The Thirteenth Coffin (22 page)

‘Well, I hope that’s all been of help?’

Lapslie nodded, and stood. ‘Thank you.’

‘I can show you the rest of his uniforms if you like. They’re in the bedroom.’ Jill made eye contact with Bradbury. ‘If you’re busy, Chief Inspector, then perhaps your sergeant would like to come and have a look.’

Bradbury’s eyes widened, and for a moment Lapslie was tempted to say yes, but he couldn’t do it to her. Not even in jest.

‘No, that’s perfectly fine. We have what we need.’

Thomas smiled broadly at Bradbury. ‘Well, come back any time.’

Lapslie was surprised to see his detective sergeant go bright red.

*

Lapslie noticed that Bradbury seemed preoccupied for much of the drive back to the station.

‘You haven’t let the major’s wife trying to get a bit fresh get to you, have you?’

It took a second for Bradbury to detach from her thoughts. She pushed a smile in return.

‘No, it’s not that at all. Just Dom being a bit moody of late, giving me a hard time.’

‘Well, I did warn you about these ex-villains.’ He kept the teasing smile there for a second before becoming more serious. ‘In what way?’

She didn’t want to go into detail about the possibly implied threat of their love games taking a wrong turn, so chose the recent trip away.

‘He was asking all sorts of questions about the trip to Edinburgh – who was I with, why the need to stay overnight, et cetera.’ She laughed nervously. ‘Almost as if he suspects I’m seeing someone else.’

Lapslie nodded, looked at the passing traffic for a moment. He noticed she’d said the last part flatly, hadn’t added ‘ridiculously’ or ‘unbelievably’, so he asked equally flatly:

‘And are you?’

Stone silence for a second, then she eased out a long breath. ‘Yes, I am.’ Perhaps she’d wanted to share this with someone all along, ease the burden; perhaps get
some advice too on how to handle the situation. And who might know better how to handle an ex-con like Dom McGinley than Lapslie? ‘Been seeing this other guy, Peter Wilkinson, for five months on and off now. He’s an academic, a lecturer in genetic engineering. They couldn’t be more different – chalk and cheese.’

‘Oh, Jesus, Emma. Not a good move.’

She arched an eyebrow as she glanced across. ‘Thanks for the support. It was you that always said Dom was a bad idea. A bad match for me. And now that I try to move on . . .’

‘Yes, I did. And I still hold to that. But that doesn’t mean I’d want to see you in any sort of danger. Leaving someone like Dom needs a clean break for a start, and handling with kid gloves. All sorts of hurt-macho-pride, old-school-villain factors there.’ He shook his head. ‘But cheating on him, you’re playing with fire.’

‘Thanks.’ She stared blankly ahead at the road. ‘I was hoping you might offer some useful advice.’

‘And I have. Make a clean break from Dom or dump the other guy – however much I might think he’d be the better match for you. But don’t keep seeing both at once.’

She nodded. What else had she expected from Lapslie but sheer bluntness? And while in her head she knew he
was perfectly right, could she get her heart and emotions to agree? Right now both men were answering different needs in her that were difficult to shed. She sighed.

‘You’re right. I’ll have to do something.’ But she knew that might be weeks or months away, unless something else forced her hand. Meanwhile she’d keep walking the tightrope of seeing both; but then maybe that tightrope was part of the excitement.

27 January 2012

Keith Sampson shouldn’t have been working on his birthday. He should have been out with his mates, celebrating. He’d had plenty of invitations, but here he was in the dark, in the pissing rain, waiting for his next call, a flask of just bearable tea and a few stale sandwiches by his side.

The truth was, he needed the money. He liked playing poker at home, online, late into the night. He knew it was draining his bank accounts the way a punctured bucket drained water, but he couldn’t help himself. It made him feel . . . special. Part of something big.

He poured himself a cup of tea and gulped it down. Not only was it stewed, but it was cold. If he’d had somewhere to spit it, then he would have. As it was, he was forced to gulp it down and wince.

He opened the driver’s-side window and poured the remainder of the flask onto the grass outside his taxi. Two cheese-and-something sandwiches followed.

Suddenly his radio burst into life. ‘Tango Golf Twenty-three, come in, over!’

He didn’t want to respond, but a job was still a job. He picked up the mike. ‘Tango Golf Twenty-three, go ahead, over.’

‘Are you available for a call, over?’

‘Yes, over.’

‘Can you go to Old Quarry, off Mill Road? There’s a Mr Brond in need of your services. He’s at the end of the old dirt-track road, if you know where that is, over.’

‘What’s he doing down there? Over.’

‘He’s been fishing, over.’

‘Brilliant. Stinking carp in the back of the cab, and maggots all over the floor. I’m on my way. Over.’

‘Good boy. Out.’

Old Quarry Road was about three miles from his location. It was ten o’clock at night and there was very little traffic around. He did find himself wondering why a fisherman would still be at the Old Quarry at this time of night, but then fishermen were funny people. They seemed to love roughing it, and revelled in discomfort. Each to their own, he supposed.

He reached Old Quarry Road and turned left onto it. After half a mile of avoiding potholes, he finally reached the end of the road. His headlights shone out across a few metres of ground and then into the darkness of the quarry.

He looked around. No sign of anyone. He flashed his lights and beeped his horn several times, but still there was no response. If this was someone’s idea of a joke on his birthday then he wasn’t amused.

He got back onto the radio. ‘Tango Golf Twenty-three to control: I’m at the location but no sign of our fisherman. Could you give him a call and see where he is, over?’

‘Wait one, over.’

Keith waited, looking around to see if he could spot anyone. He did consider getting out of the car and having a look around, doing a bit of shouting, but it was still raining hard. There was only so far you could go for a punter.

The radio burst into life again. ‘Tango Golf Twenty-three, over.’

He picked up the microphone. ‘Go ahead, over.’

‘Sorry, but he isn’t replying. I think it must be a hoax. Sorry about that. Return to standby. Over.’

‘Ten four. Over.’

He wasn’t sure whether to reverse back down the track or do a three-point turn. Given the number of deep potholes he had encountered on the way down the track, he decided on a three-point turn. Turning his wheel hard to the right, he pulled the car forward and to the right, then put it into reverse. Pulling hard to the right, he managed to get halfway through his manoeuvre when he suddenly noticed a set of headlights racing
towards him from the side. Before he had a chance to react, the other vehicle hit the side of the car.

Because he was wearing his seat belt, the inertial reel belt kept him fixed in place and his body took the full impact of the collision. Semi-conscious and shocked, he realized that his car was being pushed towards the edge of the quarry. He tried to take his seat belt off, but it was stuck. Press as he might, nothing happened.

Moments later he was rolling over and over in mid-air. Before he could tell which way was up, the taxi crashed into the murky waters below.

Water rushed in through the broken windows. Still fighting against his locked seat belt, Keith tried to hold his breath, but his ribs had been crushed by the impact and agony was flooding him like fire. Eventually, he had to take a breath, but by that time there was no air left in the car. He choked.

Up above, on the edge of the quarry, a figure emerged from the car that had pushed Keith’s cab over the edge. He stood there for a full fifteen minutes, watching for some sign of movement. When he was sure that nobody was going to emerge from the dark waters, he stepped back in his car and drove away.

*

Given the now proven accident – victim link, Lapslie knew his next step would be to call a briefing of the
squad and inform them of developments. Now that they had several new lines of inquiry, a breakthrough might be on the cards.

He called the briefing for 10 a.m. For once, everyone was on time. Bradbury did the pre-briefing, reminding them all of the rules and summing up the situation. Once that had been done she beckoned to Lapslie, who entered a very quiet briefing room.

He stood in front of them with an assortment of stickers in his hand.

‘Okay, we have a little more information for you, but it’s information that should help a lot, hopefully widen the case and bring it to a quick resolution.’ Looking around and making eye contact with everyone in the room, he continued: ‘I now believe our killer has disguised many killings to make them look like accidents. He took a chance with one of them, a nurse, Jane Summers, whom he strangled, and my gut instinct with Leslie Petersen – given that it was such a showcase killing, unlike the others – is that it was staged to put her past boyfriend, Mike Stowell, in the frame. On which front, anything new on Stowell?’ Lapslie’s gaze homed in on Barrett and Kempsey. Kempsey answered.

‘Nothing out of the ordinary: routine trips to his local
bank, post office, some shopping. But he hasn’t met anyone else since seeing his old Army mate Bill Ewan a few days back.’

As if sensing the pending question, Barrett cut in, ‘And we checked Ewan out, as you requested: no sniper experience.’

Lapslie nodded. ‘Okay. So far everything points to that killing being set up, a one-off. The rest, I am now convinced, were overlooked by the police because they were seen as accidents. We already know that the late Major John Alexander Thomas, who at first we thought had died as a result of a leaking gas bottle a few days ago, was, in fact, murdered. As you know, the next-to-last doll was dressed as a major. We also know that his uniform was damaged and a large section cut away, and that the gas bottle was tampered with . . .’

One of the DCs, Rebecca Graves, put her hand up. Bradbury looked at Lapslie. He nodded. She nodded to Graves to ask her question.

‘As I remember from the papers the major died with a woman. Was she one of the dolls?’

‘No, she was just unlucky. Wrong man, wrong place, wrong time.’ Glancing around the room again, he continued with his briefing. ‘We have now checked the
damaged uniform against the material on the doll, and they are a match, which I feel makes it conclusive.’

DC Parkin put his hand up this time. Lapslie nodded to Bradbury, and she gave him the okay to speak. ‘How did you get on to the major, sir?’

‘The police pathologist made the connection for us.’

The squad were clearly impressed.

‘Now, as a result of that, I have tasks for all of you. The tasks will be put up on the board
thus
.’

Lapslie stuck a photograph of the fireman doll onto the board. Under the photo, he wrote
DC Parkin & DC Pearce
. He then stuck a photograph of the mechanic doll, under which he wrote
DC Graves & DC Putter
. This went on until the eight unknown dolls had each been given to a team of two detectives.

‘Now I want each team to find out if any members of these professions have been killed in an accident since July first, 2007. Those detailed to non-professional dolls like the fisherman and the girl in the bikini will have to use their wits a bit more, but you’re all clever people, or you wouldn’t be here . . .’

The ones detailed to those dolls all looked at each other dubiously.

Lapslie continued: ‘I don’t have to tell you how
important speed is in this inquiry. The major is already dead and there was nothing we could have done about that. However, because the teacher doll hasn’t appeared inside its coffin yet, I am hoping that means our teacher, whoever he or she might be, is still alive. We need to get to them before our killer does. I am also assuming that our killer is aware of that, and will do his best to finish the job before we have a chance to get our hands on his latest potential victim and keep him out of harm’s way. So I’m sorry, but no leave is to be taken, under any circumstances. We are on sixteen-hour days – so work, eat, sleep a bit, and then work again. All I can say is, think of the overtime. You’ll all be in clover by the end of this. Now, do we all understand what we have to do and how quickly we have to do it?’

There was a general nodding of heads.

‘Okay, then let’s get on with it, and good luck. Remember: a teacher’s life is in your hands.’

*

If he had said it once, he had said it a thousand times: failing to plan was planning to fail.

The Teacher was the last one, and he had to be sure of the kill. After that he just had Lapslie to deal with and then he was free to live his life normally again. So far, he had established
where the Teacher, Tony Turner, lived, what school he worked at, his hours of business and which way he went to school and back, as well as which nights he tended to go out socially, where he shopped and where he played rugby on weekends. The Teacher also liked old sports cars, and ran a 1980 MG GT which always drew admiring glances in the school playground on the rare occasions he drove in rather than taking the bus.

He liked victims with a routine. It made his life so much easier.

He had parked his car a little way down the road from the nineteenth-century artisan cottage where Tony Turner lived, deliberately facing away from it. From here he could see all the man’s comings and goings quite easily without being seen himself. He kept a newspaper held up over his face, as if he was reading it, while at the same time watching the cottage through his wing mirror.