The Secret Hangman

34

H e was with Georgina now, in her Manvers Street eyrie. One of those times when he needed her backing. His lamentable record — in her eyes — of neglected duties, flip remarks and open insubordination had to be put aside for the greater good, the snaring of a serial killer. It was a matter of persuading her. He’d listed the five hangings and told her he was convinced that the sixth was imminent.

‘How can you possibly know?’ she said, folding her arms across that awesome silver-buttoned bosom.

‘It’s a pattern, isn’t it? This killer attacks couples. The woman dies first and then there’s a short interval before the man is murdered. We’re in that interval now.’

‘How long have we got, according to you?’

‘It could be tonight or tomorrow night and we know it will be somewhere in the city, which is why I’m asking for a blanket police presence. Vehicle checks, obbos, the lot.’

‘That’s easily said, Peter. We don’t have the manpower for this. I can’t just open another box of bobbies. Headquarters are already complaining about the overtime worked on the ram raids.’

The ram raids were a blind alley he refused to go down. ‘This man will die unless we act.’

‘Just having officers on the streets is a fishing trip, and you know it. Haven’t you and your people got a suspect by now?’

‘We’re closing in.’

‘You’ve had long enough.’

That remark was below the belt considering she’d insisted he stood down the incident room and put all his resources into the ram raids. Still, this wasn’t the moment to remind her. ‘Jocelyn Steel’s murder has given us several new leads. We could have an arrest any time, but it’s still vital to have this back-up.’

‘What’s the killer’s motive?’

‘If I knew that, ma’am, we’d have him by now.’

‘A connection between the victims?’

‘Nice idea.’ He was trying so hard not to sound sarcastic. ‘Nothing yet.’

Georgina sighed. ‘With a man’s life on the line, I don’t have much option, do I? I’ll clear it with headquarters, but I look to you to make it unnecessary.’

Keith Halliwell was still out at Midford when Diamond phoned him.

‘Have you caught up with the gardener?’

‘Saw him in his cottage, yes. He’s not in the frame, guv. Aged about eighty and worried he might lose his job.’

‘Any use as a witness?’

‘He’s all right mentally. He’s known the couple about four years. They don’t mix much with the villagers, he said, but they treat him well. He knew Jocelyn Steel better than her husband, who seems to work long hours. She was always even-tempered, he said. Liked her riding and swimming. The pool and the exercise room were built after the Steels bought the house. She would swim and lounge by the pool with a book. Didn’t have many visitors.’

‘Did you ask about Man Friday?’

‘He didn’t know or wasn’t saying.’

‘Out of loyalty?’

‘Hard to tell. He’s a canny old bugger.’

‘Had he heard of Agnes, the friend who left the phone message?’

‘No. He’s strictly an out-of-doors man. Brings his own coffee in a flask and drinks it by himself.’

‘Not much help, then. What are you doing right now?’

‘Looking through their filing cabinets. They’re hoarders, which could be useful. Every invoice is filed away. They did a lot of buying on the internet. Clive is already out here going through their e-mails.’

Clive was the mainstay of the Avon amp; Somerset Hi-Tech Crime Unit and it was an open secret he earned more overtime than anyone else at the nick. Every case had its computer element these days.

‘Ask him if there’s a list of addresses.’

‘Of people they e-mail? There has to be. But they won’t be postal addresses, if that’s what you were expecting.’

‘Keith, I may be a computer illiterate, but I do know that much. Have you got a pen handy? Get Clive to check for these names in particular: Wayne McRae, Kevin Cummings, Harry Lang. They’re three of the local personal trainers. What’s Ingeborg up to?’

‘Doing what you asked her — trying to reach the cleaning ladies.’

‘Are the crime scene people still with you?’

‘Yep. It’s all go.’

‘But no progress.’

‘These things take time, guv.’

‘That’s a luxury we don’t have.’

He ended the call and sifted through the photos of Jocelyn Steel’s body when it was still suspended from Victoria Gate. By now the killer would have chosen a ‘gallows’ for Martin Steel, somewhere public and yet convenient for his purpose. Was there a clue in the locations he’d used already? The Twinings had been hung from a tree in Henrietta Park and the facade of Sham Castle. Delia Williamson from the swing in Sydney Gardens and her partner, Geaves, from the viaduct over the Lower Bristol Road. Now Jocelyn Steel in Victoria Park. What had been picked for her husband?

The map in the incident room had large-headed pins marking the five crime scenes. Psychological profilers made entire careers out of sticking pins in maps. Was there anything in it? He was dubious. Most of their results could have been found by anyone with common sense, in his opinion. They’d study this little lot and tell you the killer was someone with local knowledge, someone who knew a bit about knots and worked by night. A boy scout with bags under his eyes.

Or just another crazy.

If the profiling lark was only common sense, there was a pressing need to apply some of his own. There was a pattern here. This killer believed in ladies first, and each of them left in a park. How significant was that? He was reluctant to read much into it. If you were looking for outdoor places to hang corpses you’d find parks convenient and quiet at night.

The male victims had ended up in the more spectacular settings. Sham Castle was a definite landmark, high above the city. John Twining’s body must have been visible from many viewpoints. And Geaves, dangling from the railway viaduct, had caused traffic chaos. Was that any guide to where the next victim would be found? What would you choose to make a real impact?

He thought about the major tourist attractions: the Roman Baths, the Abbey, the Pump Room, the Royal Crescent, the Circus, Pulteney Bridge and Camden and Lansdown Crescents. Every one of them had its potential for a killer wanting to create an effect. Imagine a body suspended above the Great Bath, or against the west front of the Abbey, or from one of the chandeliers in the Pump Room. Bath’s horror show could run and run.

Trying to predict the location was not a practical option.

His phone went again and Ingeborg was on the line. ‘I tracked down the woman who runs Tidy House, guv, and she put me onto Jean Buchan, who cleaned the house last Thursday and has been before. She’s bright and reliable, I’d say.’

‘As a cleaner — or a witness?’

‘Both, probably. She described Jocelyn Steel as friendly and a bit lonely, she thought, but not so depressed she’d want to kill herself. She’d make coffee for them and be happy to chat for half an hour or so out of the time she was paying to have the house cleaned. Said she looked forward to Thursday mornings because it was a chance to chat with another woman.’

‘What about?’

‘Mainly what was in the papers or on television.’

‘Nothing about our victim’s personal life?’

‘I was coming to that. She had a woman friend she’d phone sometimes.’

‘Agnes, who left the message on the answerphone.’

‘I suppose so.’

‘Did the cleaner listen in?’

‘Not really, but there was a lot of laughing and a kind of animation in the way she was talking that Jean Buchan took to mean they were discussing men. It’s something you instinctively recognise if you’re a woman.’

‘Nothing more definite?’

‘Afraid not.’

‘We must find this Agnes. Are there stored numbers in the phone?’

‘I’ll check that next.’

‘Good.’

‘Before you go, guv, DI Halliwell is here. He wants a word.’

Keith came on and sounded more buoyant than he had for some time. ‘Those names you gave me, guv.’

‘The personal trainers? Yes?’

‘They weren’t in the computer.’

‘But…?’

‘But what?’

‘You’re holding something back, you bastard.’

‘If one of them works for a firm called Home Workouts we could be on to him. There’s a bunch of invoices in the filing cabinet. Bloomfield Road, Bath. Little logo of a woman doing a side stretch. And there’s a phone number.’