Picture You Dead

8

Thursday, 19 September

As Grace and Branson sat back down in the room, Jack Alexander raised his hand again. ‘It seems to me, sir, that the painting is key. If we could establish that Charlie Porteous had it with him when he was murdered, and it was taken, that would possibly rule out a street robbery, wouldn’t it?’

‘Possibly, but not necessarily, Jack,’ Grace said. ‘These people tend to grab anything they think they can flog – often drug users desperate to earn enough for their next fix. But I agree that if we could conclusively establish he had the picture with him it would give us another major line of enquiry. Nick Sloan did have his team contact all art galleries and auction houses in Sussex and the bordering counties, as well as wider afield and online, to see if anyone had been offered a painting by this artist – and drew a blank. But as you rightly suggest, it remained a major line of enquiry at the time he had to wind down Operation Canvas.’

Once more, Grace looked at his notes. ‘The people remaining on the list of significant witnesses include his god-daughter, Carrie Hepworth, along with his other gallery staff, all of whom need to be interviewed again. As should his London driver, Meehat El Hadidy. But we need to bear in mind that the financial investigator, John Camping, had at that time been unable to provide evidence that any of them had benefited financially from Porteous’s murder. The team had also eliminated the collector, George Astone, for whom Charlie Porteous had supposedly brought the painting down to Sussex for him to view, but he also needs to be interviewed again.’

Stanstead, next to Potting, raised a hand.

‘Yes, Luke?’ Grace said.

‘Sir, over the last few days, as requested, I’ve been looking through the list of Charlie Porteous’s neighbours who were interviewed by Nick Sloan’s outside enquiry team. There’s one missing.’

Grace frowned. ‘There is?’

‘I’ve done a search on Google Earth, against all the residences listed in the enquiry. There’s one that’s been omitted – a house some distance up the road, on the opposite side to the Porteouses’ home, called Tongdean Ridge. It’s a few hundred yards away. The report says that the owners were abroad at the time, at their second home in Marbella.’

‘Which would explain it,’ Grace replied.

Stanstead shook his head. ‘No, they have two dogs – Rhodesian Ridgebacks – as well as a cat and seven hens. I’ve contacted the owners, Mr and Mrs Malby. They told me they have house-sitters whenever they are away, a couple called Joe and Liz Lee, who were in residence at the time of Porteous’s murder. I’ve since spoken to Mr Lee. He says he was never contacted by the police, probably because they had left the country on a six-month house-sit abroad.’

Frowning, Grace looked at him. ‘Did he see anything that might be helpful?’

‘Actually, yes, he did. Mr Lee is a former army officer and told me he suffers from insomnia. He would often go for a walk in the early hours, and he remembers on that particular Friday morning seeing a car accelerating hard along Tongdean Avenue. He thought it was a little strange, as it’s normally quiet – as you know, it’s a very exclusive residential street – but he said that lately there had been more car drivers using these roads as a rat run.’

‘Did he get a description of the car?’

Stanstead smiled. ‘Better than that, boss. He managed to write down part of its registration – he often wrote down and reported cars driving too fast along there.’

‘Nice work, Luke,’ Grace said. ‘Has the owner been identified?’

‘Not yet, but we are narrowing the possible matching vehicles down.’

Grace then sat thoughtfully for some moments. ‘Arrange to find and interview this Mr Lee as a matter of priority. We need the partial fingerprint found on the bill in Porteous’s wallet to be run again against the database, to see if anything new comes up. Let’s revisit the tapings from his clothes. As I said, we need to interview again this collector in Sussex that Porteous was going to show the painting to. And we want to find out and eliminate any dealer that he might have showed this picture to, prior to his murder.’

He was silent again for a short while, as he made more notes, before looking up with a specific list of actions for each member of his team. When he had finished, he said, ‘I suggest we meet again here, at 9 a.m. on Wednesday, 25 September, to review everyone’s findings. Any questions?’

There were none.