“What happened, then?” Diamond asked. “Could he have given them away? You see the difficulty? Three valuable gowns willed to him by his wife and six months later they have disappeared.”
“I hope you’re not suggesting we connived at a fraud.”
“Not at all. I happen to know where they ended up. You’re not under suspicion, but someone else is.”
“Who’s that?”
He managed an apologetic look. “Can’t say for legal reasons.”
She inhaled sharply.
He was unmoved. “Is the death certificate in the box? May I see it?”
She was unwilling to give him a sight of anything.
“Anyone can get a copy from the General Register Office,” he said. “It’s not classified information.”
The copy was reluctantly handed across.
“‘Cardiac failure and coronary atheroma.’ Heart, then. Much to be expected when you get to ninety-odd.” He gave it back. “So what happened to the contents of the house after he died?”
“Everything of value was put into an auction. It realised just under a hundred thousand pounds.”
“Would that have been mainly his stuff, or his wife’s? Presumably she left some jewellery?”
“Most of it was antique and must have belonged to her family. Their origins were Austro-Hungarian. There was also period furniture, paintings and books.”
“So the auction takings formed part of the estate. After you’d added in the sale of the house and any stocks and shares, building society accounts and so on-and subtracted the taxman’s share, and of course your modest fees, how much was left?”
“A little over two and a half million.”
“Not bad. And who were the lucky beneficiaries?”
“There was only one. The National Railway Museum.”
I was thinking today about the first two. I’m not stony-hearted but I’ve made it a rule never to mention names or dates in these occasional jottings. I’m not going to forget who I helped on their way. If I ever DO forget, it will be time to stop. No, I remember every one, some with more regret than others.
There are times when I wish I could share my experience with someone else, but it can’t happen. If ever I’m feeling isolated, I can glance through these notes and take stock of myself and how I handled matters. It’s not as if I’m lonely. There’s this area of my life that is private, that’s all.
9
In Bath CID there was plenty to moan about since their Manvers Street base had been sold and they’d been moved to this temporary home in the Custody and Crime Investigation Centre in Keynsham. The large white block was surrounded by industrial buildings instead of the homely pubs and coffee shops of Bath. It was open plan, meaning there was no place to hide. And it was home to the custody team, who resented having to make room for visitors. But from time to time someone served up a happy pill, a piece of information that linked unexpectedly with another and opened a whole new line of enquiry.
Diamond had got his new information, but happy he was not.
The more he probed the conduct of Ivor Pellegrini, the more disturbing it appeared. Dark, alien elements kept bobbing to the surface, demanding attention. In a routine investigation Diamond would have given them an airing, examined them for what they were and formed an opinion, but this wasn’t routine. He had a personal stake in Pellegrini’s well-being. He’d invested so much of himself in the rescue that he couldn’t be neutral. They were roped together like climbers and nothing would allow him to sever the rope and move upwards. Detachment wasn’t an option.
But the policeman in him knew this was morally wrong. The truth needed to come out. If he couldn’t be neutral himself, someone else must take on the job.
He ought to go straight to the incident room and brief his small team. Difficult, with no incident room.
Today he’d offered them a temporary escape from Keynsham: lunch in the city at the Grapes in Westgate Street. Chips, a sandwich and a beer. No expense spared. The building was said (on a beam above the bar) to date from as early as 1302. But to anyone who didn’t glance upwards or know the history already, the Grapes was no different inside from any other comfortable, unpretentious boozer.
“Two and a half million to a railway museum?” Halliwell said. “What will they spend it on?”
“Overhauling steam trains.”
Ingeborg said, “I can think of more deserving causes.”
“You’re missing the point,” Diamond said.
“We’re not, guv,” Ingeborg said. “We get it-Pellegrini and Filiput, both train enthusiasts.”
“Let’s move on, then. We can now make an informed guess how Pellegrini acquired the Fortuny gowns.”
Halliwell spelt it out. “The two became friends. They visited each other’s houses. Filiput stupidly showed Pellegrini the Fortuny gowns and Pellegrini nicked them, meaning to sell them when he could find a buyer.”
Ingeborg turned on him in disbelief. “Are you asking us to believe Filiput was so doddery he wouldn’t miss them?”
“He’d turned ninety,” Halliwell said.
“And still looked after himself. He wasn’t in a care home.”
“We don’t know the state of his mind.”
Trying to be just, Diamond said in Halliwell’s support, “A rich old man living alone is easy prey.”
Ingeborg said, “We’ll have to take your word for that, won’t we?”
Diamond gave her a sharp look, but didn’t follow it up.
She went on, “Do you think he helped himself to other objects, as well as the gowns?”
“More things could have been removed. I was told the jewellery didn’t amount to much after the old man died. Just silver. Nothing gold.”
“Can’t we get a warrant and search Pellegrini’s house?” Halliwell said.
“No chance,” Ingeborg said.
Diamond agreed. “The only evidence I have that he’s up to no good was obtained by deception. I was out of order. No magistrate would issue a warrant.”
Ingeborg added, “And even if you got inside you’d have no way of telling which items were stolen-if any.”
“You found out who the gowns belonged to,” Halliwell said.
“I was fortunate there,” Diamond said. “I had expert help.”
“How can we nail this guy, then?”
The force of the question pained Diamond. He was torn apart by professional duty and the strength of his bond to the man he’d rescued from the brink of death.
“I’m not over-worried about more stolen items.”
Ingeborg nodded. “Well said, guv. With the owners both dead, anything you recover will only benefit the railway museum.”
“So what are you worried about?” Halliwell pressed him.
They both looked at Diamond.
“The deaths of all these elderly people.”
If he’d thrown his beer in their faces they wouldn’t have been more shocked.
His tortured thoughts had progressed from puzzlement to fact-checking to suspicion of theft and now suspicion of murder, and it was still based more on hunch than solid evidence. He hated bringing it up but the possibility needed airing.
“You’re thinking their deaths weren’t natural?” Halliwell said after some seconds.
The printouts of the online forum on methods of murder were still in Diamond’s pocket. He divided the pages and passed them across the table.
“Found in the desk drawer in Pellegrini’s workshop.”
His two colleagues didn’t take long to read what was there.
Halliwell was the first to comment and seemed to speak for both of them. “There’s enough here to get him a life stretch.”
“That’s over-egging it. This stuff doesn’t make him a killer, but you have to wonder.”
“What’s yours about?” Ingeborg asked Halliwell. “These are from a forum on the perfect murder.”
“Much the same. Methods used in crime stories.”