poetic justice in that, Charlie. Thank you.”
He shoved the prisoner hard into the rear of the police van.
“Any room in there for Lord Nelson?” he asked.
THE AMOROUS CORPSE by
I’d been in CID six months when the case of the amorous corpse came up. What a break for a young detective constable: the “impossible” evidence of a near-perfect murder. You’ve probably heard of that Sherlock Holmes story about the dog that didn’t bark in the night-time. Well, this was the corpse that made love in the morning, and I was the super sleuth on the case. I don’t have a Dr Watson to tell it for me, so excuse me for blowing my own trumpet. There’s no other way I can do it.
It began with a 999 call switched through to Salisbury nick at 9.25 one Monday morning. I was in the office waking myself up with a large espresso. My boss, a deadbeat DI called Johnny Horgan, never appeared before 10, so it was up to me to take some action. An incident had just occurred at a sub-post office in a village called Five Lanes, a short drive out of the city. The call from the sub-postmistress was taped, and is quite a classic in its way:
“Police, please… Hello, this is Miss Marshall, the sub-postmistress at Five Lanes. Can you kindly send someone over?”
“What’s the emergency, Miss Marshall?”
“Well, I’ve got a gentleman with a gun here. He asked me to hand over all the money, and I refused. I don’t care for that sort of behaviour.”
“He’s with you now?”
“Yes.”
“Threatening you with a gun?”
“At this minute? Don’t be silly. I wouldn’t be phoning you, would I?”
“He’s gone, then?”
“No. He’s still here as far as I know.”
“In the post office?”
“On the floor, I believe. I can’t see him from where I’m speaking.”
“Are you injured, Miss Marshall?”
“No. I’m perfectly all right, but you’d better send an ambulance for the man.”
I decided CID should be involved from the beginning. Having told the switchboard to inform DI Horgan, I jumped into my Escort and burned rubber all the way to Five Lanes. I’m proud to say I got there two minutes before uniform showed up.
The crime scene was bizarre. The post office door was open. A man lay on the floor in front of the counter with a gun beside him. He was ominously still.
We put tapes across the entrance to stop a queue forming for stamps and I took a deep breath and had a closer look at the git-em-up-guy. He was wearing a mask – not one of those Lone Ranger jobs, but a plastic President Nixon. I eased it away from his face and didn’t care much for what I saw. I can’t handle death scenes. I felt for a pulse. Nothing.
My boss, Johnny Horgan, arrived soon after and took over. He was supposed to be the rising star of Salisbury CID, an inspector at thirty-one, one of those fast-track clever dicks, only two years older than me. “Did you call the hospital?”
“I just got here, guv.”
“The man is obviously dead. What’s the ambulance outside for?”
The sub-postmistress spoke up. “I sent for that.”
DI Horgan phoned for the meat wagon and a pathologist. Meanwhile, we got the full version of the hold-up from Miss Marshall:
“No one was here at the time. The man walked in wearing some kind of mask that made him look very peculiar.”
“Nixon.”
“I beg your pardon.”
“Nixon, the ex-President of America.”
“He didn’t sound like an American. Whoever he is, we don’t walk about wearing masks in Five Lanes, so I was suspicious. He pointed a gun and said, ‘This is a gun.’ I said, ‘I can see that.’ He said, ‘Give us it, then.’”
“How did you respond?”
“I told him not to be ridiculous, to which he replied, ‘Hey, come on. I’ll blow your frigging head off.’”
“He actually said ‘frigging’?”
“I may be unmarried, but I’m not mealy-mouthed, inspector. If he’d said something stronger, I’d tell you.”
“So what did you say to that?”
“I said, ‘Go on. Pull the trigger. You won’t get the money if you do. I’m all locked in. And don’t even think of trying to smash the glass.’ He said, ‘Lady, who do you think you are? It’s not your dosh.’ I said, ‘It’s not yours, either. You’re not having it.’ To which he replied, ‘Jesus, are you simple? This is a stick- up.’”
“What happened then?”
“I led him to believe that I’d pressed an emergency button and the police were already on their way. He said, ‘Frigging hell.’ He took a step back from the counter and I thought for a moment he was about to give up and go away. Then he said, ‘I’m not quitting. I’m not a quitter.’”
“Just like Nixon,” I remarked.
My boss glared at me.
Miss Marshall continued, “He lurched forward again, and I wondered if he was the worse for drink, because he reached for the glass wall of my serving area, as if for support. Then he lowered the gun, I think, and said, ‘Oh, shit.’” She gave Johnny Horgan a look that said how about that for a maiden lady.
“You hadn’t touched him?”
“What are you suggesting? That I assaulted him? I was shut in here.”
“And nobody else was in the shop?”
