Chapter 19

It was sometime after that Monica, put through a call to Richard saying: ‘I have an Inspector Wilson on the telephone asking to speak to you.’

‘Put him through.’

‘Richard it’s Bob. I need to see you about last night’

‘Well I have no clients to see me before 11.30am, so come as soon as you like.’

Ten minutes later Inspector Wilson arrived and was shown into Richard’s office. They were both members of the local golf club and played together on several occasions so no introductions were necessary. Richard asked:

‘Would you like a coffee?’

‘Yes, that would be very acceptable; I’ve hardly stopped for breath this morning.’

Richard asked Monica for two coffees which she readily agreed to provide.

Bob began: ‘My visit here is obviously regarding last night. Now one thing I need to ask you is can you add anything to your description of the man who ran past you?’

‘Well the one thing that sticks in my mind is the way he ran past me. It was not a smooth run and I think he had a problem in that he was losing ground on the girl who was running away. Maybe that’s why he fired at her. Beyond that there’s not much more I can add. It all happened so quickly.’

‘What you have told me may be very useful.’

With that Bob left Richard to return to the station. On the way out Monica asked him: ‘Could I have a quick word with you about last night?’

‘Go ahead’

‘Well about five or six years ago I was working for the local newspaper and the big news at that time was the attempted robbery at a bank in the high street. Two armed men almost got away with it. As they left the bank with a large amount of cash, one of the men sprinted rapidly to a waiting car. The other man had a limp and collided with a member of the public, causing him to fall to the ground. He was promptly arrested by two police officers who were nearby. His arrest led the police to the other robber. They were both sentenced to eight years.’

‘This is very interesting and could be important. I’ve only been in this locality for about three years but I will check back on that attempted armed robbery.’

With that, he thanked Monica for her information and then returned to the local police station, where he decided to check the attempted robbery of six years ago. He firstly asked Sergeant Cook to join him in his office and asked him:

‘How long have you been here?’

‘About eight years.’

‘Good, now do you remember the attempted robbery at the bank in the High Street?’

‘Yes, very well Sir.’

‘Well can you leave whatever you are doing this morning and dig out all the information on the attempted robbery, and provide me with a printout straight away.

Fifteen minutes later, Sergeant Cook produced two sheets of A4 paper with all the information Wilson required.

Inspector Wilson read the sheets. ‘Good God!’ he exclaimed. ‘The man we are interested in was released from prison four weeks ago. Now Sergeant, get on to the Probation office and get an update on this man.’

Sergeant Cook, in his usual efficient way, soon found out all he needed to know. With the information, he went to see Inspector Wilson and gave him the details he had ascertained. ‘Firstly our suspect Eric Smith is currently staying in a B & B at 34 East Street. The B & B s run by a Mrs. Angela Riley and this is her telephone number.’

‘Give me a few minutes and we will decide our next move.’

Inspector Wilson then rang Mrs. Riley and explained who he was. He then asked if she had a Mr. Eric Smith staying there.

Mrs. Riley quickly responded: ‘I did have him staying here but he has gone. He didn’t come to breakfast this morning, so I checked his room. He was not there and all his limited belongings were gone. He could have left at any time. The last time I saw him was at midday yesterday.’

Inspector Wilson then said: ‘I will send one of my men over just to double check his room.’ He then thanked Mrs. Riley for her co-operation. He then asked Sergeant Graham Cook to join him. ‘Well Sergeant the bird has flown.’ He related his discussion with Mrs. Riley. ‘Now what I want to do firstly is to send a plain clothed officer to inspect Smith’s room. There might be something useful to our enquires.’

Two hours later Detective Sergeant Cook returned to the station following a complete search of Eric Smith’s room. He went straight to see Inspector Wilson who said:

‘Well, did you find anything useful?’

‘Yes I found this cardboard box underneath the loose shelf at the bottom of the meter cabinet.’

He showed Inspector Wilson the box, which was about fifteen inches long and six inches wide. Sergeant Cook then lifted the flap on the box. Inside was a metal box with a three pin electric plug and two small cardboard boxes.

Sergeant Cook said: ‘I haven’t touched the metal in case there are some useful prints.’

Also in the box was a small bottle of liquid and a small plastic measure. It was just possible to read on the bottle: ‘one cap full per measure’. The Inspector removed one of the two small cardboard boxes and gently opened it. To his amazement it contained a small cartridge case without any bullet heads.

Inspector Wilson said: ‘What the hell have we got there? Any ideas Sergeant Cook?’

‘No Sir, I am afraid I have not seen anything like this.’

‘Right, take any prints you can from the top of the box and then take it to the police armourer. The nearest is at Heathrow. We don’t have any weapons at this station but they do at Heathrow. I will ring them and explain what we need to know.’

‘One final thing’ said Sergeant Cook ‘I did ask Mrs. Riley if Smith had any transport. She told me that he had recently acquired an ex-Post Office van with all its insignia removed.’

‘That’s interesting Sergeant Cook. You have done very well on this investigation. I think we are getting somewhere.’

Sergeant Cook left and Inspector Wilson telephoned the Armed Specialist Unit at Heathrow and outlined what had been found in the course of a current attempted murder enquiry.

The officer at the unit was very interested and said: ‘That’s the last type of weapon we want in this country, especially anywhere near Heathrow.’ The following morning Inspector Wilson received a call from the Head of the Specialist Unit at Heathrow. He thanked Inspector Wilson for sending such an unusual type of weapon. He went on to say:

‘None of my staff has ever seen such a weapon, so we have sent it to the Metropolitan Police for their opinion, since they have greater facilities than we have here. The only thing we discovered was a couple of words on a bottle of fluid, which according to one of my staff who used to work for the Hong Kong Police some years ago, could be Chinese.’

The response from Scotland Yard arrived the next morning. Their verdict was that the weapon was made to order by a gang, and although it must have cost a small fortune to make, could have only limited use. The revolver used bullets made of ice moulded into a brass bullet casting which obviously dissolved quite quickly on entering the victim. Tests carried out on the weapon revealed that the revolver would need to be used within thirty minutes of preparing the frozen bullet, plus the fact that the revolver was insulated, making it heavier than the normal weapon and therefore making accuracy more difficult to achieve.

The Officer then said: ‘We would like to keep this item in out museum of small arm and would suggest that information concerning this weapon be kept confidential to avoid any copycat reaction.’ Inspector Wilson readily agreed.

He then returned to his desk to study the sheets of A4 on Smith but was interrupted by a call from a Mr. Marshall, one of the surgeons at the hospital where the injured girl had been taken. He told Inspector Wilson that the girl was making steady progress.

He went on: ‘We carried out an operation last night to remove the bullets but believe it or not, we didn’t find any. We have also taken x-rays and they don’t show any foreign bodies. I am lost for words, although the girl certainly had wounds to her shoulder. There is something else I think you should know. We took blood tests, and I have to tell you that she is almost certainly a drug addict. I will send you a full report in due course.’

Inspector Wilson thanked Marshall and said: ‘When do you think we could talk to the girl?’

‘I think tomorrow would be the earliest, provided she continues to make progress but I would like you to keep it as short as possible.’

‘I quite understand. We would almost certainly send a female office in this instance.’

Inspector Wilson called Sergeant Cook into his office and asked him to contact the Post Office to obtain details of their recent sales of small vans in the area. An hour later Sergeant Cook produced the information Inspector Wilson required. He said: ‘There was only one van sold in this area and that was to the Star Trading Company, which is situated on the London Road at East Hannisford.’

‘Right’ said Inspector Wilson ‘get someone out there and check the place over. An officer in plain clothes who went to Mrs. Riley’s house would be ideal. Now the next thing I want you to do is to get one of your bright WPC’s to visit the girl in hospital and interview her to see is she can shed any light on why a man tried to kill her.’

Two days after Inspector Wilson called a meeting of those personnel involved in the case. He began by saying: ‘Firstly I would like to thank you all for the very professional way in which you have handled this case. Now to summarise the current position, we know Eric Smith tried to kill the young lady and have enough evidence to charge him with attempted murder. He is now in custody. Early this morning we mounted a search operation at the Star Trading Company and recovered a large quantity of various drugs plus a quantity of weapons. In the living area we found three adults of foreign nationality. They have all been arrested and are also in custody. It is a major success for us all.’

The television stations and all the press carried the story but one thing which was carefully omitted was details of the secret bullet.

Three people in Hannisford were delighted to hear the news. They were Richard, Mary and Mrs. Sullivan.