Page 24

chapter twenty-four

Gabriella headed to Ruby Everett’s house from the bus stop, and as she turned into Ruby’s street, she thought she caught sight of the back of James’s Wolseley driving away.

She wondered if she’d just missed him.

As she got to the front door, it swung open, and she stepped back in surprise at seeing DC Hartridge.

“Gabriella.” Ruby leaned around the detective constable. “DS Archer just left to visit you, and check that you’re all right.”

“I thought I saw his car driving away.” She cast a curious glance at DC Hartridge, wondering why he wasn’t with his boss.

Hartridge cleared his throat. “I’m off, back to the Met. Thank you for the tea and cake, Mrs. Everett.” He grinned at Gabriella and then walked down the path, whistling.

Ruby caught sight of the basket hooked over Gabriella’s arm, and ushered her in. “Whatever’s in there smells amazing.”

“I baked Teddy Roe some bread as a thank you for helping me this morning. He?—”

“He told us.” Ruby drew her through the house to the kitchen. “It sounded as if he thoroughly enjoyed it.”

“So did Jerry,” Gabriella said. “I’ll come back inside to have a chat, if you have time?”

“I definitely have time, but just hang on a sec.” Ruby went into her pantry and came out with a jam jar. “For them to have with their bread. I know Teddy Roe has butter already.”

The jam was so dark, Gabriella couldn’t begin to guess what type it was, but it looked homemade, so it was probably from the strawberries Ruby grew in her garden.

Gabriella took the wrapped loaf out of its basket and crossed the garden to the shed.

She could hear Teddy Roe and Jerry chatting away through the partially open door, and called out a greeting.

“Gabriella?” Teddy Roe poked his head out.

“I baked you some bread to say thank you, Mr. Roe. For you and Jerry.” She held it out to him and he took it, lifting it to his nose to give a deep sniff.

“Freshly baked?”

“Just came out the oven an hour ago,” she confirmed. “And Mrs. Everett has thrown in some homemade jam.”

“Lovely! We can have bread, butter and jam for our tea.” He nudged the door open and put the bread on the table. “What do you say, Jerry?”

“I say you’re a useful person to know, Miss Farnsworth. That copper was right pleased with us helping you this morning. Always good to have a marker to call in with a copper.” He smiled a gap-toothed smile.

Not really knowing what to say to that, she simply nodded. “Hope you enjoy it, and thank you again.”

“You find out who he is?” Teddy Roe asked her as she backed out.

She shook her head.

“Don’t you worry. He’ll be found out. That copper will make sure of it.” Teddy Roe gave a sage incline of his head, and then lifted up a bread knife and waved it. “Thank you again.”

She left them to their feast, and she could hear their crows of delight all the way to the back door.

When she sat down with Ruby, it was to espresso from a stove top pot.

“You know the way to a girl’s heart,” she said, and took a happy sip.

Ruby raised her cup and clicked it against Gabriella’s. “Will you show me where you were hurt?”

For the second time that day, Gabriella rolled up her sleeve. The bruises were darker now, a purple blue that looked ugly against her skin.

“I have frozen peas.” Ruby got up and fetched a bag, and draped it over Gabriella’s forearm. “Bastard.” She was glaring at the marks.

“He wanted information out of me, and he didn’t like me refusing to give it to him.” Gabriella gave a one-shouldered shrug so as not to dislodge the peas. “I think he’s working for the wife of someone I fined a while back. Trying to find out which house he was in when I fined him.”

Ruby’s face was a picture of astonishment. “Really?”

“Yes. It sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? I think the wife wants to track down his mistress.” She couldn’t think what else it could be. “And I actually can’t help her, because I can’t remember which house he did come out of.”

“But you could narrow it down to a section of the street?” Ruby asked.

“Yes.” She gave a slow nod. “That’s probably all she’d need.” She finished her espresso. “Not that I’d help her now. Not after this.” She looked down at her arm.

“No. Your detective sergeant was very keen to check up on you.” Ruby leaned back in her chair. “He’ll be disappointed to miss you. I’ll wager he’ll be around tonight.”

She hoped so, but she knew he was neck-deep in his case and there was also the trouble with Whetford. “Maybe.”

Ruby tapped the table with impatient fingers. “I’ve been dying for you to come round and tell me what’s happening with your father.”

She had meant to come sooner. She knew Ruby would be curious. “Sorry, since we spoke I’ve been able to get my friend Ben to take the case. His senior has offered to take it pro bono, and they’re going to send a letter to my father this week.”

Ruby made a face. “That’s going to stir up a hornet’s nest. But I’m glad you’re using lawyers. They should shield you from the worst of his reaction.”

She shrugged. “I’m expecting it to be bad. He thinks he’s gotten away with hiding his marriage to my mother, and now his reputation will be destroyed, along with the life of the woman who thinks she is his wife, and his children.”

“All of them might blame you,” Ruby warned. “People aren’t always logical or fair in these circumstances.”

“I can’t help that.” Gabriella shook her head. “My mother has been living in limbo for years. She can’t get on with her life. My father needs to divorce her, so she can marry Gino.”

“I agree.” Ruby looked grave. “I’m just saying, watch your back.”

* * *

The police files between 1939 and 1955 were being stored in the basement of a government building now used by the Home Office.

James looked up at the high atrium and listened to the echo of the receptionist’s high heels on the parquet flooring as she led them to the back of the building and then down some stairs.

When he’d returned to the Met from his failed mission to see Gabriella, he’d made enquiries to find out where the old case files could be found. He’d discovered they were stored in government buildings all over London, but the most recent files down here were over a decade old, so James supposed it wasn’t surprising the receptionist had handed over the key in surprise. There probably wasn’t much traffic to this basement.

He unlocked the heavy wooden door and once he and Hartridge were through, he locked it behind them again as Hartridge flicked the light switch and a sickly, yellow glow blossomed and then flickered a few times before holding steady.

“Gloomy,” Hartridge opined.

It was.

There were rows and rows of shelves, which looked like they could be accessed from both sides, holding large evidence boxes. Along the wall, though, were filing cabinets, and James turned there first. Hopefully, this was the catalogue for where to find what lay amongst the stacks.

“The blackout laws lasted almost the whole length of the war, and we know he used the blackouts to hunt.” James ran a hand along each cabinet as he read the dates listed on the drawers. “But he also used the Blitz as a way to hide what he’d done to his victims, so let’s focus on that time period first.” He came to a stop at September 1940 and pulled out a drawer.

Hartridge took the next cabinet over, which started at December 1940, and they worked in silence for the next hour.

“I’ve got something.” Hartridge held out an open file to him. “A woman was attacked at night during the Blitz by a man in uniform. Says he came up alongside her and asked her directions to the local pub. When she turned away slightly to point in the right direction, he swung something at her head. She never saw what it was, but she caught the movement out of the corner of her eye and jerked away. He shoved her, and she screamed as she fell down. A bystander coming out of an alleyway ran to her aid, and the attacker took off.”

“That sounds exactly what we’re looking for.” James took the file, scanning through the details. “We need to speak to this woman. And the bystander, if we can.”

He saw the attending officers had found a few items near where the attack had taken place.

“Stack 7, box 45,” James said, checking the inventory list. He found the right stack and had to reach to the top shelf for box 45. He brought it back to the scarred wooden table that was set between the cabinets and the shelving units, and opened the box.

“Anything useful?” Hartridge asked.

He carefully tipped the items out. “A used ticket for the cinema. An empty book of matches from a pub. A glove. And a half-empty pack of cigarettes.” He studied the cigarettes. “During the war, I have a feeling these were expensive and I don’t think someone would have just thrown a packet away with so many left inside.”

“You think it was the killer’s?” Hartridge asked.

“Most likely, but I don’t know how they could have traced them back to an individual person.” James wondered if there were any fingerprints that could be lifted off the box, though. He used a pen to shift it to the side.

“What about the glove?” Hartridge asked.

“Same, I’d imagine.” He slid the pen into the glove and lifted it closer to the terrible light.

“No. That glove looks like the one my Dad had as part of his Air Force uniform. I played dress up it in often enough when I was younger, and that one looks just like his.” Hartridge tilted his head. “There’s a number inside, I think. Tells you who it was issued to. They’re leather, and not cheap, and if you lost yours, you had to report it and pay for a replacement. My Dad was proud to have never lost a single piece of uniform, which is how I know.”

James stared at him. “Are you being serious?”

Hartridge nodded. “Absolutely.”

“The victim said he was in uniform. It was dark, obviously, with no ambient light, so she couldn’t tell which service he represented. But this could be his.” James set the glove down. “Where’s the serial number?”

Hartridge took the pen from him, and pointed to the top of the glove opening, just inside. “Should be there.”

James held out the box and Hartridge dropped the glove back inside. Then James carefully slid everything else on the table into the box as well. “Take this to the forensic laboratory, get them to dust for prints on everything in here, and get that serial number.”

Hartridge took the box, the excitement clear on his face. “You’re going to keep looking for more cases?”

“This case was from March 1941, and the Blitz only went on for two months after that, so just to be thorough, I’ll go through the rest.” James wanted to tick all the boxes now they were on the scent.

He let Hartridge out, then locked the door again. But he didn’t go back to the cabinets just yet. He walked back to stack 7 and lifted box 91 from where it sat, on the shelf below box 45.

It was in the wrong place, which had caught his attention, and then, as he’d reached up for box 45, he’d noticed the name of the officer-in-charge on the side. Whetford.

He pulled it down, took it back to the table, and then went to the cabinet to find the matching file. Surprise, surprise, the box had been placed in the wrong stack completely. It should have been in stack 17, not stack 7, he saw, and gave a cynical smile.

If it was someone else, he’d chalk it up to just a filing error. Just a simple administrative mistake. But it wasn’t someone else.

The case was from 1955, the second year Whetford had been on the force.

He flipped open the file, then decided to take a look at the evidence box first. The contents gave him pause, and he pulled his gloves from his pocket and put them on before lifting out the evidence, piece by piece.

Bloody clothes. A bloody knife. And a five pound note with smudges of blood on it.

He stared at them for a bit, and then put them back, setting the box down at his feet before he began to page through the file.

Whetford had caught the case because his boss had been off sick. It looked like a gangland killing, one thug murdered by another. Or that was the conclusion Whetford had come to, reading from his notes.

And because it was Whetford, James suspected it was all bollocks. Except, this was very early in Whetford’s career. Maybe he had been straight back then.

Maybe he was seeing corruption and spin where there was none.

According to the file, no one had ever been arrested for the crime. So why had Whetford hidden the evidence in the wrong stack?

Could this just be exactly what it looked like? A misfiled box?

He lifted the box back onto the table and studied its contents again. He held up the five pound note and saw there weren’t just smudges of blood on it. There were two clear prints.

He went back to the file.

The five pound note was in the evidence list. No mention of the fingerprints.

It was impossible that they could have been missed.

So. This whole setup was insurance.

Whetford had stashed the box here in the archives, where no crook had access, and hidden it away in the stacks to keep it safe.

It was unlikely to be discovered where it was and keeping it here was certainly safer than keeping it at the office or his home.

James thought of the letter in his inner jacket pocket that he had planned to send to the Police Commissioner, as well as the Police Board, about Whetford and his schemes, and wondered if there was a better way to deal with the situation than literally sticking his neck out and jeopardizing his career.

He mulled it over as he set the Whetford case aside and went through the last of the files from 1941 that seemed relevant.

There was no mention of either of Teddy Roe’s cases, nothing at all about his concerns that he had reported any suspicious deaths, but James wasn’t that surprised.

The search was still worth his time, because he found another report about an attack on a woman outside a pub. The man had come ‘out of nowhere’ the woman said, and just a moment after he’d attacked her, the air raid sirens had sounded.

As people poured out of the pub, he’d run away, pursued by a couple of the pub-goers, but he disappeared and they had to get to cover.

The woman was only slightly injured, her arm badly bruised as she lifted it to defend herself against a blow.

This man had come at her from the front, so in that respect, it didn’t fit with the other crimes, but he might have been acting on impulse, James thought. He had seen his prey and couldn’t resist, so he didn’t take the time to get behind her.

Maybe this mistake had reinforced to him to always take his victims completely unaware.

He noted down her name and address, although chances were she had moved on since then. It was still worth checking out.

Then he picked up the Whetford evidence box, placed the file on top, and let himself out of the basement.

If he did what he was thinking of doing, he would be exposing Whetford. Possibly to deadly retaliation.

There was no other reason to bury the case, ensure it went cold, other than he’d taken a bribe, or gotten some favor from the killer. If the case was dug back up, like James was considering doing now, whatever deal Whetford had made was done. Finished.

He turned over the implications. If Whetford had used this murder to put a gangland killer in his debt, if he’d let them get away with the death of a rival in order to profit from it, then did James really care what the fall-out was?

As he climbed the stairs, he decided the answer to that question was no.