“If you’d like to take a seat in the waiting area,” Patricia told him, frostily. “I’ll print out the information you require. We will, of course, require a receipt.”
Of course,” White said, wondering if she planned to suck any more lemons while she was out of the room.
When he was alone with the receptionist, the atmosphere immediately became friendlier. “You know, it’s strange that Dr Sadler didn’t recognise those women’s names,” she said, lowering her voice conspiratorially.
“Is it?” Charlie asked. “Why’s that?”
“Well, Ms Pilkington, was always coming in here and making a right nuisance of herself. Between you and me,” she said, looking around to make sure they couldn’t be overheard, “she was a vile woman. She was always drunk, and she had such a foul mouth on her.”
White raised an eyebrow. “Interesting,” he said. “And what did Dr Sadler think of her?”
“Oh, he couldn’t stand her,” Doreen said. “He was always complaining that once she was in his office, he couldn’t get her out, and sometimes she was up there with him for absolute ages.”
Is that a fact?”
“Oh yes,” Doreen confirmed. “God knows why he didn’t strike her off the surgery register. She did more than enough to justify his refusing to treat her anymore.”
Perhaps it was because the randy old sod was sticking more than his thermometer in her mouth when he was examining her? White kept the thought to himself.
◆◆◆
The day passed by uneventfully, and with Daylight Savings Time having ended on 31st October, the clocks had gone back an hour, so it was almost dark by five-o’clock.
There had been intermittent showers during the early afternoon, but they had finally cleared up and it looked like it was going to stay dry for Bonfire Night.
Although a lot of the organised displays weren’t taking place until tomorrow evening, it wasn’t long before the fireworks started. They were sporadic at first; just a few Bangers and Rockets, but by eight-o’clock the racket was almost incessant as the night sky was repeatedly lit up by explosions of bright colour.
Tyler and Dillon were oblivious to what was going on outside as they sat in the office, going through the information that had come in during the day. Unfortunately, there was nothing to get them even remotely excited.
Deakin’s buddy from Complaints had given them everything he had on Sadler, which was basically a copy of what the GMC had given him. It took them precisely nowhere.
The GMC had confirmed that an anonymous female had rung them at 13:00 hours on Wednesday 27th October. Refusing to provide any personal details, she had made a rushed allegation and then hung up. The voice had sounded muffled, as though the caller had wrapped a handkerchief or something around the mouthpiece to disguise her voice. The only good news was that the GMC did, in fact, have a note of the incoming number. The call had been made from a 020 number, which meant it had originated from within the Greater London area.
Reggie, the team’s resident phone expert, had already submitted a subscriber check, but that wouldn’t come back in until Monday at the earliest. This was because the SPOC – Single Point of Contact – at the Telephone Investigation Unit was unwilling to treat it as a priority submission. Apparently, he had explained, it didn’t meet the criteria laid out in their Standard Operating Procedures.
The GMC had made some enquiries into Sadler’s prescribing history following the accusation, but nothing untoward had been revealed.
According to the investigator at the GMC, Sadler had been qualified for nearly twenty-years, and had been on the FME approved list for five. He had an impeccable record, and in the absence of any additional material to corroborate it, this allegation was likely to be resulted as malicious and unfounded.
Despite what Charlie had told them upon his return from the doctor’s surgery this morning, Jack knew they didn’t have enough grounds to interview Sadler.
What they had against him was so flimsy that it would be stretching the imagination to even consider using the term ‘circumstantial evidence’ to describe it: An anonymous woman had complained that he was receiving sexual favours in exchange for prescribing controlled drugs to prostitutes and drug addicts a few days before the first murder occurred – not that his prescribing history in any way supported that claim; he just happened to be the GP for two of the New Ripper’s victims; he had claimed not to recognise Alice Pilkington’s name or her photograph, although his receptionist was adamant that the sex worker often came in to see Dr Sadler and spent ages his office each time she visited.
Sadler and his legal representative would simply laugh at them if they interviewed him on the basis of that. No, unless supporting evidence came to light over the coming days, they wouldn’t be going anywhere near Dr Sadler.
All they could do now was hope the subs check would identify a telephone kiosk that was covered by local authority CCTV, and that this would provide them with footage of whoever made the call. Even then, unless it transpired that the caller was Pilkington or Rye their enquiries would hit a brick wall.
“This is so frustrating,” Jack complained. “I feel like we’re just wasting valuable time and resources following this Sadler allegation up.”
“We don’t have a choice, mate,” Dillon told him.
“I know,” Jack snapped, “but it seems to me that all we do at the moment is chase shadows and grasp at straws.”
“Jack,” Dillon soothed, “we’re working in strict compliance with the Murder Manual framework, and we’re doing everything that’s humanly possible to find the bastard who’s murdering these women. Over the past few days we’ve taken a stack of statements, and we’ve seized a tonne of CCTV. God alone knows how long it’s going to take Paul Evans to view all that footage. We’re pursuing multiple lines of enquiries relating to telephone numbers, financial histories, and various vehicles that have been seen in the
