“Oh God!” said Julie, beginning to laugh.
“-and then dropped on the table and tipped over.”
“No!”
“Unfortunately the flame hadn’t gone out completely. Next thing we had a fire going. Flames leaping up in front of me. I had to grab a soda syphon to put it out. The tablecloth was scorched and we had to be moved to another table to finish our coffee.”
Tears of amusement ran down Julie’s face. “I heard you were accident prone.”
“Who told you that?”
She wiped her eyes. “We’ve all got our weak points. My trouble is, I can never remember who told me things.”
True to his promise, he said nothing about the investigation until they had finished eating. Then he gave her a near-verbatim account of his latest brush with Mountjoy. “And now I’ve got a real problem,” he confided. “A jumbo-sized dilemma. Do I report all this to the top brass at Manvers Street? You’ll say I’m duty bound.”
“I think you are,” said she.
“But I’ve got nothing of substance to pass on except the fact that he is armed.”
“That’s more than enough.”
He continued as if Julie hadn’t spoken, “I learned sweet FA about Samantha, or where they are holed up. If I tell Warrilow that Mountjoy is carrying a handgun, he’ll issue weapons and some idiot will shoot him on sight.”
“You can’t not tell them,” she argued. “He could shoot an officer and you’d have to live with that knowledge.”
He sighed heavily. “He’s an idiot. He’s supposed to be trying to prove his innocence. Why does he need a bloody gun? I wasn’t going to jump him.”
“I suppose he wanted to give you a fright. He wants quick results.”
“In his shoes, so would I. But he’s getting good value from me. We’re in there pitching, Julie.” He spotted an uneaten slice of toast on the next table and reached for it. “I don’t need a gun at my head.”
She nudged the conversation forward. “You spoke of something Mountjoy said that throws the whole inquiry into uncertainty again.”
“Right.” Diamond’s mood improved; with a return to London looming, any delay in the unraveling of the mystery was to be welcomed. “Picture it, Julie. He’s back at the house with Britt, right?”
“This is the night of the murder?”
“Yes. They’ve had a pleasant meal and he thinks he’s been invited back for some action. But instead, she has chosen this moment to hit him with her evidence about the Iraqis he was enrolling. It’s a setup. He said to me last night that he reckoned she was taping the conversation. Of course she was! She was a smart journalist collecting evidence. We know she used tapes in her work. She had two recorders, one of those heavy-duty things that you stack up in your living room-”
“A music center?”
“Right. And a neat little Japanese thing dinky enough to fit into a pocket or a handbag. After the murder we carted off boxes of her stuff, including tapes. The question is what happened to the Mountjoy tape?”
“If one existed,” said Julie.
“You can bet your life it existed.”
“I’ve been through the inventory of her material,” she said. “She was very well organized. There were upwards of fifty cassettes, every one dated and labeled, but nothing for the date of the murder. I’m sure I would have noticed.”
“The only person with an interest in possessing such a tape would be Mountjoy himself.”
“Unless it was still recording when the murder took place,” said Julie.
Diamond stared at her and snapped his fingers. “Brilliant! The killer may have taken it.”
“Cool-after killing someone, to check the tape recorder.”
“Very.”
“Unless…”
“Unless what?”
“… he had the opportunity to collect it later.”
He stared out across the Square. “We’re back to Billington.” The disappointment was clear in his voice. “He was the one on the scene.”
Nothing was said for some time.
Finally, Julie spoke. “You don’t want Billington to be proved the killer, do you?”
“It’s so obvious. Why didn’t I pay him more attention at the time?”
“Because of his alibi, you told me. Any news of his condition?”
“I phoned the hospital first thing this morning. He’s improving slowly, but they don’t think he’s capable of answering questions yet. Meanwhile if we could find that missing tape in his house-”
“Won’t he have destroyed it by now-or just erased the recording? I certainly would.”
“The chances are that he did,” Diamond agreed, but with reluctance.
“Should we search the house, just the same?”
“Without a warrant?”
“To examine the scene of yesterday’s assault.”
Julie was giving top value for her muesli breakfast.
He grinned. “Let’s do that.”
Realistic about his own limitations, Diamond assigned Julie to conduct the search of the Billingtons’ house unaided. As a constitutionally clumsy man, in a search he was more likely to destroy clues than find them. Instead, he resolved to find out more about Britt Strand’s investigative journalism. Interviewing was his forte. He drove to Steeple Ashton.
In time for elevenses.
The cottage was rich with the aroma of two fruit cakes recently out of the oven. The bounteous Prue Shorter explained that they were destined to be tiers of a wedding cake, and if Diamond didn’t mind having the trimmings that had overlapped the tins, there were plenty of crisp bits to sample.
She made coffee and handed him a well-filled plate. “How’s the finger?” she enquired.
“Finger?”
“Was it a thumb, then?”
“Ah-my bee sting.” He glanced down at his hand. “The agony I put up with! I’d forgotten all about it, so it must be all right.”
“And you haven’t found that convict yet? He isn’t here, you know.”
“No, he’s someone else’s job. I’m still tidying up the facts about your former colleague.”
“Britt? I told you all I know, ducky.”
“You won’t have heard that her former landlord is in hospital after a fracas with his wife.”
“He’s in hospital?”
“She cracked him over the head with a bagful of coins and now she’s accused him of murdering Britt.”
“God Almighty!” She gave a huge, wheezy laugh and took a seat opposite Diamond at the kitchen table.
Cutting the merriment short, he broached the main business of his visit. “You called at the house a few times, I believe. Did you meet the Billingtons?”
She was shaking her head, not as a response, but a reaction to the latest twist in the Britt Strand saga. “Did I meet them? Yes, miserable buggers, both of them. Nary a smile between them. You pass the time of day and they treat it as a personal insult.”
“They remember you calling. At least, she does.”
“I don’t exactly merge into the background, do I?”
“So you didn’t have much conversation?”
“In a word, zilch.”
“I’m interested to know what Britt had to say about them, if anything. The man in particular.”
“Him? Silly old tosser! He fancied her, of course. Tell me a man who didn’t. She told me he used to chat her up, or try to, when his wife wasn’t about. Gave her the odd present. Is he really under suspicion?”
“Did he ever try anything?” Diamond persevered.
“You mean with Britt?”
What else did she think he meant? “Yes.”
She paused before replying. “Who knows? I didn’t know her that well. There were other men, weren’t there? It came out at the trial. She wasn’t unapproachable, but I think she’d draw the line at old Billington. She could do better than that. Are you married, Mr. Diamond?”