The Morals of a Murderer Read online

  He sighed and raised his eyes to the ceiling. From experience he knew that that was exactly what she was going to be.

  ‘Oh yes?’ he said nodding, causing a lock of silver hair to fall across his temple. He swiftly brushed it back in position with a long, beautifully manicured hand.

  She advanced towards him, shaking her bosom and forcing a smile.

  ‘What?’ he asked warily.

  ‘I haven’t got a car, Evan. I haven’t got anything.’ She pouted.

  ‘You’ve had twenty-five grand of mine.’

  ‘Chicken-feed,’ she said jerking her hand in the air. ‘Tell you what, Evan. There’s an old Jag at the front. You’ve got eight grand on it. I’ll have that, and call it quits.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘For old time’s sake.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Now I can’t be fairer than that.’

  Evan Jones looked her straight in the eye.

  ‘No. Amy. No! You don’t understand plain bloody English, do you? The answer is no,’ he said, his accent straight from the Valleys.

  Amy’s jaw tightened. Her eyes shone.

  Evan Jones had had enough. He strode determinedly from behind the desk, side-stepped her, made for the front door, pulled it wide open and stood by it, holding the knob.

  A passing bus revved loudly to change down a gear to make the hill.

  ‘Get out, Amy,’ he bellowed. ‘Get out. You are wasting your time. And you’re wasting mine. And don’t come back here again.’

  She sucked in a deep breath. Her mouth contorted with rage. She breathed out noisily and then screamed:

  ‘You — you Welsh bastard!!’

  She turned energetically and stormed out through the door.

  Evan Jones closed it quickly and breathed out a heavy sigh.

  Chapter Two

  The following morning, at ten o’clock, Inspector Michael Angel came out of the Chief Constable’s office and closed the door. He had wanted to slam it good and hard, but he had managed to restrain himself. He stormed down the steps and along the corridor silently reeling off every expletive he could think of, knowing that he would never ever express most of them out loud.

  As he passed the charge-room door, he heard a familiar raucous voice protesting vigorously.

  ‘Take your thieving hands off me. You’re hurting! You’re hurting,’ the squawking voice persisted. ‘Leggo! Leggo!!’

  Angel stopped in his tracks. His fists tightened. The blood rushed to his face. He turned back and stormed into the room.

  ‘What the hell’s going off?’ he roared. ‘This isn’t a cattle market!!’

  An untidily dressed little man with the face of a ferret was tussling with a young policeman who was at the counter, taking his fingerprints. The constable was holding the man’s finger and rolling it on the ink block. They both looked up in awe as the inspector sailed up to the counter.

  ‘He’s hurting me,’ the little man squawked.

  ‘Be quiet. You’ll waken the dead!’ Angel boomed, then he pushed between them and glared down at the little man. His eyebrows shot up. ‘It’s Fishy Smith, isn’t it? Yes, it is. Come for your spring break at the country’s expense, have you?’

  The little man peered up at him and came very close.

  ‘Well, well, well. It’s clever-clogs Angel. No I haven’t. And I want to express a complaint. This police brutality ought to be stopped. He’s exerting too much pressure on my person and using too much violence to take my ruddy fingerprints. Also, this is a wrongful arrest. I ain’t done nothin’ and I ain’t saying nothin’.’

  Angel turned to the young policeman.

  ‘What’s he charged with? No. Don’t tell me. Don’t tell me. Let me guess. Mmm. Dipping. He’s had his hand in some old lady’s shopping-bag and nicked her purse.’

  The constable nodded. ‘We’ve found two purses on him. Been working the market, sir. Caught on CCTV.’

  ‘It’s a lie.’

  ‘Don’t bother, Fishy. Just serve your time and smile, you’re on Candid Camera!’

  ‘I didn’t do anything,’ Fishy Smith shrieked. ‘It’s not me. It’s somebody else.’

  ‘Save it for the magistrate.’ Angel shook his head and looked into his watery eyes. ‘Don’t you think its time you packed it in?’

  ‘I haven’t done nothing.’

  Angel shook his head and turned to the policeman.

  ‘Do you want any help, lad? Or can you manage the Ripper on your own?’

  ‘I can manage, sir,’ the constable said with a wry grin.

  ‘Well, carry on. And do it quietly,’ said Angel softly. He turned away.

  ‘Yes sir.’

  Then, over his shoulder, Angel said. ‘Goodbye, Fishy. See you in court.’

  ‘I’ll get even with you one day, Michael Angel,’ Fishy Smith spluttered as the door closed.

  The inspector buzzed down the corridor to his office. He had just begun to fumble through the morning’s post when there was a knock at the door.

  ‘Come in!’ he snapped.

  It was Cadet Ahmed Ahaz, twenty, slim and always smartly turned-out in a well-pressed dark suit. ‘What is it, lad?’ Angel said impatiently.

  ‘There’s a woman in reception to see you, sir.’

  ‘I’m up to my eyes!’ Angel bawled, waving an impatient hand. ‘I can’t see anybody. Who is it? What’s her name?’

  ‘Mrs Buller-Price. She says you know her, sir.’

  ‘Oh,’ Angel growled, pulling a face. ‘Ay. I do know her.’ He hesitated, then made the decision. ‘But tell her I’m out.’

  ‘She’s been round the back, sir. To see if your car’s there,’ Ahmed replied with a smile. ‘She knows you are in. She says she won’t speak to anyone else.’

  ‘Oh,’ Angel snapped. He stood up and made for the door. He charged up the green corridor to the security door that led out to reception. He tapped in the code and pulled it open. The reception area was unusually quiet. There was just one enormous body in country clothes, waterproof hat over an abundance of white hair, boots, stockings and breeches. This figure was holding a long stick with a V at the top, a thumb sticking through it like a prize onion, and was reading a wanted poster on the notice-board. At first sight the person’s gender was not obvious, but Angel knew from past encounters that it was indeed Mrs Buller-Price. She heard the door and turned round, her mouth open ready to speak.

  ‘Ah! There you are, Inspector,’ she began earnestly. She spoke in a deep cultured voice free of any accent. ‘How nice to see you. I came in about the train crash. I hoped nobody was hurt or, worse, killed. And to offer my services. It must have been a mighty accident. I am a trained nurse, you know. I was with the Desert Rats in 1943. I was in the Queen Alexandra’s. I once dressed a boil on Monty’s buttocks, you know. Oh yes. Hmm. He gave me a banana,’ she added with a girlish giggle.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Ah. You haven’t heard?’ She blinked and pursed her lips. ‘Early this morning, at two o’clock there was the most dreadful racket. Woke me up. Dickens of a bang. Metal tearing. Men shouting. More racket than VE night. My dogs were bouncing about like jumping crackers. Couldn’t settle them down. Then I was up at six. I still have five Jerseys. My milk goes straight to Windsor Castle. The Queen won’t have anybody else’s. There’s no osteoporosis in that family, you know!’

  Angel knew exactly where Mrs Buller-Price lived. He had visited her on one occasion during the foot-and-mouth epidemic four years ago. She had a farmhouse two miles northeast of Slogmarrow, and two miles from Tunistone, which was about six miles from the nearest railway track which ran through in the town of Bromersley.

  ‘Whereabouts was this, Mrs Buller-Price?’

  ‘There wasn’t a word about it on the radio or the television.’

  ‘But where was the crash?’

  ‘And the phone was on the blink.’ Her big blue eyes flashed. ‘I don’t know, Inspector. That’s why I’m here. And don’t tell me nothing happened. I heard it. T
hat crashing of metal was unmistakable.’

  Angel shook his head. She always tired him out and left him confused.

  ‘If I hear about it and if we need your nursing expertise, I will most certainly be in touch, Mrs Buller-Price,’ he said, forcing a smile and edging her to the door.

  ‘Thank you. We must all do what we can, to help one another,’ she said sweetly. ‘Like you always do,’ she added with one of her cherubic smiles.

  Angel felt a little guilty at being so impatient with her.

  The door opened suddenly and a young, skinny constable came in dragging a large, reluctant, black-backed Alsatian by a short length of clothes-line. The powerful dog hissed and snarled, but didn’t bark. Its tail was wrapped tightly down its bottom and between its back legs.

  Mrs Buller-Price stared down at the dog, then up at the PC and frowned.

  ‘What you doing with that dog?’ she demanded sternly.

  The constable looked her up and down as he addressed the inspector.

  ‘Excuse me, sir. The dog was found in an empty house. It’s got something wrong with it. It can’t move its mouth. I think it’s got lockjaw. I’m taking it to the vet’s. It’ll have to be put down.’

  Mrs Buller-Price stared down and pursed her lips. Its paws were the size of a lion’s. It hissed and snarled back at her and the hair on its back stood up.

  ‘Careful, missis. He’s very vicious,’ the constable said, pulling the clothes-line tighter.

  ‘Give me him here,’ she said masterfully, and grabbed the makeshift lead. ‘Hold that.’ She handed her stick to Angel, who took it, blinked and scratched his head.

  ‘What you doing, missis?’ the constable said. ‘He’ll have you!’

  Angel watched the old lady struggle down to her knees, pull back the sleeves of her bulky waterproof coat, and boldly take the dog’s lower jaw in one hand and the upper jaw in the other. The dog wriggled strenuously and snarled.

  Angel sighed.

  ‘Mrs Buller-Price, do be careful!’ he insisted.

  The dog turned its powerful head from side to side and snarled and hissed as she peered into its mouth, but she hung on regardless.

  ‘Ah. I thought so,’ she said with satisfaction. Pursing her lips, she freed the dog. She looked up at the constable. ‘Get me a big bowl of fresh, cold water, please.’

  The constable gawped at the inspector, inviting his guidance. Angel nodded and the young man disappeared through a side door.

  ‘It looks very dangerous, Mrs Buller-Price,’ Angel said.

  ‘Nonsense, Inspector. It’ll be all right in a jiffy.’

  She pulled up the sleeves of her coat again, heaved the big dog close under her arm, placed a hand round its nose and passed the other hand through the gap of glistening white teeth into its mouth.

  Angel saw the dog’s eyes flash. He said nothing but he thought plenty. He breathed out slowly, then licked his lips.

  A second or two later, she smiled sweetly as she slowly withdrew her hand from the dog’s mouth. Securely held between her thumb and forefinger was a grimy tennis-ball. She looked at it, then threw it contemptuously across the floor. The dog coughed twice and sneezed once. Then it barked and bounced and licked Mrs Buller-Price’s ample face as she struggled to her feet. It pulled the makeshift lead out of her hand, then ran round her and Angel, barking and beating its big tail intermittently like the branch of a tree against Angel’s legs as he put out a hand to assist the old lady.

  Eventually, Mrs Buller-Price, red in the face and panting, made the upright position.

  Angel smiled and handed her her stick.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, and sighed. Then she looked round impatiently. ‘Now then, where’s that water?’ Her Adam’s apple bobbed up and down with every syllable.

  The young constable returned through the side door carrying a white basin. The dog saw it, barked and bounded towards him. The constable froze. His jaw dropped and his eyes lit up like Maserati headlamps. He turned back to the door.

  Mrs Buller-Price took in the situation.

  ‘He won’t hurt you, man!’ she roared, her strident voice causing the strip light in the ceiling to rattle. ‘He’s as soft as Pavarotti’s belly-button, now that he’s got his self-respect back!’

  The constable swiftly placed the basin on the floor by the door; the dog had emptied it by the time he had reached the standing position.

  ‘Right. Now, I’ll take him with me,’ she pronounced, rolling down her coat-sleeves. ‘He wants feeding up.’

  ‘You can’t do that ma’am,’ the constable said. He looked at Angel who shook his head.

  ‘I’ll kennel him for a month free of charge. Then I will adopt him. If the owner turns up, which I doubt, you can send him to me. If he shows that he knows how to look after a dog like this, he can have him back, gladly. I have enough animals to feed. You know my address, Inspector.’

  ‘Yes, Mrs Buller-Price.’

  She made her way to the front door. She stopped and turned.

  ‘Hmm, she said, ‘I’ll have to think of a name for him.’

  Angel opened the door.

  ‘You know, I thought at first, I would call him Thatcher,’ she said, ‘but as he’s male, I think I’ll call him Schwarzenegger.’

  ‘Sounds as good as anything,’ Angel said, smiling.

  ‘Ah yes, Inspector,’ she gave a big smile as she pulled on her driving-gloves. ‘As usual, it has been very nice seeing you again. You must call in whenever you’re passing. I always have a cup of tea and a scone at half past three. You’d be most welcome.’

  ‘Thank you. Thank you very much. Goodbye.’

  ‘Yes. Yes. Must get off. This dog’s hungry. Come along, Schwarzenegger.’

  Angel watched her pick her way carefully down the station steps to the pavement, closely followed by the Alsatian, its tail high and swaying from side to side. The old Bentley was parked at an angle on double yellow lines, half on the pavement and half off. He watched her unlock the door for Schwarzenegger, and then heave herself laboriously into the driver’s seat beside him. She waved up to the inspector and beamed as the car glided away with the dog barking excitedly through the open window.

  Angel closed the station door, sighed and was wondering about the mysterious train crash when he heard Ahmed’s voice behind him.

  ‘The super wants you, sir. He said it was urgent.’

  ‘Ah. Oh. Right, lad.’

  He sped out of the reception area, through the security door, down the green corridor to the furthest office at the end of the line. The door had a white plastic panel with the words DETECTIVE SUPERINTENDENT H. HARKER painted on it. He knocked on the door.

  ‘Come in,’ the super bawled.

  ‘I was stuck with Mrs Buller-Price in reception, sir.’

  ‘Ay,’ said Harker tonelessly. ‘You know that distillery up at Slogmarrow?’

  ‘Imperial Gin?’

  ‘Report’s just come in. A triple-nine call from a chap called Fleming. A man’s body has been found in a vat of the stuff.’

  Angel blinked. ‘What?’ There are jokes about people drowning in barrels of booze but when it happens for real, it doesn’t seem a bit funny; in fact, it seems rather sinister.

  ‘Might only be an accident,’ the super went on, ‘I’ve sent scenes of crime, Dr Mac and a couple of uniformed. See if you can wrap it up quickly.’

  Angel nodded. ‘Right, sir.’ He stood up to leave.

  ‘Hang on,’ the super said. He reached forward to a pile of papers in front of him. He sorted one out and glanced at it. ‘I’ve had a phone call from a man I met at Hendon years ago: Peregrine Boodle of Special Branch. Done well for himself. He’s a commander now. He wants us to look into a whisper he’s had about an Evan Jones, car-dealer, Wakefield Road, Bromersley. He says there’s a whisper, nothing more, that he might be linked to that big gold robbery two years ago.’

  Angel’s mouth opened. ‘The Bank of Agara job?’

  ‘Ay. He wants someone to s
niff around, see what they can find out. I’d like to oblige him. There might be something in it for us.’

  ‘Like what, sir?’

  ‘Brownie points with the commissioner.’

  Angel sniffed. ‘Oh.’ There were plenty of other things he would have preferred. ‘Right, sir.’

  ‘One of his men infiltrated a bullion-laundering scam — he didn’t say where — posing as a punter with a big load of gold to shift, and came by Jones’s name on a list.’

  ‘Jones is a pretty common name.’

  ‘Ay, but the possibility of its being our Jones is increased by the fact that he runs a garage. Ideal as transport manager for a gang of villains. Eh?’ He nodded. ‘That, and the fact that his ex-wife has just come out of Holloway for fraud.’

  Angel’s eyebrows lifted. Now there was something to think about. He sped up the corridor to the CID office. DS Crisp was sauntering out of the door reading an email. Angel caught up with him.

  ‘Drop that. There’s a car-dealer got a pitch on Wakefield Road. He’s called Evan Jones. See what you can find out about him.’

  Chapter Three

  It was a winding climb up the east side of the Pennines to Tunistone, five miles west of Bromersley. Angel drove through fresh, green woodland showing bluebells and early yellow and white shoots through a light-green carpet. At the brow of the hill, at the sign to Tunistone, the scenery changed to a treeless, windswept terrain of moor interspersed with gorse bushes and areas of budding heather. He turned right, bypassed the village and headed along the old stretch of road towards Manchester. The road was mostly used as access to the few farms, a stone quarry, a water-pumping station, the distillery and the hamlets beyond. It meandered through steep drops here and there, and when he passed eight ft-high snow-markers at the side of the road, he knew he was nearing Slogmarrow. He turned the corner and saw the big enamel sign, black on white, Imperial Gin Plc. He turned off the main road on to a single lane and passed through the open gates. He drove past many stone buildings, and on up to an area where a plain white van, a police car and an ambulance were parked. He pulled up alongside them. He glanced round at the maze of grey stone buildings, chequered with light-grey pointing, with ten regular rows of dark-glass windows surrounded by white frames. It had been a woollen mill many years ago, now it reminded him of photographs he had seen of US prisons. There was no sign of life. He made for the nearest door and pulled it open. The sickly smell of fresh juniper berries hit him in the face.