The note read: I have a gun. Give me some money or I’ll blow your brains out.
‘I beg your pardon?’ Philip wondered.
This time his assailant spoke. ‘I have a gun. Give me some money or I’ll blow your brains out.’ The paper bag he laid on the counter certainly looked as if it might contain a gun.
Philip hesitated for a few seconds as he recalled his brief training session. Don’t be a hero, he remembered. Hand over the money and don’t be a hero. ‘Oh!’ he exclaimed, reaching under the counter to retrieve the manilla envelope. ‘This is for you,’ he said, manoeuvring it under the reinforced glass partition, into Gaspipe’s eagerly awaiting hands.
Gaspipe couldn’t believe his luck. He grabbed the envelope and ran for the exit.
A private hire taxi from the other company – the one they didn’t use for the weekly supermarket run – as ordered by him five minutes earlier, was standing at the kerb, engine running. Gaspipe yanked the passenger’s door open and flopped into the comfortably worn seat of the elderly Mercedes, saying: ‘Middleton, please. Acre Road,’ as he looked back at the bank.
‘Are you Mr Zermansky?’ the taxi driver asked.
‘Er, no, I’m Mr Smith. I rang for you a few minutes ago.’
‘Sorry, pal, not me. I’m looking for Mr Zermansky.’
‘What difference does it make? He can go in my taxi.’
‘It’s bad for our reputation if we don’t turn up. I’m afraid you’ll have to get out, Mr Smith. Your ride should be along in a few seconds.’ Jason Gaspipe, aka Mr Smith, looked back at the bank again. People were spilling out onto the pavement, staff and customers alike, some brandishing camera phones and pointing. Jason stuffed the manilla envelope into the glovebox of the Merc and opened the door. He could hear the siren of a police car, very faint but growing louder.
Full stop, the end. Hey-hey, that’s it. I’ve done it, just like Jimmy Loose Screw said I should. And a ho-ho too, for the season. It was harder than I thought, but worthwhile deeds don’t grow on banana trees, as Mama, God bless her, used to say.
Apparently it was this zonco, known as Gaspipe according to one witness, who did for me. I only knew him as Mr Smith, but try telling that to a judge. He had form for burning down the polytechnic, but arsonists don’t usually transmogrify into bank robbers, according to the probation officer who knew him, so they weren’t taking that information with the seriousness I deemed it worthy of. And it was doubtful in law if a cucumber in a paper bag counted as armed robbery. I’d bet my last coppers it was Spiderman who pointed the poisoned chalice at me, but what does a humble taxi driver know?
I sat there watching the action in my rear-view mirror, enjoying the excitement of the blue lights getting closer, the siren notes rising and falling, the snow beginning to swirl as if part of the scene’s orchestration, safe in the knowledge that it was nothing to do with me, warmed by the righteous feeling that all that was in the past.
At some time during this reverie, Gaspipe legged it.
Jimmy Loose Screw just came in, to see if I was ready.
‘Could you give these to the clerk of the court?’ I asked, handing him my statement, and he said he would.
‘I don’t suppose there’s a chance the good Judge Herod slipped on the icy court steps and broke his leg?’ I ventured.
‘Sorry boss, but there’s been a thaw.’
‘Curses,’ I said. ‘Curses and damnation.’ I don’t usually blaspheme, but I felt this little outburst was justified. ‘What sort of mood is he in?’
‘Well, he just fined someone a hundred spondulicks for not having a dog license.’
‘We haven’t had dog licenses for ten years.’
‘They haven’t had a dog for five.’
‘That bad, eh? Do you think I’ll go down?’
‘For stealing two thousand big ones? I’d rather bet on the Titanic finally making it.’
‘But I didn’t do it.’
‘The package they found in your glovebox says you did. Shall I take it you’ll be staying for dinner?’
I gave a sigh that started right down in my boots and popped out of the top of my head. ‘Yeah, I suppose so.’
‘I’ll make you a reservation.’
‘Thank you. And what delicacies might there be on this evening’s menu?’ I asked.
Jimmy Loose Screw gave me one of those devilish grins that only those truly contented with their life’s calling can conjure up.
‘Take a wild guess,’ he said.
Martin Edwards
* * *
InDex
* * *
(Being an extract from a draft index to Celebrity Lawyer, the autobiography of Jude Wykeham)
Wykeham, Jude
Affair
With Esther Yallop
Autobiography
Mysterious disappearance of
Paid enormous sum to write
Posthumous publication, anticipated
Guilt
Presumed motive for suicide
Launch Party
Meets Esther Yallop at
Police investigation of
Errors in
Fake suicide note, misled by
Publisher
Shared with Esther Yallop
Puerto Banus,
Purchase of holiday home at
Weekends spent with Esther Yallop in
Queen’s Counsel
High earnings as
Rhetorical skills
Seduction, persistent employment of when engaged in
Strangling
Suspected of
Suicide
Yallop, Esther
Dress
Expensive tastes in
Provocative
Erotic poems
Authorship of
Lover, dedicated to
Husband, boredom with
Sarcasm, gift for
Strangulation of
Pleasure taken in
Remorse for, subsequent
Yallop, William
English degree, uselessness of
Indexer, part-time employment as
Manuscript
Re-writing of
Theft of
Novels, unpublished
Personality
Despair, tendency to
Obsessive
Revenge, lust for
Writing,
Career, literary
Experimental nature of
Failure in
Celebrity Lawyer, determination to compile index for
Confession
Double murder, to
Index, by means of
* * *
Murder Squad
* * *
* * *
Author Biographies
* * *
ANN CLEEVES has been published for twenty-five years. She’s best known for her Shetland Quartet and her Vera Stanhope series. Raven Black, the first of the Shetland novels, won the CWA Duncan Lawrie (Gold) Dagger for 2006. It was later adapted for Radio 4’s Saturday play and White Nights, the second in the series, will be broadcast later this year. The Vera Stanhope books have been adapted for a major ITV drama starring Brenda Blethyn. Ann lives in North Tyneside with her husband.
MARTIN EDWARDS’ latest Lake District Mystery, featuring DCI Hannah Scarlett and Daniel Kind, is The Hanging Wood, published in 2011. Earlier books in the series are The Coffin Trail (shortlisted for the Theakston’s prize for best British crime novel of 2006), The Cipher Garden, The Arsenic Labyrinth (shortlisted for the Lakeland Book of the Year award in 2008) and The Serpent Pool. He has written eight novels about lawyer Harry Devlin, the first of which, All the Lonely People, was shortlisted for the CWA John Creasey Memorial Dagger. In addition he has written a stand-alone novel of psychological suspense, Take My Breath Away, a novel featuring Dr Crippen, Dancing for the Hangman, and completed Bill Knox’s last book, The Lazarus Widow. He has published a collection of short stories, Where Do You Find Your
Ideas? and other stories; ‘Test Drive’ was short-listed for the CWA Short Story Dagger in 2006, while ‘The Bookbinder’s Apprentice’ won the same Dagger in 2008. He has edited twenty anthologies and published eight non-fiction books, including a study of homicide investigation, Urge to Kill. His website is www.martinedwardsbooks.com and his blog www.doyouwriteunderyourownname.blogspot.com
MARGARET MURPHY is the author of nine internationally acclaimed psychological thrillers – both stand-alone and police series. Her work has been shortlisted for the First Blood award and the Crime Writers’ Association (CWA) Dagger in the Library. Her short fiction is featured in Best British Mysteries 2006 and The Mammoth Book of Best British Crime (2009). She is the founder of Murder Squad, a monstrously talented and thrillingly diverse bunch of writers who have supported, sustained and enriched her life over the last ten years. She has chaired the CWA Debut Dagger competition for unpublished writers and is a former Chair of the Crime Writers’ Association. She is proud to have held a Royal Literary Fund Writing Fellowship from 2008–2011. Her website is: www.margaretmurphy.co.uk
STUART PAWSON is creator of Detective Inspector Charlie Priest – once the youngest inspector in the East Pennine force, and now its longest-serving inspector. He has recently enjoyed his thirteenth outing in the fictitious Yorkshire town of Heckley, situated in what was once called the Heavy Woollen District. Stuart’s first career was as an engineer in the mining industry but this came to an end with the demise of coalmining. He followed this by working part-time for the probation service for five years. His chief hobbies have been oil painting and fell walking and he has incorporated these in the character of Charlie Priest. Stuart and his wife, Doreen, live in Fairburn, Yorkshire, with no cats, just four lusty tortoises.
CATH STAINCLIFFE is an established novelist, radio playwright and the creator of ITV’s hit series Blue Murder, starring Caroline Quentin as DCI Janine Lewis. Cath’s books have been shortlisted for the Crime Writers Association Best First Novel award and for the Dagger in the Library and selected as Le Masque de l’Année. Looking For Trouble launched private eye Sal Kilkenny, a single parent struggling to juggle work and home, onto Manchester’s mean streets. Missing is the seventh and latest title. Trio, a stand-alone novel, moved away from crime to explore adoption and growing up in the 1960s, inspired by Cath’s own experience. Cath’s newest novels, The Kindest Thing and Witness, examine hot topical issues and tell stories of ordinary people, caught up in the criminal justice system, who face difficult and dangerous choices. Cath lives in Manchester with her partner and their children.
Copyright
First published in 2011
The History Press
The Mill, Brimscombe Port
Stroud, Gloucestershire, GL5 2QG
www.thehistorypress.co.uk
This ebook edition first published in 2011
All rights reserved
© The Murder Squad, 2011
The right of The Murder Squad, to be identified as the Authors of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyrights, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
EPUB ISBN 978 0 7524 6650 7
MOBI ISBN 978 0 7524 6651 4
Original typesetting by The History Press
Ebook compilation by RefineCatch Limited, Bungay, Suffolk