Not Dead Enough

Dorset countryside and Prince Harry cavorting on a beach with an enviably pretty girl. All the nation’s news editors were hungry for a big story, and what better than the murder of a wealthy, beautiful woman?
    The conference room for the morning press briefing he had called had been so tightly packed that some reporters had been left out in the corridor. He kept it short and tight, because he didn’t have a lot to tell them at this stage. No new information had come in overnight, and the earlier team briefing had been more about assigning tasks for the day than assessing any developments.
    The one message he did put across clearly, to the sea of forty or so faces of press and media reporters and photographers in the room, was that the police were anxious to trace Mrs Bishop’s recent movements, and they would like to hear from any members of the public who might have seen her during the previous few days. The press were to be issued with a set of photographs Grace had chosen from the Bishops’ house, most of them from a montage of action pictures. One showed the dead woman in a bikini on a powerboat, another at the wheel of her convertible BMW, and in another she wore a long dress and a hat at a smart race meeting – Ascot or Epsom, Grace guessed.
    He had chosen these photographs very carefully, knowing that they would appeal to news editors. They were the kind of pictures readers liked to feast their eyes on – the beautiful woman, the fast, glamorous lifestyle. With acres of column inches to fill, Grace knew they would be used. And wide coverage just might jog the memory of one key witness out there somewhere.
    He slipped away quickly at the end, anxious to call Cleo before going into a further interview with Brian Bishop, which was scheduled for midday, leaving Dennis Ponds, the senior police public relations officer, to distribute the photographs. But only yards before reaching the security door leading through to the sanctuary of his office, he heard his name called out. He turned, and was irritated to see that the young Argus crime reporter, Kevin Spinella, had followed him.
    ‘What are you doing here?’ Grace said.
    Spinella leaned against a wall, close to a display board on which was pinned a flow chart headed M URDER I NVESTIGATION M ODEL , an insolent expression on his sharp face, chewing gum, holding his black notebook open and a pen in his hand. Today he had on a cheap, dark suit that he seemed to have not quite yet grown into, a white shirt that was also too big for him and a purple tie with a large, clumsy knot. His short hair had that fashionable, mussed, just-got-up look.
    ‘I wanted to ask you something in private, Detective Superintendent.’
    Grace held his security card up to the lock. The latch clicked and he pulled open the door. ‘I’ve just said everything I have to say to the press at the conference. I’ve no further comment at this stage.’
    ‘I think you have,’ Spinella said, his smug expression irritating Grace even more now. ‘Something you omitted.’
    ‘Then speak to Dennis Ponds.’
    ‘I would have raised it at the conference,’ Spinella said, ‘but you wouldn’t have thanked me for it. The thing about the gas mask?’
    Grace spun round, shocked, taking a step towards the reporter, letting the door click shut again behind him. ‘What did you say?’
    ‘I heard there was a gas mask discovered at the murder scene – that it might have been used by the killer – some kinky ritual or something?’
    Grace’s brain raced. He was seething with anger, but venting it now wasn’t going to help. This had happened before. A couple of months back, on another case, a vital piece of information about something found at a crime scene and withheld from the press – in that case a beetle – had been leaked to the Argus . Now it seemed it had happened again. Who was responsible? The problem was it could have been anyone. Although the information had been withheld from the press conference, half of Sussex Police would already know about it.
    Instead of shouting at Spinella, Grace stared at the man, sizing him up. He was a smart lad and crime was clearly his thing. Quite likely in a year or two he would move on from this local paper to a bigger one, maybe to a national; there was nothing to be gained from making an enemy of him.
    ‘OK, I appreciate your not raising it at the conference.’
    ‘Is it true?’
    ‘Are we on the record or off?’
    Spinella shrewdly closed his