Chapter 3: A Headless Organization

Chapter 3: A Headless Organization

After over an hour of interviews, Inspectors Evans and Checchino left Kim Watt’s house in Chelsea and set off back to the station. They talked about their impressions on the way.

“I never thought the notorious Bruno Tartufo would be such a short man!” began Inspector Evans. “Even you’re taller than him, Sandra!”

She gave a little laugh, but kept her eyes fixed on the road. “Don’t be fooled,” she said, “small people can be dangerous.”

“I didn’t like the way he was staring at Kim whenever she spoke,” her colleague continued. “He was intimidating her. Do you think she was telling the truth?”

“People like her are never honest about everything, Gary,” she replied, “but she did take the news about Cooper very badly.”

“For a few moments, maybe, then she was perfectly normal again. I know she says she was at the dog track in Walthamstow all evening, but that closed just after midnight, and she has no alibi for the time of the shooting.”

“Not many people will have an alibi that they can prove, Gary. After all, it was between five and six o’clock in the morning. I’m sure that you and I were asleep like most other people in London, but nobody can prove that either, can they?”

Inspector Evans turned to his colleague and grinned.

“Only because you’ve turned me down so often, Sandra. I know better than to ask you out on a Friday night now.” Inspector Checchino laughed in amusement.

“Oh, come off it! You’re a good friend, but we tried that once, if you remember. It would never work.”

“I know, I know,” he said.

“You can’t blame me for trying, though.”

There was a short pause in the conversation.

“What about Bruno?” he asked.

Inspector Checchino frowned.

“Hmm, yes, what about him?” she agreed. “He didn’t appear at all shocked by the news. And I find it very suspicious that he says he left the nightclub at exactly 5 a.m., don’t you?”

The car came to a halt at some red traffic lights, and she looked Inspector Evans in the eye. “Moments before Cooper was killed,” he agreed, scratching his chin. “But Bruno says that his boss was expecting a visitor and that he wanted to be alone when that person arrived. That’s why he left the club at that time.”

“So he says, yes,” sighed Inspector Checchino. “I don’t believe that story for a second. It’s very convenient for Bruno, isn’t it?”

Inspector Evans nodded slowly. “It is, yes. But it could be convenient for us that we found him at Kim Watt’s house today. According to Omar, she was going out with Cooper, wasn’t she? So, what do you think she was doing with Bruno on a Saturday afternoon?”

Back at the police station, the two detectives met Superintendent Fisher to discuss their findings. She listened to everything they had to say, but she was not interested in the smaller details: her favourite football club Arsenal was playing at 5:30 p.m., and she was planning to watch the game from start to finish.

“Let’s be realistic,” she said. “Although it’s very likely, we still don’t have any solid proof that Cooper didn’t kill himself. And it won’t be hard to find a lot of people who had a good reason to want that man dead. I’m sure even you two are pleased that he’s gone.”

“You’re right, ma’am,” said Inspector Evans. “And although we’ve collected some statements from the people nearest to him today, it will take a few days to compare what they’ve said against whatever evidence there is.”

“Right,” she said. “So let’s call it a day and enjoy what’s left of the weekend.”

Inspector Checchino remained quiet and followed Inspector Evans out of the superintendent’s office.

On Monday morning, Inspector Checchino arrived at work a good hour before Inspector Evans. She had not been able to sleep well, and she wanted to see what developments had taken place over the weekend. An incident room had been set up at the station to collect all the information related to Stanley Cooper’s death. The inspector was in there reading through the reports when her colleague finally turned up.

“So, have you heard?” she asked her colleague, her face red with anger.

“Good morning, Sandra! Nice to see you, too,” he said ironically. “It’s not like you to be here before me on a Monday.”

“Sorry. Good morning, Gary,” she smiled. “Well, have you?”

“Obviously not. What have you got for me?”

“To begin with, there was an arson attack at Lust late last night. The fire brigade think that someone broke a window and set fire to a can of petrol. You saw all the soft furniture in there: it went up like a match. The fire’s destroyed everything inside.”

“What?! How did that happen? Didn’t we have an officer guarding the club all weekend?”

“Only until the club manager locked up after the forensics team had finished investigating the scene,” Inspector Checchino explained. “That was on Saturday evening.”

“I see,” Inspector Evans said.

“And do you have any idea why someone might want to burn down one of Cooper’s clubs?”

“Well, it was too late to destroy the evidence. My first thought was that Omar Omari might have had something to do with it, but then I read these.”

She passed Inspector Evans a pile of paper.

“Three people in the north of the city have reported the theft of their greyhounds. Altogether we have six expensive racing dogs to find.”

“Why should we care about some kidnapped dogs?” he asked. Then he remembered. “I suppose I don’t need to ask what connects these animals to Stanley Cooper, should I?”

“Probably not, no,” said Inspector Checchino. “The owners race them at Cooper’s track in Walthamstow. And, as we learnt on Saturday, Kim Watt is the manager there.”

“What do we know about the owners - are they friends?”

“One of them is Kim’s brother. The other two were close friends of Cooper’s. And when I say ‘friends’, I mean that both were in his gang.”

“Ah. But why would someone target the dogs and not the people?” asked DI Evans.

“Well, for a start, each greyhound is worth at least 40,000 pound’s. And all six are meant to be racing at an event tonight, so it will be very bad for business if they aren’t there.”

“Sorry if I’m being a bit slow,” he replied, “but what do these dogs have to do with the fire at Lust? What’s the connection?”

Inspector Checchino took the papers back and put them on the desk.

“I think it was a symbolic act,” she said. “It’s typical for gangs. Just think about it: Lust was Cooper’s most prestigious nightclub, and it’s where all the best DJs went to play. Whoever the killer was, he didn’t only want to kill the king, he wanted to destroy his palace, too. Kidnapping the dogs adds insult to injury for Cooper’s gang. If we find the dogs, we will probably find our killer,”

“You may have a good point there, Sandra. But I need to wake up properly with a coffee before looking at this more closely. Can I get you one, too?”

Nobody knew exactly how many security cameras there were in the city of London, but there were a lot. There were cameras on every main road and in every underground station; they were also installed on every bus to fight vandalism, terrorism and other crimes.

A team of junior officers were watching the camera footage from all of the night buses that left Trafalgar Square for Finchley in North London early on Saturday morning. It was a boring job, but it was the only way to find out if Omar Omari was telling the truth: he had told the police that he could not remember exactly which bus he had taken, but that he normally got on the 134 or the N13.

Meanwhile, Inspectors Evans and Checchino were reviewing the videos from Lust. There was a lot of footage on the hard disk from Friday night.

Finally, they saw Bruno Tartufo leave the building just before 5 a.m. The recording was turned off five minutes later.

“I don’t believe it!” cried Inspector Evans. “He really did leave the club before Cooper was shot!”

“Hmm…,” his colleague said quietly, “but did he return?”

They repeated the last ten minutes of footage in Cooper’s office. It was a strange feeling to watch the monitor.

Inspector Checchino thought it was as if one of the dead had come back to life and was walking around the room.

The two detectives watched Cooper point to the door, at which point the short Italian man turned and left the room. Cooper then took out his mobile phone and made a call that lasted only a few seconds. He was smiling. After he put his phone back into his pocket, he waddled up to the computer in the corner, looked up at the camera, and the screen went black.

“He turned off the recording himself!” she exclaimed in surprise. “Why would he do that?”

“I’d say it’s fairly obvious that he was about to do something that he wanted to keep secret,” replied Inspector Evans dryly. “What do you mean?”

“Well, it could have been anything. A secret business deal, a meeting with an important drug trafficker… maybe even a meeting with a mystery lady friend?”

Inspector Checchino laughed.

“A mystery woman? Do you really think that someone as unattractive and disgusting as Stanley Cooper could manage two women?”

He was about to reply when one of the junior officers shouted across the room: “I’ve found him!”

She had identified the bus that Omar Omari got onto after work on Saturday morning. The club manager had been correct that it was the 134 to Finchley, but he had got the time wrong. According to the clock on the screen, it was already 5:30 a.m. when he left Trafalgar Square.

“A whole hour later?” Inspector Checchino thought aloud. “A lot can happen in sixty minutes…”