Dr Mac, dressed in whites, and carrying his case and a plastic bag, plainly containing samples of evidence, was coming out of Number 22. Angel waited at the front gate for him.
‘Ah, Michael,’ Mac said. ‘This your case?’
‘Aye, for my sins.’
Mac smiled.
‘Hear you’ve got an eyewitness?’
‘Looks like it,’ Angel sniffed. ‘We’ll see.’
A woman walking a Yorkshire terrier stared at the apparition in white as she passed between them on the pavement.
‘What’ve you got?’
Mac opened his car door and dropped his case and the plastic bag inside, then began to pull off the whites. ‘A woman, aged about forty. Shot in the forehead. One bullet. Calibre .202. She was shot while sitting where she was found, on a settee, I believe. At very close range. There are powder burns on her chin and on her clothes. I have found what seems to be a human hair on her skirt.’
Angel’s face brightened.
‘The result of a struggle?’
‘Don’t think so. There don’t appear to be any signs of a struggle. The woman appears to have been moderately attractive, but no clothes disarranged or anything like that, so I’d rule out any sexual motive. The downstairs seems pretty tidy; I don’t think the place has been searched, so I’d also rule out robbery.’
Angel pulled a face. ‘It’s going to be one of those cases, is it?’
‘That hair may or it may not prove to be helpful.’
Angel pursed his lips.
‘Anything else?’
‘Yes,’ Mac said, quickly stepping out of the paper suit and rolling it into a ball. ‘Peculiar. Very peculiar,’ he added. He threw the roll into the back of the car, closed the door and then looked up at him. ‘Yes. Strewn about the body and on the settee was … orange peel.’
Angel blinked.
‘Orange peel?’ he said, much louder than he had intended.
An old woman pushing a pram with a sleeping baby in it passed between them, heard Angel’s outburst and stared at him as if she thought he was ready for a session with Dr Raj Persaud. He watched her until she was out of earshot.
‘Orange peel?’ he repeated quietly. ‘Like Reynard?’
Mac nodded.
Angel’s heart started pounding again. This was going to attract national interest if Reynard was responsible for the murder.
‘Was a card found? Like a visiting card? His are supposed to say, “With the compliments of Reynard”.’
‘I didn’t see anything like that,’ Mac said, as he threw the rest of the discarded white suit into the back of the car. ‘SOCO are still hard at it in there. They’ll find it, if it’s there.’
Angel started rubbing his chin. His mind began to dart off in all sorts of directions. If Reynard was suspected, the Serious Organised Crime Agency and its high ranking medico-forensic staff might bustle into Bromersley nick, take over the case, the station, the canteen and probably his office, too. He didn’t want that. At the same time, they had expressed a particular interest in Reynard and it would be churlish not to inform them if there were clear pointers that that man might be the murderer.
Mac was now changed and behind the wheel of his car.
Angel stood on the pavement in the shade of the horse chestnut, deep in thought.
‘The meat wagon’s on its way, Michael. I’ll send you my report later tomorrow.’
He looked up.
‘Yeah, right, Mac. Thank you.’
Mac engaged the gears, pulled out of the sombre, leafy backwater and was soon out of sight.
Angel made straight for the gate to The Beeches, pushed it open and strode quickly up the path to the house door. Across the doorway was ‘POLICE LINE DO NOT CROSS’ tape. He reached forward, deliberately avoided the button for the doorbell and banged on the door. It took some time for the door to be answered. A detective constable in whites opened it.
‘DS Taylor there?’ Angel asked.
Taylor came up behind the DC.
‘Come in, sir,’ the sergeant said. ‘We’ve finished the initial sweep downstairs, except for the search after the body has been removed.’
‘Right. Give me some gloves.’
A white paper packet was passed to him from a plastic container.
‘Nothing been moved at all?’ he asked as he tore the packet open and took out a pair of white rubber gloves. ‘Everything exactly as it was?’
‘Except for Dr Mac’s close examination of the body, sir.’
Angel nodded as he snapped the gloves on.
‘Aye. Anything else?’
‘He took a small piece of orange peel.’
Angel raised his head thoughtfully. He didn’t say anything.
Taylor stepped back and pulled open the door.
Angel heard the humming of a vacuum cleaner. A SOCO man was upstairs sucking round for evidence. He stepped into the house. There were sterilized white sheets covering most of the floor. He followed Taylor into the sitting-room. He was slightly shocked to find the victim seated upright in the middle place of a three-seater settee. He walked tentatively over to a position in front of the fireplace and looked at her. There was a patch of dried brown blood on her forehead. Her hair was mousy-coloured and tidy; in fact there was not a hair out of place. She had clearly been a pretty woman. Her head was on one side, her eyes closed and her hands on her lap. Pieces of orange peel were strewn across the settee and several pieces on her skirt. It almost looked as if she might have peeled and eaten the orange herself, but he knew it could not have been so.
She still looked alive … although sleeping. He shuddered and briefly felt cold. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end. He had seen so many bodies, but he felt he would never get used to death, especially murder. He turned away.
Taylor had been was standing in the doorway, watching the inspector taking in the scene.
He came up to him.
‘Peculiar, sir. Isn’t it?’
Angel nodded and rubbed his chin.
They both looked at the figure sitting on the settee.
After a moment, Angel said: ‘Did you find anything like a business card on or around the body, Don?’
Taylor frowned.
‘No, sir. Nothing like that.’
‘Any doors or windows forced?’
‘No, sir. Back door closed but unlocked. Front door ajar. Several windows open.’
Angel shook his head censoriously.
‘Well, sir, it is a warm day.’
He nodded then turned away. He found the kitchen. Everything spotless and cleared away. On the draining board at the sink, he spotted a small pile of coins neatly placed on top of a five pound note.
He turned to Taylor and pointed to them.
‘What’s this, Don?’
‘Dunno, sir. Just as we found it. Six pounds, fifty-six pence.’
Angel stood pensively. He wondered if it meant that the murderer was honest? Unusual. Was it likely that a titled lady might be up to murdering somebody for money, but above taking six pounds odd after they were dead?
He found a door leading out of the kitchen.
‘That’s a pantry, sir,’ Taylor said.
Angel opened it and found a large storage room. It looked clean, well-stocked and everything seemed in order. At the end of the room was a fridge. He stepped inside and accidentally kicked something. He looked down and there were two shopping bags overflowing with groceries.
He looked back at Taylor, with eyes narrowed.
‘That’s just as it was, sir. I don’t know why.’
Angel nodded. He strode over the tops of the shopping bags and made the few paces down to the fridge. He opened the door, looked inside, observed that it contained nothing unusual. He checked the ‘use by’ date on a container of milk, replaced it and closed the door.
He returned to the entrance hall followed by Taylor. Together they went upstairs and looked round all the rooms. Angel saw nothing that was remarkable. They made their way downstairs. At the bottom he turned to Taylor.
‘Don, I want you to look out for any reference at all to a Lady Blessington. We desperately need her address. She’s our number one suspect. In fact, she’s our only suspect. Letters, cards, any mention of her at all, I want to know about it. Might be in the victim’s address book. The poor woman was blind, so she may not have used such a thing. The description of Lady Blessington is that she’s of medium height, between forty and sixty and last seen in a powder blue dress, described as “fussy”. I’m not sure what that means in this context. OK?’
‘Right, sir.’
There was a knock at the door. Taylor opened it. It was DS Crisp.
Angel’s mouth tightened.
‘I want you, laddie!’ Angel bawled before Crisp had chance to say anything.
Crisp knew he was in trouble.
Angel turned back to Taylor. ‘I must get away, Don. I’ll see you tomorrow.’
‘Right, sir.’
The door closed.
DS Crisp was a clean-shaven, dark-haired man, much admired by the ladies, particularly by WPC Leisha Baverstock who was on the strength of Bromersley force. He was always very smartly turned out. Tidy hair. Suit sharper than a broken vodka bottle.
Angel’s face flushed.
‘Where the hell have you been?’ he bawled, when they were alone. ‘Ahmed has been trying to contact you all day. There’s a murder come in. I needed you. I need every man I can get!’
‘I know, sir.’ He protested. ‘I know. I’ve been phoning you. Every opportunity I had, but you were always engaged. I got called out to a drunk who was causing a disturbance in The Feathers.’
Angel sighed.
‘So what?’
‘Then I got buttonholed by the super. He pulled me in to attend a briefing with some “uniformed” about Reynard.’
Angel blinked.
He always found that whenever Crisp went missing and then eventually turned up, he always had a truly magnificent explanation.
‘Reynard? What about him?’
‘You know, sir. The murderer who always leaves a calling card behind.’
‘I know all about his MO,’ he bawled. ‘What about him?’
‘Information received that he was in the area, sir. It was on the front page of the Yorkshire Mercury. Supposedly been in Leeds last night. A man was murdered.’
‘How do they know? Nobody knows what he looks like, do they?’
‘No, sir. But that’s what it said.’
Angel’s eyebrows had shot up. He hadn’t heard. That was unexpected.
‘And what was the point of the briefing?’
‘To raise the profile of Reynard, sir, and enlist our co-operation. A CDI from SOCA rolled in. They’re marshalling a big operation to try to net him, as they believe there’s every possibility of his turning up around here sometime.’
Angel had had enough of the banter, and he rather wanted to get away from thoughts about Reynard being in or even near Bromersley. Crisp, as usual, had delivered an almost plausible explanation. It would be time-wasting to push the argument any further. Time was precious. There was too much at stake.
Angel sighed and shook his head. He knew he’d been beaten.
‘There’s a woman called Margaret,’ he said quickly. ‘I’ve been told she does some cleaning for Prophets and lives in the top flat at the top of Mansion Hill. Find out where she was today … if she was at the Prophets’ house at all. And what she can tell you about the relationship between the murdered woman and her husband. And anything else that might be helpful. See if she knows of the whereabouts of Lady Blessington … her home address and so on. And keep in touch. OK?’
‘Right, sir.’
‘Any questions?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Well push off then, lad. See if you can make up for all the time you’ve already wasted!’
Angel’s mobile rang.
‘Right, sir,’ Crisp said, then he ran down the crazy-paving path to his car.
Angel took out his mobile as he watched the young sergeant reach the gate. Although he couldn’t see his face, he knew Crisp would be laughing his socks off at him.
He sighed as he answered the phone. ‘Angel.’
‘It’s Scrivens, sir. Ahmed says to tell you that there’s nothing known on the NPC about Lady Blessington or Charles Prophet.’
‘Right,’ Angel grunted.
‘But I’ve traced the taxi driver. His name’s Bert Amersham. He picked up Lady Blessington just before two o’clock outside Wells Street Baths and took her to 22 Creesforth Road. He then brought her back to the baths an hour later. I spoke to him on the phone. He said he thought there was something wrong when he took her back. She seemed agitated.’
‘Hmmm. Right, Ed,’ Angel said urgently. ‘Wells Street Baths? There’s a job for you, then. Find Lady Blessington.’
Scrivens hesitated.
‘Where would I start, sir?’
Angel blew out an impatient sigh.
‘I don’t know. You’re the detective. You could start at the top of the Blackpool Tower, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon or Number Ten, Downing Street. Personally, I would start where the taxi driver said he had dropped her. Now stop wasting time. She’s our number one suspect. For God’s sake get out there and find her!’
Angel closed the phone, shoved it in his pocket, and walked briskly down the path to his car.
He must get to the husband, Charles Prophet, before the poor man heard the tragic news from some other source.
He saw Gawber walking on the pavement. He was carrying a clipboard. They met at the front gate.
‘Nobody saw anything of anybody arriving or leaving Number Twenty-two, sir,’ Gawber said.
Angel’s jaw tightened. He rubbed it.
‘Hmmm. They never do.’
‘There was plenty of gossip.’
‘Oh, yes?’ he said knowingly.
‘Yes. The women had plenty to say about Mr Prophet. All good though. He comes out very well. The perfect husband. The next best thing to Johnny Depp.’
Angel’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Charles Prophet: Mother Teresa in Y-fronts, eh? Loaded with money. Stuck with a woman who is blind.’
Gawber nodded wryly. ‘That’s about what they’re saying.’
Angel grunted and then said, ‘I’ve still got to tell that poor man about his wife.’
Gawber was aware that it had to be done.
‘Anybody see Lady Blessington?’ Angel asked.
‘A woman in the house opposite, The Larches, Number Eighteen, says she saw a taxi arrive about two, and a woman in blue get out. She’s seen her before, a couple of times. Medium height. She thought about sixty. Strange dress. Couldn’t get any more detailed description. Nobody else saw anything.’
Angel wrinkled his nose.
‘What’s strange about a blue dress?’
Gawber shrugged.
‘You’d better get after her. I’ve already set Scrivens on to start at Wells Street Baths, that’s where the taxi picked her up and dropped her, but why Wells Street Baths, I wonder?’
He squeezed the lobe of his ear between finger and thumb.
‘What attraction could an Olympic-sized swimming pool possibly have for a middle-aged titled lady who is most probably a murderer?’ Angel mused.
‘Swimming, sir,’ Gawber said innocently.
Angel frowned.
‘Swimming?’ he growled. ‘Well do the crawl and find her then. Smartish!’