Fall of Angels Read online

  Redfyre considered this. “Not Darwin. He’s dead. But remember—this is Cambridge, Sarge.”

  “Some are even more discreet—just initials. But—hard to believe—some of them have a telephone number to them. How stupid is that! What kind of burk gives his telephone number to a tart?”

  “Young? Inexperienced? Uncaring? No shortage of those around. But how very useful to us.”

  Thoday sighed, thinking presumably of the hours of police work about to swamp them. “Evidently there was no robbery. And that’s the funny thing, sir, almost as if . . . Well, I found the bag when we were handling the body—me and the PC. It was underneath her. Why? So no passing light-fingered lad would spot it and nick it?”

  “Underneath?”

  “Yes. Not chucked away, not thrown over the nearest wall. Tucked up under her bum, it was. Whoever placed her body after killing her, he wanted us to know who she was.”

  “Thank you, Sarge. Let’s take a look at her, shall we? Doctor, if we may?”

  Her face had been hidden below a fold of her muffler, a respectful gesture the doctor usually employed, not for his own comfort but to lessen the unease of those gathered around the body.

  “Two in two days, Inspector. And the same method of killing seems to have been used. It’s a strangulation from the front. Quick, clean, decisive—no need for a weapon. No incriminating knives, coshes or ropes. Just two strong hands and a burst of uncontrollable rage.”

  “Would you say that? I was thinking a controlled, impersonal summoning up of killing energy. The sort of unpleasant but necessary muscle flexing you might find in a chicken-strangler, an executioner or—for goodness sake—a frontline soldier. ‘Nothing personal, you understand, but I just have to kill you.’ These victims aren’t evoking the terrible slashing and disfiguration of a Ripper, a man driven by his devilish urges. In its way, this very control is ominous. Our man clearly has the stamina to recover quickly and move on to the next victim with no time necessary for boiling emotions to calm.”

  Redfyre added as an afterthought, “Do you know what trench-raiding is, Doctor?”

  A mystified Beaufort nodded.

  “Some platoons chose to mount trench raids just to relieve the boredom of war. An enterprising young captain would decide almost clinically to go out across No Man’s Land after dark and kill the buggers in the nearest enemy trench. In total silence, with a kind of cultivated icy rage, you make your way systematically along the trench with knife, bayonet, revolver. It takes considerable nerve and energy. You hardly see the man you’re killing, and he doesn’t see your blade flash. A few lucky ones you may haul back as prisoners for questioning. If you get back safely, you prepare for a tit-for-tat incursion into your own trench the next night. It helped to pass the time,” he finished bitterly.

  “So, you’re looking for an ex-soldier? An erstwhile trench warrior suffering the boredom of retirement in Ivory Towers, Civvy Street, Cambridge, and inventing his own brand of wide game to pep up his bland life?” Beaufort raised a sardonic eyebrow.

  Thoday shuffled his feet in embarrassment. “I can see what you mean, Inspector,” he said, clearly struggling to understand and support his superior officer in his wild assertions. “These weren’t individuals for him. They’re like faceless enemy in the opposite trench. He’s working his way along, and then he’ll make a dash for his dugout when he’s achieved his object.”

  “Redfyre—I’m concerned. In this close-quarters mêlée you’ve conjured up, are you prepared for retaliatory action yourself? You may wake up and find him at your throat one dark night if you don’t learn to keep your head down. And fat chance I see of that!” Beaufort said. “But there’s a factor that doesn’t fit your explanation. These girls are hardly the random contents of a trench. They have been carefully selected—they’re young and pretty. Why don’t you take a look at this one?”

  Redfyre pushed the muffler aside and started in dismay and disbelief at her features.

  “Good Lord!” he muttered. “I know this girl! I mean, I don’t actually know her—this is the first time I’ve clapped eyes on her. But I think I know who she is.”

  “Curly blonde hair, you can see. Clean complexion. Well nourished. No physical signs of drugs. I’ve closed her eyes, but they’re blue. Any help?”

  “Yes, doctor. It’s Venus,” Redfyre muttered almost to himself.

  Beaufort broke the stunned silence. “Well, as I said, she must have been very pretty, but Venus? That’s going it a bit far, isn’t it?”

  “Not her real name. I’ve seen her—and so has MacFarlane—in a photograph. The one I took from Louise Lawrence’s room yesterday. A group of friends taking tea on the Lawrences’ terrace one day last summer. ‘Venus’ was her nom de guerre. The girls in this group name themselves after Roman goddesses, I think as a sly reference to their roles in society. They see themselves as a sort of pantheon of deities, though precisely what their divine purpose in regard to the rest of us humans is, I really don’t know yet.”

  “Venus, eh? Goddess of love? Poor child! Bit near the knuckle, isn’t it? A callous jibe, do you suppose? Or did she accept it as a devil-may-care acknowledgement of the truth? What on earth would a girl like Miss Lawrence have had to do with a woman of the underclass? Where would she have met her? I know it’s all the go these days for women to band together for social reasons . . . jam making, knitting socks for sailors—my wife’s in a Save the Suffolk Squirrel group—but these are genteel pursuits. Ladies who socialise are more likely to form a club dedicated to stamping out women like this, not invite one to take tea with them. Were the Lawrence parents aware of who was sipping Earl Grey from their Worcester china, do you suppose?”

  “The father, no. At least I don’t think so. I’ll check. The mother? Yes, I believe even through her drug-induced state, she suspected something of the sort.”

  “Inspector, how many girls did you say there were in that photo, and how many have been attacked?” There was an urgency in Thoday’s voice that focused Redfyre’s attention.

  “If I include Miss Proudfoot, who escaped—and I think I should—that’s three women out of a total of eight present that day. But you should know that one of those photographed is my innocent Aunt Henrietta, who strayed into the shot wielding a large teapot. I think the timing of one of the meetings of the pantheon must have clashed with my aunt’s usual Wednesday errand of mercy. She’s an old friend of the Lawrence family. Her presence would have turned the would-be suffragist meeting into an informal—and very jolly, I’d guess—tea party. Whoever was behind the camera would have felt sufficiently at ease to take a photograph recording the event.”

  Finally, he searched in his inside pocket and produced the photograph. “Don’t touch, either of you. It’s the only copy I have.” He held it under each interested face for a moment. “See what I mean?”

  Beaufort gave a nostalgic smile. “Takes me back to my student days. In that golden time, you couldn’t have a drink or a bite to eat without the presence of a professional photographer capturing the moment.”

  “No need to book in advance these days. Pocket Kodaks are everywhere. And now, before you ask, I’m planning to see my aunt as soon as I can arrange a meeting. Probably for tea. And I shall have thumbscrews in my back pocket. Not that Hetty ever needs much encouragement to gossip. ”

  “Three victims out of a possible seven, then. That’s nearly half. At the rate of one a day, he should be done by next Thursday. Are you able to identify and warn the remaining four deities, Redfyre?” the doctor asked brusquely. “I don’t want to spend another morning freezing my kneecaps off staring at extinguished beauty. Defenseless young creatures! This has got to stop!”

  The unprofessional remark was exceptional, and the outburst a good measure of the doctor’s distress.

  So was the hand that reached out and clutched Redfyre’s arm. “I mean it, Redfyre! You’re doing your
best, but I have a feeling the playing field is tilted against you in this affair.” He looked about him at the sculpted stone, the ironic resting place for the pathetic bundle of limbs and clothes that belonged to another part of the town. “I’ll see if there’s something I can do to restore a balance . . . Whatever the professional cost . . .”

  Puzzled by his remark, Redfyre told him, “We’ll be thankful for any help, doctor. Sergeant Thoday and I will combine our forces and won’t have another night’s sleep until we’ve made a date for this bugger with the gallows up on Castle Hill. May I speak for you, Sarge?”

  “Right on, sir! I’ll help haul up the black flag. I’ve got this girl’s address. It’s a new entry for us—not on our books. As soon as I’ve notified the master of whichever college owns these premises, I shall be off straight down King Street to rattle a few knockers and bash in a few doors.”

  “Take a couple of our heavies with you. You’ll need some muscle to shake that clientele out of their sleep. I’ll see you back at the nick or come in pursuit when I’m done here. Toseland! Forget the beat. I want you by my side as runner for the day.”

  “Glad to oblige, sir!” The voice was eager but controlled. Redfyre knew that a man discovering a body usually felt some strange but compelling attachment to it, unable to struggle free until the murderer was behind bars or dead. Toseland would work like a Trojan to come up with answers to the puzzle of the second murdered girl.

  Doctor Beaufort drew his attention back to the corpse. “The ambulance has arrived, and I’d like to send her off to the labs as soon as we can. Lights are beginning to go on in the colleges, and it would be good to be clear here before men in gowns and shining morning faces start flocking down the passage to Holy Communion at Great St. Mary’s or out into town.”

  Redfyre looked at him sharply.

  “Don’t pull that face! I’m not in any sense suggesting we cart off the rubbish so as not to give offense, if that’s what you’re thinking! I don’t care whether this is a tart of the town or the King’s cousin! She’s dead and has little enough dignity left, whoever she may be. I don’t like my corpses gawped at by the public. She can tell me her story in the seclusion of the lab.”

  Redfyre nodded. “Just tell me what she’s whispered so far, will you? If it will help us find this devil.”

  “I’m only sharing my first impressions, but it appears to be the same method as Miss Lawrence. I’d say she died between ten and three. There’ll be a better estimate on offer after the autopsy, of course. She may have been killed elsewhere, and her body brought here and, um, laid out. I have a way of establishing that. Along with the evidence of her identity, placed with such precision and it seems to me, a touch of mockery, under her bottom. Miss Rosalind Weston of Cromwell Court, King Street, will be accorded the very best attention I can offer. I’ll get the stretcher crew and take her away now. What have you got on your busy weekend schedule, apart from your tea party with your aunt?”

  “Oh, I thought I might nip up Trinity Street and call on the next victim. Warn her that her life is in danger,” Redfyre said with a tight smile.

  Chapter 18

  Minutes later, Redfyre was ducking underneath a carriage-wide archway and following a cobbled road into—a rarity in Cambridge—a charming piece of largely Georgian domestic architecture. The small square was elegant, withdrawn and secretive. Once, it had been a thoroughfare that sandaled Roman feet might have taken if business sent them east and north into the fenland. Some of the rooflines, soaring upwards in acute angles above the more squat profiles of seventeenth-century buildings, gave increasingly rare evidence of the fast-disappearing ancient town. The cobbles were set to the width of a carriage and dated, he supposed, from the time of the Regency, as did one or two of the prettier houses.

  Though smoking chimneys told him that fires had been lit early against the sharp cold of the morning, he was relieved to see that most of the curtains at the windows were still closed.

  Nevertheless, it was with a tingling between his shoulder blades, warning him that he was being observed from all sides, that he made his way to the steps leading up to the front door of a charming villa on the far side of the square. He paused to caress the curlicues of an iron balustrade whose handrail had been worn ribbon thin with the passage of the years.

  He climbed up to the glossy black door and looked back over his shoulder.

  The small house had a clear vision of the comings and goings of its neighbours and, Redfyre conceded, was itself in the view of anyone ready to twitch a curtain and peer out. He stood, hand raised to grasp the knocker, and hesitated. He checked his wristwatch. Five minutes to go before nine o’clock. If this was a social call, there was no possible way he could justify a bang on her door before midday on a Sunday morning without having previously telephoned to announce himself. If it was a professional police knock-up, the question of etiquette did not arise, of course. But then she would never speak to him again, and he realised how very sad that would leave him. He’d been looking forward to taking up her invitation to toast a crumpet or two before an open fire, to hearing her voice, low, warm and ready to break into laughter.

  The knocker was suddenly wrenched from his hand as the door was flung open.

  “How much longer were you going to loiter on my doorstep?” Dark brown eyes shone with amusement and a smile widened in unmistakeable welcome. He’d forgotten from one meeting to the next how very attractive she was. “No, I haven’t got second sight. I was watching you through the window, creeping along rather furtively, I thought. Try not to look so shifty! Canon James, two doors down on the left, has you in his crosshairs, and Mrs. Professor Alexander, first on the right, has been tracking you every step of the way. Good morning, John! I was hoping you’d come, though I hadn’t expected you so early on a Sunday. I was just sitting down to breakfast. Have you had breakfast?”

  “Er, no. Early call out, I’m afraid.”

  She gave a merry wave to . . . Mrs. Professor Whatsit, he could only suppose, and closed the door behind him. As she turned and stepped close to take his hat, he felt a jolt of surprise, as he always did, to find a woman’s eyes on a level with his own. What had MacFarlane said when he’d drooled crassly over the photograph? “What a smasher! Big lass! Look at those muscles!” Redfyre risked a glance at those muscles and looked away immediately. But there was no denying that the lady was worthy of attention. Even, or perhaps particularly, when he’d caught her still glowing from her morning’s exercise. Rowing? In this weather, surely not? Running? It was rumoured that women were spotted charging about on the towpaths early these mornings. She was wearing a man’s rowing vest, which emphasised the well-rounded arms and the narrow waist. Her exercise trousers, casually tied up at the waist with a bright silk scarf, could not disguise the long, muscled legs beneath. He decided not to comment or trip over his tongue by referring gauchely to her outlandish state of dress—that was her business. And she struck him as perfectly capable of throwing him back down the steps if she were so minded.

  Her eyes narrowed and her lips pursed in concern. “Poor you! Look, in that case, why don’t you slip into the bathroom, freshen yourself up and join me for breakfast? I was just about to struggle into a more suitable Sunday getup. If I know Mrs. Alexander, she’ll be ringing the Ladies’ Morality League right this minute to denounce me for receiving a single gentleman while dressed in my underpinnings.”

  She spoke lightly, but Redfyre was alarmed. “Would you like me to go over and show her my warrant?”

  “Good heavens, no! She’d have an attack of the vapours. Look, I’ll see you back here at the table in five minutes. It’s all very simple, I’m afraid. Just porridge cooking in the bottom oven. My mother was Scottish, and I always serve it well cooked and with salt. But I have cream and sugar if you prefer. There’s boiled eggs, toast, honey, strawberry jam. And the coffee’s good. You do drink coffee? I’m sorry, it occurs to me that I real
ly don’t know you very well, John. Perhaps tea would . . .”

  To his sly satisfaction, he noted that the table was laid for two, and that the coffee pot was a large one. Perhaps she knew him better than she was pretending—better than he knew himself?

  “Coffee would be wonderful, Minerva,” he said. “And all those other things, in any order. I’m ravenous. ”

  He watched her closely to gauge her reaction. “Minerva.” He’d said it clearly enough, but she appeared not to have heard it.

  “Good! There’s some Lifebuoy soap in there and a fresh towel or two on the shelf. Help yourself.” And, over her shoulder, with a decided twinkle, as she headed for the staircase, “Perhaps you’d like to make up the fire before you do that? Visiting gentlemen do usually enjoy executing a few slick moves with a poker to announce their presence to the household gods. Lares et Penates, would that be? Or Vesta, Goddess of the Hearth? How these old Romans haunt us!”

  She allowed him to make inroads into his bowl of porridge and companionably refilled his coffee cup before she spoke again. “Now, John—or Inspector—if this is really that kind of visit, shall we agree to remember we’re grown-ups and skip the frivolity of using silly nicknames? I am—you must choose—Suzannah or Headmistress. Or plain Miss Sturdy. How did you know I would be staying here?”

  He looked with renewed appreciation at the soberly dressed and rather imposing figure. A nut-brown woollen day dress echoed the colour of her shining and unfashionably long hair, now scraped hastily back into a knot in the nape of her neck. A long string of ivory beads attempted disconcertingly to settle itself on one side or other of her bosom.

  “I’m sorry, Suzannah, to barge in on your quiet morning. I rang your school yesterday to enquire after you. We had a pencilled-in arrangement to take tea, if you remember, and not knowing the date for the end of your term, I thought I’d better check whether you were still in Cambridge. Your deputy head was manning the phone and told me you were here taking the weekend off to celebrate the end of term. I was in the neighbourhood, and—”