‘True,’ said Slider.
‘One thing,’ said Atherton, ‘the place is so tidy it ought to be easy to spot any gaps.’
‘Yes,’ said Slider. There was something about the economy of despatch that made him feel uneasily that it was a professional hit. It would have been extremely lucky for an opportunist amateur to have found the precise spot on the skull where a single blow would kill. And if it was professional, what was he after? A stolen-to-order painting or other artefact? Or was it something like bonds or valuable documents? ‘Do we know if he had a safe?’ he asked.
By the time Slider had inspected the rest of the building, to get the lay of the land and to look for access, exits, security cameras etc, the doctor had arrived and was on his knees beside the body. It was not Wasim, however, but his old friend Freddie Cameron, the original Dapper Doctor. Cameron was the forensic pathologist, but was not averse to a bit of police surgeon work, especially when it was a case that was going to come to him anyway. He liked to see the body in situ and to get to it before anyone else fouled the pitch.
‘Ah,’ he said, looking up with satisfaction as Slider appeared in the doorway, ‘the old firm, back at the usual stand.’
‘Hello, Freddie. How’s tricks?’
‘All serene, old boy. How’s Joanna? Are you a father yet?’
‘No, seven weeks to go yet. And she’s fine, or as fine as you can be in those circumstances.’ It seemed odd to Slider to be discussing cheerful life in this place of death, with Stonax still lying where he had fallen, still dead. ‘She says it’s like being a ventriloquist’s dummy, only you’ve got the whole ventriloquist inside, not just his hand.’
‘I’m still waiting to be invited to the wedding,’ Freddie said sternly. ‘I hope you’re not going to be adding to the statistics.’
‘I’ve been trying to get married,’ Slider said, wounded. ‘Arranging a wedding between a policeman and a musician is like trying to push a balloon into a milk bottle.’
‘Well, stop trying to arrange it and just do it,’ Freddie suggested helpfully. ‘You know who this is, don’t you?’
‘Ed Stonax, the TV bloke.’
‘Bingo. Strange how different a body looks when you’ve seen it on the telly in life.’
‘I was thinking the same thing. Anything to tell me? I assume it was the blow that killed him?’
‘It certainly looks that way. The bones of the skull are crushed here. It was a very violent blow, with something small but heavy, and rounded in profile, like a nice old-fashioned lead cosh. With a good right arm behind it, it could have been something small enough to conceal in a pocket.’
‘And given that it’s to the left temple, it looks like a right-handed blow?’
‘Unless the murderer’s a tennis ace,’ said Freddie. ‘Possible, but unlikely. Professionals don’t generally swipe their victims backhand.’
‘You think it’s professional, then?’
‘Either that, or a lucky guess.’ He stood up. ‘I’ve bagged the hands, but I don’t think they’ll yield anything. There’s no sign of a struggle or any defensive wounds. Eyes open. I think he was taken by surprise and felled before he even knew it was coming. The why of it, I leave to you.’
‘Time of death?’ Slider asked.
Freddie glanced automatically at his watch. ‘I’d say it was four to six hours, so that would put it between five and seven this morning.’
Slider’s eyebrows went up. ‘This morning? We were assuming it was last night. He’s fully dressed, as if he came home from work and it happened then.’
‘Well, these times are not precise as you very well know, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t that long ago. He must have been on his way to work,’ said Freddie.
‘You’re just giving me problems,’ Slider said. ‘Burglars, as a race, are not early risers.’
‘There’s always the exception,’ said Freddie. He looked at Bob Bailey. ‘Right, if it’s OK with you, I’ll take him away.’
‘Yes, OK. We’ve got everything,’ said Bailey.
Freddie’s assistants laid the bag down and with trained knack lifted the body easily, despite its size, across and on to it. Something moved on the carpet.
‘What’s that?’ said Slider.
Bailey picked it up and held it out for Slider to see. It was a biro, an ordinary, amorphous, cheap biro, white with a black top and no cap, the sort that charities send you in begging envelopes in the hope that you’ll use it to write them a cheque. The body had been lying on it.
‘I’ll dust it for prints,’ Bailey said. ‘You never know.’
‘If there are any, they’ll only be Stonax’s,’ Slider said. ‘Although I wouldn’t have put him down as a cheap biro man. I’d have thought he’d have a gold Mont Blanc.’
‘Maybe it’s chummy’s?’ said Bailey.
Maybe – and how lovely it would be, Slider thought, to get a clear and perfect lift of the murderer from it. But life was never than easy. ‘Send it off anyway, Bob,’ he said. ‘There may be something else on it that will help.’
Porson, their Detective Superintendent, arrived as Slider was preparing to leave.
‘Chuffing Nora, it’s bloody madness out there,’ he complained, stamping into the vestibule, his vast ancient coat swirling about him like a cloak. As he came to rest, Slider noticed that one of his shirt collar points was curling upwards, there was a shiny grey stain of what looked like porridge on his tie, and a ghostly line of dried shaving-soap along his jaw. When his wife was alive she would never have allowed him to leave the house in a less than perfect state of hygiene. Slider wondered if he was having difficulty coping.
‘Bloody press are going bezique,’ Porson rumbled on. ‘Just because it’s one of their own. Always the same when a journo gets hit. You’d think the world revolved around ’em.’
‘He wasn’t a journo any more, sir,’ Slider pointed out.
‘What does that lot care? And he was telly, as well – that makes him a god. Telly and BBC. They’re going to be all over us like a cheap rash. I’ve had a word with that Forster woman at Hammersmith and she’s going to co-ordinate the TV coverage.’ Mo Forster was the new Press Officer for the area.
‘Does that mean one of us will have to go down to the publicity suite and do an interview?’ Slider asked, feeling depressed. Porson hated doing it as much as he did, but Porson had the rank to get out of it.
Porson’s face didn’t soften – it was built like a bagful of spanners and softening wasn’t an option – but there was a sympathetic gleam in his eye as he answered. ‘No, laddie. Mr Palfreyman’s doing all the fronting. Too important to be left to the likes of us to mess up. In fact – ’ he almost smiled – ‘I’ve been given a pacific injuncture to pass on, that we’re to avoid talking to the press at all costs.’
‘Thank God for that,’ Slider said.
Palfreyman, head of the Homicide Advice Team, had been busily empire-building ever since he came to Hammersmith, and the chance to be the face on the screen in a big case like this must have set him drooling.
‘Thank Him all you like,’ Porson said shortly, scowling. ‘But don’t forget that what Mr Palfreyman wants to be remembered for is solving the case. He doesn’t want to be up there looking like a prat, being questioned about a cock-up. So if anything goes wrong it’ll be my gonads in the cross-hairs. And when I say mine, I mean yours.’
‘Of course, sir.’
‘Right. As long as you know.’ The massive eyebrows resumed normal position. ‘You know me, laddie. Threats are water off a duck’s bridge to me. But this case is going to have a searchlight on it all the way. What’s the story so far?’