Chapter 20 Jameson & Brook
Chief Superintendent Wragg decided to write a personal letter to Sweet Dreams Funeral Parlour and not a typed one as he felt it was too officious and final. He decided to put down what he had thought through when he received their letter, mentioning that the Forensic Department would be holding onto the coffin for a while, but also stating that the police could not be responsible for the state of the coffin and therefore it would be in the Company’s own interest to claim from their insurance. He was most apologetic regarding this and he mentioned that his hands were tied dealing with finances and his budget would only allow money to be spent on police business. He signed the letter with his full rank and name, Ian Wragg, to give that personal touch.
Whether it was true about him being able to authorize payment of monies to outside concerns, he was not sure and as the said item was over £300 he decided to throw caution to the wind and say nothing about payment.
He had just finished writing and was placing the letter in the envelope when sergeant Dotrice brought the worse news to him. Wragg dropped everything and went straight to the incident room for a update, although no-one actually knew quite what had happened. Everyone who was anyone was detailed to report at the accident site although it was in two places – a road on top of another. The horror that confronted both Wragg and his posse of policemen was terrifying. Looking up roughly a distance of thirty feet, the concrete edging of the road above was bridged and beneath were Jameson’s and Brook’s mangled bodies underneath the vehicles that were travelling on the lower road. If the fall hadn’t killed them, then vehicles travelling along would not be able to stop in time at fifty miles an hour.
Wragg went to the top road. This was used by traffic that was not going the town. It had a 70 mph limit and apparently a lorry had a tyre burst and had careered out of control straight in the pathway of the two police motorcyclists who had just passed the vehicle on the way to another reported accident. It seems that the vehicles in front of the Jameson and Brook were slowing down and that’s when the accident occurred.
The driver of the lorry had disappeared from the scene and Wragg thought it was a typical hit and run incident. The penalties for killing policemen were in some cases very severe.
Later on the driver of the lorry was found dumped amongst some bushes on a roundabout that joined the two roads up before splitting once more – his throat was cut.
It was obvious to Wragg that this was a planned job to get rid of two men who were part of a team of four motorcyclists and he had a nagging feeling at the back of his mind that Dodd and Lodge were behind it, but proving this was going to be difficult as those two were already at the scene of another road accident. Wragg had to fathom out how it was necessary to call for assistance of Jameson and Brook when the other two were already there. It was a minor incident as a drunk with a bottle of whiskey was jay walking across the by-pass and had been narrowly missed by passing traffic.
Both Dodd and Lodge denied calling for assistance and no call was recorded. It was a puzzle but Wragg knew it was possible that a call had been made, especially when he recalled the name of Dodd on his computer in the office after everything that day was finalised. He confirmed that Raymond Dodd was the brother of Samantha Dodd, the woman who had been murdered. The police hadn’t been able to find the killer, but it was still an open case. Wragg didn’t believe it was the serial killer; it was a separate person paid to do the job and for a fleeting moment Wragg thought it might have been Guy Arnold that had perpetrated the road accident, but luck was on Guy’s side as Wragg learnt from a telephone call he received at the scene of the road accident that Guy was a victim of a shooting incident somewhere in the countryside, almost ten miles away. One thing for sure he couldn’t be in two places at once. Wragg had decided that there was only one suspect, but proof at the moment was going to be difficult.
Wragg had decided he was going to set up his own inquiry into the affairs of P.C Dodd. He knew that probably P.C. Lodge could be persuaded or possibly blackmailed into doing something against the law, but as always, it had to be proved.
His team members he had already picked in his mind. They were Detective Sergeant Luke Dotrice, Detective Sergeant Phillip Stone and his remote friend Detective Inspector Brian Crosby. It was time for him and his cohorts to have a secret meeting somewhere well away from London and in civilian clothing; an old boys outing. He informed his wife Gladys that he would be away all day Saturday meeting up with old friends from the police station he was stationed at. It was going to be a chinwag, catching up with some mates.
‘I suppose you will be drinking as well.’
‘Well, maybe a couple of drinks!’
‘You can sleep in the spare room, I know you, even after a couple of drinks. You snore like a pig!’
Wragg said goodbye to his wife early the following morning and left by taxi to the railway station. There were two pairs of keen eyes watching his progress until he reached his first stop which was inside the railway station. As Wragg alighted from the taxi he casually glanced beyond the outline of the vehicle and spotted Dodd and Lodge on their own motorbikes. They hadn’t realized he had seen them and Wragg knew he was right about both of them and classed them as a couple of bad apples, pity! he thought.