Bryant & May - The Burning Man (17 page)

Someone had been in the flat. De Vere was sure of it.

A heavy Minotti armchair had been pushed back a few inches, leaving a scuff on the newly waxed hardwood floor, and the stack of letters and bills he had opened in the kitchen had been moved. He knew that Lena couldn’t have returned early because he had spoken to her late last night, and the only other person with keys was his cleaning lady. He worked with some crazy people, borderline-autistic tech-heads who were likely to turn up at the front door, find no one home and climb through a window. But they couldn’t do that here, in an apartment building that had designed out any possibility of illegal entry.

Yet something had been dragged along the hall; there were more black scuff-marks. While he was thinking about what might have happened, he made himself some strong, sweet tea and found that someone had spilled sugar in the kitchen. He walked around in puzzlement, passing the doorway to the second bedroom. The red light on the voicemail button of his house phone was blinking. It was a line hardly anyone used.

‘Mister De Vere, is Katya here, I very sorry not come today but I come to you and get my bag stolen on the bus and it have your keys in. I am so sorry.’

He knew she would never go to the police because she was here illegally, but Katya was a damned good cleaner. Surely she wouldn’t have been so dumb as to put his address on her key tag? If she had, it meant there was a chance that someone had used them to get into the flat.

Heading into the study, he checked his laptop and found it in its usual place. He kept little of real value lying around, but the thought that a stranger might have been going through his personal belongings sent a prickle across his back.

Realizing that he hadn’t checked the bedroom, he headed there, but found nothing out of place. He drank some more tea, loosened his tie and lay down on the bed fully clothed. If he just closed his eyes for a few minutes …

Strong arms dropped over him and crushed the breath from his chest. De Vere tried to raise himself up, but a hand pressed down hard on his throat. Something dark and heavy descended across his vision.

He could no longer move his head. He smelled heat, then felt it coming closer. He wanted to scream but his voice was cut off, and then there was only the searing white-hot pain that blotted out his senses.

It was a good thing he lost consciousness as the mask went over his face.

It was the cleaner who found him. Katya had forgotten that Mr De Vere had given her a second key the year before. After returning home, she had found it among the loose jumble of house keys she kept in a jar under the sink.

When she got back to the flat, she saw that her employer’s briefcase had been set down in the hall, so she knew he had returned. She called out to let him know that someone else was there, but got no answer. The kitchen was barely touched – although he had made himself his usual tea – and she was heading down the hall when she saw his trouser-clad legs on the bed. She called his name tentatively, not wishing to disturb him if he was having a nap, but there was something wrong – a single shoe on the carpet – that encouraged her to push the door a little wider.

When she saw the burned bedcover Katya fought the urge to scream. What had he done to his face? There was some kind of metal mask fitted over it. Backing out, she called the police from the house phone, hanging up before they could ask for her name. On her way out she left the keys on the counter, knowing she would never have cause to use them again. He owed her a month’s wages which she now knew she would never get.

The call was transferred to Buckingham Palace Road and was then picked up by the City of London, with the result that Fraternity DuCaine caught it on the first bounce. ‘Belgravia SOCO’s in first,’ he told Longbright, ‘but we can take over if we’re fast.’

‘How come?’ Janice looked up from her screen, surprised.

‘They’re not structured to set up a Major Incident Room, and there are circumstances—’

‘What do you mean?’

‘The SOCO says it sounds like our guy again,’ said Fraternity grimly. ‘You’d better tell the old man.’

‘God, I’m supposed to be looking after him,’ said Longbright.

Fraternity raised his eyebrows. ‘Since when did he need looking after?’

Arthur Bryant was a medley of contradictions. Despite being a man who took twenty minutes to locate the right cable channel on his TV remote, he could be out of the door and heading to a crime scene in under thirty seconds. It was fairly likely that at any given moment he could set himself on fire, yet he was capable of drawing an admission of guilt from a suspect in minutes, succeeding where everyone else had failed.

Now, in the company of John May, Banbury and DuCaine, he climbed into May’s silver BMW and was taken to Belgravia.

Familiar to its residents as the Grosvenor Estate and still largely owned by the Duke of Westminster, Belgravia is one of the wealthiest areas in the world. The Grosvenor family came from Eaton Hall in Cheshire, hence the address of Eaton Square, Belgravia, where the detectives found themselves heading. Many of the classical cream stucco exteriors were just façades now; the grand families had long gone, leaving behind offices and apartments carved into lateral spaces across the properties, so that in reality a considerable part of the square was little more than a grandiose business development. It was best not to get Bryant on that subject.

‘Typical of this bloody country as a whole,’ he announced from the back seat as they searched for somewhere to park. ‘A shining false front of English propriety hiding the usual wormy muck of greed, corruption and duplicity. “Oh,” everyone cries, “it’s so English!” Isn’t it, though.’

‘I’m surprised you haven’t joined the protestors yet,’ said May testily, checking his rear-view mirror.

‘I’m not sleeping in a tent at my age, thank you.’ Bryant was indignant. ‘I paid my dues from “Ban the Bomb” to “Support the Miners”. My marching days ended when councils insisted on providing us with Portaloos. What was wrong with having a wee in an alley?’

May enjoyed winding his partner up. ‘This square is one of the grandest architectural set pieces in London. So what if there’s strip-lighting and chipboard behind it?’

‘It’s vulgar, that’s what.’

‘Says the man with the Fablon-and-Formica kitchen.’

‘Are they always like this?’ DuCaine asked Banbury as they alighted.

The crime scene manager shrugged. ‘No, they’ve mellowed.’

They took the lift to the top floor of the corner building, where a young constable was standing in the hallway by the open door of a flat. The stench of burned fabric stung their nostrils.

‘He’s in the bedroom at the back,’ said one of the emerging firefighters, pointing over his shoulder.

‘You’d better go first, Dan,’ Bryant suggested. ‘I don’t want you nagging me about touching stuff.’

The apartment hall was painted in shades of sour cream and granite, and was lined with small brownish modernist paintings, brightened by the inclusion of what looked like an original Paul Klee and a Joan Miró. Beyond them, a smell of burning emanated from the master bedroom.

‘Hey, welcome back,’ said Senior Fire Officer Blaize Carter, stepping out into the hall. ‘It just keeps getting weirder. Come and take a look.’

The corpse was on its back, sprawled on the remains of a king-sized grey bedspread. Its torso and limbs were still intact, but over the victim’s head had been fitted a rough-hewn iron mask. It was hinged vertically and shut so that only a few tufts of singed brown hair and the top half of the left ear had survived outside it, stuck to the blackened pillowcase.

‘He looks like a Trojan warrior,’ remarked Bryant. ‘What is that thing?’

‘We’ve got scorch marks around his shoulders,’ said Carter. ‘It was put in place while it was hot.’

Bryant bent over the mask and sniffed. ‘Roasted flesh. Who kills somebody by sticking their head in something like that? How would it even work?’

‘How come you’re here?’ Banbury asked the fire officer.

‘CoL knew you’d caught the call,’ said Carter, ‘and there was a follow-up from a neighbour who smelled burning.’

‘Were there any windows open? Did you have to kick the door in?’

‘No, the door was shut but not locked. It would have kept any fire contained. These are expensive properties, renovated in the last five or six years, since the new fire regs came in.’

‘So plenty of smoke detectors.’

‘One in every room.’ Carter pointed up at the white box in the ceiling with wires hanging down from it. ‘Easy to disable. I met the Belgravia SOCO, who was very happy to leave this to you. It’s a bit outside his comfort zone. He reckons the initial call came from the cleaning woman.’

Banbury closed in on the body. ‘It looks like the damage is entirely local, centred on the skull.’

‘Nothing on his wrists,’ said Bryant. ‘How did the killer subdue him? Do a fingertip search around here. I want to know if the victim was knocked out, locked in, what kept him from leaving.’ He believed in a system he called ABC:
Assume nothing. Believe nobody. Check everything.
‘How long has he been dead?’

‘We picked up the call at nine-o-five a.m.,’ Carter replied. ‘By the time we got here the smoke had dissipated. The bedspread’s not flammable, but the mask scorched everything through to the mattress springs. I don’t have to tell you this wasn’t self-inflicted, do I?’

‘I saw a camera in the lobby,’ said Banbury. ‘Fraternity, could you find out where the feed goes?’

Bryant had already eased himself over the cordon that the Belgravia SOCO had set around the end of the bed, and was going through a work folder that lay on the dressing table. ‘You’re lucky the flat didn’t go up,’ he said, examining the papers.

‘There was no air exchange because of the closed windows and sealed internal doors,’ Carter replied. ‘The problem for you is that the heat has sterilized the immediate site.’

‘Jonathan De Vere.’ Bryant unfolded a letterheaded sheet and attempted to read it. ‘Anyone heard of something called CharityMob?’

‘It’s an app,’ said Banbury, on his knees and peering at the base of the burned bedspread.

‘What does it do?’

‘It gets mobile-phone users to donate their social reach. It’s got a very cool interface.’

Bryant gave his partner a blank look. ‘I suppose that means something to you?’

‘Information,’ translated May. ‘It’s the number of unique people who read an ad that contains social information. To widen your user circle you need to constantly expand your social reach.’

‘Nope, sorry, I still have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about,’ said Bryant, dismissing him. ‘There must be something else here. Dan, have you done that weird thing you always do?’

Banbury also had a system of his own. Before the rest of the circus arrived he would get suited up and go in with his notepad, repeatedly asking himself what he was seeing and hearing. Then he would crawl about, following the left-hand wall around the room, noting blood distribution, saliva, fibres, anything lying around. He would check the central-heating timer to help estimate the time of death, note which lights were on, whether there were any open drawers, and whether the toilet seat was up or down. In his time with the detectives he had experienced more than his share of bizarre sights, but this one ranked in the top ten.

‘Giles is standing by to look at the body,’ he said, studying De Vere’s skull mask. ‘That thing looks heavy. Some kind of traditional design … Could it mean something?’

‘I’ll need to check,’ said Bryant. ‘Can you make sure his head survives the transit in one piece? You don’t know what damage that thing’s done.’

‘So how did this work?’ asked May. ‘He came into the flat, his assailant followed him in or was already here – then what?’

Bryant rose and grimaced, stretching his back. ‘De Vere wasn’t restrained. He was drugged first.’

‘How do you know that?’ asked May.

‘Because of the kitchen.’ He led the way and pointed to the work surface, where some sugar had been spilled from its container. ‘The cup’s under the bed, on its side. The carpet’s very wet so he hadn’t finished drinking from it.’

Banbury crouched at eye level. ‘Want me to test these granules?’

‘If you would be so kind, Dan, and the tea. And take a sample from the hob, will you? There are some black particles beside one of the rings. Let’s get a couple more people over here and talk to everyone in the building. Entry signs, escape routes, all tradespeople and residents listed. It’s got to be the same bloke, hasn’t it? He’s playing with fire again.’ He collared the hallway constable. ‘You. Spotty teenager in a uniform. When’s the ambulance coming?’

‘It’s already round the back, sir.’

‘Anyone notice anything?’

‘The neighbour saw the cleaning lady heading down the stairs, sir. She didn’t raise the alarm because she’d seen her lots of times before. Lady upstairs called about the smell of burning.’

‘Was the front door open?’

‘The neighbour says not.’

‘Nobody ever sees anything in a building like this. He must have had a key.’

‘Don’t hold your breath for fingerprints but we might get glove marks,’ said Banbury. ‘I’ve got some leathers from the Brixton site.’

‘You can do that?’ DuCaine was surprised.

‘People assume leather gloves are untraceable,’ said Banbury. ‘They’re good for gripping, but there’s a leather grain present on the surface of the glove. It can be as unique as human skin because leather itself is skin. New pairs are tricky, but I like old ones. They have pores that pick up dirt and grease from different surfaces, so you can get good transfer particles. Unlined gloves get saturated with oil and sweat if they’re regularly worn, and that sometimes comes through. I’ve heard of DNA traces coming right through a glove.’

‘Fraternity, unless you spent the whole of your time at Hendon fast asleep you should know all this,’ said Bryant. ‘Dan, stop getting overexcited. Just remember you’ve only got one chance. If you seize the wrong things to start with, you’ll set us off in the wrong direction. I’ll leave you to deal with the site but it seems pretty straightforward.’