SEAT 97: wrong place, wrong time: the mystery of a very public murder
A man who had it coming, or mistaken identity?People are finding their seats for a soul concert when a shot rings out. David Barron crumples to the floor. Next to him, journalist Nick Colton and his wife, Greta, step in to help.The assassin quickly escapes from the building. Realising this might be the scoop of his life, Nick rushes after him.Although the man evades him – perhaps a good thing, seeing as he is holding a gun – Nick is determined to find the killer. Despite the misgivings of the police.So who was David Barron and why was he shot? Why was he holding the lethal ticket for Seat 97?Can you work out the mystery?This is a totally gripping standalone crime mystery set in London that will keep you guessing.
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Chapter 27:
Detective Charlie Allen and his driver, a uniformed constable, are chasing gangster Freddie Valmar through the streets of East London after a drugs raid. The armed East End villain is heading for a Hackney housing estate he knows well.
Freddie Valmar’s heart was beating fast as he sped through Hackney. He was overtaking, where he could. He was taking risks, where he could.
‘There’s no way I’m going back inside’ were the words he kept repeating like a mantra.
His Jaguar, now travelling at speeds of up to sixty miles an hour, hurtled through red traffic lights at the junction with Morning Lane, forcing a van driver to pull up sharply. The two policemen had been gaining ground, but were obliged to let the van go through in front, costing precious seconds.
Valmar careered round the corner into Amhurst Road. His car then ploughed round the Dalston Lane roundabout into Pembury Road in Lower Clapton.
‘Those bastards aren’t far behind,’ he complained as he drew up on the edge of the Pembury Estate, a collection of red-brick council blocks built in the 1930s. He leaped out and dashed down a narrow lane between two of the five-storey Victorian buildings.
A sign on the block that was immediately ahead of him read ‘Midfield House’. The front doors to the higher flats were accessible via long balconies with an enclosed stairway in the centre. There were two parked cars in the yard beneath.
Valmar climbed the stairs two at a time until he reached the third floor. His heart was pounding again. His hands were clammy, his mouth dry. His breaths were coming in short bursts.
Then, fearing his pursuers may have already entered the courtyard below, he fell to his knees and crawled until he reached flat forty-three. Stretching up with his right hand, he pressed the buzzer on the door and waited.
Within seconds, it was opened by a shapely blonde woman in her late thirties in a pink top and jeans. She laughed heartily. ‘Freddie Valmar, what the heck are you doing down there?’
‘Let me in, for God’s sake,’ he whispered as he crept onto her red, patterned hallway carpet. Then, as the woman closed the door, he rose to his feet and, without another word, darted into the kitchen, leaned over the sink and peered through the net curtains at the balcony and yard outside.
She stood bewildered in the hallway. ‘Whatever’s got into you?’
‘I’m sorry, Marilyn. I’m being chased by the cops. I think they saw me come onto the estate, but hopefully they won’t realize I’m here.’
He turned as she entered the room and kissed his right cheek. She fondled his neck and chest. ‘Whatever have you done this time, you naughty boy?’
He pulled her hand away. ‘Not now, Marilyn. They think I’m tied up in a job for the Diamonds, so they followed me all the way from Fetterlock.’
‘Oh Freddie, you’re not still involved with that Vinny Diamond, are you?’
‘I ask myself that sometimes. This time we were grassed up and it’s all Vinny’s fault. He told one person too many what he’d got planned. It’s time I took over the business.’
‘Freddie, I wish you’d give it all up.’
‘Not now, Marilyn. I’ve got to think of a way out of here. This place will be running with cops quicker than a greyhound with his bum on fire.’
Tony Bassett, a former Fleet Street journalist, has had seven crime novels published so far.
This latest book, Seat 97, introduces Nick Colton, a journalist who is swept up into a murder investigation. It is a standalone novel that may possibly lead to a series. The book is published by London-based independent publishers The Book Folks, who specialise in crime fiction.
Tony is best known for his Midlands series of crime novels featuring DCI Gavin Roscoe and DS Sunita Roy (Murder On Oxford Lane, The Crossbow Stalker, Murder Of A Doctor, and Out For Revenge, all published by the Book Folks).
He first developed a love of writing at the age of nine when he and a friend produced a magazine called The Globe at their junior school in Sevenoaks, Kent. When he reached his teenage years, growing up in Tunbridge Wells, his local vicar staged one of his plays, about Naboth's Vineyard.
At Hull University, Tony was named student journalist of the year in 1971 in a competition run by Time-Life magazine and went on to become a national newspaper journalist, mainly working for the Sunday People in both its newsroom and investigations department.
His very first book to be published, the crime novel Smile Of The Stowaway, was released in December 2018. It concerns a Kent couple who harbour a stowaway and then battle to clear his name when he is charged with murder.
Then, in March 2020, the spy novel The Lazarus Charter was released. It involves foreign agents operating in the UK. The book has kindly been endorsed by Marina Litvinenko, widow of the murdered Russian dissident Alexander Litvinenko, and by Stan and Caroline Sturgess, parents of the innocent mother-of-three poisoned with novichok in Salisbury in 2018.
Tony has five grown-up children. He is a Life Member of the National Union of Journalists. He lives in South-East London with his partner Lin.
www.facebook.com/tony.bassett.92505
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