The Samsara Project, David Burgess [most popular ebook readers txt] 📗

get extra cream.” She smiled.
“Sounds good to me,” said Pat, “extra cream it is. And could we have two more drinks please?”
“Certainly, I’ll bring them over and put them on your bill.”
“I’m impressed,” said John.
“Thank you,” replied Pat, “I think it’s a plan.”
“I’m impressed with the service Pat, with Shirley, the waitress.”
“Ohh,” he said, “The service.”
“The plans interesting to, but I’m intrigued as to how I fit in?”
Pat lowered his voice as the couple from the next table stood up to leave. As they walked past Pat he kept quiet.
“We need someone we can trust to do the DNA test, someone we have absolute faith in.” said Pat when the couple were no longer in ear shot.
“Peter,” said John, “you want me to ask Peter?”
“Why not, he’s perfect. We can trust him. He’s one of the Country’s top experts in DNA research. If anyone can help, he can. If he says it’s a match, it’s a match”
“And if he says it isn’t?”
“Then we’ve saved ourselves a lot of embarrassment.”
John thought about it for a minute, “What excuse could I give? I can hardly tell the truth. Brother-in-Law or not I’d be escorted out of his lab quicker than you can say ‘DNA match’”
“You’re a journalist, you’re good at improvising. You’ll think of something. Have we got a plan?”
“I’ve no choice have I. Anyway, it’s time I had a trip up to Liverpool. I’ll give him a ring this evening and drive up in the morning.”
Pat rubbed his hands together. “It’s a plan.”
Shirley re-appeared. “Two Black Forests with extra cream and two fresh drinks enjoy”
Pat and John stayed in the Three Horseshoes for another hour.
The two left the pub and walked over to Pat’s car, the blood samples were in the boot of his metallic blue, year old Freelander. Pat opened the tailgate and took out a medium sized blue coloured picnic cooler box. Secure inside were the blood samples they hoped would prove their theory. Pat handed the cooler box over to John. “Take care of these John, they’re all we have.”
“I know.” He said, “Don’t worry; they’ll be safe with me. I’ll keep in touch; don’t switch your mobile off.”
“I won’t” he replied, “I’ll be waiting for your call.”
“What do you want from this Pat?”
“For now, John, I just want to know once and for all if what we think is true, is true. Then we’ll either think of ourselves as two gullible fools or try and figure out how to convince DCS Hughes he is actually trying to find ‘Jack the Ripper’.
John nodded and with that, the two men went their separate ways.

* * * *

The intercom buzzed on DCS Hughes’s desk. “Yes Tracy,”
“DI Bales is here to see you sir.”
”I’ll see him in a minute Tracy, ask him to wait please.”
Tracy turned to DI Bales. “Have a seat please Detective Inspector. DCS Hughes will be with you shortly.
DCS Hughes did not have to let DI Hughes wait. He just wanted to make him ‘sweat’ a little beforehand. News of Ron Billington’s accident reached DCS Hughes shortly after it happened. He had personally gone to the hospital to try and interview Ron to try and find out what had happened. He did not know until he arrived that Ron Billington had been pronounced ‘Dead on Arrival’.
As soon as he had arrived back at New Scotland Yard DCS Hughes had requested immediate access to Ron Billington’s interview tapes as well as the CCTV surveillance tapes from cameras outside New Scotland Yard. Due to their length he was unable to listen to the content of the interview tapes in full. The sections he did listen to though had given him a very good insight into the state of Ron Billington’s mind as he walked out of New Scotland Yard. DCS Hughes was not a happy man, he wanted answers and a part of him felt like giving DI Bales as hard a grilling as he had given Ron Billington.
The Superintendent pressed a button on his desk. “Yes sir?” answered Tracy.
“Send in DI Bales please Tracy, oh and Tracy, no refreshments or interruptions.”
Tracy looked over to DI Bales, “Detective Inspector, the Chief Superintendent will see you now.”
DI Bales stood up and walked past Tracy into the office. DCS Hughes was sat behind his desk flicking through some papers. He made the Inspector wait in front of his desk until he was ready. “Ron Billington, you interviewed him this morning for over three hours with DC Wilding.”
“I did sir.”
“You are aware DI Bales that Ron Billington is dead, run over outside the station by a route master bus.”
“I am sir, a terrible accident Tragic.”
“That’s all you have to say on the subject is it DI Bales? Tragic”
DCS Hughes had not asked DI Bales to sit he decided to leave him standing. Make him feel slightly uncomfortable. DCS Hughes leaned back in his chair and studied DI Bales face. No emotion, no sadness at what had happened and DCS Hughes determined any guilt.
“Let me make sure I’ve got this straight in my mind” said DCS Hughes in his gruff Yorkshire accent. “This morning Ron Billington, at your request had identified the body of his long time girlfriend Suzie Reeves. He did this only an hour or so after finding out she had been brutally murdered on the night he was due to propose to her. From all accounts she would have, without hesitation, said yes. You then ask him to meet you here at New Scotland Yard because you wanted to ask him a few questions, get a little background on Suzie Hughes, right so far?”
“Yes sir, I asked”
DI Bales did not get any further as DCS Hughes abruptly told him to be quiet. “You’ll get your chance later. Let me tell you DI Bales I have listened to the tapes of the so called interview you carried out with DC Wilding. I have to say I have never been so appalled at what I heard. You brought in a man, in an already vulnerable state and subjected him, without the benefit of counsel, to three hours of what I can only describe a verbal police brutality.”
”I object to that sir”
DCS Hughes stood up and looked DI Hughes squarely in the face. “Do not interrupt me again DI Bales, and, bear in mind that I am giving you far more of an opportunity to defend yourself than you and your DC gave Ron Billington. He had no chance once the two of you laid into him with your pre planned assault. Do not be under any illusion DI Bales, as far as I am concerned you may have well have pushed him in front of that bus. It may have been better if you had because then he may have had a slight chance of some justice. As it is he probably won’t.”
DCS Hughes sat down again. “Don’t speak.” He snapped.
“You are aware there will be a coroner’s inquest into the death?”
“Yes Sir”
“If requested, I will have no option but to hand over the interview tapes, in their entirety. You do know those tapes will hang the two of you. That interview has already ended a young man’s life. At some point in the future they’ll probably end two careers as well. The two of you are going to need a miracle to get yourselves out of this one. I suggest you go and find one. That’s all.”
DCS Hughes then picked up some more papers from his desk and started to read them. DI Bales knew it was better to say nothing. He turned around and walked out of the office.

* * * *

It was seventeen minutes past five and Andrew Cleaver was in Burger King, enjoying a double bacon whopper with large fries and a regular cola when his phone text alert went off. The sound of the William Tell Overture could be heard in the restaurant as Andrew struggled to retrieve the message. He had been intending for some time now to change the text tone but had never got around to doing it. If he was honest with himself he quite like the ring tone, Andrew always considered the height of intelligence was to listen to the William Tell Overture and think of the Lone Ranger.
Andrew was holding his phone in his left hand and his burger in the other. The text message was from Geoffrey Adamson, the private detective he had met earlier in the day.
The text read ‘Please call as soon as possible to arrange meeting, preferably today.’ Andrew took a bit from his burger and as he was chewing it dialled Adamson’s number. The call was answered by the very efficient Sylvia. Andrew explained about the text message he had just received and was immediately put through to Geoffrey Adamson.
“Hello Andrew, thanks for calling, you got my text then?”
“Yes, just now. You have some news for me?”
“I have, but not over the phone. How soon can you get over here?”
Andrew made a quick mental calculation. Ten minutes to finish my food, quick wash up in the gents, taxi ride. “I can be with you within the hour.”
“That’s fine, see you then.”
Geoffrey hung up leaving Andrew wondering what he had managed to find out.
Andrew called John to bring him up to date. He had not heard from John since they spoke on the telephone earlier. The call was answered on the first ring. Andrew listened as John brought up to date with most of what had happened at his meeting with Pat. John though did miss out the part about testing Jack the Rippers blood for a DNA match. John did say that he was going to Liverpool the next day, possibly for a day or two and for Andrew to keep in touch. John also asked Andrew to check again for anything that might explain why the original Jack the Ripper murders stopped. At the end of the call Andrew hung up and wondered why John was so fixed on the original killings. “Must be some reason,” he thought.
Andrew knocked on the door of Adamson’s detective agency six minutes earlier than he had expected. His taxi driver had made excellent progress through the busy streets of London. Andrew had been glad though that he was in the taxi and not one of the other drivers on the road who had the misfortune to be in the way of his taxi. The driver certainly had been a ‘man on a mission’.
Sylvia showed Andrew into Geoffrey’s office. Tea and coffee was already laid out as well as a good selection of fresh cream cakes. “Geoffrey certainly knows how to look after his clients” Andrew thought.
Both men were sat in the same chairs as they had done at their morning meeting. Andrew wondered if this was coincidence or territorial, he thought it best not to ask.
“Andrew,” said Geoffrey, I have a few bits of information for you. First of all, did you know that Ron Billington was killed this morning?”
“No, I had no idea,” replied Andrew. “Was he murdered as well?”
“No, apparently he was hit by a bus outside New Scotland Yard. I heard he was called in for an interview this morning and that they gave him quite a hard time.”
Andrew shook his head.
“The other piece of information is a bit more interesting.”
Andrew looked up. “Go on,” he said.
“Suzie Reeves or Natallia Kolinsky, to give to woman her real name came into the UK some