Bloodhounds

Chapter Thirty-three

Out of consideration for his passenger, he drove to the back of the central police station, and they entered through a side door. Even so, several heads swiveled when he escorted Jessica, teetering high-heeled along the corridor in the pale blue Armani suit she'd put on for the London art dealer.

In Diamond's office the phone was flashing like a burglar alarm. He pulled out a chair for Jessica and asked if she wanted that coffee tasting of plastic. She requested water.

He read the written messages left on his desk. Julie Hargreaves had spoken to Shirley-Ann Miller and confirmed that she had a good alibi for the previous night. Halliwell had traced Miss Chilmark to Lucknam Park, the country house turned hotel at Colerne, and was on his way there; lucky bastard, he wouldn't be drinking out of plastic cups. And Jack Merlin, the pathologist, couldn't, after all, get to Bath next day; the postmortem on Rupert Darby would have to be postponed unless someone else took over.

After collecting tea for himself, Diamond sat opposite Jessica, observing her, deciding on his strategy. She was drumming her fingers on the desk. There didn't seem much advantage in gentle sparring.

"Mrs. Shaw, why did you write those lists of words on the paper bag?"

The finely shadowed eyes narrowed, but there was nothing else to register the body blow this was meant to be. This lady wasn't simply going to roll over and tell all.

"The bag you used to treat Miss Chilmark's hyperventilation. I have it here." He opened his desk and took it out, enclosed in a transparent cover. "They happen to rhyme, these words. 'Jack, flak, knack, mac'… It looks like working notes for a poet-or at least a writer of verse. In this case, they rhyme with 'black.' There's a second column rhyming with 'motion' and a third with 'room.' I could be wrong, but those are words that feature in the case under investigation: Penny Black, Milo Motion, and Locked Room. Working notes?"

Jessica's only response was the merest movement of the padded shoulders.

"You did write them yourself, didn't you?" he pressed her. "Sid Towers had nothing to do with it."

Not even a flicker this time.

"It can't have been Sid because of the fresh riddle in verse that was published yesterday. Sid is dead. He couldn't have been our poet." He watched her minutely. This wasn't achieving anything. "I'll be frank," he said. "Until this morning I still wasn't certain. You know what happened this morning?"

No answer.

"Mrs. Shaw?"

A sigh. "Yes, I heard what happened."

"Another death," he said. "Rupert Darby's death."

She said calmly, "You're not telling me anything I don't know."

Encouraged that there was two-way traffic now, he said, "Let's go back to the riddle for a moment:

'To end the suspense, as yours truly did,

Discover the way to Sydney from Sid.'

"In style, it was not dissimilar from the other two. It was on similar paper, in an identical typeface, and distributed in the same way to the local media. That wasn't some publicity seeker messing about, Mrs. Shaw. 'To end the suspense'… It was written in the knowledge that a man would shortly be found hanging from a bridge in Sydney Gardens. Isn't that plain?"

"If you say so."

"You must have read the riddle in the paper."

"Yes."

"Did you write it? — that's the question."

"I did not."

"Did you write the others?"

"No."

He paused, letting the gravity of her situation take root. He studied the paper bag as if he hadn't seen it before. Then he looked up and started again, but less abrasively. "Until yesterday afternoon, I was taken in by these lists. Thought they were written by Sid. Had to be."

She held his gaze with her dark brown eyes.

He said, "If Sid wrote them, it was natural to assume that he was our poet, the composer of the riddles, the joker who stole the Penny Black and magicked his way into a locked boat. They looked like working notes, the first notes for a riddle that never appeared, because Sid was killed before he completed it." He spread his hands. "I boobed. We all make mistakes. But what am I left with?"

He took his time. Passed his hand around the back of his neck and massaged it. "What I'm left with, Mrs. Shaw, is the alternative. You wrote the lists." Another pause. "Do you follow my thinking? The bag was Sid's. He handed it to you. You handed it to me. True?"

She sighed-a reluctant admission. Yet the logic of what he had said was inescapable.

"We call that continuity of evidence, Mrs. Shaw. That's why it's clear that if Sid didn't write the lists, you did." He leaned forward, hunched over his desk, watching her. "Makes you my prime suspect." An exaggeration, but he had to find some way of getting through. "I'm trying to give you every chance. This isn't a formal interview. If there's an explanation, now's your opportunity."

She looked down at her fingernails, not persuaded, it seemed.

He said, "The postmortem hasn't been done on Rupert yet, so this may be premature, but I expect it to confirm that he met his death by foul play."

She caught her breath-the first unguarded response. "He hanged himself."

"He was found hanging."

"I don't follow you."

"I think you do. We took a blood sample. The man was well tanked up, some way over the limit, probably incapable of rigging up a noose."

She said, "This is in the realm of speculation." Fair comment, too.

He found himself analyzing his performance so far. This isn't the approved interviewing technique, he told himself. It isn't an interview at all yet. I'm laying out all my cards while she sits there denying everything.

He picked up his cup and did damage to the inside of his mouth. Tea from the machine was always too hot or tepid. "Could I have a sip of that water? I'll get you some fresh."

She pushed the beaker across the desk.

He said, "It may be speculation now, but we'll know soon enough. The postmortem will show if there was a struggle. You can't string a man from a bridge without handling him roughly."

Jessica drew herself up in the chair and said scornfully, "You're not seriously suggesting that I did this to Rupert?"

"You probably couldn't have done it alone," he conceded.

"Why should I do it at all?"

"That's no mystery," he said. "We recovered his beret, and it has traces of sprayed paint."

Another sharp intake of breath. The wall of indifference was crumbling.

He told her, "I know all about the graffiti sprayed on the gallery window. Mean."

She started to say, "How-"

"I've discussed it with your husband and your friend AJ."

"They told you?"

He moved relentlessly on. "Rupert was at the party with paint on his beret."

She said, "Are you sure of this?"

"I can show you the beret if you like. The real point is that it gave you, and possibly someone else, a clear motive for silencing Rupert. He would have exposed you."

"I didn't know it was Rupert."

He got up, walked to the window and looked out.

She repeated, with more fervor, "I didn't know it was Rupert."

He let a few seconds pass. Then, without turning from the window: "Do you still deny writing the riddles?"

"Of course I deny it," she said passionately. "I didn't write them. I didn't kill anyone."

"But you wrote those lists of words on the paper bag."

"It doesn't mean I'm a killer."

He said, "But you wrote the lists. You will admit that much?" By now, he reckoned, she ought to be ready to admit to the lesser crime.

She showed she had spirit. "Is this going to take much longer? — because I have things to do. I assume I can walk out whenever I wish. I'm not under arrest, or anything?"

He said in sincerity, "Mrs. Shaw, I brought you here so that we could talk in private, away from the gallery. I'm giving you the opportunity to explain your actions."

Coolly, she asked, "What actions? I've done nothing illegal."

"At the very least, fabricating evidence."

"How can you say that?"

"Look, if you didn't write the lists as notes for a riddle, you wrote them for another purpose. You were taking a considerable risk, of course, but it was-what's the term bridge players use? — a finesse. The winning of a trick by subtle means, playing a low card. And you played it with a skill anyone would admire. You didn't volunteer the bag. You waited for me to ask if it was still in your possessioh. And when you handed it across, you didn't draw my attention to the lists. You let me find them myself and conclude that Sid wrote them. You conned me and my team. Why? Why mislead the police? You must have had something to hide."

She shook her head.

"Someone to shield, then?"

The color rose to her face.

He said mildly, "A.J.?"

A jerk went through her like an electric shock.