Die With Me (16 page)

‘Very impressive,’ Tartaglia said, turning away and gazing at a tower of full jiffy bags and neatly wrapped parcels waiting to be posted out, the top one addressed to somewhere in Canada. ‘You send books all over the world?’

Angel nodded. ‘Thanks to the internet. We wouldn’t be able to survive without it.’

‘You keep saying “we”. Do you have a business partner?’

Angel shook his head. ‘Force of habit. The business used to belong to my grandfather and we worked together. But he’s dead now.’

‘So, you take care of this entirely on your own?’ There had been no mention of anyone else in the file but, judging by the scale of the operation, he felt sure that Angel had help of some kind. Angel hesitated. ‘If you don’t want to tell me,’ Tartaglia continued, ‘I can find out.’

Angel looked annoyed. ‘Look, I’ve nothing to hide. A woman comes in to help a couple of days a week. That’s all.’

‘Could you give me her details?’

‘What’s she got to do with Marion Spear?’

‘I’ll be the judge of that,’ Tartaglia said, curious that Angel seemed reluctant to give it to him.

Angel sighed. ‘She’s called Annie Klein. She’s only been helping me out in the last few months. Surely you don’t need to bother her?’

‘Probably not, but I’d like her details all the same.’

Angel scribbled something down on a piece of paper and thrust it at Tartaglia. ‘Is there anything else or can we go back upstairs? I should be opening up soon and I haven’t even had my breakfast.’

‘Thank you. I’ve seen enough for now.’

Tartaglia led the way back upstairs. At the top, he turned to face Angel. ‘Just a couple more things. Could you tell me what you were doing between four and six last Wednesday afternoon?’

‘Why on earth do you want to know about that?’

‘Please answer the question, Mr Angel.’

It took a moment for Angel to answer as if he were debating in his mind whether he needed to. ‘I was here, of course.’

‘Can anyone corroborate that?’

‘Now what’s this about?’

‘Please answer the question, Mr Angel.’

‘Nobody was here apart from me. Annie doesn’t usually work Wednesdays.’

‘What about customers coming into the shop? Might someone have seen you here during that time?’

‘Weekday afternoons are usually quiet but I really can’t remember.’

‘Perhaps you can check your records.’

‘Look, what’s all this got to do with Marion Spear?’

‘Absolutely nothing at the moment.’ He let the words sink in before adding: ‘But we’re investigating a murder which took place at St Sebastian’s, just around the corner from here.’

It took a second for the significance of the words to penetrate. Angel’s eyes widened. ‘What, that young girl? You think...’ He put his hands on his hips and stared at Tartaglia, his face turning red, his expression a mixture of anger and indignation. He was either a good actor or the reaction was genuine. ‘Now look here, Inspector. I’ve tried to be helpful and I’ve answered all your questions. But if you start trying to join up the dots and make a cat look like a horse, I’m going to have to call a lawyer.’

‘Calm down, Mr Angel. You’re a local. It’s just a routine question. I’m sure you’ll be able to prove that you were here at that time.’

Before Angel could reply, the sound of someone knocking loudly on the shop front door made Tartaglia turn around. Donovan was standing on the step, nose pressed to the glass.

‘Can’t she bloody see we’re closed,’ Angel muttered, looking round in the direction of the door.

‘That’s my Sergeant. One last question; do you have a car, Mr Angel?’

Angel turned back and glared at him, arms still folded. ‘A van. Before you get any ideas, I use it for book-buying trips.’

Tartaglia smiled. ‘What sort of ideas would those be?’

Angel said nothing, biting his lip.

‘What sort of a van?’

‘A VW camper. Now, if that’s all, I’ve got work to do.’

‘Thank you, Mr Angel,’ Tartaglia said, unlocking the door and opening it wide, letting a gust of freezing, damp air blow inside. ‘I’ll get someone to call you later about last Wednesday. Perhaps you can give them the licence number of the van at the same time. Just for the record.’

Without waiting for a response, Tartaglia went out, slamming the door behind him, the little bell jangling furiously. Aware that Angel was watching from the window, he and Donovan walked down the street until they were out of sight, sheltering under a shop awning from the rain while he gave her the gist of his conversation with Angel.

‘I want you to go and see this woman right away.’ He handed Donovan the paper with Annie Klein’s details and explained what Angel had said. ‘When you’ve done that, can you check with the shops on either side of Angel’s. See if they remember him going out at all last Wednesday afternoon.’

‘Will do.’

‘There’s also Marion’s ex-flatmate, Karen Thomas. She works somewhere near here.’ He passed her another slip of paper. ‘Did you get anything interesting from Angela Grafton?’

She was about to reply when her mobile rang. Answering it, she listened for a moment before speaking. ‘Yes, he’s here. I’ll tell him. Right away, I understand.’ She snapped her phone shut and turned to Tartaglia looking excited. ‘That was Steele. She’s been trying to get hold of you but you’re not answering your pager and your mobile’s apparently switched off.’

‘Damn.’ In his hurry to get out the door that morning, he’d left his pager in his other jacket pocket and he had forgotten to turn on his phone after the interview with Zaleski. ‘What does she want?’

‘A woman was seen struggling with a man late last night on Hammersmith Bridge. The woman fell in and the man ran away. They can’t find her body but she’s probably dead. Local CID called us right away and Yvette’s been briefed. She’ll meet you at the rendezvous point on the Hammersmith side of the bridge.’

‘Where did it happen?’ Tartaglia asked, ducking under the tape that marked the inner cordon on the north side of Hammersmith Bridge.

‘About three quarters of the way along, on the Barnes side, sir,’ Yvette Dickenson said.

Out of breath, her oversized, overstuffed handbag constantly slipping off her shoulder, she had been struggling to keep up with him from the rendezvous point. Stifling impatience, he held the tape up high for her to step through. Although the rain had stopped temporarily, the wind had picked up and was whipping her thick brown hair across her face, strands catching on the edges of her glasses, which were spattered with rain. She made a couple of futile attempts to restrain her hair with a gloved hand, then seemed to give in to the forces of nature. Bundled up in a large grey overcoat, which barely met around her stomach, her eyes were red, nose streaming, and she looked miserable. Tartaglia wondered why Steele couldn’t have let her stay behind in the warmth of the office and sent someone else to brief him instead. Also, why Dickenson wasn’t tucked up at home enjoying the last month or so of her pregnancy in relative tranquillity was beyond him. But he knew it was her choice and not a subject she liked to discuss.

Scanning the length of the bridge, he could just make out the flapping white material of the forensic tent, tucked away behind one of the tall towers that held up the bridge. He crossed the bridge on his motorbike every day on his way to work but he had long since stopped noticing it. With the pressure of daily life, of getting from A to B as quickly as possible, it had faded into the general background, like so much of London. However, on foot it seemed much more substantial and garish. In his view, whoever was responsible for painting it that particular shade of goose-shit green should be taken out and shot. But it was still handsome in a solid, Victorian sort of way, with ornate ironwork picked out in gold and four tall towers, each looking like a mini replica of Big Ben. It formed the gateway between urban Hammersmith and rural Barnes and was a favourite spot for couples watching the sun set over the river, as well as suicides. More extraordinarily, it had survived three separate terrorist attacks, although why anyone should target it was beyond him. There were far more famous and important bridges along the Thames to choose.

Dickenson had fallen behind and he stopped for a moment, turning away from the icy wind, hands stuffed in his pockets. The sky was ominously dark, with only a glimmer of light on the horizon. After the heavy rain, the swollen river below was the colour of milky coffee, awash with debris and flowing particularly fast around the pontoons of the bridge. On the south side, it was so high that it skimmed the bank, almost at the level of the towpath. Anyone going over, particularly at night, would have stood little chance.

‘They were standing just over there, sir,’ Dickenson said, out of breath as she caught up with him, gesturing ahead towards an area at the foot of one of the towers where the footway had been taped off by the forensic team.

Just at that point, the path looped outwards around the tower, forming a balcony overlooking the river. He remembered standing close to the spot with friends a few years before, watching the Oxford and Cambridge boat race. The area was covered with scaffolding and a makeshift tent to protect it from the elements, bright lights shining inside and the shadows of the SOCOs moving around.

He turned to Dickenson. ‘Where was the witness when she saw the couple?’

‘On the other side of the road, sir. She said the man and woman were standing very close together. She first thought they were kissing but when she went past she heard them arguing.’

‘What time was this?’

‘Just after midnight. She lives in Barnes and was on her way home.’

‘Could she hear what they were they saying?’

‘Not the exact words, what with wind and the noise of the river. But she said the woman was crying and seemed to be pleading with the man. She thought the woman sounded American, although she couldn’t be sure. The witness was nearly on the other side when she heard the woman scream. She turned around and saw the woman struggling with the man; he then pushed her over the bridge.’

‘He pushed her? She’s sure?’

‘That’s what she said. She thought she heard a splash and ran to the other side of the bridge but the water was so dark, she couldn’t see the woman at all.’

‘What about the man?’

‘He was bending right over the edge looking down. For a moment, she worried that he might fall in too. He seemed to be talking to himself, totally unaware of her presence and she thought maybe he was high on something. After a moment, he ran off towards Hammersmith.’

‘Do we have a description?’ The bridge was quite well lit at night and visibility should have been good.

‘Pretty basic, I’m afraid. Tall, slim build, and scruffily dressed. He was wearing a coat or jacket with a hood, which was pulled up over his head so the witness couldn’t see his face clearly. The woman was older and quite smartly dressed. She said they looked an odd pair.’

He couldn’t help feeling a little disappointed that the description of the man was so vague. ‘What about forensics?’

‘The SOCOs have found some scuffmarks on the railings and a whole load of fingerprints, although some are badly smudged.’

He nodded. ‘It’s a popular place to stand and admire the view.’

Although there was a lot of pedestrian traffic on the bridge, if the man had held onto the rail as he looked over, they might get some prints. But if it was Tom, why had he taken the woman there? With the previous three murders, Tom had chosen quiet, private places where there was little risk of interruption and where he could control the environment. The bridge, with cars, cycles and pedestrians going by even late at night, was very public and to kill someone there would require a degree of improvisation. Yet Tom’s previous killings seemed to have been so carefully planned and staged, down to the last detail, the ritual seemingly important. In Tartaglia’s view, it didn’t feel right. Hypersensitive, given all the publicity, Cornish had insisted that they look at any possible crime that could be linked. But Tartaglia cursed the tenseness of a situation which had brought him there simply because a woman had been pushed from a high place.

‘I assume there’s no sign of the body yet?’ he asked, knowing the answer. It could take days, sometimes weeks, for a body to surface from the murky depths of the Thames. Given the current, it was probably half way down the river by now, somewhere near Greenwich.

Dickenson shook her head. ‘The River Police have been alerted and the local uniforms are searching the banks on either side. Maybe she managed to swim away.’

‘Unlikely. The current’s particularly strong at this time of year. Unless she was a very strong swimmer, she would have been pulled under almost immediately. Have you checked to see if anyone’s reported her missing?’

‘Nothing’s come in so far. I’m liaising with DS Daley at Hammersmith, who’s in charge of the case for the moment.’

‘What about CCTV footage?’

‘DS Daley’s dealing with that now. It’s lucky the bloke went off Hammersmith way. The area around the Broadway’s littered with cameras.’

Tartaglia looked over the bridge again at the swirling water below. His instincts told him that they were wasting their time. But one thing held him back from saying so outright. The incident had happened on Hammersmith Bridge, right on the doorstep of the Barnes murder investigation team, almost like a direct challenge. But if Tom was responsible, he had changed his MO. They would have to wait for the body to surface to discover more. In the meantime, the priority was to find the man.

He turned and started to walk back towards Hammersmith, Dickenson stumbling along beside him. ‘How much longer is the bridge going to stay closed?’ he asked, after a moment.

‘The crime scene manager thinks it may be another few hours, sir. I just hope it’s open before I have to go home.’ She sighed, every step an effort. He considered offering her his arm but thought better of it. Knowing Dickenson, she would misinterpret the gesture as patronising or a reminder of the fact that she was finding it difficult doing her job in the last few months of her pregnancy. ‘I had quite a time getting into work this morning,’ she continued, irritably. ‘I had to go all the way over to Putney Bridge to get across. The traffic was a ruddy nightmare, I can tell you.’

He nodded sympathetically. Despite the fact that the Barnes office was straight over the bridge, only a quarter of a mile away, he was going to have to make a lengthy detour to get there. Thank God he had his bike. ‘It’s a bugger having to go all the way around. Hopefully, it won’t be for much longer. I’ll bet the worthy burghers of Barnes are up in arms.’

She gave him a weak smile. ‘There’ve been no end of complaints and it’s barely lunchtime. It’s as if they think we’ve done it deliberately to ruin their day.’

He shook his head. You couldn’t win. When the bridge had been closed for over two years for structural work and refurbishment, the doctors, dentists, writers, musicians, actors and other solidly middle class residents on the Barnes side had campaigned militantly to keep it permanently closed to cars, so as to preserve their nice little village haven from commuter traffic. But close it for a day and everyone was screaming blue murder. It mattered not a jot that some poor woman might have died, let alone been killed.

Donovan slid Coldplay’s
X&Y
into the CD player and shoved the car into gear. According to the A–Z, Annie Klein lived about a ten-minute drive away from Soane Antiquarian Books, close to the M4 motorway. Hopefully, she’d get there before Harry Angel had a chance to call Klein and prime her. Although there was no evidence that Marion Spear had been murdered, let alone anything to link her death with that of the other three girls, she agreed with Tartaglia. Angel definitely merited closer investigation.

Inching along in heavy traffic, she thought back to the conversation earlier that morning with Angela Grafton, Marion Spear’s former boss. Grafton, a large-boned, red-faced woman in her late fifties, with a helmet of lacquered, bottle blonde hair, had been forthright and helpful. Chain-smoking, planted behind her large desk, she tipped a long tube of ash into a saucer and said: ‘Marion may have been nearly thirty but she had as much nous as a sixteen-year-old. Or less so, given what sixteen-year-olds are like these days.’

In full flow, hardly needing any prompting from Donovan, she spoke emphatically, her opinions not open to question. ‘Of course, it’s not surprising when you understand Marion’s background.’ She gave Donovan a knowing look as if to say that she’d seen much of the world and understood all its ins and outs. ‘Only child, with Dad running off at a young age, leaving Mum to cope on her own. I certainly remember the mum, silly goose of a woman; always on the phone, fussing and fretting, never letting Marion be, whining about how lonely she was without her. Passive aggressive, I think they call that type nowadays. She wanted Marion to throw in the towel and go home to Leicester. Poor Marion, I remember thinking on more than one occasion, what a waste it was. She was a decent girl but there was something about her that made you feel sorry for her, and want to take her under your wing. But there’s only so much you can do.’

Sighing deeply, as if Marion had been an accident waiting to happen, she had added that Marion had been popular with clients but that she didn’t remember anyone in particular ringing up or coming around to see her at the office. ‘I certainly don’t recall her talking about a boyfriend or admirer. But then why would she mention it to me?’ She shrugged her broad shoulders. ‘Marion wasn’t the type to confide. She was a pretty little thing but she didn’t stand a chance, with her god-awful mother. A woman like that would make anyone secretive, don’t you think?’

The traffic was still creeping along and Donovan heard a siren in the distance. With the roads still slick from the rain, she wondered if maybe there had been an accident up ahead. Worrying that Angel would be calling Klein any minute now, Donovan took the next turning off the main road and started to cut through the side streets and onto Popes Lane, where things were moving faster. Stopping once outside the gates of Brentford Cemetery to consult the A–Z, five minutes later she turned into the road where Klein lived.

Although not much more than half a mile from Ealing Green, the area had a different feel, paint peeling, front gardens untidy, estate agent boards scattered everywhere, interspersed with the odd sign offering B&B accommodation. Klein’s address was in the middle of a long row of tall, ramshackle semi-detached houses. Stepping around a collection of kids’ bikes that had been abandoned in a pile in the middle of the path, the owners probably having gone off home for lunch, Donovan walked up to the front door and peered at the intercom. ‘Klein’ was scrawled in biro on a piece of tape stuck against the top bell. She pressed the buzzer several times until a sleepy female voice answered.

‘Who is it?’

‘I’m looking for Annie Klein. I’m Detective Sergeant Donovan.’

‘Police?’

Donovan heard the alarm in the woman’s voice. Used to the reaction, even from completely innocent members of the public who weren’t accustomed to dealing with the police, she tried to sound as friendly as possible. ‘Nothing to worry about, I assure you. I just need a quick word concerning Harry Angel.’

There was silence followed by the screech of a sash window being hauled open somewhere above. Donovan craned her neck upwards and saw a woman with long, bright red hair peering down at her.

‘I’m Annie. Is Harry OK?’

‘He’s absolutely fine. May I come up?’

‘Are you really a policewoman?’ She sounded a little sceptical.

Donovan held out her warrant card, although at that distance it was just a token gesture.

‘It’s all right, I believe you,’ Annie said. ‘Here, catch this.’

A couple of Yale keys on a key ring landed at Donovan’s feet. ‘The buzzer’s not working. Top floor, just follow the stairs.’

Annie appeared to have a trusting, accommodating nature. At least it seemed as though Angel hadn’t yet warned her to expect a visit from the police.