Friends to Die For

Eleven

By the time she finished her stint on point duty, Michelle’s anger and irritation had evolved into full-blown fury. She couldn’t believe the way Vogel had cross-examined her. She had no doubt whatsoever that he’d deliberately orchestrated their ‘chance’ meeting by the coffee machine in order to grill her. And it had been a tremendous shock to her to realize that he considered her a suspect — which he most definitely did, however much he might protest.

She decided to walk from Charing Cross police station to her home at the top end of Holborn in order to calm herself down a bit. But it didn’t work. Taking a sickie for her own personal reasons might be an unwise career move, but it had nothing to do with Vogel. Similarly if she chose not to reveal to her friends the true reason for her absence from town, that was entirely her own business. How dare Vogel poke about in her life.

Michelle was still fuming as she unlocked the door to her studio flat in an ugly purpose-built 1960s block just off Lamb’s Conduit Street. It seemed very cold inside. She shivered as she began to take off her coat. She put it back on again and then checked the heating system thermostat. Everything seemed to be in order, but the place was definitely extremely chilly.

Surely it couldn’t be the damned communal boiler again? She phoned the part-time caretaker. The boiler was indeed on the blink, for the third time that year — and it was only March.

Michelle shouted at the caretaker, which she knew was small of her. It wasn’t his fault. Well, not exactly. Then, roundly cursing the world in general, she made her way into the tiny kitchen off the far end of her bedsit. She wanted a drink. But she’d finished her last bottle of wine the previous evening. She remembered that she was also hungry, having skipped lunch, and opened the door of her fridge. It contained only the dubious remains of a carton of milk, a piece of cheese tinged with green and some bread so hard you’d need an axe to break into it.

Her mood darkened further. She was fed up, cold, hungry and thirsty. For a moment she considered just getting into bed with a hot-water bottle and forgetting the day. Then she thought again. She really should at least try to do something positive.

She called Marlena and suggested she come over and bring a bottle. Marlena jumped at the idea.

‘Just make sure it’s a decent one,’ she commanded imperiously.

Michelle grinned. Marlena rarely disappointed. And Michelle knew exactly what her friend meant by a decent bottle. It had to be champagne. She checked her watch. It was just gone eight. If she hurried, Marks and Spencer in Long Acre, just half a street away from Marlena’s home by the Opera House, should still be open. Their own-brand vintage bubbly was one of the few mass-market labels Marlena found even remotely palatable. Anything beyond that, however, was outside Michelle’s means, until and if that long-awaited transfer to a better job, and maybe the promotion to go with it, ever came.

She had walked home still wearing her police uniform, with only a raincoat covering it. She changed swiftly into jeans and a sweater, then hailed a cab to speed up the short journey, a luxury she rarely allowed herself. Less than an hour later, carrying an M&S shopping bag loaded with champagne, chicken liver pâté, a loaf of crusty bread, a piece of decent cheese, and a few other bits and pieces from the deli counter, she arrived at Sampford House.

Marlena buzzed her in.

‘Darling,’ she said, by way of greeting, as she leaned on her crutches in the hallway of her flat. ‘I didn’t expect dinner.’

‘Why, have you eaten already?’ enquired Michelle disingenuously, well aware of her stick-thin friend’s insistence that she rarely took solids except in company.

‘Of course not,’ said Marlena, appalled at the suggestion.

‘Well, I’m absolutely starving, so I thought if I brought some grub you might at least have the grace to join me.’

‘If you insist,’ drawled Marlena. ‘But for God’s sake, let’s have a drink first.’

Swiftly and efficiently she opened the champagne Michelle had brought and poured generous portions into large crystal glasses. Meanwhile Michelle piled the food on a tray which she placed on the coffee table in the middle of the sitting room.

As if by unspoken agreement both women at first avoided all mention of the string of incidents which was at the forefront of both their minds, which resulted in their conversation taking a rather stilted and unnatural tone.

How Marlena was feeling and the condition of her leg occupied some time. Marlena, who claimed to be much better and said she was sure she would be on her feet in no time — ‘both of them, darling’ — wanted to know how Michelle was getting on at work, and if she was any nearer to the promotion she so desired.

Eventually this led Michelle on to the subject which was actually the only thing either of them really wanted to discuss that night. She told Marlena how she had sought help from the man whom she regarded as probably the best detective in the Met.

‘Would that be Detective Sergeant Vogel?’ asked Marlena.

‘Ah,’ responded Michelle. ‘Has he been to see you already?’

Marlena said that he had, adding: ‘I could see he was a sharp cookie.’

‘He’s that all right,’ said Michelle, giving the words more edge than she’d intended.

Marlena glanced at her enquiringly. ‘I thought that was why you went to him,’ she said.

‘Ummm.’ Michelle couldn’t help herself. ‘Trouble is, now the bastard seems to have me down as his prime suspect, damn and blast him.’

‘You? Why on earth would he suspect you? I mean, any more than anyone else. One would assume you would be beyond suspicion, since you’re in the police and you brought the whole darned thing to his attention?’

Michelle gave herself a moment to think. She realized that she had backed herself into a corner. If she responded honestly, that would mean revealing to Marlena that she had lied about being away in Belfast on that non-existent course. And she couldn’t do that. Not yet, anyway.

‘Oh, I don’t suppose he does — not any more than Alfonso and Ari, anyway,’ she said eventually, keeping her voice as level as she could manage. ‘We’re the only three not to have been targeted, so obviously any police inquiry is going to focus on us first.’

‘Ah, I hadn’t thought of that.’ Marlena clasped her hands together under her chin. ‘What an absolutely ghastly state of affairs.’

‘Isn’t it just.’ And you don’t know the half of it, thought Michelle.

‘Indeed, indeed. And all I can suggest right now, darling, is that we finish the last of your champers. I think I may well have another decent bottle or two tucked away somewhere.’

‘As long as you think you dare risk it,’ said Michelle. ‘I mean, maybe I spiked the bottle.’

‘Well, if you have, darling, that should solve all our problems,’ said Marlena, emptying the last of the Marks and Spencer champagne into Michelle’s glass.

Another bottle was duly opened. This time a claret far superior to anything Michelle would ever have acquired.

‘Just a little something to go with that rather good cheese you brought with you, dear,’ said Marlena. ‘Mr Kips — the nice man who runs that shop in Endel Street which sells everything — gets it in specially for me. He sent round half a dozen bottles the morning after I came out of hospital, bless him. A welcome-home present, he said. Seems everyone in Covent Garden knows what happened — in as much as any of us do...’

Marlena allowed her voice to tail off as she poured them each generous measures. She took a long appreciative drink.

‘Nothing quite like drowning your sorrows,’ she murmured.

By the time Michelle finally left Marlena’s apartment just before midnight she was inclined to agree. She had declined her friend’s offer to open a third bottle, but consuming the equivalent of one had definitely helped. Along with the food too. Funny how a full tummy could improve your state of mind.

And so Michelle found herself feeling surprisingly positive as she began to walk home, not allowing herself the luxury of a second cab in one day and unwilling to face public transport in the early hours. Besides, she enjoyed walking in London at all times of the day and night. It was good thinking time. And after the amount of wine she’d dispatched, she hoped the night air might clear her head.

Naturally, her thoughts returned to Vogel and the investigation. He’d be sure to get to the bottom of it all, she told herself. And if he could find no sinister link between the incidents... well, that must mean there was no connection. But Michelle didn’t really believe that. And she didn’t believe Vogel was the sort of man who would write the whole thing off as random. No, he would persevere until he had everything satisfactorily accounted for.

She was still considering what path Vogel’s investigations would take, and what conclusions he may or may not come to, as she crossed Southampton Row, heading into Theobalds Road.

The punch, when it came, was a total surprise. A fist smashed into her nose, its force all the greater because its perpetrator, whom she saw only at the very last moment, was riding a bicycle. She did not even register whether the cyclist was a man or a woman. His or her face was obscured. She had a vague impression of some kind of goggles or glasses beneath a grey hoody, and maybe a scarf wound round the chin of her assailant. At any rate, the lower face was covered.

The next thing she knew, she was going down like an axed tree trunk. There was blood everywhere. It was as if her nose had exploded. But at first she was too dazed to register the damage, or to notice that her handbag had been wrenched from her shoulder.

She was, however, aware of the searing pain emanating from her shattered nose. It seemed to spread across her face and right through her entire head, piercing into every nerve. She started to scream and couldn’t stop.

Then suddenly, strong arms were wrapped around her, and a soothing voice told her to lie very still, that help was on the way, that she shouldn’t worry about anything.

‘I’m here, I’ll look after you,’ said the voice. It was a familiar voice.

Michelle stopped screaming and struggled to focus. Panic momentarily engulfed her because she couldn’t see clearly. What had happened? Had she been blinded? She reached for her eyes with one hand and rubbed the back of it across them. It was then that she realized that her eyes were covered with blood. And although the pain remained as excruciating as ever, it came as a huge relief when her sight cleared as she wiped the worst of the blood away.

Now she could see. She looked up into the concerned face of the man who was cradling her in his arms.

No wonder his voice had been familiar. It was Alfonso.

Vogel was sound asleep when the call came at around 4 a.m. He always slept well and took the attitude that anyone who didn’t probably did not work hard enough.

He had issued instructions at Charing Cross and throughout every relevant department within the Met that he should be notified at once in the event of any incidents involving the Sunday Club members. As luck would have it, when responding officers called in details of the attack on Michelle, PC Jessica Harding was on duty in Dispatch. Two days earlier, she’d contacted Vogel when the mutilated dogs were found, and had been sufficiently intrigued by the case that, even without a written directive, she would have alerted him to the latest development. A violent assault on a serving police officer took the investigation to another level. Finding whoever was responsible for the attacks on this group of friends would now become a priority, not just for Vogel, but for the Met’s top brass.

Vogel had the knack of waking up quickly, but the news PC Harding imparted caused him to awaken even more quickly than usual. He groped for his spectacles, without which he was virtually blind, and sat bolt upright, listening intently as Harding concluded her report with the news that Michelle had been taken to University College Hospital, where she was expected to be detained for the rest of the night.

Vogel’s next, perhaps somewhat obscure, response was a sense of relief. This must mean that Michelle could not be responsible for the other incidents. After all, she could hardly have mugged herself. Then the pedantic nagging voice Vogel could never quite discount began to make itself heard, asking questions he did not really wish to consider. Could Michelle have arranged the assault in order to eliminate herself from his inquiries? Had she hired some lowlife to stage an attack? Perhaps the hired thug had hit her with more force than she’d bargained for. If the hospital had decided to keep her overnight, then they probably suspected concussion or something more serious than a black eye.

Given that Michelle was a police officer, there was also a possibility that the attack was connected to her job rather than Sunday Club. Working in Traffic, she didn’t come in contact with the sort of violent criminals that officers in the serious crimes squads dealt with, but the anger of motorists who believed they had been unjustly treated was legendary. Could it be that someone had recognized her out of uniform and taken revenge?

‘Any witnesses?’ he asked.

‘Yes, a passing motorist and a pedestrian,’ replied PC Harding. ‘It was well gone midnight but there were still a few people about. Craddick and Parsons were the responding officers. They took two witness statements, each giving more or less the same account of a hooded cyclist riding straight up to Michelle, punching her full in the face, nicking her bag and riding off.’

‘Bit like the other incident with Marlena, then.’

‘Yep.’

‘Nobody tried to stop this cyclist?’

‘Well no, Sarge. Sounds like it was the usual story: all happened so fast, and so on.’

‘Anything else?’

‘Well, one of the witnesses — the pedestrian — said he knew Michelle. He happened to be walking home from work and saw the whole thing. Quite a coincid—’

Vogel interrupted sharply.

‘Name?’ he barked. ‘Do we have a name for this witness?’

‘Of course,’ responded Jessica Harding. There was a brief silence. Vogel assumed she was checking the report on screen.

‘Alfonso Bertorelli,’ the PC continued. ‘Oh, isn’t that one of the other names on your list?’

Before Harding had finished speaking Vogel was half out of bed, trying to dress with one hand while using the other to keep the phone clamped to his ear.

His wife propped herself on one elbow.

‘Try not to wake Rosamund, won’t you,’ she said.

Vogel nodded, smiled, and mouthed the word ‘sorry’, but his mind was elsewhere.

‘What address did Bertorelli give?’ he asked Harding.

Harding read out the Dagenham address Alfonso had given Vogel the previous afternoon.

‘And where is he now?’ Vogel asked, keeping his voice as low as he could.

There was another silence while PC Harding did some more checking before she spoke again.

‘His present whereabouts is unknown. According to the report, he went to the hospital, travelling in the ambulance with Michelle. When nursing staff told him she was being detained, he left.’

‘And we don’t know where he went?’

‘Well, no. Home, I should imagine.’

‘Do we know what time it was when Bertorelli left the hospital?’

Another pause.

‘He was still there when Craddick and Parsons turned up to get a statement from Michelle. She’d been in a state of shock when they tried to question her at the scene, so they followed the ambulance to UCH. It would seem Mr Bertorelli left the hospital about the same time they did: around three a.m.’

‘Unlikely he was going back to Dagenham at that hour.’

‘Well, I don’t know about that,’ said Harding.

‘I bloody know,’ responded Vogel, rather more loudly than he’d intended.

‘Shhhhh,’ said his wife.

Turning to her, Vogel pulled an apologetic face. Then he spoke again into the phone.

‘Why the hell didn’t those two idiots stop him leaving?’

‘Stop him? Why would they?’

Still holding the phone to one ear, his shoes clutched in his free hand, Vogel tiptoed out of his bedroom and along the short corridor past his daughter’s room towards the kitchen. He needed coffee.

‘Because he should have been brought in for formal questioning, at the very least,’ he said. ‘Not only is Alfonso Bertorelli one of these Sunday Club people, he was also the star witness when Marleen McTavish was knocked down by a hooded cyclist. Didn’t Craddick and Parsons realize that? Didn’t anybody in Dispatch check it out? It’s all in the system. Every detail. I’ve made sure of that.’

Harding mumbled something incomprehensible in response.

‘We need to find Bertorelli, and we need to find him fast, before he has a chance to dispose of any evidence,’ Vogel went on. ‘I think I know where he’ll be: at his nan’s place, King’s Cross. Full address already on file. I’m going over there. I’ll need back-up. You don’t have a response unit nearby, do you?’

‘Hold on,’ said Harding. This time there was a silence lasting three or four minutes before she spoke again.

‘There’ll be a patrol car outside your place in ten minutes,’ she said. ‘DC Jones will meet you at King’s Cross with a second team.’

Alfonso was wide awake when he first heard the wail of a siren, some time approaching 5 a.m. he thought. He was indeed at his nan’s place, and had arrived there shortly before 4 a.m., having walked from the hospital just along the Euston Road. He hadn’t bothered going to bed because he knew there was no hope of getting any sleep that night.

Instead, for reasons he was later unable to explain to himself or anyone else, still wearing his black waiter’s trousers and the white shirt stained with Michelle’s blood, he had lain down on the velveteen sofa in his nan’s front room. The night was chilly. He was shivering with cold, but did not even think about digging out a sweater or a blanket. The TV in the corner was tuned to a bad movie, but Alfonso was not really watching.

His family were all devout Catholics. He had taken one of his nan’s several crucifixes off the wall and was clutching it to his chest. He could not explain why he was doing that, either.

Alfonso’s mind was racing, replaying the events of the last few days, particularly the attacks on Marlena and Michelle and the injuries they had both suffered. He’d been told at the hospital that Michelle would require plastic surgery to repair her face. But it wasn’t only the extent of Michelle’s injuries that had left him in a state of shock. He couldn’t stop thinking about his own situation. Now only he and Ari remained unscathed, as it were. And if that wasn’t enough to draw the finger of suspicion, Alfonso had been in the immediate vicinity of the two most brutal incidents.

The two officers who’d arrived while the ambulancemen were attending to Michelle had been unaware that it was the latest in a series of incidents. When they asked what had happened, he told them that he’d been walking home from the Vine when he heard a woman screaming. His name was already on the police computer because of the statement he’d given about the attack on Marlena. The similarities between the two attacks would not go unnoticed. Particularly when they came to the attention of that CID man with the intelligent eyes. He had already seemed suspicious of Alfonso when they’d met for coffee the previous evening. How would he react when he learned that Alfonso had been witness to a second attack? Detective Sergeant David Vogel did not strike Alfonso as a man who would be prepared to accept a single coincidence, let alone a double one.

The wailing siren seemed to be very close now, loud above the noise of the TV. Perhaps it was more than one siren. Alfonso wasn’t sure. They couldn’t be coming for him, could they? Not yet. Not that quickly. He jumped up off the sofa and ran to the window overlooking the street.

Tugging the heavy brocade curtain to one side, he peered out. He couldn’t see a police car and neither could he hear one any more. Maybe it had passed by. He tried to reassure himself that was what must have happened, but in his mind’s eye he pictured the patrol car parking up outside, and police officers climbing the concrete staircase to the walkway that ran along the 1950s council block to his nan’s flat. He had after all, under protest and against his better judgement, given DS Vogel the full address.

He stood by the window of the third-floor maisonette, listening and watching for less than a minute. It seemed longer. Part of him wanted to run away, to escape from it all, but he had nowhere to run to.

When he heard the hammering on the front door, it came almost as a relief. Bang, bang, bang. Then a male voice calling out — not Vogel; this voice was harsher and much harder.

‘Police, open up. Police. Open up!’

On autopilot, Alfonso did as he was told. He walked into the hall and opened the front door. Several police officers burst in, including a woman in plain clothes, another detective, Alfonso assumed. One of the male uniformed officers grabbed his arms and held them firmly behind his back. Vogel followed, his manner far less aggressive, those intelligent eyes sweeping over Alfonso.

‘Mr Bertorelli, DC Jones and I need to question you further in connection with the attack on PC Michelle Monahan a few hours ago,’ Vogel said. ‘I understand you were a witness to this attack and that you travelled to University College Hospital with PC Monahan. Is that the case?’

Alfonso agreed that it was. ‘I was walking back here,’ he continued lamely.

‘Isn’t it rather a long walk, Mr Bertorelli?’

Alfonso shrugged. ‘I do it in about forty-five minutes,’ he said. ‘The only exercise I take is getting to and from work.’

‘I see,’ said Vogel, in the unmistakable tone of voice of one who clearly did not. ‘Well, sir, I should warn you that there are certain formalities we must now proceed with, and that I have a warrant to search this property.’

Alfonso had been half-expecting this, but he was stunned all the same. He knew he wasn’t functioning properly and felt as if he would probably never function properly again.

‘Is there anyone else here, Mr Bertorelli?’ asked DC Pam Jones.

‘What?’

It was hard for Alfonso to answer the simplest of questions. Nothing was registering in his brain. There was only thick fog inside his head. He should have been prepared, but he wasn’t. Not at all.

‘Y-yes,’ he stumbled. ‘My nan. She’s in bed. Asleep.’

‘Right,’ Vogel interjected. ‘Heavy sleeper, is she?’

‘Yes. I suppose so. She’s poorly. The doctor gives her pills. Why?’

‘Because I thought we’d made enough noise to wake most people up, Mr Bertorelli,’ persisted Vogel. ‘Now, perhaps you’d like to rouse your nan and bring her down here. Might give her less of a shock than one of these chaps bursting in on her.’

Vogel gestured vaguely in the direction of his and DC Jones’ uniformed escort. In their equipment-packed tactical vests they certainly looked frightening to Alfonso. He nodded. Subdued. Submissive. He began to make his way towards the door that led out to the hall, aware that one of the constables seemed to be planning to accompany him.

Suddenly Vogel ordered them to wait, then took a step towards the second door off the sitting room, which led directly into the kitchen, and pointed at a washing machine in the far corner. It was running.

‘Doing a wash, are you, Mr Bertorelli?’ queried Vogel. ‘At this hour in the morning?’

Alfonso shook his head. He looked puzzled.

‘Maybe Nan put it on, before she went to bed.’

‘Long cycle, unless your gran keeps extremely late hours,’ said Pam Jones, pointedly checking her watch. The time was 5.10 a.m.

Alfonso shrugged and made his way upstairs, followed as he’d thought he would be by a uniformed PC. When he returned, Vogel was still standing in the kitchen doorway staring at the washing machine.

‘Nan’s on her way down, she’s just getting dressed,’ Alfonso said.

Vogel didn’t respond. The machine appeared to be in spin mode now. As if on cue, it came to the end of its cycle and stopped. Vogel opened the door and pulled out a small bundle of damp washing, letting it fall to the floor. He sifted quickly through and pulled out a grey hoody.

‘No DNA left on this, I shouldn’t think,’ he muttered.

Then he held the garment up and showed it to Alfonso.

‘Yours, sir, I assume?’ he said.

‘No,’ Alfonso replied, in a high-pitched voice he didn’t recognize as his own. ‘I’ve never seen it before in my life.’

‘I see, sir. So how do you suppose it got into your grandmother’s washing machine?’

‘I have no idea.’

‘Might it belong to your grandmother?’ Vogel’s voice was heavy with irony. ‘Wears hoodies, does she?’

‘Of course not.’

‘Right. So you’ve never seen this hoody before, and yet it’s being washed in your washing machine in the early hours of the morning.’

‘My nan’s washing machine,’ Alfonso responded.

‘Mr Bertorelli, I advise you to think very carefully before you make any remarks that might be regarded as facetious,’ said Vogel. ‘I surely don’t have to remind you what a serious matter this is.’

‘Look, I’m as bewildered as you are,’ Alfonso began.

Then he stopped. One of the uniformed officers searching the property had entered the room and was whispering something in Vogel’s ear. The detective sergeant looked stern when he spoke again.

‘Mr Bertorelli, do you remember when we met yesterday I asked if you owned a bicycle?’

‘Yes.’

‘And what did you reply?’

‘No. No, I don’t own a bicycle.’

‘Mr Bertorelli, PC Sanderson here has just found a black bicycle in your grandmother’s storeroom downstairs. Not only that, the bike is wet, indicating that it has recently been used, probably within the last few hours as the rain only started shortly before midnight.’

There was no colour left in Alfonso’s face. He didn’t speak.

‘So, are you sure you don’t own a bicycle?’ Vogel repeated.

‘I told you. No.’ Alfonso’s voice was now a barely audible squeak.

‘Then who do you think it might belong to?’

Alfonso shook his head. There were tears in his eyes.

‘How old is your grandmother, Mr Bertorelli?’ asked DC Jones.

‘S-she’s eighty-nine.’ Alfonso stumbled badly over the words.

‘And she’s not in the best of health?’

Alfonso agreed that she wasn’t.

‘So it is unlikely the bike is hers?’

‘It’s definitely not hers.’

‘Definitely not,’ repeated Vogel. He appeared to be on the verge of saying more, but he was interrupted by the return of PC Sanderson, who had left the room again.

Sanderson was holding a black leather handbag in one gloved hand. He passed it to Vogel, who glanced inside, withdrew a small folded case and opened it so that Alfonso could see. The case contained Michelle Monahan’s warrant card.

Alfonso made an involuntary gulping sound. He looked close to collapse.

Vogel stared at him with icy eyes. ‘Alfonso Bertorelli, I am arresting you on suspicion of assault and robbery,’ he said. Then he began to recite the statutory caution: ‘You do not have to say anything. But it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.’

As he spoke, Vogel became aware that Alfonso was not looking at him. Instead his gaze was fixed somewhere beyond Vogel’s left shoulder. The detective turned. An elderly woman, wearing a thick knitted cardigan over a nylon nightdress, was standing in the doorway. She looked very frail. Her hands were shaking and her face was ashen.

‘What have you done, my boy?’ she asked. ‘Mio caro, mio caro, what in the name of God have you done?’