“And you think I can help?”
“It isn’t like that.”
“What is it like, exactly?”
“Didn’t I just say that I can’t go into details?”
“Why not, if there’s an embargo? Surely that makes it safe to talk.”
“Please don’t be difficult. I know this is a wretched time to be disturbed, but take my word for it, there is an overriding necessity for you to come.”
“You mean right away?”
“The officers who are with you now have instructions to drive you here. As soon as you arrive you will be fully briefed.”
“And if I decline?”
“I would still require the officers to drive you here.”
Diamond was tempted to ask what the purpose of the phone call had been if he was being carted off to Bath willy- nilly, but he restrained himself. “I’d better get some clothes on then, but no obligation. You do appreciate I’m not in the police anymore?”
He showed Smith and Brown where the coffee things were and went back to the bedroom to break the news of his departure to Stephanie. He told her as much as he knew; after all, she was entitled to be told and he was under no obligation of secrecy. She found it difficult to credit that the police wanted him back after the angry scene when he had quit. In his heavy-handed way he had been a good detective, but no one is irreplaceable. She asked how long he would be there and he reminded her that Bath was only a couple of hours’ drive. He promised to phone her in the morning.
To make light of it, he said, “Well, I suppose it beats posing in the nude.”
Stephanie said, “Don’t count on it.”
Chapter Three
Sergeant Brown drove as if he wanted to get airborne. The streets of West London were a blur from the backseat of the red Montego heading for the M4. Peter Diamond, never comfortable in cars, tried repeatedly to get a conversation going, but neither of his escorts would be charmed or bullied into disclosing any more about the “major emergency” being used to justify this extraordinary night exercise. By Junction Three Diamond had concluded that they were just dogsbodies who knew nothing.
He changed the subject and asked for news of the current personnel in the Avon and Somerset CID. Evidently a shakeout had taken place since the new Chief Constable had arrived. Of the murder squad of two years ago-Diamond’s team- only two senior detectives remained. As many as seven had been transferred to other duties or had taken early retirement. The survivors were Keith Halliwell, charming, but a lightweight, and John Wigfull, the fast-track career man with the staff college mentality. Wigfull had been elevated to the rank of Chief Inspector. He now headed the squad.
Diamond closed his eyes and told himself it was all behind him. What did it matter to him personally if a toe rag like Wigfull had the top job?
“Good thinking,” said Smith.
“What?”
“Getting some shut-eye while you can.”
“The speed we’re going, it could be permanent.”
However, Diamond did drift off.
When he woke, prepared to find himself in intensive care, they were at Membury Services, sixty miles on. A petrol stop.
“I don’t know about you fellows, but I wouldn’t say no to a coffee,” he suggested.
“We’ll be there in under the hour,” said Smith.
“Under three-quarters,” said Brown. “Have a coffee when we get there.”
“By then I’ll need something stronger than coffee.”
The last stretch, over the rump of the Costwolds on the A46 after leaving the motorway, gave Brown the opportunity to bring the experience to a heart-thumping climax, leaving tire marks at intervals on the winding descent from Cold Ashton, beside what Diamond knew was a sheer drop of several hundred feet if the car left the road.
In other circumstances the night panorama of Bath with its myriad lights spreading out from the floodlit Abbey would have been a welcome sight. He saved his approval for the moment they turned right onto the level stretch of the London Road.
“Good.”
“Good driving, or good to be here?” said Smith.
“What time is it?”
“Just after three.”
“All of two hours. What kept us so long?”
Smith and Brown were easy targets. He looked forward to sharper exchanges presently.
“Who will I see at the nick? Who are the insomniacs on the roster?”
Smith didn’t know, or didn’t care to answer.
The car drew up at the entrance to Manvers Street Police Station and Diamond, buoyant after surviving the trip, went in with Smith to get the answer to his question.
The public reception area had been altered since Diamond’s day, drastically reduced in size by partitioning. The silver trophies won by the force remained on display in a glass cabinet, practically daring the local smash-and-grab lads to have a try. A round mirror was strategically placed to give a view of anyone entering. The desk sergeant operated from behind protective glass, like a bank clerk. He was one of the old hands and his face lit up. “Mr. Diamond! It’s a real tonic to see you again.” A warmer welcome than old acquaintance merited. Diamond wasn’t fooled: it said more about the new regime than his own lovability.
Smith escorted him upstairs to the room the top brass used as an office when they visited. Ironically, it was the same room Diamond had stormed out of the last time he had been here. That ill-starred morning, Mr. Tott, the Assistant Chief Constable, in uniform, every button fastened, had been at the far end of the oval mahogany table to inform Diamond he was being taken off the murder inquiry he was heading and replaced by Wigfull. The offense? He had allegedly caused concussion to a turbulent twelve-year-old who had kicked him in the privates. All he had done was push the boy aside, against a wall. Young Matthew had later admitted he was faking the concussion, but by then Diamond had resigned.
The door stood open.
“Go right in,” said Smith. “Mr. Tott is waiting.”
Diamond slapped a hand against the door frame. “Did you say Tott? I don’t believe this.”
“The ACC,” Smith whispered reverentially.
“I know who he is,” Diamond said in a voice that must have carried into the room. “I don’t wish to speak to him.” He turned away from the door and started back along the corridor to the stairs. He wasn’t sure where he was heading except away from that bloody man he despised. The anger he thought he had dissipated two years ago had him seething.
Smith came after him and caught him by the arm. “What’s wrong? What did I say?”
“Just enough to prevent carnage.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Don’t worry. It’s no concern of yours.”
“But it is. I was supposed to bring you to that room. They’re waiting in there to speak to you. It’s the middle of the night, for pity’s sake! Where are you going?”
“As far away from that dipstick as I can. I’m a civilian. I don’t have to grovel.”
He continued downstairs.
“I can’t let you do this, Mr. Diamond,” Smith called after him. “You can’t leave the building.”
“Try and stop me,” the ex-detective shouted back. “Do you have a warrant?”
Upon reaching the ground floor, he walked briskly to the entrance hall, past his friend the desk sergeant without so much as a look, through the double doors and out into the night air.
Tott.
He said aloud, “What kind of plonker do they take me for?”
He strode up Manvers Street in a state of outrage; a case of rocketing hypertension. Some way up the street he realized that spots before the eyes are not a healthy sign, and he had better talk himself into a calmer frame of mind. At least he’d had the gumption to walk out. He ought to be feeling better for asserting his independence. He would try the Francis Hotel in Queen Square; a congenial place to get his head on a pillow until morning, when he would return home by train. At lunchtimes in the old days when things were quiet at the nick he had sometimes popped into the Roman Bar at the Francis for a beer. In more benevolent moods than this he had basked in the plush ambience suggestive of less stressful times. It was easy to picture city worthies in pinstripes, with waistcoats and watch chains, entertaining flighty young ladies in cloche hats.