‘What was your dispatcher’s name?’
‘Mmmm. Monday afternoon. It’d be Maisie. That’s all I know her by.’
‘What time would that be, Mr Amersham?’
‘Well they were only just in time for the train. I saw the train leave, so it would be a few minutes to two o’clock. Say five to two. I wasn’t late. I belted across town, down Wath Road, left onto to Wells Road and up to the entrance of the baths. And there she was, Lady Blessington.’
‘And how did you know her name was … Lady Blessington?’
‘ ’Cos she told me, when we got to Creesforth Road. Made a point of it, she did.’
‘And where was she waiting exactly?’
‘On the steps that lead into the baths.’
‘Did you think she’d just come out of the baths then?’
‘I suppose so. Niver thought about it. It was just that Maisie had said that that was where I was to pick her up from.’
‘What did Lady Blessington say to you? Can you remember?’
‘The usual. Just chatter, you know. The weather. It was a beautiful day. It was boiling hot.’
‘Did she have any luggage?’
‘She didn’t have no big luggage. No suitcases or anything like that. Just a handbag, I think. I’m not sure.’
‘Did you consider, that if she had been for a swim, she would have needed a towel and a swimsuit at the very least?’
Bert Amersham looked at him and blinked.
‘I niver give it a thought, Inspector. I just drive a motor. I don’t think about….’
‘Well, did she have a bag large enough to carry, say a medium-sized towel and a swimming costume?’
‘I suppose they don’t take up that much room. She probably had a bag that big, I am not sure, Inspector. Sorry and all that. I remember she had a handbag. She kept her money in a handbag. I remember that. Yes. I remember that I heard it click when she closed it after she paid me.’
He sighed. ‘That’s all right. Now did Lady Blessington have any particular mannerism or did she behave in any way unusual?’
‘We get all sorts, Inspector. All our customers are all different. She was as normal as any of them.’
‘We believe that she murdered the householder, a blind lady, Mr Amersham. I am desperate to find her. You may have seen or heard something that could give me a clue as to where we might find her.’
‘Wow! I didn’t realize. That’s a rum do.’
‘Anything else you can tell me? Did she smell of anything? Did she smoke? Did she speak with an unusual accent? Did you notice any scars or marks on her face, hands or legs?’
‘No, Inspector. I don’t think so. None of those things. Her dress came down nearly to ground and I thought that was a bit unusual, but then again, we get all sorts.’
‘You wanted me, sir,’ Scrivens said.
‘Yes, Ted. Come in. Close the door,’ Angel said. ‘There’s a retired bank clerk, Simon Spencer. He’s retired early. Very early. Too early! There is evidence to suggest that before he left, he got his money mixed up with the Northern Bank’s. Now there’s no proof yet, just a load of circumstantial. So I need you to tread carefully. The current address National Insurance have for him is 212 Huddersfield Road. Will you nip up there and ask him to be kind enough to accompany you back here to assist us with our inquiries?’
Scrivens grinned.
‘Do you want him in here, or in an interview room, sir?’
‘Interview room.’
Scrivens nodded and went out.
Angel picked up the phone and tapped in a number.
‘It’s DI Angel. Are you still at the Prophets’ house?’
‘Yes, sir,’ DS Taylor replied. ‘We broke off to attend the murder scene outside The Three Horseshoes, you know. And early this morning we swept Harrison’s flat. It wasn’t big, but there were three rooms. You told us to—’
‘I’m not chasing you, Don. Just enquiring.’
‘Oh? Right, sir. Well, we should be finished here this afternoon. There’ll be standard samples taken from here to process.’
‘Did you find anything significant at Harrison’s flat?’
‘No, sir. After eliminating his prints, there were no samples to take.’
Angel frowned. That meant there were no clues or DNA in the flat. He blew out a long breath. Thank God he had found the money and the prints on it!
‘Right,’ he said. ‘In your search there … at the Prophets’, did you come across an address book?’
‘Yes, sir. And a Christmas card list. I think it’s in a woman’s writing.’
Angel’s face brightened.
‘I’d like to have those A.S.A.P. And did you see a camera anywhere?’
‘A camera, sir?’
‘Yes. An ordinary domestic camera for taking snaps of the family and so on?’
‘No, sir. No camera.’
Angel frowned.
‘Right, Don. See you later this afternoon.’
He rang off.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The lift was out of order. Angel had to walk up three staircases to the third and top floor of Mansion House Flats. He started off well, but had to take the third staircase rather more slowly. When he arrived at the top, he hung onto the handrail and waited, breathing deeply several times. He stuck four fingers down the top of his shirt collar and pulled it away from his sticky neck. He sighed. He was thinking, he really would have to hold back on those meat pies and halves of Old Peculier at The Fat Duck for a few months. For some time, Mary had been suggesting that he took a flask, a banana and a hard-boiled egg into the office for lunch. He didn’t rate that idea much. It was the sort of thing desk-bound workers do. He hadn’t much time for people who pushed paper around for a living and got fat backsides from hanging onto a desk job for years on end. He had noticed a definite tightness of his trousers round the waist: maybe he’d give it serious thought. Last time they came back from Sketchley’s, he had thought he had been given somebody else’s by mistake.
A door banged shut on the floor below. It prompted him to move along the corridor smartly. He passed number twenty, which had been Harrison’s flat, to the one next door, number nineteen. As he approached, he could hear music blaring out from inside.
He knocked on the door.
He had to wait a little time, then it was opened by a pretty young woman in a short pink house-coat, long, white uncovered legs and imitation fur slippers with rabbits heads on them. She was holding a child aged about a year. Its eyes were closed and it had a comforter in its mouth. The radio blared out loudly behind her.
Angel blinked.
The young woman had a ready smile and a bright twinkle in her eyes. ‘Yes? What can I do for you?’ she said.
‘Miss Gaston? Margaret Gaston?’ he shouted.
‘Yes. Sure. Come in,’ she said pulling the door open wide.
‘Thank you,’ he shouted over the blaring radio. It was something as loud and incomprehensible as The Arctic Monkeys. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Angel from Bromersley Police.’
‘Oh yes,’ she said with a smile.
She had even, white teeth, a lovely mouth and long blonde hair hanging partly over her face like a film star of yesteryear. She looked straight into his eyes.
She carried the sleeping child with one arm, closed the door, reached down to a transistor radio on the floor, pressed a button and switched it off.
The silence was golden. Angel blew out a quantity of breath with relief.
‘I’ve already given a statement to Trevor,’ she added, looking concerned. ‘Wasn’t it all right?’
Angel licked his bottom lip. It had not exactly been a statement, and he was a little irritated to hear her refer to DS Crisp so familiarly. Young people talked that way. He knew it was his age.
‘That was fine,’ he said. ‘There are some other matters.’
She looked down at the child in her arms. ‘I’ve just got him off to sleep.’