The London Tram Murders (Vance and Shepherd Mysteries Book 2) | Book by John Broughton

Oct 13

Oct 13 The London Tram Murders (Vance and Shepherd Mysteries Book 2)

Book summary

"In 'The London Tram Murders', Detectives Vance and Shepherd confront a challenging copycat killer case, entangling them in a web of deception with a suspect who eerily resembles the sister of a deceased serial killer."

Excerpt from The London Tram Murders (Vance and Shepherd Mysteries Book 2)

Brittany Shepherd displayed her driving skills and intolerance of other less expert drivers as she drove through beautiful, sleepy Kentish villages. Yet, the poor performance of other road users was not her chosen topic of conversation because, on the journey, she was obsessively concerned about the nature of copycat killings.

“I’ve set Rhodesy”—her fond name for her sergeant, Ellen Rhodes— “to check the precise timeline of Arnold Tibbet’s murders. I know it’s a long shot, but we might anticipate this killer’s next moves and save some lives.”

“Good thinking, Brit. Let’s hope we get something out of this visit. The last thing we need at the moment is a wild goose chase, lovely as the countryside is in these parts. That pub looks particularly inviting. Forget that I said that! Maybe on the way back,” he said wistfully.

“No way, pal. We’ll take the motorway back. It’s only an hour to Central London. While it’s less scenic, it’s much faster.”

“Fair enough.” Vance brooded over a vision of a pint of beer disappearing into nothingness like Lewis Carroll’s Cheshire Cat. Only the foam was left as the pint disappeared. The Detective Inspector was partial to a pint of bitter and if it was unfiltered craft beer, so much the better.

Whatever preconceptions the two detectives had of an industrial estate, they had to abandon when they pulled into the Kent Science Park. The planners had created an environmentally friendly estate containing laboratories and office facilities screened by trees, but including not only those attributes, as they soon found out. Their request for Monarch Chemicals was met by an inscrutable smile from an elegant young woman, who made a phone call, said u-hum three times before inviting them to follow her. She led them across a footbridge that arced over a stream to a modern white rectangular building fronted by large, plate-glass windows.

“The Hub,” she said laconically, leading them into the bright interior. The two officers took in meeting spaces and a restaurant at a glance. “Monarch’s Technical Director is on his way and will meet you here in a couple of minutes. Meanwhile, would you like a coffee, some cake?”

They accepted coffee and Brittany, belying her trim figure, failed to resist a slice of orange cream sponge though Vance, as usual, refused any kind of dessert. Within the promised time, a man appeared, wearing a grey three-piece suit, under it a blue silk tie with unobtrusive white dots, to greet them with outstretched hand and a wide smile. He joined them for coffee.

“Duncan Weybridge,” he introduced himself, “Technical Director of Monarch Chemicals.” He scrutinised their warrant cards, looked up and gave Brittany a beaming smile. “Congratulations, Detective Inspector, you must be good to have achieved your rank at such a young age.”

“The best.” Vance leapt in to cover before Shepherd said anything caustic. He knew her only too well. “My colleague is older than she looks, but don’t be taken in, she’s exceptionally good at what she does.”

“I paid him to say that!” Shepherd smirked.

“So, what can I do for you formidable detectives?”

He listened carefully, his gaze occasionally straying to the view over the picturesque Japanese gardens outside. When Vance had finished, he said, “Yes, I remember the request. It came from a Melanie Something-or-other. I can furnish you with her surname if you want. Sorry? Yes, quite certain. No, Melanie, not Bethany. Of course, I only spoke to her on the phone because, you see, I had to direct her to our Sheerness depot. That’s where we keep our stock for distribution. So I’m afraid if you need a physical description of the lady, you’ll have to slip over there. It’s only twenty minutes from here by car. Take the A249, which brings you to Brielle Way, just before the road bridge turn right onto New Road, and you can’t miss it.”

“What do you remember of that call, sir?” Vance asked.

“First of all, I was impressed. We don’t take calls from Porton Down every day.”

“Hang on!” Shepherd interrupted. “Did she say she was at Porton Down?”

Weybridge smiled unctuously. “Certainly, that made an impression on me, but so did her knowledge of chemistry, which you’d expect coming from there, of course.”

“Did anything strike you as slightly off?” Shepherd insisted.

He looked surprised. “No, not at all. Why do you ask?”

Shepherd decided to come clean. “Because we’re investigating a murder. The substance used to kill a healthy young woman was hydrogen cyanide.”

“Good Lord! And you suspect this Melanie What’s-her-name?”

“Sir, I think at this point, if you could furnish us with her surname, it would be helpful.”

The executive whipped out his phone, dialled a number and waited for a second, his eyes never leaving Shepherd’s oval face. “Amanda, be a darling and check out a visitor name for me. A Melanie Something, roughly two months ago. He tapped the table rhythmically with three fingers whilst waiting. “Good girl!” he said patronisingly, not noticing Shepherd’s wince. “Bradshaw,” he announced, “Melanie Bradshaw. I can also confirm that she paid for an unspecified quantity of hydrogen cyanide at our Sheerness Depot.”

Vance stood, proffering his hand, to bring the interview to an end.

“Thank you. You’ve been most accommodating, Mr Weybridge. But we must be off.”

“Might I offer you lunch before you go?”

The detectives exchanged glances and understood each other. Shepherd took it upon herself to reply. “Time is important at this stage, sir. Much appreciated, but we must move on. The excellent cake I ate here will keep me going.” She gave him her hand, which he held for a fraction too long, gazing into her sapphire eyes.

“Good luck with your case, Detective Inspector, bring the villain to justice.”

“Amen! We’ll do our best,” she said, releasing her hand.

As she drove out of the park onto the A248, she said through gritted teeth, “It’s types like him that create a glass ceiling for the female sex.”

“Don’t be too harsh on him, Shep; at least he gave us a lead to follow up.”

She scowled. “It’s not much, just a false name Bethany invented to cover her tracks.”

“We can’t be sure of that. There might be a real Melanie Bradshaw on the loose for all we know. People read the newspapers, you know. She may be an independent psychopath pretending to have had intimate knowledge of Tibbet!”

“I bow to your greater experience, Detective Inspector.”

“Harrumph!”

“Although—”

“What?”

“I don’t buy it. Why would a killer who almost got clean away with the perfect murder put us on her tracks with that diary? Doctor Tremethyk, by his admission, almost missed the faint trace of HCN. If he had, and without the diary, he’d have reported a heart attack.”

“All of which proves the Met recognises a talent like yours when it has one.”

“Are you taking the mickey, Jacob?”

He smiled secretly and said nothing. They were observing the speed limit along Brielle Way when Vance, who had spotted the road bridge ahead, said quietly, “Turn right here.”

Shepherd obliged, surprised at the narrow lane, but it led onto New Road. “Right or left?”

He guessed, “Turn right.”

They drove for a while, then he pointed. “That’s Monarch Chemicals.”

“By heck! Next time I enter a car rally, you’ll be my navigator!”

“When did you ever participate in a rally, Shep?”

“Just saying.”

He snorted, struggling to extract his warrant card from a pocket without unfastening his seat belt. They didn’t need their warrants to drive into the large car park. To their left was an impressive fleet of new Mercedes Antos lorries. All a uniform grey, they bore the clever wording on the front, Delivering the Solution. Not bad for a chemical delivery vehicle, Vance thought. He also admired the circular logo of diminishing white dots, starting and ending with one large green dot. He considered the symbol striking and effective. The graphics were located on the cab doors.

Shepherd parked, and they proceeded to an office, where an immaculately-groomed secretary greeted them. She soon made a call through to management, then announced, “Ms Johnson, our Quality Manager, will be along in a moment if you’d care to take a seat.”

A dapper woman in a power suit and her mid-forties, entered the office. “Metropolitan Police? I hope there hasn’t been an accident. In Europe, maybe? We have several drivers in France,” she said, with a faint Irish brogue.

“No, ma’am, nothing of the sort,” Vance sensed her apprehension, “don’t worry, our inquiry doesn’t involve any of your staff, but I believe that someone here can help us in a murder investigation.”

If anything, her anxiety grew at these words, but she heard him out without interrupting. When he ended his explanation, she said, “So, you think the killer bought her supply of hydrogen cyanide here? Sweet Jesus, that’s terrible!” She hesitated, in thought, then resumed, “I seem to remember my colleague, David Brookes, saying something about a chemist from Porton Down about a couple of months ago. Stephie, be an angel and get David down here, will you?”

The secretary smiled and tapped out a number.

“David is our Area Sales Manager,” she clarified, brushing an imaginary speck from her sleeve.

“Hi, Bernadette, what’s up?” a man in a beige suit and wide brown tie asked breezily, and gazed curiously at the visitors.

The Quality Manager explained and introduced the Met officers to him. The cheery smile vanished to be replaced by an expression of concern. “That’s dreadful,” the flaxen-haired manager frowned, “she seemed so competent and above board. All her documents were in order, too. We can’t sell hydrogen cyanide to just anyone who turns up here, you know.”

“Documents?” the detectives asked in unison and looked at each other in surprise.

“Yes, an order on official headed paper and rubber-stamped. I remember it well since it was from Porton Down. As you know, Porton Down is—”

“We do know, sir.” Vance interrupted.

“Yes, of course. That’s why I had no hesitation in supplying the twenty phials she required.”

“I don’t suppose you still have that document, sir?”

“No, Detective Inspector, but there will be the other routine paperwork involving the transaction.”

“Before you retrieve it for us,” Shepherd said, “what can you tell us about the woman’s appearance?”

“I’m not much good at descriptions,” Brookes confessed, “but I remember that I fancied her at first, begging your pardon, officer. She was slight of build, I’d say about five feet two inches tall, with long blonde hair.” The police officers exchanged glances. “She had beautiful blue eyes. That’s what attracted me initially, apart from her elegance and evident expertise. She was very particular about the concentration of the liquid. But you know that old saying about the eyes being the mirror of the soul. That’s what put me off her. I remember thinking, you’re a cold fish, madam. You see, Detective Inspector, those eyes held no feelings. It’s not hindsight; I felt I wouldn’t like to cross you, young lady. But with what I know now, let’s say, I’m not surprised.”

“Young, you say,” Shepherd seized on the remark. “How old would you say she was?”

“Not sure, but no more than thirty, maybe less.”

“I see. Apart from her eyes, did you notice any particulars? Accent? Distinguishing marks?”

“No tattoos or anything like that. She struck me as too elegant. Pierced ears, though, just normal, she had two round gold earrings about this big.” He held up a finger and thumb like a pincer. “But I didn’t pick up any accent. A well-spoken, educated type.”

“I don’t suppose she gave you any idea of where she was going when she left?”

“No, but I noticed she was driving a black Audi TT. I spotted that because I’ve always longed to own one myself.”

“Registration?”

“Why would I notice that? Sorry, I can’t help there.”

“The paperwork?”

“That, I can do.”

“Already done, Mr Brookes.” The secretary, Stephanie, smiling smugly, gave him a sheaf of papers held together with a paperclip.

“Thanks, Steph, as efficient as ever.”

He pulled off the clip and shuffled through the pages. “Ah, this might be of interest—her signature.” He passed it to Vance, who glanced at it and handed it Shepherd, who whipped out her mobile and photographed the page. “Apart from that, it’s just specification of quantity and sales date, all routine stuff.”

“Show me, please,” Vance said. “Mmm, photograph this, Shep.” He turned to the sales manager. “This concentration,” he pointed to the letters 500 mg/m3, “is that sufficient to kill in the air?”

“Definitely, and quickly, too, if breathed at close quarters. I’d say it would provoke a coma and almost instant heart failure.”

“I think we’re done here. Thank you for your cooperation, Mr Brookes, Ms Johnson. Good day to you.”

“I hope you catch her. She’s got twenty of those phials.”

In the car, Vance said, “I’ll ring Max. We need to know whether there’s a Melanie Bradshaw at Porton Down.”

“She faked the document, Jacob,” Shepherd said with certainty.

“Probably, but if she was once their employee, it’d make life much easier for us.”

Shepherd heard a voice answer. “Max, it’s me. I want you to get on to Porton Down. Find out if they’ve ever employed anyone by the name of Melanie Bradshaw. That’s right. If not, chase up the name and see what you can dig up for me. Thanks.”

Back at headquarters, and three strong coffees later, a knock came at Vance’s door. With an air of triumph, Max Wright sat down uninvited to stare at the inspector with a broad grin on his face.”

“Well, out with it, man!”

“Your intuition was correct, boss. Melanie Bradshaw, research chemist, worked at Porton Down until three months ago. She gave notice of quitting six months ago, correctly worked out her contractual twelve weeks, then rode off into the sunset. My contact at Porton says they have no record of where she went, and interestingly, she didn’t ask anyone for a reference. But I suppose, with a first-class honours degree in Chemistry with Medicinal Chemistry from Imperial College, she shouldn’t find employment hard to obtain.”

“There you are, Shep, I told you, Melanie Bradshaw worked at Porton Down. She would have had plenty of time to get her hands on headed notepaper and pilfer an official rubber stamp.”

Shepherd looked up from studying Ellen Rhodes’s detailed timeline, the tension contorting her otherwise angelic face, “The day after tomorrow, she’ll strike again, and this time it will be a white male in his mid-twenties if our scientific brainbox sticks to Arnold’s schedule.”

“We’ll have to move fast then. Max, did you find anything interesting from her matriculation at Imperial?”

“I looked into that, but she, or someone else, beat us to it. I don’t know if this Melanie has computer skills, but someone had skilfully removed her personal details from Imperial’s records. It looks like our suspect covered her tracks remarkably well. Quite how she breached their system eludes me because it took all my expertise to enter the site. Unless she paid an expert, of course, or bribed someone in their administration, which strikes me as too risky.”

“Shame, but we might just trace her another way. I want you to check ownership of Audi TTs in Greater London. Oh, and Wiltshire since Porton Down is in that county. It’s not such a common model as, say, an A4, so you might have some joy there, Max.”

“I’m onto it, sir.” He rose and fairly sped out of the room.

“I wish all our other staff were as efficient as our geek,” Jacob muttered.

“Ellen’s done a good job. We have a clear overview now of when the killer will strike and the victims’ profiles. It looks like we’re in for a busy month if she’s determined to follow in Arnold’s footprints. It’s a nightmare, Jacob.”

“We won’t let her kill nine people, Brit—all we need is a lucky break.”

“Listening to Max, though, I get the impression that this psycho is more cunning than Arnold Tibbet—and that’s saying something. She’s his bloody sister, after all!”

“We don’t know that.”

“I’d stake next month’s pay cheque on it. Melanie Bradshaw is Bethany Tibbet as far as I’m concerned.”

“Nothing like keeping an open mind, is there, colleague?”

For a moment, her cheeks turned pink, and she didn’t meet his eyes, but then, defiantly, she asked, “Did you put surveillance on the riverside flat?”

“My sergeant’s on it. Do you want me to call Mark?”

“Why not?”

“OK.” He frowned and tapped a number on his mobile. Shepherd heard the faint ringtone of Mark Allen’s phone. “Mark, anything to report?” She listened to the soft drone of the sergeant’s voice since Vance hadn’t thought of using the handsfree mode. Jake’s something of a technosaur. She smiled at her newly-conceived expression: a person too old-fashioned to master technology—a technosaur, as in dinosaur. Vance, whose interest in dinosaurs was unknown to her, would have shocked her had she spoken her thought by informing his colleague that the Technosaurus was a genus of Late Triassic silesaurid dinosauriform.

He ended the call and turned to his sniggering partner. “Mark’s been busy. He’s checked with King Street—the Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham council offices—the apartment is, indeed, registered in the name of Bethany Tibbet, and that’s an interesting point because she made the legal change shortly after Arnold’s death, signing it into her sole ownership. That means, of course, that Bethany exists and your instinct that the blonde among the gravestones was her was probably correct.”

“My instincts never let me down, Jacob. You should know that by now. And I’m telling you that Bethany Tibbet and Melanie Bradshaw are one and the same.”

He looked sceptical. “Mmm, I don’t know. Without belittling your famous intuitions, I’m keeping an open mind on that one. Mark said that according to the council clerk, all Bethany’s local taxes are unimpeachably paid. She pays by standing order. Whilst Mark’s been watching the flat there has been no movement. He phoned the UK Power Networks office and found the same thing: she pays by standing order. But hear this; they told Mark that there had been almost zero consumption in the last quarter. What does that say to you?”

“That Bethany isn’t in residence.”

“Quite! So, I told Mark to put a couple of uniforms on surveillance for forty-eight hours in shifts. They’ve to look out for a black Audi TT and a petite blonde with long hair. If nothing shows up after that time, we’ll call off surveillance.”

“She won’t show, Jacob. She’s too damned cunning for that.”