They thanked him and ignored his advice, taking a footpath that looked as if it might lead into someone’s garden, yet presently brought them into Conkwell Wood. With the flashlight picking out the path, Diamond strode ahead, forcing his feet through inches of leaves. “At certain times of the year, you can still hear nightingales,” he informed Julie, as if he were leading a nature ramble, then added, “so my neighbor told me.” The only sound on this particular evening was the steady drone of traffic across the valley cruising along the A36. Occasionally they saw the moving headlights, for the wood dipped sheerly to their right.
Diamond was still on his nightingale theme. “These days, in this neck of the woods, you’re more likely to have your eardrums blasted by rock music.”
“I shouldn’t think so,” Julie told him. “The studio must be soundproofed.”
Every few steps, he raised the torch beam to see what was ahead, but for the present there was no variation in the tree trunks and bushes except that some of the trees were dead and had fallen at odd angles against the branches of others and become festooned with creepers. The path was reasonably clear thanks to regular use by walkers and horse riders, but there was thick scrub on either side, mainly of brambles. Once they disturbed a roosting bird and sent it screeching in search of a safer place.
After some minutes of careful walking, because hidden rocks were a real hazard, they passed a six-foot chain-link fence with a triple band of barbed wire along its top. Examination with the flashlight revealed that it was too thick in rust to have been erected by Jake Pinkerton, who had built his studio in the mid-eighties. The path skirted the fence, so they moved on.
Pinkerton’s fence, when it came in sight, was taller, clear of rust, and electrified along the top. The name of a security firm was displayed at intervals. They walked around it looking for the entrance. From time to time Diamond waved the flashlight across a section of the interior.
“Looking for something in particular?” Julie asked.
“Maybe,” he muttered. “But it’s going to be well hidden.”
“Difficult with a torch.”
“Yes.”
A moment later, almost at the highest point of the wood, they activated a double set of floodlights. Dazzled and immobilized as rabbits on a motorway, they had found the entrance. A respectably wide road led up to the studio.
“So I needn’t have ruined these shoes,” Julie commented in an effort to reduce the whole expedition to basics and restore her nerve.
Diamond wasn’t listening. He had found a box with a two-way communication system and a surveillance camera above it. “Police,” he said after the speaker had crackled, “for Mr. Jake Pinkerton.”
“Mr. Pinkerton has left,” came the answer.
“We’d still like to come in.”
“Wait for the barrier, then.”
They passed through a security gate. Ahead, a man in a silver-buttoned black uniform and peaked hat opened a door and asked if he could be of some assistance-but in a manner that made clear that the “some” was meant as a limitation rather than infinite generosity.
“I’m sure you can,” said Diamond, who in his time had done a similar job and knew about dealing with visitors without appointments. “This is Inspector Hargreaves and my name is Diamond. Show him your ID, Julie, would you? How long ago did Mr. Pinkerton leave?”
“At least an hour.”
“Was he going home?”
“I wouldn’t know, sir.”
“I expect he has a car phone,” Julie chimed in.
“Good idea,” said Diamond, and told the security man, “Better let him know we’re here. Is there anyone else about?”
“Two of the studios are in use. A band is making a recording right now.”
“Regular staff, I meant.”
“The chief sound engineer is in the control room with the studio manager, but they wouldn’t want to be disturbed unless it’s extremely urgent.”
“We won’t bother them in that case. You can show me what I want to see, Mr., em, Humphrey. Are you ex-police, by any chance?” On the principle that you get better service if you address people by name, he had gone close enough to read Cyril Humphrey’s identity tag.
The security man flushed crimson. “I can’t help you. I know nothing about the workings of the studios.”
“The studios don’t interest us,” said Diamond, in the knowledge that he was speaking only for himself, not Julie. “I want to see where you park your cars.”
“That’s round the back.”
“Then we’d like to look round the back.”
As it worked out, they had privileged views of the studios on their way to the car park, because the modern trend in studio architecture is for huge windows where soundproof cladding was once thought indispensable. The artists need no longer feel enclosed in a bunker. So the recording session and the rehearsal were on display to anyone passing the window; hence, presumably, the elaborate security. However, nobody in the studios seemed to be doing anything; long-haired youths lounged around looking bored, drinking from paper cups.
“The car park’s this way,” Humphrey informed them.
About ten vehicles stood on a square of tarmac with space for three times that number. Diamond flicked the flashlight across them. “Does the boss leave his car here?”
“Mr. Pinkerton? No, sir. He has his private garage round the other side.”
“We’d like to see that next.”
“No chance. It opens electronically.”
“From outside, you mean.”
“Yes, he has a sensor thing in his car.”
“It triggers the mechanism?”
“Yes. We don’t have a spare.”
“When the door has opened and he’s driven in, does it close behind him?”
“Yes, sir.” Cyril Humphrey seemed smugly satisfied that he had conveyed the principle-and the impossibility of letting them see inside the garage.
“So there must be an interior door,” said Diamond, “leading to his office, right? Then we’ll all go inside and get to it that way.”
“I couldn’t take responsibility for letting you into Mr. Pinkerton’s office. Not without permission.” This was becoming a battle of wills.
“The office doesn’t interest us,” said Diamond. “We want to see the garage.”
“It’s empty.”
“I said the garage, not the car.”
“You could phone him,” Julie reminded the man.
Faced with the prospect of informing Pinkerton that the police wanted to look inside his garage, Humphrey backed down. He admitted them inside the building, along a carpeted corridor hung with modern paintings, through a secretary’s office and into the sanctum, a room furnished like a set from a Wagner opera, all black and silver, with ironwork thrones (you couldn’t call them chairs), avast round iron table, braziers for lights and the walls hung with suits of armor.
They were shepherded across to a stretch of black wall where a door was artfully concealed. Then down some stone steps to Jake Pinkerton’s private garage, a clean, concrete place with space for four vehicles.
“You see?” said Humphrey. “Nothing here.”
Diamond made a short walking tour and then said, “Is this the only garage? What about the other top people? Do they have anywhere to leave their cars under cover?”
“This is the only one.”
“Thanks, then. What sort of security do you have outside?”
Humphrey looked uncomfortable. “What do you mean- the fence?”
“The grounds. Dog patrols? Lights? Alarms?”
He gave a guarded answer. “It’s an effective system.”
“Can I take a walk around the grounds without having a Doberman at my throat?”