Murder is a Tricky Business (DCI Cook Thriller Series Book 1) Read online

  Murder is a Tricky Business

  Phillip Strang

  Copyright Page

  Copyright © 2015 Phillip Strang

  Cover Design by Phillip Strang

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review to be printed by a newspaper, magazine, or journal.

  All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  All Rights Reserved.

  This work is registered with the UK Copyright Service.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 1

  ‘Murder is a tricky business when you don’t have a body, a suspect or a motive,’ Detective Chief Inspector Isaac Cook mulled out loud in the confines of the office. He may as well have called it home ‒ he had spent so many hours there of late.

  ‘What do you mean, “no motive”? The woman was a bitch,’ Detective Inspector Farhan Ahmed replied. He was a no-nonsense cop destined as was his senior officer, Isaac Cook, for greatness in the police force. The London Metropolitan Police, politically correct, and aiming to fast-track anyone of superior ability with a non-Anglo-Saxon background: a display of embracing all cultures, all religions and all colours.

  It was the ideal place for two ambitious men. DCI Isaac Cook, the first generation, English-born of Jamaican parents and Ahmed, ten years in the United Kingdom, initially for training, and with no intention of going back. It irked some of the older police officers ‒ Anglo-Saxon and white ‒ now being overlooked for the late arrivals. The occasional disparaging comment in the corridors of the Challis Street Police Station, discreetly aimed in their direction, shrugged off, although it sometimes upset the young Pakistan-born detective inspector.

  ‘Who told us she was a bitch?’ DCI Cook asked as he looked out of the window.

  ‘Admittedly, those she worked with.’

  ‘Being a bitch is not much of a motive. And we’re still assuming she’s been murdered,’ DCI Cook said.

  ‘We’ll find the body. You know that. It’s just a case of knowing where to look.’

  ‘Do you?’

  ‘Not yet, but we haven’t rummaged in the dirt yet. If we dig enough, we’ll find the woman or at least what’s left of her.’

  ‘So where do we start?’ Isaac said, his interest piqued by his colleague’s enthusiasm.

  ‘Her fellow actors on that damn-awful soap opera.’ It was an unexpected outburst by the detective inspector.

  ‘I’ve not heard you speak in that manner before.’ Isaac felt the need to comment.

  ‘It’s my wife. She’s obsessed with the programme.’

  ***

  The death of Billy Blythe did not come as a surprise, forecast as it had been for several weeks. The final week before his death, the magazines were awash with front page speculation. Eight million, five hundred and sixty thousand viewers, a new record the night he was bashed to death in the local playground by three youths.

  The executives at the television station were delighted: record advertising revenue, premium rates. The only one, assumed not to be delighted, his fictional sister, or at least, the actor who played the part; she had gone missing. They had spliced in some earlier footage of her for the episode to conceal the truth from the viewing public.

  It was pure fiction, but for millions across the country, compulsory viewing. Whether they realised the soap opera for what it was, or whether it was an escape from their mundane lives was for psychologists to analyse, advertising executives to take advantage of, and television stations to revel in the money.

  The melodrama had been on the air for twelve years. The lives of an apparently benign group of individuals in a small provincial town had kept a nation enthralled. There had been murders, rapes, thuggish behaviour, even incest, but the characters still played out their parts in the innocence of a community where nothing ever changed. One week, it was a murder; the next, a wedding and Billy Blythe, the local villain, had had his fair share of those: at least one every eighteen months to two years and none had lasted.

  The country or, at least, the less discerning - according to Charles Sutherland, the actor who portrayed the erstwhile Billy Blythe - had been enthralled by his nuptials, but he had become fat and unpleasant due to a more than adequate salary and an inappropriate fondness for alcohol and junk food.

  Marjorie Frobisher portrayed his elder sister, Edith Blythe, in the series - her character: matronly and demure, ashamed of her brother, hoping he would reform.

  Isaac Cook considered the situation. He was a smart man, not given to extravagance and not inclined to speak without some forethought. He summed up the facts presented with his DI.

  ‘So, why does everyone assume it is murder? She’s only been missing for three weeks. She could have just gone incognito, decided it was a time for a break.’

  Farhan, his DI - the two men had known each other long enough to address each other by their first names - saw the situation differently. ‘The newspapers continue to put forward the fact that she’s probably dead, even if it’s not murder.’

  ‘And we base our evidence on what the papers say?’ Isaac Cook did not achieve the rank of Detective Chief Inspector on the basis of ‘someone said something’ or ‘what the newspapers are reporting.’ He needed evidence, and so far, there had been none, only innuendo.

  ‘Of course not,’ Farhan replied.

  ‘We deal in facts, not what the press and the gossip magazines print.’

  Farhan continued. ‘Marjorie Frobisher was at the height of her profession. She had just been given another three-year contract, at a monthly salary, five times what you and I receive in a year, and there is her record of service.’

  ‘What do you mean by record of service?’

  ‘In the twelve years since the programme first went on the air, she has only missed five episodes, and that was because she had no part to play.’

  ‘Where do you get this information?’ Isaac had asked the production company for some updates when they had first been pulled in to investigate, and he had less than his colleague.

  ‘From my wife, where else?’

  Isaac sarcastically asked, ‘Does your wife know what happened to the body?
’

  ‘She has a theory.’

  ‘Let’s hear it then.’

  ‘According to my wife, and unfortunately, she may be right…’

  ‘Why do you say that?’ Isaac was trying to be polite and patient, but if it had not been his colleague, he would have dismissed it with no credence.

  ‘I know what you’re thinking. You think my wife is off her head.’

  Isaac realised he had probably offended his colleague.

  ‘According to my wife, there was a similar situation on another series about six years ago. One of the characters went missing for no apparent reason. Ted Entwhistle, the local butcher on the programme just disappeared. You must remember, headline news for a couple of weeks.’

  ‘So what happened to him?’

  ‘They dragged it out, milked it for all it was worth. They thought they were dealing with a fictional disappearance, not a real-life murder. It appears that the actor portraying Ted Entwhistle had been messing around with an actress in the series, on-screen and off. Her off-screen husband got wind of it, strung him up on a meat hook in an old derelict barn. Poetic justice, the husband said when they caught him. Anyway, that’s what my wife is saying.’

  ‘A copy-cat killing inspired by a soap opera. Are you suggesting we seriously consider it?’

  ‘Why not? Marjorie Frobisher’s missing and according to Detective Superintendent Goddard, she’s probably been murdered.’

  ‘Is that what’s happened here?’ Isaac had heard it all in his time as a policeman. The idea that a murder could be committed based on what a scriptwriter at the lower skill end of his craft could make up seemed implausible.

  ‘It’s happened in the past, hasn’t it?’ Farhan was not as sceptical.

  ‘Not that I remember.’

  ‘Ted Entwhistle was real enough. Fiction often overlaps with reality on the television these days.’

  ‘But you said you don’t watch it.’

  ‘That’s true, but it’s always on at my house.’

  ‘If your Ted Entwhistle could be found strung up on a meat hook, what would Marjorie Frobisher’s fate have been?’

  ‘According to my wife…’

  ‘Facts, please.’

  ‘What I was going to say was that Marjorie Frobisher’s character, Elizabeth Blythe had been the headmistress at the local school. In retirement, she had taken over from the church organist,’ Farhan said, a little annoyed by Isaac’s oblique criticism of his wife.

  ‘Let’s go out on a limb. What’s does your wife believe happened?’ Isaac felt there was no need for a formal apology.

  ‘I know it sounds crazy, but she believes she’s in a church.’

  ***

  Charles Sutherland, a classically trained actor, or, at least, he felt he was, was either not classical enough, not trained well enough or the casting agents defective in their recognition of genuine ability. He believed the latter. There had been a few walk-ons, at some of the best theatres in the country in some of the most prestigious dramas early in his career. But, they did not last long. It soon became apparent that he was deficient in important critical areas: his inability with accents, his belligerent attitude to fellow cast members.

  Isolated and penniless, he had over a few years been relegated to soap operas; the one area where he had achieved success. Billy Blythe had been his latest reincarnation after other long-running shows of a similar vein. He had been an undertaker, a shopkeeper, a philanderer, even a man of the cloth, but Billy Blythe had been his pièce de résistance.

  They had killed his character; it was as if they had killed him. He knew it was the pinnacle of a disappointing career, and that he would neither forget nor forgive.

  It had been assumed that his fictional sister would have taken up the mantle of bereavement, with the small, tight-knit town rushing to her side. The only problem was that she wasn’t there. The executive producer had seen an issue. He was first to react to his leading actress’ disappearance with alarm.

  ‘What are we going to do?’ he had screamed at a meeting of his production staff two weeks earlier. The programme was always recorded one week in advance, so there was time to work round an integral character. ‘Marjorie’s gone and done a disappearing act on us. Has anyone any idea where she is?’ Richard Williams had been in the business for almost ever. He had reluctantly entered the world of soap operas as a script writer on a now defunct episodic programme. A plausible plot about an inner city school full of delinquents, and idealistic teachers in the north of England, which somehow had failed to capture the viewing public’s approval.

  He had left the University of Sussex over thirty-five years earlier with a BA in Journalism and a desire to be a war correspondent, travelling the world, helmet and bulletproof vest, ducking the bullets and bombs, ‘bringing you the news from the frontline’. The farthest he got was a protest outside the Iranian Embassy in South Kensington when the police had come in with tear gas, and he had received a severe dose and a rock to the head for his troubles.

  He had a soft-spoken voice, yet authoritative. He had guided the soap opera through its early years to where it stood now, predominant in the United Kingdom and sold to at least twenty more countries around the world. Nowadays, he mostly left it to others to deal with the daily episodes. It was rare for him to leave his elegant office with its sweeping views of London and to venture down to the production facilities, a prefabricated town of frontages, held up by plywood and paint, located in what had once been an old industrial wasteland. He had reached his sixty-third year. He was not an attractive man, a little short yet slim. His hair, once black, now came courtesy of a bottle and an expensive hair transplant; the body, once wiry and firm, showed signs of flabbiness and creasing.

  ‘Marjorie is nowhere to be seen, hasn’t been seen for a few days.’ The script producer, Ray Saddler, had been with the soap opera for the last six years, and he had moulded a formidable script writing team together.

  ‘Has anyone looked for her?’ Williams asked.

  ‘Of course, we have,’ the series producer, Jessica O’Neill said. She had joined the production team six months earlier. There had been dissension in the ranks on her appointment. Her demanding manner and excessive attempts at perfection, resulting in numerous retakes, sometimes late into the night, irritated some of the older hands in the business.

  ‘Milady,’ an antiquated term of respect for a female member of the British aristocracy, or derision in her case, was often used behind her back. Charles Sutherland, alias Billy Blythe, had said it to her face once, but he had been drunk.

  The meeting had not taken long before Richard Williams made his pronouncement, as he was apt to do when presented with an imponderable. ‘Write her out and if the woman turns up, we’ll deal with it then.’

  ***

  Isaac Cook had one uncertainty which concerned him greatly. Why as a senior investigating officer, had he been pulled out of the homicide incident room to search for a missing woman? He needed to meet with his superior officer and raise the subject. Detective Superintendent Goddard was a decent man, a man that DCI Cook respected enormously - their relationship based on mutual respect and friendship.

  Challis Street Police Station, an impressive building, at least on the third floor where the detective superintendent had ensured a good office with a good view was welcoming as Isaac entered. The senior officer sat behind an impressive wooden table with a laptop and a monitor to the right-hand side. In the centre, there was a notepad. A bookshelf lined one wall, full of legal books. A hat stand stood in one corner, where the detective superintendent’s jacket and cap hung.

  It was the office of an efficient man. A man who had an admirable habit of not going home at night to his wife of thirty years, unless the desk was clear, and all the work for the day had been concluded and filed away. Some days that meant late into the night, but that was how he worked, and no amount of cajoling from his wife or his colleagues would change the habit of a lifetime.

  He ros
e and walked around the table as Isaac entered. A brisk, firm handshake and both men sat down on a pair of comfortable black leather chairs which were placed to one side in the office.

  ‘Sir, why are we chasing after a missing person?’ Isaac asked.

  ‘Do you know who this person is?’

  ‘She’s just an actor in a mundane television drama.’ The detective chief inspector had been a diligent student at school, in part due to his parent’s decision not to have a television in the house. They had received an adequate education in Jamaica but soon realised on their arrival in England, that they were woefully out of touch with what was required in London. They had been of farming stock in Jamaica, up close to Montego Bay, in the north of the island. But in London, it was smart people that were required. After a few years trying to better their education, they realised they had left it too late. With their time to make something of their lives behind them, they had devoted their attention to a son who showed the promise of fulfilling the ambitions denied to them.

  ‘Marjorie Frobisher is hardly an actor in a mundane drama.’ Detective Superintendent Goddard understood the reticence of his best detective to become involved.

  ‘So why are we looking? There’s no body, no motive and certainly no reason for us to be involved. It should be registered with missing persons.’

  ‘Agreed, but you don’t understand the situation.’

  ‘What don’t I understand?’

  ‘Influential friends…’

  ‘That’s an ambiguous statement,’ Isaac said, although he had heard it before. Someone with influence using it to get preferential treatment.

  The detective superintendent had hoped to avoid the conversation, and that Isaac would have continued with the case and got on with it. He realised now that it would have been best to have told him upfront. ‘What do you know about Marjorie Frobisher? Apart from the fact that she’s an actor of little note in your estimation?’

  ‘I’ve no idea whether she is good enough for an Oscar or a bit part in the local drama society’s production of “The Importance of being Ernest”.’