’
‘It was the stones you found at the site of the first murder in the Country Club, Danilov, that set us thinking. The lab report came back with traces of embalming fluid on them.’
‘It did. Not much, but enough to be observable,’ said Danilov.
‘So we looked at Dr Fang’s report. He tested the clothes of both Lieutenant Deschamps and his floozy. And guess what?’
‘Dr Fang discovered they also tested positive for embalming fluid.’
‘Right you are, Danilov. Even better, the tests came back with exactly the same mixture of chemicals from the stones and the clothes of the victims.’
‘Twenty-two per cent formaldehyde, forty-three per cent methanol and eight per cent glutaraldehyde, if I remember correctly.’
‘That’s right, Danilov. Not a common mixture, especially the eight per cent glut… ara… dehyde.’ Cartwright stumbled over the last chemical. ‘However it’s pronounced. The rest is water and a few oils.’
‘So we know embalming fluid was present on or near the bodies of the victims,’ said Danilov, more to himself than anybody in the room.
‘We know more, Inspector. The company Dr Fang uses, a C.J. Dawtry, Undertakers, keep a bottle of their embalming fluid at the morgue.’
Again, Cartwright paused for dramatic effect. Danilov expected him to pull a rabbit out of a hat at any minute.
‘We tested it and… guess what?’
‘The embalming fluid is a mixture of twenty-two per cent formaldehyde, forty-three per cent methanol and eight per cent glutaraldehyde…’
‘You’re quick learner, Danilov. And, there’s more… only one company uses this formulation, The Dodge Company of Boston.’
Another rabbit, thought Danilov.
‘C.J. Dawtry, Undertakers, was only appointed three months ago after a new tender. We’ve checked and there seems to be no record of their business before that date. They won the tender because they offered by far the cheapest price.’ Cartwright smiled again. The smile of a hyena who’s just seen a goat tied to a stake. ‘The bottle kept by them at Dr Fang’s morgue was manufactured by…’
‘…the Dodge Company of Boston.’ Danilov finished the sentence.’You have been busy, Inspector.’
‘We’re not all sitting on our arses smoking all day, Danilov.’
Chief Inspector Rock smiled benignly. ‘There was one final clue, and you provided it, Danilov.’
‘I did, sir?’
‘You did, Inspector. You said the blind beggar told you he heard the sound of an engine that wasn’t a lorry or a car?’
Danilov nodded.
‘Well, I must say I discounted the evidence at the time. But as I thought about it, what better way to move bodies around than in a hearse? And what engine sounds stronger than a car but weaker than a lorry?’
‘A hearse.’ Cartwright answered the rhetorical question, smiling all the time at Danilov.
Chief Inspector Rock clapped his hands. ‘Well done, Cartwright and Meaker. I’ve ordered a raid by the Rapid Action Force on the premises of C.J. Dawtry in Jessfield Road tomorrow morning.’
‘Good, sir, what time?’ asked Danilov
‘Oh, we won’t be needing you, or Strachan. I’ll lead the raid and, of course, Inspectors Meaker and Cartwright will accompany me as they cracked the case.’ He closed the file, laying it on the desk. ‘It’s getting late, gentlemen. I suggest we get a good night’s sleep; we have to be back here at five tomorrow morning.’
‘But I need to be involved in…’
‘You don’t need to be involved in anything, Danilov. Cartwright and Meaker cracked the case with a smart piece of work. They will have the pleasure of the final collar.’
‘But…’
‘Enough, Danilov. You’ve had a trying day. Good work on rescuing Miss Cavendish.’ He tucked the file under his arm. ‘It’s been a good day all round, gentlemen. I look forward to a satisfactory end to this case tomorrow morning.’
With the conclusion of the meeting, he marched out of the Investigation Room.
When he had gone, Cartwright stood up. ‘See, Danilov, there are other detectives in this bloody station too. Some of us actually know how to do our job. We don’t go off spouting about patterns and dead men coming to life and Locard’s bloody transference theory. We just do our bloody job as coppers.’
‘Your whole case relies on Monsieur Locard’s theories, Inspector Cartwright.’
Cartwright stared at him without understanding.
‘Every contact leaves a trace, as Monsieur Locard put it. You are relying on the fact that the killer touched the bodies and touched embalming fluid at the same time.’
‘I don’t know, and I don’t bloody care, Danilov. We’re going to snatch this killer tomorrow morning. Then we’ll pass him on to the tender questioning of Charlie Meaker here. Good at getting confessions is Charlie.’
‘The best, even if I do say so myself.’
Cartwright took a step forward, pushing his finger into Danilov’s chest. ‘So, fuck you and your fucking theories. After tomorrow, we’ll be so far up Rock’s arse, we’ll be brushing his teeth from the inside. We’ll be his little blue-eyed boys and you’ll be arresting dog-eaters and beggars in Hongkew.’
Danilov moved Cartwright’s finger away from his chest. ‘ I know you’re wrong about the undertakers, Cartwright. And I’m going to prove it.’
Cartwright laughed. ‘ You’re fucked, Danilov. I’ve got you this time.’