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distance was around two metres.’
    ‘And did you note how far the robot was from the dead body?’
    ‘Yes. Around two metres.’
    ‘That doesn’t help any then, Mac. If somebody else was in that workshop he must have been standing just about where we found the robot.’
    ‘Or just in front of it.’
    ‘Would that be within the realms of possibility?’
    ‘Oh yes.’
    ‘You’re a great help, Mac. As always. Thank you very much for now. Goodbye.’
     
    ‘You wanted me, sir?’ It was DS Flora Carter.
    Angel looked up.
    Flora Carter had been enlisted from Sheffield force to replace DS Ronald Gawber, Angel’s sergeant of ten years. Gawber had moved down south so that his wife could look after her elderly father. Flora Carter was senior both in terms of length of service and experience in detective work to DS Crisp.
    Angel wasn’t happy about female officers, particularly if they were pleasing to the eye. He considered the appreciation of femininity out of place in a police station. Modelling clothes, hair or make-up, presenting programmes on radio or television, or being at home bringing up children was where such fortunate ladies should be. He worried in case he came to work one day and found vases of wallflowers in the cells. What with her and PC Leisha Baverstock, he had been heard to mumble, Bromersley police station was getting more like a hothouse for contestants entering the Miss World competition than an establishment for finding criminals and bringing them to justice.
    She smiled at him sweetly.
    He didn’t smile back. He wrinkled his nose. ‘Aye. Sit down. Are you fully in the picture with this Razzle case, lass?’
    ‘I think so, sir. I’ve kept up with the reports. Charles Razzle locked himself in his workshop where only he knew the combination. A robot he had built shot him dead. CCTV confirms that nobody else entered or left the house during the time of the incident. His wife was away in London with many witnesses. So it’s either an accident or suicide.’ She looked at him, blinked, and waited for his approval.
    With eyebrows raised he said, ‘Pretty close. Except for the last bit. It wasn’t an accident or a suicide. It was murder.’
    Her face changed. A cold chill ran down her spine. ‘Oh?’ she said. Then she frowned. ‘How’s that possible, sir.’
    ‘I don’t know, yet.’
    He told her about the forensic he had received from Mac only a few minutes earlier and the deduction he had made.
    Her eyes narrowed.
    ‘But what about the CCTV, sir?’
    ‘There were no strangers shown on it,’ he said.
    ‘So nobody could have managed to have entered the workshop dodging both cameras, then hide anywhere until the critical time, then come out, take the gun out of the robot’s hand, shoot Razzle, replace the gun, wait there until the workshop door was unlocked and opened and sneak out, because all the time after the door was opened, PC Donohue and PC Elder were there in the kitchen and would have seen anybody coming up the basement steps. Also Donohue and Elder stayed there until SOCO took over at approximately 0840 hours and, anyway, the CCTV tape was running the entire time. It would have recorded it.’
    ‘Exactly,’ Angel said. ‘So there must be another way into the workshop, or a hiding place in there, where an intruder could have been, or a way past the CCTV cameras … a door or window or trapdoor in the basement or something like that. I want you to get a squad together and check that out. Do it thoroughly. Take the building to pieces if necessary. It’s a pity there wasn’t a CCTV camera in the workshop itself. That would have explained everything.’
    ‘I’ll have a good look round, sir.’
    She stood up to leave.
    There was a knock at the door.
    ‘Come in.’
    It was Ahmed with a large brown envelope. The word EVIDENCE was printed in red across it.
    ‘Just came, sir,’ he said, offering it across to Angel. ‘By messenger.’
    ‘I’ll go, sir,’ Flora Carter