New Tricks s09e01 Episode Script
A Death in the Family
Whoa! Ah! I'm sorry, when was this? The fourth of January, 1851.
Don't look at me.
This one's mine.
Sandra's starting from the same place you are.
And that means it jumps the queue? It's a day's work.
Everything else can wait a day.
You all right with this? I'm listening, Gerry.
Thank you, Sandra.
Though I am the ranking officer, Gerry, so "being all right with it" isn't a prerequisite.
Tell that to Jack.
If he decides to grace us with his presence, I will.
Abigale Padua.
She was bludgeoned to death by an unknown assailant.
A hundred and sixty-odd years ago.
Yes.
So why the sudden urgency? Is it always like this? Yes.
But they do have a point.
I assume you're not suggesting that Abigale Padua's killer is still at large? I just need UCOS to spend the day on this case.
Why? It's been requested.
And it's not a request I'm in a position to refuse.
Sorry, Sandra, usually I'd tell you more but Inspector George Renfield was the investigating officer.
This is his report.
It is the only copy in existence so I Sorry, everybody! Everything all right, Jack? Yes, yes, my bank Manager.
Had a meeting first thing and Oh, it It overran.
Sorry I'm late.
Since when did you have meetings with your bank manager? Since when did you become an authority on my comings and goings? My bank manager's got it in for me.
No, that's your tailor.
Is this a new one? Hardly.
Because I've been thinking about the Kirby business and I think we need to go back to the stepdaughter.
No, no, no.
The stepdaughter's in the clear.
Only for her alibi, and I reckon there's a hole Is this supposed to be a crime scene picture? What idiot took these? They're daguerreotypes.
They're what? Well, it's old photography.
Victorian.
murder of a woman named You're kidding! .
.
Abigale Padua.
I see and you're afraid this bloke might strike again? If I could get beyond saying this woman's name this morning, THAT would be David Kirby's killer is alive and well, and we have a chance of catching her.
This is a day's work, Jack.
Well, when we have a spare day, we'll give it all our attention.
Coffee, Jack? He's had enough coffee.
Sandra? If you could come back here please, Brian? Kettle's not long been boiled, it's a waste of energy just to leave it.
Quite right.
And we wouldn't want to be careless with the kind of energy that's generated in this room.
Black, one sugar.
If it's real, of course.
I'm sorry, who are you? This is Stephen Fisher.
Stephen - Sandra Pullman.
The bloke from Intelligence? Or thereabouts.
How did you get down here without an escort? Oh, bless.
It's instant.
Instant coffee Sorry.
I'll blink, shall I? I find these games a little tedious.
I'll pass on the coffee, thank you, Mr Lane.
I asked him down here, Sandra.
The Abigale Padua case came from Stephen.
Yes, how's that going? Barely started.
Oh, really? I thought I was running late.
Not to worry.
May I? Abigale Padua.
Beaten to death in an alley in the city of London on the night of the fourth of January, 1851.
Did that sound sufficiently "police-y"? Miss Padua was something of a whiz with numbers, a "computer" in the parlance of Victorian times.
Literally someone who computes.
Rather unusual for a woman to do that, but it seems she had an uncommon gift for it.
She worked for the family business, which was run by her brother, Sidney, both parents having died some years previously.
To all intents and purposes, Miss Padua's death looks like a violent robbery.
Money and jewellery were even removed from her person by the killer.
But, a few weeks after she died, a new investment package the Padua's had been marketing went belly-up, ruining a lot of well-placed, influential members of London society.
And Inspector Renfield, who was in charge of the investigation, came to believe there might be more to Miss Padua's demise than met the eye.
Unfortunately, he was unable to reach any firm conclusions.
And you think that we, without any new witnesses to interview, no new evidence, will succeed where he failed? That's what you do, isn't it? And there is new evidence.
What Renfield didn't know at the time, because the various sections of the Metropolitan Police Force didn't work in such beautiful harmony as they do now, was that a man named Joseph Gleick, who had been Abigale Padua's mathematics tutor and who subsequently became her mentor, lost his life in a house fire later that same night.
There are several other interesting commonalities, I'm sure your well-honed instincts will root them out very quickly.
Sir, there are a couple of ongoing cases that frankly should Those cases are on hold as of now.
Abigale Padua is the priority.
This is a burn-bag.
At the conclusion of your investigation, everything you've discovered any notes you've made, documents you've sourced, together with the original copy of Renfield's report and the various other items in the case file will be placed in here to be incinerated by me.
Are you serious? Oh, dear, has my reputation as a prankster preceded me? Shove it.
We don't take orders from you.
Jack And we don't take orders from you, either.
Sandra does, we're all retired.
We work on cases where there's at least a chance of nicking someone.
And there's plenty of those to keep us busy.
So you can shove it.
Jack, if I decide this is a UCOS case No, no, Robert, Mr Halford makes a perfectly fair point.
Mr Halford, Mr Standing, Mr Lane - you're excused.
You can't fire us either.
I wouldn't dream of it.
I will, however, need your desks for a day or two, so that I can draft in some new officers to work with Detective Superintendent Pullman.
When this is all over, you'll be free to resume your duties.
Fine by me.
If you could just leave behind a cheque for £17,433, Mr Standing, I'll see it gets to the Inland Revenue.
You what? The tax due on your undeclared earnings over the past 30 years.
Are you threatening me? Actually, perhaps it would best if you all stay after all.
We wouldn't want any of our guilty little secrets coming to light, would we? Mr Lane? Mr Halford? Bollocks.
Excellent.
I'll require hourly reports.
That's your office, Detective Superintendent? Yes.
Robert? Grumpy lot, aren't they? Did they expect you to stick up for them, do you think? I don't know.
But you didn't.
They were right.
They do have several active cases.
This is important.
Why? You don't think I'm entitled to know why you're requisitioning my team? I KNOW you're not entitled to know.
The vast difference in our security clearance levels tells me that.
I really don't mean to keep you, Robert, you should feel free to go about your day.
And leave you in charge? I think I'll stay.
Maybe it's an academic exercise, you know, some kind of test.
Testing what? I don't know.
Our ability to take shit from superiors? When was that ever in doubt? Question is, why is Fisher so interested in a Victorian murder mystery? That's what I want to know and I bet the answer lies somewhere in this case.
It is an interesting one, computers being people, rather than machines.
All these financial institutions trusting incredibly complex calculations to human beings like Abigale Padua.
Whereas now they use actual computers, and we know where THAT'S got them.
She must have had an incredible brain, is what I'm saying.
Maybe that's why she was killed? Well, if we find out who did it, we could have a seance and ask him.
Well at least we know what he looked like witnesses reported seeing a woman matching Abigale Padua's description being chased through the streets shortly before she was murdered.
There was a coachman in Threadneedle Street who gave a description of the man chasing her.
Said he was tall and slim, wearing a dark coat and a black hat.
In my mental image of Victorian London, they all look like that.
But there was a night watchman called Thomas Quinn, who worked in a building adjacent to the alley where Abigale Padua was killed, who also claimed to have seen a tall, thin man dressed in black emerging from the alleyway a few moments later.
And then the Southwark police claimed that a man matching the same description was seen later that night in the vicinity of Joseph Gleick's house, just before it burned to the ground.
Although, of course Renfield wasn't to know that at the time, because nobody had made the connection between the two deaths.
Brilliant! We're looking for a tall dark stranger who's been dead for a hundred years! You're very quiet over there, Jack.
I want to tell you all something.
What is it? I was going to tell you first thing, then this nonsense with Fisher happened.
I'm leaving.
You what? I'm leaving UCOS.
I'm retiring.
Retiring again.
Why? Well, I just think it's time.
If I don't go now, I never will.
Yeah, but what are you going to do? Well, there's a little village in the Ardeche that Mary and I used to go to on holidays.
We always used to say we'd try and find a little place there when I retired.
Well, I've found a little place, I've sold the house, we finalised the deal this morning.
You sold the house?! So, you've been planning this? Why didn't you say something? Because I knew you'd try and talk me out of it.
And you may have succeeded.
Now, well, it's a fait accompli.
I don't know what to say.
I can't stay here forever.
When are you going? Well, I was hoping to be able to settle this Kirby case, but that's not an option today, now.
Today? If I don't leave now there'll be another case.
And another.
I never thought I'd be here THIS long.
So it looks like this Victorian business will be my last case.
Fisher be damned, but it would be good to solve it.
Look, I've got to return this call.
We need to talk about this, Jack.
No, we don't, we really don't.
Let's get on with this case, and then we can all have a nice drink.
No.
He's not serious.
You don't think? What him, retire to France? Like he says, he can't stay here forever.
None of us can.
Yeah, well, I'm not buying it.
Why is it all so sudden? As you all seem to be sitting around chatting perhaps you could get us some coffee? I need a word.
Excuse me? A word, sir.
Sandra, I know this is What the hell is going on? Look, Stephen Fisher What are you playing at letting Fisher take over? Sandra What are you playing at letting him talk to us like that? If I could get a word in.
Jack's leaving.
What do you mean, leaving? He says he's retiring.
For good, this time.
He's moving to France.
Well, I suppose you can't blame the man for I don't blame him, but his leaving affects the team.
Do you want me to talk to him? And say what? You're hardly flavour of the month.
OK.
We'll deal with that later.
Let's concentrate on the matter in hand.
Stephen Fisher's a very difficult man to deal with.
Butting heads with him gets you nowhere.
What's he up to here? I honestly don't know anything more about this case or his reasons for wanting it looked at than you do.
If I find anything out, you'll be the first to know.
I don't trust him.
That's a very good place to start.
No, he's just in one of his moods.
He'll change his mind by lunchtime.
No, there's more to it than that.
He was late in this morning, that's not like Jack.
Then there's the phone calls.
What phone calls? Eh? The past few days, he keeps getting these calls on his mobile and he runs off and takes them in private.
Like just now.
I hadn't noticed that.
Call yourself a detective? I tell you what did surprise me, is how well he speaks French.
Jack's a subject for later.
We must get on now and get Fisher out of our hair.
What are you doing, Brian? I'm trying to make sense of the crime scene.
This bloke Thomas Quinn, who reckons he saw the murderer emerging from the alleyway, he was a night watchman working here.
The coffee jar? Yeah, but what he says doesn't make sense.
Do you think he was lying? Possibly.
It's to do with the lines of sight.
From here, through to that bag of sugar, there.
Course, I am working from a very old map and a slightly rudimentary model.
Slightly? Does the alley still exist? Yeah.
A lot of the buildings have changed, but it's still on the map.
OK, good, get your coats.
Find Jack and tell him to meet us out front.
Where are you going? Crime scene.
No.
How did I know you were going to say that? Everything you need is in the documents I provided.
If you're such an expert on criminal investigation, why are you wasting our time? No one leaves this building.
We think that one of Renfield's witnesses was lying.
How do you know? Apart from being good at our jobs, you mean? We don't think he could have seen what he claimed to have seen.
And you want to check that on the real location? Yeah.
It will have changed too much.
This is how we work.
Now, you either let us do our jobs, or there's the door.
Miss Pullman Detective Superintendent Pullman.
Back in an hour.
This is how you let them speak to you? No, Stephen, it's how I let them speak to YOU.
Jack Ah-ha! Here we are! Not now, Sandra.
This is the exact spot where, according to John Harper the coachman, Abigale Padua ran out from under that archway and into the street and in front of his cart, causing the horse to rear up and the cart's axle to break.
It was quite a serious traffic incident at the time.
Now, in his statement, Harper reckoned that moments later, a man emerged from the archway and gave chase.
Any idea where she was coming from? No, but we know where she ended up.
So, this is where she died.
Now, this is my problem.
Thomas Quinn, our night watchman, was working up there on the night of the murder, right? That's the coffee jar? Exactly.
Now, according to the statement he gave Renfield's men, he saw a tall man in a dark coat emerging from the alleyway and heading off down in that direction.
He says he saw the man turn left down at the end, there.
But there's no line of sight.
You can't see the bag of sugar from the first floor of the coffee jar.
Why would he lie? And why didn't Renfield spot this at the time? There were lots of witnesses, and lots of conflicting statements.
Maybe he was taken off the case before he had a chance to follow them all up.
And this is the actual alley, is it? Yep.
I think Jack's right.
The witness statements are what threw Renfield's investigation, because Quinn said the killer turned left onto the main road, but there was another witness, George Boole, who says he saw the same man running south down the street behind these buildings.
One of them's wrong.
Or lying.
So, this was where she was killed, yeah? Yeah.
Her body was found here.
Did anyone actually see it happen? No, no witnesses to the murder itself.
She should have kept running.
Why? Well, rather than hide here and hope he didn't find her, if she'd kept going, she would have been in the clear.
No, she couldn't have done, cos that was a dead end back then.
This building was a factory, but originally it was L-shaped so it went right across the end there, so there was no way through.
Then it was bombed during the Blitz and that half was made into a through-way when they When they what? Where's he off to now? This is Maiden Lane.
Yeah.
So? Well, this other witness, who said he saw a man running down this street in the opposite direction gave his address as 10 Maiden Lane.
It was all one building.
Before the Blitz, this was a dead end.
This building is new, but back in 1851 This would have been 10 Maiden Lane.
Right, now two witnesses, two doors on two different streets, both leading into the same building.
Yeah, but the building was empty.
Apart from Thomas Quinn.
So who was George Boole? And which one of them sent the police on a wild goose chase? 'Jack Halford's an interesting one.
' In what way? Whiter than white on the surface.
A role model, I'd have thought, hard-working, diligent, tenacious, intelligent, a good leader of men.
Yes.
That is, without doubt, the worst cup of coffee I've ever had.
What point are you trying to make about Jack? He was a Detective Chief Superintendent when he retired.
That's right.
A position he achieved through honest hard work? Yes.
Oh, come now.
You don't know Jack.
Well one of us doesn't know him, that's for sure.
Has he told you he's leaving yet? He's retiring to France.
Is he? Good for him.
Thomas Quinn, George Boole and John Harper, the coach driver, all claimed to have seen a tall man in a dark coat and a hat in the vicinity of Abigale Padua's murder.
We don't think Thomas Quinn could have seen what he claimed to have seen from the first floor window of that factory, and there's a question mark next to George Boole because the address we have for him turns out to be in the same empty building where Quinn was a night watchman.
All these women were local prostitutes who claim to have been variously harassed by someone matching the killer's description.
It's noise.
How d'you mean? They're all conflicting, they can't all be true.
The police don't know what to believe, so can't get anywhere with the investigation.
Maybe so.
Gerry, I want you to look into all these witnesses.
Find out who they were and what happened to them.
Let's see if hindsight can give us a better idea of who was lying and who wasn't.
Right you are.
There are a load of figures in this file.
Calculations.
Presumably Abigale Padua's.
I think they might relate to that investment package she was working on.
You know, that went belly-up when she died.
Do you think you can make any sense of them? I could try.
The Padua company went bust.
Did anyone benefit from that? A business competitor or someone involved in a family feud maybe? Then there's this Abigale Padua's jewellery was taken, presumably to make the police think it was a robbery.
But this ring here is quite distinctive.
Now, I know it's a long shot, but let's get an image out there and see if it turned up anywhere subsequently.
Very good, Miss Pullman.
I'm sorry, Detective Superintendent.
What are you not telling us? Ah, you're ahead of me now, I'm afraid.
No, we're not.
No, because nothing we've discovered so far would explain your interest this case.
Ah.
So? Abigale Padua was my mother's great-grandmother.
This crime has haunted my family for generations.
It was my mother's dying wish that I should discover the truth about what happened to Abigale.
Abigale Padua didn't have any children.
Well, it can't be that then.
I'll be in your office if you need me.
Do knock.
Jack? What do you make of this? What? Don't ask me, Brian, you're much better to do all this financial stuff than I am.
Oh, I'll be back in a minute.
Gerry?! What are you doing? It's a woman.
What woman? Elizabeth.
Elizabeth Green.
Nearly all his incoming and outgoing calls over the last few days, including that last one, Elizabeth Green.
Maybe it's a girlfriend? Of course.
A girlfriend? Don't be stupid.
Well, what then? You think it's a girlfriend? What else could it be? I don't know but not Jack, no.
He's leaving us for a bit of skirt.
I doubt she's a "bit of skirt", Brian.
What about Mary? Mary's dead.
Oh, so that's a license for him to shack up in France with the first girl that flutters her eyelashes, is it? This is Jack we're talking about, Brian, not Benny Hill.
Look, if he wants to talk to us about it, then that's fine, but we can't worry about it today, we must focus on this case.
Fifth of January, 1851.
Interview with Sidney Padua Esquire.
It is Mister Padua's assertion that he was working late at his office on the night of the fourth of January and he was not expecting to see his sister, Abigale, until office hours commencing at eight o'clock the following morning.
Sixth of January.
I share with Mister Padua my concern that he bears a striking resemblance to a man seen by several witnesses in the vicinity of Abigale Padua's murder.
Mr Padua insists that he was in his office at the time of the murder.
Seventh of January, Mister Padua denies being involved in any altercations with women of low repute in the weeks preceding Abigail Padua's death.
He also denies reports by members of his household staff that he and his sister enjoyed a tempestuous relationship I came out into the hallway and Mr Padua and Miss Abigale, they were arguing, and then he struck her across the face.
How dare you, Inspector! This is the third time you have come to my house and the third time you have chosen to insult me! Renfield had his sights firmly fixed on Sidney Padua.
Did he ever talk to a man called William Anderson? Not so far.
Why, who's he? Padua's most obvious business rival.
When Padua & Co went under, Anderson cleaned up.
There was speculation at the time that he'd somehow bet against Padua.
Don't ask me how that works, but it would require that Anderson knew in advance that Padua's investment scheme would collapse.
Renfield wouldn't have known about that.
The case was closed before anything about investments would've come out.
What was it? Two weeks? It's a bit quick, innit.
A lot of very important people lost a lot of money, Gerry.
They wouldn't have wanted it known they'd invested in a shaky scheme cooked up by a bloke suspected of murdering his sister.
Hence why there's only one copy of the Renfield report.
And why there's absolutely nothing about this case online.
And hence Fisher's burn-bag.
So what the hell is he up to? I don't know, but I do think Sidney Padua is our man and whatever he did, must be connected to now, or he wouldn't be so interested.
It took them long enough to focus, didn't it? I feel like I'm presiding over detention.
Are you sulking, Robert? How did you know Jack was leaving? I know lots of things.
How did Pullman take it? We haven't had much chance to discuss it, have we? She's losing her mentor.
I think she can stand on her own two feet.
Oh, she's very capable.
Too capable, wouldn't you say? The work we do here Yes, yes, I know.
It's all very vital and challenging.
So is cleaning the toilets at the House of Lords but we don't put our best people on it.
She's here because she wants to be.
She's very loyal to this team.
Interesting that you see it that way round.
I wonder if it's not their loyalty to her that keeps her here.
UCOS wouldn't survive Pullman leaving, would it? I don't know.
Yes you do.
You might find someone to replace her, but you'd very likely lose the team dynamic if dynamic is the right word.
Pullman knows that.
She has no partner, no children.
Her father committed suicide, her mother Surely Sandra Pullman is here because it's the only place she actually feels wanted? Is this conversation useful, Stephen? It's interesting, human nature.
Don't you find? If you understand what makes someone tick, they become predictable.
I wouldn't call anyone out there predictable.
Oh, but they are, Robert.
You wait and see.
There's something weird going on with these numbers.
I love conversations that start like that.
This algorithm that Abigale Padua invented for the investment company, I've been feeding the numbers into a spreadsheet and it works like a dream until the inputs get too high What does that actually mean, Brian? Well, it means that if too many people invest too much money, the whole thing collapses and everyone loses.
That's what happened, didn't it? Could it have been deliberate? Revenge, you mean? According to Renfield's report, Sidney Padua didn't treat Abigale very well.
It's hard to tell if this flaw is intended or not.
There are annotations alongside Abigale's calculations, initialled "JG", presumably Joseph Gleick, our second victim.
The annotations suggest that he'd also spotted the problem.
Why didn't they warn Sidney? Maybe he didn't believe them.
Or didn't want to hear it.
If someone warns you your company's about to go under It could've been too late to do anything.
Plus wealthy, influential people have invested with you, you'll lose a lot of face giving them their money back because you got the numbers wrong.
You're going under either way, though, aren't you? So there's only one thing to do William Anderson.
We know Anderson made a lot of money when Padua & Co went under.
He couldn't have done that without a tip-off.
Sidney goes to his biggest rival, presumably under a different name and bets against himself.
The investment goes belly up.
And Sidney makes a fortune.
No, no, no, but did he, though? I thought he left London penniless? He'd have to make it appear that way, wouldn't he? And the only flies in the ointment would be Abigale Padua and Joseph Gleick.
If they'd already warned him and he hadn't called the thing off, then they'd know he was up to something Find out where Sidney Padua went and more importantly what kind of lifestyle he had when he got there.
Well, yes, France will be different More relaxing, yes Something's come up, I'll call you back.
What's going on, Jack? With what? Your sudden decision to leave for a start, and all these secret phone calls.
They're not secret, they're private.
There's a lot of things to do, Sandra.
You're seriously leaving? Yes.
France? The Ardeche.
And it's not a sudden decision, I've been thinking about leaving for 50 years.
In that case you could have given us more than a day's notice.
I was trying to avoid this sort of conversation.
Well, it didn't work, did it.
Who's Elizabeth Green? Oh, so Gerry looked at my phone.
Yeah, cos we're worried.
We don't understand I don't want you to worry about me.
Who is she? That's none of your business.
If she's the reason you're leaving it is my business.
I'm leaving because I'm fed up.
I didn't join the force to put up with the political machinations of Strickland and Fisher and all their kind, and yet that's all I seem to have done for the last five decades.
Fine.
You do what you want, Jack.
Please yourself.
Is there anybody else I'm supposed to be pleasing? Is there anybody else I'm supposed to be responsible for? No.
Are you trying to tell me you can't stand on your own two feet? I just don't want you to go.
Well, why didn't you say that in the first place? Would it have made a difference? No.
But at least it would have avoided this ridiculous conversation.
Come on, let's get back to work.
Now.
Witnesses.
These women were all on the game.
And according to Renfield's report they all claimed to have been hassled by a tall man in a long dark coat in the two weeks prior to Abigale's death.
But none of them came forward until after the murder.
Now Renfield was iffy about them and I think he was right to be, I reckon they were paid to tell porkies to the cops.
Can we prove that? No.
There's no way of tracing them, or checking if they suddenly came into money.
What about Quinn and Co? Well, that is more interesting.
In the 1851 census, there was a Thomas Quinn living within a few streets of the factory where he was night-watchman.
But, he doesn't appear on the 1861 census.
Tell them about the bomb.
I'm coming to that, Brian.
The factory was bombed in the Blitz.
So I did a little search, and I came up with this Now the bomb that landed on the factory didn't explode, but it caused a lot of damage as it fell through the building and buried itself in the basement.
When the bomb disposal crews turned up to dig it out and defuse it, they found the body of a 30-year-old man, which they reckon had been buried in the dirt under the basement for a hell of a long time.
Thomas Quinn? Can't prove it, there's no way of matching those bones, wherever they are, to Quinn's.
But what is interesting is he cause of death.
He was bludgeoned? Skull caved in in three places.
What about this other witness? The one with the different address that turned out to be in the same building George Boole.
Never existed.
At least, he's not on any census that I've found.
Thomas Quinn couldn't have seen what he claimed to have seen from that first floor window? No.
But he saw something.
There's a window at the back overlooking the crime scene.
Quinn could have been a witness to the actual murder And the killer saw him.
So he finishes with Abigale Padua and then he pays Thomas Quinn a little visit.
He takes the body down to the basement and he buries it.
So he buries Quinn, cleans himself up and then he's about to slip away but the alarm has gone up and there are police everywhere.
Maybe they knock on the door looking for witnesses or maybe the killer comes out of his own accord.
Either way, he's improvising now.
Quinn's murder was spur of the moment but, he doesn't panic, he turns all of this to his advantage He identifies himself to the police as Thomas Quinn and sends them in the wrong direction.
But he can't leave the building because he's told them he's the night watchman.
So he goes back through the factory And out the back door? And there he meets more police, whereupon he identifies himself as George Boole and he sends those policemen off in a completely different direction.
So, it's like Jack said, he's creating noise, he's confusing the police with contradictory witness statements.
So Quinn and Boole are both the killer.
It does fit.
We can't prove it.
You don't have to prove it.
As you all variously pointed out earlier, it's a little late to arrest anyone for this crime.
I just want to know what happened.
But why? Please Continue.
All this actually means is that all our witnesses are fakes.
No, no, not all of them.
John Harper.
The outlier.
He doesn't fit the pattern.
No, I reckon he's legit.
Abigale Padua ran in front of his coach and caused this huge pile up.
Now he described the man chasing her and I think he's the only one telling the truth.
So what happened to him? Murdered.
You're kidding.
Two weeks later, down by the river.
How? Skull caved in.
It looked like a robbery.
Maybe it was.
And maybe it wasn't.
It doesn't make sense, though.
Harper had already made his statement, which was woolly at best, so why kill him? He'd seen the murderer.
Yeah, but his description was so general as to be useless.
That's not the point.
He'd seen him.
There was a good chance he'd recognise him if he saw him again.
Gerry, what was the date of John Harper's murder? The date on this newspaper is February the second.
He might not've given a very good description of the killer But he'd have recognised the picture.
And Sidney Padua must have known that piece was about to appear with his picture attached.
So we're back to Sidney Padua.
It's only circumstantial, though.
It doesn't need to be anything more.
Excuse me, but yes it does.
If you're forcing us to pursue this nonsense, at least we'll do it properly.
Professional to the last, Mr Halford.
What outcome are you hoping for here, Stephen? I told you before, Robert, your clearance level I mean, when is this over? It seems pretty clear Sidney Padua killed his sister.
Brian Lane thinks that's circumstantial.
And you said that was enough.
Lane's an odd fish, isn't he? Does he still sneak the occasional drink, do you think? No.
Can't ever be sure though, can you? Can never fully trust someone like that.
I do.
What would it take, I wonder? A bad day at work? Some bad news? Possibly a friend or loved-one in poor health? They say an alcoholic is always looking for a reason Who's "they"? Well, that's true.
I didn't answer your question.
I don't require proof that Sidney Padua killed his sister.
I doubt that's even available, but I need to know for certain what happened.
And then you're going to destroy all the documentation.
Yes.
Yours not to reason why, I'm afraid.
I thought we were knocking? Ellis-Finch.
I'm sorry? The finance company? The finance company.
Well? What have you found? We're asking the questions now.
I certainly am.
What's going on? One of the items of jewellery taken from Abigale Padua was a very distinctive ring.
This ring.
It was sold to a museum at a charity auction in New York in 1987.
Who was the seller? Joshua Ellis.
Of Ellis-Finch? A company last year who was involved in the collapse of two mortgage companies and who are now brokering a deal to let some big Chinese corporation take over one of our largest pension funds! And God knows what happens to all those pensions when they do.
What's the connection, Stephen? Between? Do you honestly expect us to believe that it's a coincidence that a 160-year-old case is suddenly connected to a major financial deal involving the Chinese? I really can't control what you believe.
The game's up, Stephen.
You actually do say that, do you? I'm here because I was led to believe there might be a connection between Joshua Ellis and the murder of Abigale Padua.
So why didn't you tell us? Because there's a difference between mounting an investigation and seeking to prove a hypothesis.
I find the former to be a little more honest.
There may have been no such connection, after all.
Well, now we know there is, would you like to share the nature of it with us? I have no idea, I'm afraid.
I was assuming that would be your team's next course of enquiry.
Who told you about this in the first place? You know better than to ask.
Even I didn't think you'd involve UCOS in something like this.
Something like what? This is political.
You're a representative of the UK Government, tasking us to investigate an international investment scheme involving the Chinese.
You make it sound so sinister.
Well, I'm sure, to the thousands of people whose pensions are at risk in this scheme, it IS sinister.
We don't know yet, do we? There may be a perfectly innocent explanation as to how that ring came into Joshua Ellie's possession.
You don't believe that for a second.
Not for a second, no.
Talk to me about Gerry Standing.
No, I don't think I will.
Well, according to the bumph in this auction catalogue, that ring was an Ellis family heirloom.
Yeah, right! It could have been.
How's that? Depending on how far back you can trace the Ellis family.
Well, that's the thing.
I've gone as far back as I can and the first one I come up with is Henry Ellis, who turned up in New York in 1852.
The year after the murders.
Where had he come from? There's no record of that.
He just seems to appear out of nowhere.
But he's got money, because a few months later, he started an investment firm in Manhattan and that's the firm that went on to become Ellis-Finch.
Pictures? No.
And that's weird as well because in New York in those days, like today, if you're rich, you're moving in the right circles, somebody's going to take a photograph of you.
But Henry Ellis seems to have been more than a little camera-shy.
He'd learned his lesson after that newspaper article.
So we still have no concrete link between Sidney Padua and Henry Ellis.
Not concrete, no, but here's the kicker.
Five years later, he got married and had two children.
A boy and a girl Abigale and Joseph.
He names his kids after two people he's killed? Sounds like it.
That's it, then.
Fisher said he didn't need hard evidence.
What we've got is circumstantial, but pretty damning.
What's the point of it all? We can't prove Joshua Ellis knows the truth about his ancestry and, even if he does, he's not responsible for the murders.
He wouldn't be where he is today without them though, would he? If Sidney hadn't killed his sister and Gleick and bet against his own company, then Ellis-Finch wouldn't exist.
Yeah, but who cares now? The Chinese.
It's very important family history.
Especially when you're trusting your money to a family who made theirs by ripping off investors.
It wasn't him.
Who wasn't him? Sidney Padua.
Guess where he went when he left London? It's not going to be New York, is it? He went home.
Well, sort of.
Padua? He died in 1881 in a little village just outside Padua, Italy.
He wasn't living in an enormous mansion by any chance, was he? He was a shoe salesman for nearly 30 years.
He had three daughters and he was practically penniless.
I know the feeling.
So Sidney Padua didn't become Henry Ellis? No.
And he didn't kill his sister or Joseph Gleick, or the coachman.
No.
But what about the photo in the paper and the timing of the coachman's death? Coincidence.
It wasn't him.
Then who was it? We don't know.
Well, that's ridiculous.
How many people could it have been? In London? In 1851? Two million, maybe? Don't be facetious, Mr Halford.
He's not being.
If it wasn't Sidney Padua, then it could have been anyone.
Anyone linked to the Ellis family.
You can only link to the Ellis family once you've decided what two things you're trying to link together, that's just simple logic.
Logic! Boolean logic! Why did the killer pick that name? George Boole you mean? Yeah, it was probably spur of the moment.
He's just buried Thomas Quinn, he's sent the police off on a wild goose chase.
He's improvising like mad.
But he thinks he's home and dry, so he calmly walks out through the back door, bang into more policemen, and he identifies himself as George Boole.
This newspaper.
Do we have the rest of this newspaper? Yeah, I have somewhere.
What have you got, Brian? Boole was a famous Victorian mathematician.
There you go.
Boolean logic - it's like binary.
You know, ones and zeroes.
Ah-ha! Who plucks a name like that out of his head on the spur of the moment? You? It's got to be another mathematician.
That's Gleick.
Yes.
An etching taken from a photograph.
A very good likeness.
Published on the same day as the picture of Sidney Padua.
Two days after the coachman who saw the killer was killed.
Now we've been assuming that the coachman was killed to stop him identifying a picture of Sidney Padua in the newspaper.
But maybe it was to stop him identifying another picture due to be published that day, to accompany an obituary for Joseph Gleick! Obituary is the point, surely? Gleick was dead.
Well, no, not necessarily.
Gleick's house was burned down and Gleick was never seen again.
No remains were ever found and I doubt any were looked for.
As far as the Southwark Police were concerned, he died in the fire.
And if Gleick knew that the investment algorithm wasn't going to work Maybe you were right before.
Maybe it was designed not to work.
These annotations - maybe Gleick wasn't correcting Abigale, maybe he was collaborating with her.
They decided to have a go at Sidney for what he's done to Abigale and make a profit on the side.
But if at some point Abigale had a change of heart It doesn't take an expert to realise that not only Sidney would be hurt, but a lot of other people would also lose their money in that deal.
So she goes to warn Sidney.
She's a brave girl, considering how Sidney would have reacted.
But Gleick knows, that if she gets to Sidney, not only will his profit disappear, but he'll be in serious trouble.
This is another hypothesis.
It seems like a pretty good one to me.
And one we can prove.
How? Look at this, these are the articles of incorporation for the company that Henry Ellis set up in 1852.
Look at that.
You'd need an expert to verify it It's the same handwriting.
It was Joseph Gleick all along.
What are you doing to do? Do? I need Renfield's original report, all the documents you've used, every note you made, the physical samples of Gleick's handwriting We have evidence here.
Of a crime that was committed a century and a half ago.
As you've all taken great pains to point out, that's hardly relevant today.
Yes, it is relevant.
That information could stop this Ellis-Finch deal with the Chinese.
He doesn't want it stopped.
He wants to make sure it can't be stopped.
And like Jack said this is a pension fund they're interfering with.
It's people's lives.
He doesn't care about that, Brian.
Whether I care or not, that's not the business I'm in.
What business are you in? I serve the national interest.
And it's more important for the nation to make nice with China and keep people like Joshua Ellis happy than it is to protect hundreds of thousands of pensioners, is it? You're not even aware of how naive that sounds, are you? I think it's time you left, Stephen.
By all means.
Empty-handed, I'm afraid.
Ah.
It's one thing to come in here and requisition this team for your own private investigation.
It's quite another to make us all complicit in the destruction of evidence in a murder investigation, especially one which may have implications in the present day, on the international stage.
You've been rehearsing that speech.
The evidence will stay here, pending a conversation I'm going to have with the Commissioner.
I see.
How do you envisage that conversation playing out? Well, we'll have to see, won't we? I can tell you, if you're interested.
The conversation ends with you handing over to me everything I've asked for, just prior to writing your letter of resignation.
I won't be threatened by you, Stephen.
I know you'd like us all to think your power extends that far Not my power, Robert! The power of the British Government, brandishing the Official Secrets Act, to which you are all subject and the contravention of which brings with it consequences far graver than you seem to be considering.
Those of you who still have careers, consider what you will do without them.
Those of you who don't, consider how your loved ones will cope while you live out the twilight of your lives at Her Majesty's pleasure.
Now I suggest you put the documents in the bag and put today's events very firmly out of your minds.
A wise decision, Mr Halford.
Shove it.
We must do this again, Robert.
Always a pleasure.
I'm sorry.
It's not your fault.
There was nothing we could do.
Well, I think we've earned a drink.
You up for that, Jack? There's a couple of things I want to do.
I'll meet you there.
What do you want to do? Couple of errands.
I'll see you in about an hour.
Well, that was quick.
Maybe he's got a date.
A what? Perhaps there's more to Jack's retirement than meets the eye.
I think we should throw a load of drink down his throat and just ask him outright.
Go gently, I don't want it turning nasty.
You coming, Brian? Yes, yes, of course.
I'll just tidy up first.
Work starts again tomorrow, Brian.
We'll finish the Kirby case, so Jack can draw a line under it.
I'll just close the computer down.
Suit yourself.
I'll see you in the pub.
See ya.
It's me.
Yes, it's done.
The information will be in the papers in the next day or so.
No, I've no idea which one of them leaked it.
I think our Mister Ellis will have plenty to worry about without stringing up some retired policeman.
Exactly.
I suggest it gets put down to yet another careless civil servant leaving his homework on the train.
Mission accomplished, we should let sleeping plods lie I think, don't you? Good luck, Jack.
They think you've got a fancy woman.
Bloody hell, Brian! What are you doing sneaking around? I was waiting for you.
And you couldn't wait in the pub? I wanted to warn you.
They think you've got a fancy woman.
Elizabeth Green.
It's not what you think.
It's not what they think.
You understand them being suspicious, though, don't you? It's all been a bit sudden.
They think I'm running off to France with a floozy.
What do they think I am? A liar.
They even had me believing it for a while.
Until I saw you switch those documents on Fisher.
I saw that and I thought, "Why would Jack risk everything for this? "Why would he risk his whole future?" That's when I looked up Elizabeth Green.
Brian The Elizabeth Green Hospice.
I'm going to the Ardeche.
The hospice is arranging the medication I need to take with me.
When did you find out? Few weeks ago.
It's in the liver.
There's nothing they can do.
We're your friends.
I don't want any fuss.
We're your friends! Yes, you are.
And I want you to remember me as I am.
I want to go away to a place that was special to Mary and me.
And just be there, with her and our memories.
When are you going? ASAP.
Will you do something for me, Brian? Yeah, of course I will.
Anything.
Don't tell anyone.
Not until after.
And I don't want anyone to try and stop me.
Or anyone coming after me or anyone trying to get in touch with me.
It's just me and Mary.
D'you understand? Yes.
Now, get into that pub and put on a brave face.
I'm so sorry, Jack.
Brave face, Brian.
And mine's a large Scotch.
Don't look at me.
This one's mine.
Sandra's starting from the same place you are.
And that means it jumps the queue? It's a day's work.
Everything else can wait a day.
You all right with this? I'm listening, Gerry.
Thank you, Sandra.
Though I am the ranking officer, Gerry, so "being all right with it" isn't a prerequisite.
Tell that to Jack.
If he decides to grace us with his presence, I will.
Abigale Padua.
She was bludgeoned to death by an unknown assailant.
A hundred and sixty-odd years ago.
Yes.
So why the sudden urgency? Is it always like this? Yes.
But they do have a point.
I assume you're not suggesting that Abigale Padua's killer is still at large? I just need UCOS to spend the day on this case.
Why? It's been requested.
And it's not a request I'm in a position to refuse.
Sorry, Sandra, usually I'd tell you more but Inspector George Renfield was the investigating officer.
This is his report.
It is the only copy in existence so I Sorry, everybody! Everything all right, Jack? Yes, yes, my bank Manager.
Had a meeting first thing and Oh, it It overran.
Sorry I'm late.
Since when did you have meetings with your bank manager? Since when did you become an authority on my comings and goings? My bank manager's got it in for me.
No, that's your tailor.
Is this a new one? Hardly.
Because I've been thinking about the Kirby business and I think we need to go back to the stepdaughter.
No, no, no.
The stepdaughter's in the clear.
Only for her alibi, and I reckon there's a hole Is this supposed to be a crime scene picture? What idiot took these? They're daguerreotypes.
They're what? Well, it's old photography.
Victorian.
murder of a woman named You're kidding! .
.
Abigale Padua.
I see and you're afraid this bloke might strike again? If I could get beyond saying this woman's name this morning, THAT would be David Kirby's killer is alive and well, and we have a chance of catching her.
This is a day's work, Jack.
Well, when we have a spare day, we'll give it all our attention.
Coffee, Jack? He's had enough coffee.
Sandra? If you could come back here please, Brian? Kettle's not long been boiled, it's a waste of energy just to leave it.
Quite right.
And we wouldn't want to be careless with the kind of energy that's generated in this room.
Black, one sugar.
If it's real, of course.
I'm sorry, who are you? This is Stephen Fisher.
Stephen - Sandra Pullman.
The bloke from Intelligence? Or thereabouts.
How did you get down here without an escort? Oh, bless.
It's instant.
Instant coffee Sorry.
I'll blink, shall I? I find these games a little tedious.
I'll pass on the coffee, thank you, Mr Lane.
I asked him down here, Sandra.
The Abigale Padua case came from Stephen.
Yes, how's that going? Barely started.
Oh, really? I thought I was running late.
Not to worry.
May I? Abigale Padua.
Beaten to death in an alley in the city of London on the night of the fourth of January, 1851.
Did that sound sufficiently "police-y"? Miss Padua was something of a whiz with numbers, a "computer" in the parlance of Victorian times.
Literally someone who computes.
Rather unusual for a woman to do that, but it seems she had an uncommon gift for it.
She worked for the family business, which was run by her brother, Sidney, both parents having died some years previously.
To all intents and purposes, Miss Padua's death looks like a violent robbery.
Money and jewellery were even removed from her person by the killer.
But, a few weeks after she died, a new investment package the Padua's had been marketing went belly-up, ruining a lot of well-placed, influential members of London society.
And Inspector Renfield, who was in charge of the investigation, came to believe there might be more to Miss Padua's demise than met the eye.
Unfortunately, he was unable to reach any firm conclusions.
And you think that we, without any new witnesses to interview, no new evidence, will succeed where he failed? That's what you do, isn't it? And there is new evidence.
What Renfield didn't know at the time, because the various sections of the Metropolitan Police Force didn't work in such beautiful harmony as they do now, was that a man named Joseph Gleick, who had been Abigale Padua's mathematics tutor and who subsequently became her mentor, lost his life in a house fire later that same night.
There are several other interesting commonalities, I'm sure your well-honed instincts will root them out very quickly.
Sir, there are a couple of ongoing cases that frankly should Those cases are on hold as of now.
Abigale Padua is the priority.
This is a burn-bag.
At the conclusion of your investigation, everything you've discovered any notes you've made, documents you've sourced, together with the original copy of Renfield's report and the various other items in the case file will be placed in here to be incinerated by me.
Are you serious? Oh, dear, has my reputation as a prankster preceded me? Shove it.
We don't take orders from you.
Jack And we don't take orders from you, either.
Sandra does, we're all retired.
We work on cases where there's at least a chance of nicking someone.
And there's plenty of those to keep us busy.
So you can shove it.
Jack, if I decide this is a UCOS case No, no, Robert, Mr Halford makes a perfectly fair point.
Mr Halford, Mr Standing, Mr Lane - you're excused.
You can't fire us either.
I wouldn't dream of it.
I will, however, need your desks for a day or two, so that I can draft in some new officers to work with Detective Superintendent Pullman.
When this is all over, you'll be free to resume your duties.
Fine by me.
If you could just leave behind a cheque for £17,433, Mr Standing, I'll see it gets to the Inland Revenue.
You what? The tax due on your undeclared earnings over the past 30 years.
Are you threatening me? Actually, perhaps it would best if you all stay after all.
We wouldn't want any of our guilty little secrets coming to light, would we? Mr Lane? Mr Halford? Bollocks.
Excellent.
I'll require hourly reports.
That's your office, Detective Superintendent? Yes.
Robert? Grumpy lot, aren't they? Did they expect you to stick up for them, do you think? I don't know.
But you didn't.
They were right.
They do have several active cases.
This is important.
Why? You don't think I'm entitled to know why you're requisitioning my team? I KNOW you're not entitled to know.
The vast difference in our security clearance levels tells me that.
I really don't mean to keep you, Robert, you should feel free to go about your day.
And leave you in charge? I think I'll stay.
Maybe it's an academic exercise, you know, some kind of test.
Testing what? I don't know.
Our ability to take shit from superiors? When was that ever in doubt? Question is, why is Fisher so interested in a Victorian murder mystery? That's what I want to know and I bet the answer lies somewhere in this case.
It is an interesting one, computers being people, rather than machines.
All these financial institutions trusting incredibly complex calculations to human beings like Abigale Padua.
Whereas now they use actual computers, and we know where THAT'S got them.
She must have had an incredible brain, is what I'm saying.
Maybe that's why she was killed? Well, if we find out who did it, we could have a seance and ask him.
Well at least we know what he looked like witnesses reported seeing a woman matching Abigale Padua's description being chased through the streets shortly before she was murdered.
There was a coachman in Threadneedle Street who gave a description of the man chasing her.
Said he was tall and slim, wearing a dark coat and a black hat.
In my mental image of Victorian London, they all look like that.
But there was a night watchman called Thomas Quinn, who worked in a building adjacent to the alley where Abigale Padua was killed, who also claimed to have seen a tall, thin man dressed in black emerging from the alleyway a few moments later.
And then the Southwark police claimed that a man matching the same description was seen later that night in the vicinity of Joseph Gleick's house, just before it burned to the ground.
Although, of course Renfield wasn't to know that at the time, because nobody had made the connection between the two deaths.
Brilliant! We're looking for a tall dark stranger who's been dead for a hundred years! You're very quiet over there, Jack.
I want to tell you all something.
What is it? I was going to tell you first thing, then this nonsense with Fisher happened.
I'm leaving.
You what? I'm leaving UCOS.
I'm retiring.
Retiring again.
Why? Well, I just think it's time.
If I don't go now, I never will.
Yeah, but what are you going to do? Well, there's a little village in the Ardeche that Mary and I used to go to on holidays.
We always used to say we'd try and find a little place there when I retired.
Well, I've found a little place, I've sold the house, we finalised the deal this morning.
You sold the house?! So, you've been planning this? Why didn't you say something? Because I knew you'd try and talk me out of it.
And you may have succeeded.
Now, well, it's a fait accompli.
I don't know what to say.
I can't stay here forever.
When are you going? Well, I was hoping to be able to settle this Kirby case, but that's not an option today, now.
Today? If I don't leave now there'll be another case.
And another.
I never thought I'd be here THIS long.
So it looks like this Victorian business will be my last case.
Fisher be damned, but it would be good to solve it.
Look, I've got to return this call.
We need to talk about this, Jack.
No, we don't, we really don't.
Let's get on with this case, and then we can all have a nice drink.
No.
He's not serious.
You don't think? What him, retire to France? Like he says, he can't stay here forever.
None of us can.
Yeah, well, I'm not buying it.
Why is it all so sudden? As you all seem to be sitting around chatting perhaps you could get us some coffee? I need a word.
Excuse me? A word, sir.
Sandra, I know this is What the hell is going on? Look, Stephen Fisher What are you playing at letting Fisher take over? Sandra What are you playing at letting him talk to us like that? If I could get a word in.
Jack's leaving.
What do you mean, leaving? He says he's retiring.
For good, this time.
He's moving to France.
Well, I suppose you can't blame the man for I don't blame him, but his leaving affects the team.
Do you want me to talk to him? And say what? You're hardly flavour of the month.
OK.
We'll deal with that later.
Let's concentrate on the matter in hand.
Stephen Fisher's a very difficult man to deal with.
Butting heads with him gets you nowhere.
What's he up to here? I honestly don't know anything more about this case or his reasons for wanting it looked at than you do.
If I find anything out, you'll be the first to know.
I don't trust him.
That's a very good place to start.
No, he's just in one of his moods.
He'll change his mind by lunchtime.
No, there's more to it than that.
He was late in this morning, that's not like Jack.
Then there's the phone calls.
What phone calls? Eh? The past few days, he keeps getting these calls on his mobile and he runs off and takes them in private.
Like just now.
I hadn't noticed that.
Call yourself a detective? I tell you what did surprise me, is how well he speaks French.
Jack's a subject for later.
We must get on now and get Fisher out of our hair.
What are you doing, Brian? I'm trying to make sense of the crime scene.
This bloke Thomas Quinn, who reckons he saw the murderer emerging from the alleyway, he was a night watchman working here.
The coffee jar? Yeah, but what he says doesn't make sense.
Do you think he was lying? Possibly.
It's to do with the lines of sight.
From here, through to that bag of sugar, there.
Course, I am working from a very old map and a slightly rudimentary model.
Slightly? Does the alley still exist? Yeah.
A lot of the buildings have changed, but it's still on the map.
OK, good, get your coats.
Find Jack and tell him to meet us out front.
Where are you going? Crime scene.
No.
How did I know you were going to say that? Everything you need is in the documents I provided.
If you're such an expert on criminal investigation, why are you wasting our time? No one leaves this building.
We think that one of Renfield's witnesses was lying.
How do you know? Apart from being good at our jobs, you mean? We don't think he could have seen what he claimed to have seen.
And you want to check that on the real location? Yeah.
It will have changed too much.
This is how we work.
Now, you either let us do our jobs, or there's the door.
Miss Pullman Detective Superintendent Pullman.
Back in an hour.
This is how you let them speak to you? No, Stephen, it's how I let them speak to YOU.
Jack Ah-ha! Here we are! Not now, Sandra.
This is the exact spot where, according to John Harper the coachman, Abigale Padua ran out from under that archway and into the street and in front of his cart, causing the horse to rear up and the cart's axle to break.
It was quite a serious traffic incident at the time.
Now, in his statement, Harper reckoned that moments later, a man emerged from the archway and gave chase.
Any idea where she was coming from? No, but we know where she ended up.
So, this is where she died.
Now, this is my problem.
Thomas Quinn, our night watchman, was working up there on the night of the murder, right? That's the coffee jar? Exactly.
Now, according to the statement he gave Renfield's men, he saw a tall man in a dark coat emerging from the alleyway and heading off down in that direction.
He says he saw the man turn left down at the end, there.
But there's no line of sight.
You can't see the bag of sugar from the first floor of the coffee jar.
Why would he lie? And why didn't Renfield spot this at the time? There were lots of witnesses, and lots of conflicting statements.
Maybe he was taken off the case before he had a chance to follow them all up.
And this is the actual alley, is it? Yep.
I think Jack's right.
The witness statements are what threw Renfield's investigation, because Quinn said the killer turned left onto the main road, but there was another witness, George Boole, who says he saw the same man running south down the street behind these buildings.
One of them's wrong.
Or lying.
So, this was where she was killed, yeah? Yeah.
Her body was found here.
Did anyone actually see it happen? No, no witnesses to the murder itself.
She should have kept running.
Why? Well, rather than hide here and hope he didn't find her, if she'd kept going, she would have been in the clear.
No, she couldn't have done, cos that was a dead end back then.
This building was a factory, but originally it was L-shaped so it went right across the end there, so there was no way through.
Then it was bombed during the Blitz and that half was made into a through-way when they When they what? Where's he off to now? This is Maiden Lane.
Yeah.
So? Well, this other witness, who said he saw a man running down this street in the opposite direction gave his address as 10 Maiden Lane.
It was all one building.
Before the Blitz, this was a dead end.
This building is new, but back in 1851 This would have been 10 Maiden Lane.
Right, now two witnesses, two doors on two different streets, both leading into the same building.
Yeah, but the building was empty.
Apart from Thomas Quinn.
So who was George Boole? And which one of them sent the police on a wild goose chase? 'Jack Halford's an interesting one.
' In what way? Whiter than white on the surface.
A role model, I'd have thought, hard-working, diligent, tenacious, intelligent, a good leader of men.
Yes.
That is, without doubt, the worst cup of coffee I've ever had.
What point are you trying to make about Jack? He was a Detective Chief Superintendent when he retired.
That's right.
A position he achieved through honest hard work? Yes.
Oh, come now.
You don't know Jack.
Well one of us doesn't know him, that's for sure.
Has he told you he's leaving yet? He's retiring to France.
Is he? Good for him.
Thomas Quinn, George Boole and John Harper, the coach driver, all claimed to have seen a tall man in a dark coat and a hat in the vicinity of Abigale Padua's murder.
We don't think Thomas Quinn could have seen what he claimed to have seen from the first floor window of that factory, and there's a question mark next to George Boole because the address we have for him turns out to be in the same empty building where Quinn was a night watchman.
All these women were local prostitutes who claim to have been variously harassed by someone matching the killer's description.
It's noise.
How d'you mean? They're all conflicting, they can't all be true.
The police don't know what to believe, so can't get anywhere with the investigation.
Maybe so.
Gerry, I want you to look into all these witnesses.
Find out who they were and what happened to them.
Let's see if hindsight can give us a better idea of who was lying and who wasn't.
Right you are.
There are a load of figures in this file.
Calculations.
Presumably Abigale Padua's.
I think they might relate to that investment package she was working on.
You know, that went belly-up when she died.
Do you think you can make any sense of them? I could try.
The Padua company went bust.
Did anyone benefit from that? A business competitor or someone involved in a family feud maybe? Then there's this Abigale Padua's jewellery was taken, presumably to make the police think it was a robbery.
But this ring here is quite distinctive.
Now, I know it's a long shot, but let's get an image out there and see if it turned up anywhere subsequently.
Very good, Miss Pullman.
I'm sorry, Detective Superintendent.
What are you not telling us? Ah, you're ahead of me now, I'm afraid.
No, we're not.
No, because nothing we've discovered so far would explain your interest this case.
Ah.
So? Abigale Padua was my mother's great-grandmother.
This crime has haunted my family for generations.
It was my mother's dying wish that I should discover the truth about what happened to Abigale.
Abigale Padua didn't have any children.
Well, it can't be that then.
I'll be in your office if you need me.
Do knock.
Jack? What do you make of this? What? Don't ask me, Brian, you're much better to do all this financial stuff than I am.
Oh, I'll be back in a minute.
Gerry?! What are you doing? It's a woman.
What woman? Elizabeth.
Elizabeth Green.
Nearly all his incoming and outgoing calls over the last few days, including that last one, Elizabeth Green.
Maybe it's a girlfriend? Of course.
A girlfriend? Don't be stupid.
Well, what then? You think it's a girlfriend? What else could it be? I don't know but not Jack, no.
He's leaving us for a bit of skirt.
I doubt she's a "bit of skirt", Brian.
What about Mary? Mary's dead.
Oh, so that's a license for him to shack up in France with the first girl that flutters her eyelashes, is it? This is Jack we're talking about, Brian, not Benny Hill.
Look, if he wants to talk to us about it, then that's fine, but we can't worry about it today, we must focus on this case.
Fifth of January, 1851.
Interview with Sidney Padua Esquire.
It is Mister Padua's assertion that he was working late at his office on the night of the fourth of January and he was not expecting to see his sister, Abigale, until office hours commencing at eight o'clock the following morning.
Sixth of January.
I share with Mister Padua my concern that he bears a striking resemblance to a man seen by several witnesses in the vicinity of Abigale Padua's murder.
Mr Padua insists that he was in his office at the time of the murder.
Seventh of January, Mister Padua denies being involved in any altercations with women of low repute in the weeks preceding Abigail Padua's death.
He also denies reports by members of his household staff that he and his sister enjoyed a tempestuous relationship I came out into the hallway and Mr Padua and Miss Abigale, they were arguing, and then he struck her across the face.
How dare you, Inspector! This is the third time you have come to my house and the third time you have chosen to insult me! Renfield had his sights firmly fixed on Sidney Padua.
Did he ever talk to a man called William Anderson? Not so far.
Why, who's he? Padua's most obvious business rival.
When Padua & Co went under, Anderson cleaned up.
There was speculation at the time that he'd somehow bet against Padua.
Don't ask me how that works, but it would require that Anderson knew in advance that Padua's investment scheme would collapse.
Renfield wouldn't have known about that.
The case was closed before anything about investments would've come out.
What was it? Two weeks? It's a bit quick, innit.
A lot of very important people lost a lot of money, Gerry.
They wouldn't have wanted it known they'd invested in a shaky scheme cooked up by a bloke suspected of murdering his sister.
Hence why there's only one copy of the Renfield report.
And why there's absolutely nothing about this case online.
And hence Fisher's burn-bag.
So what the hell is he up to? I don't know, but I do think Sidney Padua is our man and whatever he did, must be connected to now, or he wouldn't be so interested.
It took them long enough to focus, didn't it? I feel like I'm presiding over detention.
Are you sulking, Robert? How did you know Jack was leaving? I know lots of things.
How did Pullman take it? We haven't had much chance to discuss it, have we? She's losing her mentor.
I think she can stand on her own two feet.
Oh, she's very capable.
Too capable, wouldn't you say? The work we do here Yes, yes, I know.
It's all very vital and challenging.
So is cleaning the toilets at the House of Lords but we don't put our best people on it.
She's here because she wants to be.
She's very loyal to this team.
Interesting that you see it that way round.
I wonder if it's not their loyalty to her that keeps her here.
UCOS wouldn't survive Pullman leaving, would it? I don't know.
Yes you do.
You might find someone to replace her, but you'd very likely lose the team dynamic if dynamic is the right word.
Pullman knows that.
She has no partner, no children.
Her father committed suicide, her mother Surely Sandra Pullman is here because it's the only place she actually feels wanted? Is this conversation useful, Stephen? It's interesting, human nature.
Don't you find? If you understand what makes someone tick, they become predictable.
I wouldn't call anyone out there predictable.
Oh, but they are, Robert.
You wait and see.
There's something weird going on with these numbers.
I love conversations that start like that.
This algorithm that Abigale Padua invented for the investment company, I've been feeding the numbers into a spreadsheet and it works like a dream until the inputs get too high What does that actually mean, Brian? Well, it means that if too many people invest too much money, the whole thing collapses and everyone loses.
That's what happened, didn't it? Could it have been deliberate? Revenge, you mean? According to Renfield's report, Sidney Padua didn't treat Abigale very well.
It's hard to tell if this flaw is intended or not.
There are annotations alongside Abigale's calculations, initialled "JG", presumably Joseph Gleick, our second victim.
The annotations suggest that he'd also spotted the problem.
Why didn't they warn Sidney? Maybe he didn't believe them.
Or didn't want to hear it.
If someone warns you your company's about to go under It could've been too late to do anything.
Plus wealthy, influential people have invested with you, you'll lose a lot of face giving them their money back because you got the numbers wrong.
You're going under either way, though, aren't you? So there's only one thing to do William Anderson.
We know Anderson made a lot of money when Padua & Co went under.
He couldn't have done that without a tip-off.
Sidney goes to his biggest rival, presumably under a different name and bets against himself.
The investment goes belly up.
And Sidney makes a fortune.
No, no, no, but did he, though? I thought he left London penniless? He'd have to make it appear that way, wouldn't he? And the only flies in the ointment would be Abigale Padua and Joseph Gleick.
If they'd already warned him and he hadn't called the thing off, then they'd know he was up to something Find out where Sidney Padua went and more importantly what kind of lifestyle he had when he got there.
Well, yes, France will be different More relaxing, yes Something's come up, I'll call you back.
What's going on, Jack? With what? Your sudden decision to leave for a start, and all these secret phone calls.
They're not secret, they're private.
There's a lot of things to do, Sandra.
You're seriously leaving? Yes.
France? The Ardeche.
And it's not a sudden decision, I've been thinking about leaving for 50 years.
In that case you could have given us more than a day's notice.
I was trying to avoid this sort of conversation.
Well, it didn't work, did it.
Who's Elizabeth Green? Oh, so Gerry looked at my phone.
Yeah, cos we're worried.
We don't understand I don't want you to worry about me.
Who is she? That's none of your business.
If she's the reason you're leaving it is my business.
I'm leaving because I'm fed up.
I didn't join the force to put up with the political machinations of Strickland and Fisher and all their kind, and yet that's all I seem to have done for the last five decades.
Fine.
You do what you want, Jack.
Please yourself.
Is there anybody else I'm supposed to be pleasing? Is there anybody else I'm supposed to be responsible for? No.
Are you trying to tell me you can't stand on your own two feet? I just don't want you to go.
Well, why didn't you say that in the first place? Would it have made a difference? No.
But at least it would have avoided this ridiculous conversation.
Come on, let's get back to work.
Now.
Witnesses.
These women were all on the game.
And according to Renfield's report they all claimed to have been hassled by a tall man in a long dark coat in the two weeks prior to Abigale's death.
But none of them came forward until after the murder.
Now Renfield was iffy about them and I think he was right to be, I reckon they were paid to tell porkies to the cops.
Can we prove that? No.
There's no way of tracing them, or checking if they suddenly came into money.
What about Quinn and Co? Well, that is more interesting.
In the 1851 census, there was a Thomas Quinn living within a few streets of the factory where he was night-watchman.
But, he doesn't appear on the 1861 census.
Tell them about the bomb.
I'm coming to that, Brian.
The factory was bombed in the Blitz.
So I did a little search, and I came up with this Now the bomb that landed on the factory didn't explode, but it caused a lot of damage as it fell through the building and buried itself in the basement.
When the bomb disposal crews turned up to dig it out and defuse it, they found the body of a 30-year-old man, which they reckon had been buried in the dirt under the basement for a hell of a long time.
Thomas Quinn? Can't prove it, there's no way of matching those bones, wherever they are, to Quinn's.
But what is interesting is he cause of death.
He was bludgeoned? Skull caved in in three places.
What about this other witness? The one with the different address that turned out to be in the same building George Boole.
Never existed.
At least, he's not on any census that I've found.
Thomas Quinn couldn't have seen what he claimed to have seen from that first floor window? No.
But he saw something.
There's a window at the back overlooking the crime scene.
Quinn could have been a witness to the actual murder And the killer saw him.
So he finishes with Abigale Padua and then he pays Thomas Quinn a little visit.
He takes the body down to the basement and he buries it.
So he buries Quinn, cleans himself up and then he's about to slip away but the alarm has gone up and there are police everywhere.
Maybe they knock on the door looking for witnesses or maybe the killer comes out of his own accord.
Either way, he's improvising now.
Quinn's murder was spur of the moment but, he doesn't panic, he turns all of this to his advantage He identifies himself to the police as Thomas Quinn and sends them in the wrong direction.
But he can't leave the building because he's told them he's the night watchman.
So he goes back through the factory And out the back door? And there he meets more police, whereupon he identifies himself as George Boole and he sends those policemen off in a completely different direction.
So, it's like Jack said, he's creating noise, he's confusing the police with contradictory witness statements.
So Quinn and Boole are both the killer.
It does fit.
We can't prove it.
You don't have to prove it.
As you all variously pointed out earlier, it's a little late to arrest anyone for this crime.
I just want to know what happened.
But why? Please Continue.
All this actually means is that all our witnesses are fakes.
No, no, not all of them.
John Harper.
The outlier.
He doesn't fit the pattern.
No, I reckon he's legit.
Abigale Padua ran in front of his coach and caused this huge pile up.
Now he described the man chasing her and I think he's the only one telling the truth.
So what happened to him? Murdered.
You're kidding.
Two weeks later, down by the river.
How? Skull caved in.
It looked like a robbery.
Maybe it was.
And maybe it wasn't.
It doesn't make sense, though.
Harper had already made his statement, which was woolly at best, so why kill him? He'd seen the murderer.
Yeah, but his description was so general as to be useless.
That's not the point.
He'd seen him.
There was a good chance he'd recognise him if he saw him again.
Gerry, what was the date of John Harper's murder? The date on this newspaper is February the second.
He might not've given a very good description of the killer But he'd have recognised the picture.
And Sidney Padua must have known that piece was about to appear with his picture attached.
So we're back to Sidney Padua.
It's only circumstantial, though.
It doesn't need to be anything more.
Excuse me, but yes it does.
If you're forcing us to pursue this nonsense, at least we'll do it properly.
Professional to the last, Mr Halford.
What outcome are you hoping for here, Stephen? I told you before, Robert, your clearance level I mean, when is this over? It seems pretty clear Sidney Padua killed his sister.
Brian Lane thinks that's circumstantial.
And you said that was enough.
Lane's an odd fish, isn't he? Does he still sneak the occasional drink, do you think? No.
Can't ever be sure though, can you? Can never fully trust someone like that.
I do.
What would it take, I wonder? A bad day at work? Some bad news? Possibly a friend or loved-one in poor health? They say an alcoholic is always looking for a reason Who's "they"? Well, that's true.
I didn't answer your question.
I don't require proof that Sidney Padua killed his sister.
I doubt that's even available, but I need to know for certain what happened.
And then you're going to destroy all the documentation.
Yes.
Yours not to reason why, I'm afraid.
I thought we were knocking? Ellis-Finch.
I'm sorry? The finance company? The finance company.
Well? What have you found? We're asking the questions now.
I certainly am.
What's going on? One of the items of jewellery taken from Abigale Padua was a very distinctive ring.
This ring.
It was sold to a museum at a charity auction in New York in 1987.
Who was the seller? Joshua Ellis.
Of Ellis-Finch? A company last year who was involved in the collapse of two mortgage companies and who are now brokering a deal to let some big Chinese corporation take over one of our largest pension funds! And God knows what happens to all those pensions when they do.
What's the connection, Stephen? Between? Do you honestly expect us to believe that it's a coincidence that a 160-year-old case is suddenly connected to a major financial deal involving the Chinese? I really can't control what you believe.
The game's up, Stephen.
You actually do say that, do you? I'm here because I was led to believe there might be a connection between Joshua Ellis and the murder of Abigale Padua.
So why didn't you tell us? Because there's a difference between mounting an investigation and seeking to prove a hypothesis.
I find the former to be a little more honest.
There may have been no such connection, after all.
Well, now we know there is, would you like to share the nature of it with us? I have no idea, I'm afraid.
I was assuming that would be your team's next course of enquiry.
Who told you about this in the first place? You know better than to ask.
Even I didn't think you'd involve UCOS in something like this.
Something like what? This is political.
You're a representative of the UK Government, tasking us to investigate an international investment scheme involving the Chinese.
You make it sound so sinister.
Well, I'm sure, to the thousands of people whose pensions are at risk in this scheme, it IS sinister.
We don't know yet, do we? There may be a perfectly innocent explanation as to how that ring came into Joshua Ellie's possession.
You don't believe that for a second.
Not for a second, no.
Talk to me about Gerry Standing.
No, I don't think I will.
Well, according to the bumph in this auction catalogue, that ring was an Ellis family heirloom.
Yeah, right! It could have been.
How's that? Depending on how far back you can trace the Ellis family.
Well, that's the thing.
I've gone as far back as I can and the first one I come up with is Henry Ellis, who turned up in New York in 1852.
The year after the murders.
Where had he come from? There's no record of that.
He just seems to appear out of nowhere.
But he's got money, because a few months later, he started an investment firm in Manhattan and that's the firm that went on to become Ellis-Finch.
Pictures? No.
And that's weird as well because in New York in those days, like today, if you're rich, you're moving in the right circles, somebody's going to take a photograph of you.
But Henry Ellis seems to have been more than a little camera-shy.
He'd learned his lesson after that newspaper article.
So we still have no concrete link between Sidney Padua and Henry Ellis.
Not concrete, no, but here's the kicker.
Five years later, he got married and had two children.
A boy and a girl Abigale and Joseph.
He names his kids after two people he's killed? Sounds like it.
That's it, then.
Fisher said he didn't need hard evidence.
What we've got is circumstantial, but pretty damning.
What's the point of it all? We can't prove Joshua Ellis knows the truth about his ancestry and, even if he does, he's not responsible for the murders.
He wouldn't be where he is today without them though, would he? If Sidney hadn't killed his sister and Gleick and bet against his own company, then Ellis-Finch wouldn't exist.
Yeah, but who cares now? The Chinese.
It's very important family history.
Especially when you're trusting your money to a family who made theirs by ripping off investors.
It wasn't him.
Who wasn't him? Sidney Padua.
Guess where he went when he left London? It's not going to be New York, is it? He went home.
Well, sort of.
Padua? He died in 1881 in a little village just outside Padua, Italy.
He wasn't living in an enormous mansion by any chance, was he? He was a shoe salesman for nearly 30 years.
He had three daughters and he was practically penniless.
I know the feeling.
So Sidney Padua didn't become Henry Ellis? No.
And he didn't kill his sister or Joseph Gleick, or the coachman.
No.
But what about the photo in the paper and the timing of the coachman's death? Coincidence.
It wasn't him.
Then who was it? We don't know.
Well, that's ridiculous.
How many people could it have been? In London? In 1851? Two million, maybe? Don't be facetious, Mr Halford.
He's not being.
If it wasn't Sidney Padua, then it could have been anyone.
Anyone linked to the Ellis family.
You can only link to the Ellis family once you've decided what two things you're trying to link together, that's just simple logic.
Logic! Boolean logic! Why did the killer pick that name? George Boole you mean? Yeah, it was probably spur of the moment.
He's just buried Thomas Quinn, he's sent the police off on a wild goose chase.
He's improvising like mad.
But he thinks he's home and dry, so he calmly walks out through the back door, bang into more policemen, and he identifies himself as George Boole.
This newspaper.
Do we have the rest of this newspaper? Yeah, I have somewhere.
What have you got, Brian? Boole was a famous Victorian mathematician.
There you go.
Boolean logic - it's like binary.
You know, ones and zeroes.
Ah-ha! Who plucks a name like that out of his head on the spur of the moment? You? It's got to be another mathematician.
That's Gleick.
Yes.
An etching taken from a photograph.
A very good likeness.
Published on the same day as the picture of Sidney Padua.
Two days after the coachman who saw the killer was killed.
Now we've been assuming that the coachman was killed to stop him identifying a picture of Sidney Padua in the newspaper.
But maybe it was to stop him identifying another picture due to be published that day, to accompany an obituary for Joseph Gleick! Obituary is the point, surely? Gleick was dead.
Well, no, not necessarily.
Gleick's house was burned down and Gleick was never seen again.
No remains were ever found and I doubt any were looked for.
As far as the Southwark Police were concerned, he died in the fire.
And if Gleick knew that the investment algorithm wasn't going to work Maybe you were right before.
Maybe it was designed not to work.
These annotations - maybe Gleick wasn't correcting Abigale, maybe he was collaborating with her.
They decided to have a go at Sidney for what he's done to Abigale and make a profit on the side.
But if at some point Abigale had a change of heart It doesn't take an expert to realise that not only Sidney would be hurt, but a lot of other people would also lose their money in that deal.
So she goes to warn Sidney.
She's a brave girl, considering how Sidney would have reacted.
But Gleick knows, that if she gets to Sidney, not only will his profit disappear, but he'll be in serious trouble.
This is another hypothesis.
It seems like a pretty good one to me.
And one we can prove.
How? Look at this, these are the articles of incorporation for the company that Henry Ellis set up in 1852.
Look at that.
You'd need an expert to verify it It's the same handwriting.
It was Joseph Gleick all along.
What are you doing to do? Do? I need Renfield's original report, all the documents you've used, every note you made, the physical samples of Gleick's handwriting We have evidence here.
Of a crime that was committed a century and a half ago.
As you've all taken great pains to point out, that's hardly relevant today.
Yes, it is relevant.
That information could stop this Ellis-Finch deal with the Chinese.
He doesn't want it stopped.
He wants to make sure it can't be stopped.
And like Jack said this is a pension fund they're interfering with.
It's people's lives.
He doesn't care about that, Brian.
Whether I care or not, that's not the business I'm in.
What business are you in? I serve the national interest.
And it's more important for the nation to make nice with China and keep people like Joshua Ellis happy than it is to protect hundreds of thousands of pensioners, is it? You're not even aware of how naive that sounds, are you? I think it's time you left, Stephen.
By all means.
Empty-handed, I'm afraid.
Ah.
It's one thing to come in here and requisition this team for your own private investigation.
It's quite another to make us all complicit in the destruction of evidence in a murder investigation, especially one which may have implications in the present day, on the international stage.
You've been rehearsing that speech.
The evidence will stay here, pending a conversation I'm going to have with the Commissioner.
I see.
How do you envisage that conversation playing out? Well, we'll have to see, won't we? I can tell you, if you're interested.
The conversation ends with you handing over to me everything I've asked for, just prior to writing your letter of resignation.
I won't be threatened by you, Stephen.
I know you'd like us all to think your power extends that far Not my power, Robert! The power of the British Government, brandishing the Official Secrets Act, to which you are all subject and the contravention of which brings with it consequences far graver than you seem to be considering.
Those of you who still have careers, consider what you will do without them.
Those of you who don't, consider how your loved ones will cope while you live out the twilight of your lives at Her Majesty's pleasure.
Now I suggest you put the documents in the bag and put today's events very firmly out of your minds.
A wise decision, Mr Halford.
Shove it.
We must do this again, Robert.
Always a pleasure.
I'm sorry.
It's not your fault.
There was nothing we could do.
Well, I think we've earned a drink.
You up for that, Jack? There's a couple of things I want to do.
I'll meet you there.
What do you want to do? Couple of errands.
I'll see you in about an hour.
Well, that was quick.
Maybe he's got a date.
A what? Perhaps there's more to Jack's retirement than meets the eye.
I think we should throw a load of drink down his throat and just ask him outright.
Go gently, I don't want it turning nasty.
You coming, Brian? Yes, yes, of course.
I'll just tidy up first.
Work starts again tomorrow, Brian.
We'll finish the Kirby case, so Jack can draw a line under it.
I'll just close the computer down.
Suit yourself.
I'll see you in the pub.
See ya.
It's me.
Yes, it's done.
The information will be in the papers in the next day or so.
No, I've no idea which one of them leaked it.
I think our Mister Ellis will have plenty to worry about without stringing up some retired policeman.
Exactly.
I suggest it gets put down to yet another careless civil servant leaving his homework on the train.
Mission accomplished, we should let sleeping plods lie I think, don't you? Good luck, Jack.
They think you've got a fancy woman.
Bloody hell, Brian! What are you doing sneaking around? I was waiting for you.
And you couldn't wait in the pub? I wanted to warn you.
They think you've got a fancy woman.
Elizabeth Green.
It's not what you think.
It's not what they think.
You understand them being suspicious, though, don't you? It's all been a bit sudden.
They think I'm running off to France with a floozy.
What do they think I am? A liar.
They even had me believing it for a while.
Until I saw you switch those documents on Fisher.
I saw that and I thought, "Why would Jack risk everything for this? "Why would he risk his whole future?" That's when I looked up Elizabeth Green.
Brian The Elizabeth Green Hospice.
I'm going to the Ardeche.
The hospice is arranging the medication I need to take with me.
When did you find out? Few weeks ago.
It's in the liver.
There's nothing they can do.
We're your friends.
I don't want any fuss.
We're your friends! Yes, you are.
And I want you to remember me as I am.
I want to go away to a place that was special to Mary and me.
And just be there, with her and our memories.
When are you going? ASAP.
Will you do something for me, Brian? Yeah, of course I will.
Anything.
Don't tell anyone.
Not until after.
And I don't want anyone to try and stop me.
Or anyone coming after me or anyone trying to get in touch with me.
It's just me and Mary.
D'you understand? Yes.
Now, get into that pub and put on a brave face.
I'm so sorry, Jack.
Brave face, Brian.
And mine's a large Scotch.