LONDON — JUNE 6, 1943
“Well, well. We haven’t heard from the Ligature Killer in two years.”
Detective Constable Gerald Warren stared at the naked body of the rotund man that lay face-up in the middle of the double-sized bed. The room, like the rest of the flat, seemed on the shabby side for Mayfair.
“Two years, four months, ten days,” replied Detective Inspector Daniel Gale. “January 27, if I remember correctly.”
Warren blushed in front of the Divisional Police Surgeon who had finished his inspection of the body and was about to leave.
“It was in Hackney!” Warren said, as if that might help him recover some stature.
Gale nodded and waited for the young man to give the exact location. But Warren, after scrunching his face in an effort at remembrance, shrugged.
“Sorry, sir. Don’t remember exactly.”
“Mrs. Ketcham’s lodging house. Dunloe Street. Second floor, third bedroom on the right.”
Warren’s smile was grim. “That’s why you’re the Detective Inspector and why I’m going to be a Detective Constable until I retire in 1986.”
Although he wasn’t in the mood, Gale chuckled to make Warren feel better.
“All right, Detective Constable, take a look at our friend here and tell us what you detect.”
He turned to the Police Surgeon. “That all right, George? You’ve certified, I take it?”
Dr. George Palmer nodded. “A pathologist is on his way over. Professor Marsden, they said.”
“Oh good.” In addition to being one of the Home Office’s best pathologists, Marsden taught at King’s College London. “Thanks, George.”
After Palmer turned and left the bedroom, Gale said, “Okay, Warren. Until the Prof gets here, take a look. But don’t touch, obviously.”
“Right, sir.”
Gale was unable to suppress a smile as his assistant approached the bed. Warren kept his hands in his trouser pockets as if they might inadvertently touch something. He stood, leaning over the body.
Although the man on the bed seemed to be in his early thirties, his hair was prematurely balding. The only other distinguishing feature was the olive complexion of his skin.
“Foreigner,” said Warren.
Gale nodded. “Anything else?”
“None of the typical signs of asphyxia, sir.” Warren bent over the bed, inspecting the dead man’s face. A woman’s silk stocking, tied with a single knot, was wrapped at least twice around the neck of the corpse. Sightless eyes stared at the ceiling.
Gale turned to the body on the bed. Warren was correct but wanted the boy to use his mind to reason it out.
“Such as?”
“His lips and ears aren’t blue. No bloodstaining around the nose or mouth.”
Gale nodded. “His hands are clenched, though. And the nails have changed color.”
Warren moved his eyes down the torso and Gale realized the younger man had missed the obvious telltale signs because of embarrassment at the proximity of the exposed genitals.
He removed a fountain pen from his jacket and handed it to Warren. “Look under his eyelids.”
Warren brought his face inches from the dead man’s and with a delicate touch of the pen, raised the corpse’s left eyelid.
“Ah, yes. I see ’em. Tiny asphyxial hemorrhages.”
Warren stood upright and turned to Gale. “So it looks like he’s back. And we all figured he’d been killed in the Blitz.”
Indeed, thought Gale. The so-called Ligature Killer—the phrase was, inevitably, the work of the newspapers—had strangled three men in a twelve-month period shortly after the war began. Everyone at the Yard figured such a type would continue until he was stopped, but when a year passed without another body being discovered with the characteristic silk stocking around the neck, they assumed a Luftwaffe bomb had done the executioner’s work for him.
And yet ...
Something was not quite right. The three previous victims were all much younger than this man on the bed. One was a university student and the other two were barely out of their teens. And each was strikingly handsome. Investigations had determined that none of them were homosexual. And that was one line of speculation at the Yard: the victims had refused the advances of the killer and had paid with their lives for that rejection.
Gale’s thoughts were interrupted by voices outside in the living room. He recognized Benson, the constable stationed at the front door. The voice was raised, which was puzzling. The pathologist would have identification papers and should have no obstacle to entering the flat. Then Gale heard another voice, even louder, clearly arguing. What the devil was going on out there?
The bedroom door burst open. In strode a man, sandy-haired, tall, and although dressed in a tailored summer suit, Gale sensed immediately he was—or at some point in his life had been—a military officer.
“Don’t touch a damned thing!” the stranger snapped to the two detectives.
A mere five words, thought Gale, and the man’s history—Eton, Sandhurst, privilege, entitlement—was obvious. Thank God none of the senior men at the Yard displayed such attitudes. Professionals all, men of middle- or lower-middle class, who had put in their shifts and made their way up through sheer talent, charisma, and hard, bloody work. No true copper, even at the top, got where he was through inheritance or acquaintances. Gale detested men like this man in general and he instantly detested this one in particular.
“Who the fuck are you?” he asked. Gale sensed the surprised reaction of Warren next to him. He seldom used the vulgarities of the street and when he did, it was for deliberate purpose—coming from such a seemingly mild-manned man, it was intended to shock, to make the person being confronted wonder: What else could such a placid person be capable of?
The stranger strode—almost marched—towards Gale. He snapped up his right arm, placing a document in front of the detective’s face. Presumably it was still in his hand after already showing it to Benson outside.
“MI5,” he said.
Gale blinked, genuinely surprised. He glanced at the identification card. He had seen the like before, but even if he hadn’t, he believed the man was telling the truth.
“What is MI5 doing here?”
The stranger pointed to the corpse on the bed.
“He’s the commercial attaché at the Portuguese Embassy. And he just might be a bloody Nazi spy.”