The Thirteenth Coffin (8 page)

Rouse leaned back in his seat. ‘I’ll be honest, Mark – it’s about these dolls. Don’t you think you’re getting a bit carried away with them? I mean, they’re
dolls
, for God’s sake. I can’t see how they can be significant, and yet you seem to be spending a lot of resources on them. That vagrant died of natural causes – I’m waiting for
the post-mortem results but the initial analysis has confirmed it. There
is
no case.’

Lapslie looked at him for a moment, savouring the blood-connection bombshell he was about to drop. ‘I think they are
very
significant, sir. In fact I would bet my pension that we have a serial killer on our hands.’

Rouse sat up straight in his orthopaedic chair. ‘A serial killer? That’s a bit strong, Mark. How have you come to that conclusion?’

‘There was a girl murdered yesterday, shot with a high-powered rifle . . .’

‘Yes, I know. Tragic. On her wedding day, I understand.’ Rouse pulled on his serious face. ‘But we have half the roles and professions known to man also represented with those dolls, so I don’t see that we should attach specific significance to the bride doll.’

‘Well, that’s the point – that significance has now been taken a step further. Some time after her murder, someone entered the fall-out shelter where the tramp’s body was discovered and where the dolls were found. They got in through an escape tunnel we have only just discovered, and covered one doll – importantly, the doll with the wedding dress – in blood. They also made a hole in the doll’s chest right where the bullet wound was.’

‘Some grotesque practical joke?’

‘I doubt it. There were only a handful of people who knew where the bullet had hit, and they’re either police, SOCOs or family and friends – and the family and friends have all been tied up giving statements.’ He paused, and took a breath. ‘I am also betting that the blood is the girl’s.’

‘
What
?’ Rouse looked astonished, his eyes keen. ‘Why would you think that? How could that possibly be the case?’

‘I have no idea, sir. It’s just a hunch at the moment, but the dolls have all been taken down to the labs and I’ve asked for a blood comparison, so we’ll know soon enough. Doing a DNA match might take a bit longer.’

‘And it all costs money . . .’

‘Maybe, sir, but if I’m right it will be money well spent and it will prove my other theory.’

‘Which is?’

‘That each of those dolls signifies a victim. The bride just happens to be the latest.’

Rouse was becoming increasingly agitated. Before he could ask more questions there was a knock on the door and his PA walked in with a tea tray. She placed the tray on Rouse’s desk and left. Picking up a biscuit and biting
on it, Rouse looked across at Lapslie. ‘Go on,’ he said, crumbs spilling down his lapels.

‘When I first saw the dolls, nine of them had been placed inside their coffins. Each of those nine dolls was badly damaged in some way. All differently, but all damaged. The three outside their coffins were in perfect order, with no sign of damage at all. After the girl was shot, a hole appeared in the bride doll’s chest at the precise spot where the bullet entered the girl’s body and killed her. The other two intact dolls and their coffins have also disappeared, although fortunately we do have photographs of them. It is my opinion, based on the evidence, that there are now ten victims, including the bride, and that there are two potential victims left out there. Unless we move fast we are going to have at least another two murders on our hands.’

Rouse leant back in his chair again. ‘This is all very interesting, Mark, but it’s just speculation. Morbid speculation. You don’t have an ounce of actual evidence, do you?’

‘We will when we get the reports on the blood samples found on the doll’s wedding dress.’

Rouse nodded his head. ‘True enough,’ he said, ‘true enough.’ He steepled his hands on the desk. ‘I’m sorry,
but this is what I’m going to do. I don’t want any more of my tightly stretched resources spent on this doll thing until you can come up with something a little more concrete. The girl’s murder is eating into my budget as it is. If you and Bradbury want to poke around and see if you can put some flesh on the bones of your theory, that’s fine, but you mustn’t neglect the girl’s murder. That has to be the top priority. The sooner we get that sorted out, the cheaper it’s going to be for the force, and then I might have some money to spend on your doll theory. Are we
d’accord
on this?’

Lapslie nodded dully, feeling the familiar wash of disappointment flow through him. He’d been here before, in this chair, hearing these words, or some that were similar. ‘Yes, sir. Understood.’ He paused, wondering whether he had enough leverage with Rouse to push a little further. ‘Is it still okay to have a DNA match done on the blood from the doll?’

Rouse thought for a moment. He finally nodded. ‘Okay, but that’s it. No more ordering Special Ops out and racking up the force overtime bill, okay?’

Lapslie nodded. Rouse was hedging his bets. If Lapslie was right then it would be Rouse who authorized him to investigate. If he was wrong, well, Rouse could quite
honestly say that he had warned him off. The man really did take the biscuit.

*

As Lapslie pulled into the car park of the mortuary, he wondered if Jane Catherall would be able to add anything to what he already knew. He parked his car and made his way inside the anonymous single-storey building.

He hated visiting the mortuary, hated that lingering spell of death and chemicals, decay and cleanliness, all mixed up together. He made his way to Catherall’s office. She was sitting bent over her computer typing what Lapslie assumed was a report of some sort. With anyone else, the phrase ‘bent over her computer’ would be a descriptive metaphor, but with Jane it was the truth. She had been one of the last children in the country to be struck down with polio before it had been eradicated. She had spent half her childhood in an iron lung, and the disease had left her with a twisted spine and a bloated abdomen. Yet despite her physical problems, she was one of the brightest and friendliest people that Lapslie knew. As well as being one of the most pedantic.

She spoke before him. ‘You are being a bit premature,
aren’t you, Chief Inspector? I hadn’t intended starting on the post-mortem of that poor girl until tomorrow.’

‘I came about the tramp, actually. The one they found in the bunker.’

She cut in. ‘With the dolls?’

Lapslie nodded. ‘Yes. How did you know about those?’

‘It may surprise you to know that I am a great fan of jazz music. In particular, I am an aficionado of the jungle drums.’

‘As played by that popular beat combo Jim Thomson and his Merry Men?’

She turned away from the computer and gazed at him with pale blue, slightly protuberant eyes. ‘My lips are sealed, Chief Inspector. So you want to know how he died?’

Lapslie nodded. ‘It would be helpful.’

‘All quite straightforward, I’m afraid . . .’

‘I’m glad that something is.’

‘Old age and decrepitude. His heart gave out, although to be honest if it hadn’t been his heart it would have been something else. His internal organs were in a race to see which could fail first. It was the drink, of course.’

‘No indications of anything unnatural?’

Catherall shook her head. ‘If you mean “Was he murdered?” then the answer is “No”. No evidence for that at all. It was just his time. It was, frankly, way past his time.’

‘Do you have any idea who he was?’

Catherall shook her head again. ‘No, none at all. I’ve forwarded what details I have to the delightful Emma Bradbury: she may manage to dig something up, but I doubt it.’

Lapslie felt a sudden overwhelming sense of sadness, and it obviously showed. Jane’s faced creased into a sympathetic grimace, and she continued: ‘I see an increasing number of these cases, year on year. More and more people are falling through the cracks. It’s very sad, but there isn’t much we can do here. We are at the end of the chain. We take what details we can, in case there is a match against any missing person, but that seldom happens. If it helps, there was a postcard and a couple of old black and white photos in his pocket. The postcard was addressed to “Billy”. That might be him, or alternatively he could have picked the card and the photographs up from the floor or found them in a bin. These people who end up on the streets, sleeping rough, they often start acting like magpies, picking up odd detritus and
keeping it as if it’s worth more than jewels.’ She shrugged: an awkward movement of her twisted shoulders. ‘It’s only a feeling, but I think it was his. That’s what we have called him anyway. Billy. A lot better than “John Smith”, don’t you think?’

Lapslie nodded his agreement. ‘So what happens to him now?’

‘We keep him for a few weeks, then the council take him away and cremate him. They put his ashes in the Garden of Remembrance and that’s it.’

Lapslie looked at the two black and white photographs. One was a single shot of a young boy of about eight; the other was a family group. Mother, father and the same eight-year-old child. Lapslie wondered if ‘Billy’ was the young boy in the photograph, or maybe the father. He wondered what paths he had followed in order to end up dead and alone in a stinking fall-out shelter.

He looked back at Catherall. ‘If you do find out anything about him, can you let me know?’

Catherall nodded. ‘Of course.’ She smiled at him.

‘In fact, if you don’t discover who he is, can you let me know that too?’

Catherall nodded again. ‘No trouble at all.’

Lapslie was grateful. ‘I could also do with a photograph of his face, if he isn’t too badly decomposed by now.’

Catherall nodded. ‘We can touch him up. I have picked up various cosmetic skills along the way. I’ll get my assistant, Dan, to do it. He’s getting very good at things like that. He has an artistic streak.’

‘Thanks. Get a few copies over to me. I want to see if anyone recognizes him. You never know: he may have talked to a few people in the local village about what was going on inside the bunker. Could give us a lead. We could do with one before more people die.’

‘You think they will?’

Lapslie nodded. ‘I’m bloody sure of it.’

Catherall looked surprised and a little shocked.

‘Anyway, I’ll see you tomorrow for Leslie Cooke’s PM?’

‘You mean Leslie Petersen? She was married, you know. Not for long, but she was.’

Lapslie suddenly felt very awkward. ‘Petersen. Yes, of course. Sorry. I should at least call her by her correct name: everything else has been taken away from her.’

With that he turned and left.

*

From the mortuary he made his way back to force HQ, a four-storey, flat-sided building in Chelmsford which
looked like it had been built entirely from white Lego. Only a touch of police blue on its front insignia and entrance awning, which was equally flat and lacking in detail, offered any relief. Those wishing to be kind described it as functional and efficient, those who didn’t feel so inclined used terms such as sanitized and unimaginative. Lapslie had called ahead to Bradbury to make sure there were no distracting sounds or noises near his desk when he arrived. He always went in the back way to avoid as many people as he could. Police stations were by nature noisy places: people screaming, shouting, running, dropping things, banging on metal doors. Each of those sounds had an effect on him, an effect he didn’t need.

Bradbury did her job well. From the moment he entered the HQ to the time he reached his office, Lapslie didn’t see another soul. He also made the short journey in total silence. He had only been in his office a few moments when Bradbury knocked gently on the door and entered.

‘Everything okay, sir?’

‘Yes, fine. A good job, as ever.’ Lapslie looked up at her and smiled, noticing her eyes had faint red rings. ‘And you? Everything okay? You look a bit tired.’

‘I’m fine. Dom got a takeaway curry last night. Bit hot, and some indigestion kept me up.’

Lapslie’s eyes stayed on her for a second, and she wondered what smell might have hit him if he’d detected the lie. The takeaway part was true, but the late night and fitful sleep following was due to the argument between her and Dom, her partner for the past three years, which had nothing to do with the curry. More to do with the increasing number of evenings she was spending apart from Dom, which equally she was finding increasingly hard to put down to investigative duties.

Dom McGinley had been a career villain, and understandably Lapslie had warned against the association, saying that it would never work out. But was she loath to talk about any cracks appearing in their relationship to avoid the inevitable ‘I told you so’ comments, or because those cracks sprang more from her own actions than from Dom’s?

Lapslie’s expression as quickly relaxed and he held out one hand. ‘Take a pew.’

Bradbury sat down in the chair opposite Lapslie’s desk. ‘Any update on the tramp?’

‘You mean Billy?’

She looked surprised. ‘You have a name for him?’

Lapslie smiled broadly. ‘Maybe. It’s what we’re going to call him for now. Like Doctor Catherall said, it’s a lot better than “John Smith”. Makes him more human.’

Bradbury was obviously confused. ‘So why Billy?’

‘It was a name found on a postcard in his pocket, along with a couple of old photographs. Maybe it’s him, maybe not. Who knows? Anyway, there was nothing suspicious about his death. Natural causes. That said, I think with a bit of luck he might still be able to help us from beyond the grave.’

Bradbury was all attention.

‘I want you to get hold of those two PCs, Parkin and Pearce. Tell them to check out all the rough sleepers known within, oh, a 15-mile radius. See if anyone knew a tramp by the name of Billy.’

‘Bit of a long shot, sir, especially if that wasn’t his name.’

‘Doctor Catherall is having some photographs taken of his face. They should be here soon. Get Parkin and Pearce to show them around. Someone might recognize the poor sod.’

‘Yes, sir. How long do you want us to do it for?’