Private London (Private 4)

I had been entirely rational in my reassurances to Harlan Shapiro. But logic was one thing and human emotion another, and emotion was a far stronger force than logic. As I was just about to find out.

Chapter 72

PETER CHAPPEL WAS a forty-five-year-old ophthalmic optician with a small practice in Chesham, a quiet Buckinghamshire market town set amidst the rolling natural beauty of the Chilterns.

His premises were on the High Street and, although it was a Sunday, he had come into his shop to sort through some paperwork and receipts that he needed to send off to his accountant for the quarterly VAT return. He had an elderly female assistant who worked with him, but as often as not he would find himself coming into the shop on his day off to catch up with the admin.

He put all the receipts together into a large white envelope, sealed and addressed it, walked through to the reception area and left it on his assistant’s desk to go out in the morning post. He was ahead of schedule but Peter Chappel was a man who paid attention to detail.

He walked back to his examination room. It was windowless, with an old-fashioned roll-top desk in the corner that he used for an office. He unplugged and picked up the laptop that was sitting on the faded green leather and deliberated for a moment.

It was a few minutes past three o’clock and Peter Chappel made a decision. Pulling at an eye-test chart, he swung it out from the wall to reveal a safe behind it.

He put the laptop into the safe, closed the door and spun the dial. Then he put the eye chart back in place and bustled back out through reception.

He picked up a couple of carrier bags that he had left by the front door and then went out onto the street, putting them down again so he could lock the door behind him.

He looked at his watch again and set off for home. He was a little late but not much and he certainly didn’t want to miss any of the fun. Luckily he lived just a hundred yards or so away from his shop in Punch Bowl Lane. Quite appropriate, Peter Chappel thought to himself as he strolled quickly along Red Lion Street – there was no show without Punch, after all, as the old saying goes.

Chapter 73

TOM CHALLONER HAD worked for the Underground for thirty years.

He was a stationmaster and would be retiring in the autumn. At ten minutes past three he was sitting at his desk taking what he considered a well-earned tea break, timing himself as he finished The Times crossword.

The shock waves from the explosion shattered the window of his office and knocked him from his chair to lie unconscious on the floor.

Near Edgware Road Tube station, Kirsty Webb was sitting at her desk in one of the CID offices at Paddington Green. Cursing the ever-increasing bureaucratic demands that meant she and her colleagues spent more time doing paperwork than they ever did out on the street solving crimes. Or trying to.

She had given up on the paperwork an hour ago and had been working on a presentation that she would be giving in a few days’ time in Manchester. She had been shortlisted as one of three final applicants for the new post in the newly created division. Each of them had to give a fifteen-minute talk. A case study of a successful murder case on which they had worked.

Kirsty had wanted to give her presentation on the ‘Ring-Finger Murders’ as one of the red-top papers had named them – a title that had been taken up by most of the broadcast media. But she had been sidelined on the case because it had been taken over by the serial-crimes unit and she found herself relegated back to donkey work. Taking statements, filing reports, dead-end policing.

She put her pen down, picked up a sheet of paper with random thoughts and doodles on it, screwed it into a ball and was about to throw it across the room into a waste-paper bin when a call came.

She looked at the caller ID, then across the room to where a couple of male colleagues were discussing yesterday’s football game. She walked out of the office, along to the steps at the end of the corridor and answered it.

‘DI Webb,’ she said.

‘Kirsty, it’s Doctor Lee. I’ve got some news.’ Kirsty felt a small flutter of expectation. She could tell by the woman’s voice that something significant had happened.

‘What have you got for me, Wendy?’

‘Dan had me run the DNA analysis for you.’

‘Yeah, I know,’ said Kirsty impatiently.

‘We’ve got a hit.’

‘Hang on.’ Kirsty lodged the phone in the crook of her shoulder and pulled out her notepad and pen.

‘Shoot.’

‘She’s a Romanian national. A nurse – and she’s got a criminal record back at home so we got lucky. You wouldn’t have got a hit on your police systems and would have had to go to Interpol, which would have taken even longer.’

‘Thanks, Wendy.’

‘Thank Dan. He put me on it on my day off.’