Angel and the Actress by Roger Silverwood

van with the car. He was wearing protective pads round his legs and arms over a dark suit, and he had a safety helmet over the balaclava.’
    Angel rubbed his temple. ‘Were there any firearms?’
    ‘Yes, sir. The driver who rammed them. He had a small, sort of blue-coloured handgun.’
    Angel shook his head and wiped over his face with his hand. ‘Too many guns around the place. What do they know about their getaway?’
    ‘They said that the four men made their escape in a blue Ford Mondeo, sir. They went north towards Leeds. They didn’t get the licence number.’
    ‘It would have been a false number plate, anyway,’ Angel said. ‘Did they get away with a lot?’
    ‘Two hundred and twenty thousand, sir.’
    His eyes opened wide. ‘It’s a lot of money,’ he said, shaking his head.
    ‘Another thing, sir. The notes were all dirty or torn notes on their way to the Bank of England to be destroyed.’
    ‘Did Slater’s men see anything helpful at all? You know, a tattoo, a wristwatch, that sort of thing?’
    ‘They said not, sir,’ Crisp said. ‘This gang weren’t amateurs. They seem to have left the job absolutely clean.’
    Angel’s eyes flashed. The muscles round his jaw tightened. ‘Nobody can deliberately drive a car into a van at speed, blow open the door of the safe, take away all that dosh and not leave something behind.’
    ‘They left three pickaxes, sir.’
    ‘Yeah, I mean more than that. I’m hopeful that DonTaylor will find something … a print or something. All right, Trevor. Carry on, but press them on anything they might have seen or heard of the robbers.’
    ‘I will, sir,’ Crisp said, and he returned to the two Slater Security men in his car.
    Angel walked up to the vehicle wreck. ‘Is Don Taylor there?’
    The tall slim figure wreathed in white came out of the innermost part of the van. ‘Yes, sir?’ he said.
    ‘How you doing, Don?’
    He pulled down his mask and said, ‘Found a cigarette end, sir. The brand is “Adelaide”. Never heard of it. No prints on it. Looks like all the gang were wearing gloves, and that that discipline was maintained throughout.’
    Angel’s face creased. ‘Can we get any DNA from it?’
    ‘Yes, sir.’
    ‘That would be great, if they’re on record,’ Angel said, rubbing his chin. Then his forehead wrinkled. ‘Just a minute,’ he said, and he walked back to Crisp’s car, opened the door, peered in and said, ‘Excuse me, chaps.’ He looked at the two Slater Security men and said, ‘Do either of you smoke?’
    ‘No,’ came the reply in unison.
    He nodded, closed the car door, came back to Taylor and said, ‘It’s not from either of them.’
    Taylor smiled. ‘Great stuff, sir. We’ll get it off to the lab today.’
    ‘Find anything else, Don?’
    ‘We’ve been over the three pickaxes they used to claw their way into the back of the van, but there are no prints or anything useful on them.’
    ‘Right. I’ll take them with me. Get one of your lads to put them in my boot, will you?’
    ‘Yes, sir.’
    ‘Anything else?’
    ‘I’ve found part of the remains of the detonator, sir. A handmade job. Quite primitive but it works. Made from a three-inch length of steel wool, two matches, six inches of Sellotape, several yards of twin-core electric cable and a little nine-volt battery. A kid of ten could make it. And so efficient. The detonation is so quick that the blast of the dynamite blows out the flame of the two matches before they are burnt up.’
    Angel blinked several times. ‘Interesting from the modus operandi point of view, Don,’ he said, ‘but there’s nothing forensic we can learn from that, is there?’
    Taylor didn’t reply quickly. He scratched his head, then said, ‘It helps to measure the size of the explosion, sir.’
    ‘True. And the mentality of the villains.’
    ‘It’s that sort of info you’d get from a spell in prison.’
    Angel nodded his agreement. ‘I reckon it would cost about two snorts of