Diamond Dust

29

They brought in fish and chips and a couple of six-packs and spent much of the evening talking over old times at Fulham nick. Stormy had a better recall of those days than Diamond. You never forget your first year of policing, your first arrest, your first raid.

'I had other postings before then,' Diamond said to excuse his hazy memory. 'I signed on before you, Dave. Turned fifty this year – and don't say you wouldn't know it.'

'What did you do?'

'Do?'

'To celebrate the big five-o.'

'Oh – nothing.'

'Pity.'

'Save it, pal. It was after Steph was killed. What's a bloody birthday after something like that?'

'How long were you married?'

'Nineteen years. Why?'

'The way you talk about her, I'd have thought it was less.'

'Why? I felt the same about her as the day we met.'

Stormy nodded. 'I guess you were the kind of couple who hold hands in the street.'

A sharp look was exchanged. So far as Diamond could tell no sarcasm was intended. 'If we felt like it, we may have done.'

'There's the difference. We kept our distance. Doesn't mean we didn't care about each other. Like I told you, it wasn't rosebuds all the way for Patsy and me. I played away a few times – call me weak-willed, or oversexed -and she usually found out. But we always patched things up. Try and explain that kind of marriage to a sleuthhound like Bowers.'

'Did you have to?'

'Not yet, but he'll be onto it soon. Friends of ours know we scrapped sometimes. They'll tell him.'

'I'm glad you told me.' Diamond appreciated the honesty. No doubt there would be suspicions that one more 'scrap' had resulted in violence and Patsy's death. The man was realistic enough to know the pattern any investigation followed. Bowers would dissect the relationship.

Some awkwardness remained between them. Stormy, talkative, with a tendency to blunder into trouble, wasn't the sort of man Diamond would normally strike up a friendship with, but then who was? He had almost no close companions in the police. It wasn't a job that encouraged confidences. But he was glad he'd made the gesture of welcoming him to his home. With their common cause they would make an effective team.

'Do you want vinegar with that?'

Stormy shook his head. 'What I'd really like is to find out if they nicked Joe Florida.'

Diamond said it was simple. He'd call the duty sergeant and find out.

A few minutes later he passed on the news that Florida was being questioned by McGarvie at Shepherd's Bush Police Station.

'Will he ask the right questions?'

'Who knows? They sound confident.'

'Aren't you?'

'That Florida is the killer?' Diamond looked away, at the photo of Steph he'd put in a frame on the wall-unit. 'He was never top of my list.'

'But he's a vicious bastard. You helped send him down.'

'Justly. He was bang to rights.'

'So what's the problem, Peter? He's well capable of murder.'

'I can't see the logic in it. If he hated my guts – and he probably did – then why not murder me? People like Florida live by a simple, brutal code, Dave. They demand, and they get. If they don't get, they give, and what they give is violence. We're not dealing with a chess grand master here. I don't see Joe Florida scheming and plotting in jail for years thinking when I get out I'll murder the wives of the coppers who banged me up, and that'll really make them suffer.'

'He'd rather kill us?'

'Of course – if he still bears a grievance. And I'm not convinced he had a reason to hate you when all you did was sit beside Blaize in the interviews.'

'I was alone with him a lot.'

'Doing what? You didn't get physical with him?'

Stormy grinned. 'Me – with Joe Florida?'

'I meant restrain him.'

'I know what you meant. He asked me things, how long I'd been on the force, if I was married, had kids. You know me by now. I can go on a bit.'

'He actually asked if you were married?'

'Yes.'

'And you told him?'

'I was trying to seem laid-back.'

'What was he after – a smoke?'

'I wouldn't have given him one. No, I thought at the time he was softening me up for something. It was scary, to be honest.'

'Softening you up for what?'

'He could see I was new in the job. He had this aura of evil. You must have sensed it, same as me.'

'What are you saying, Dave? That he psyched you out? That you did something out of order?'

Stormy was quiet for a time. Finally he sighed and said, 'I've never mentioned this to anyone.'

Diamond waited.

'He asked me to make a phone call for him, letting his girlfriend know he was nicked.'

'And did you?'

'Of course not.'

'But you promised Florida you'd do it?'

'Kind of.'

'Either you did or you didn't.'

He shrugged. 'I did, then.'

'And you think he remembers?' Diamond said in disbelief.

'I remember – and I wasn't sitting in the Scrubs staring at the walls. Things can get out of proportion, Peter.'

Diamond took a short swig of beer. 'Even if you're right, and he held a grudge as long as this, I still say he'd take it out on you, not your wife.'

About eleven, they made up an extra bed in the spare room. 'What's the agenda tomorrow?' Stormy asked.

'A trip to Guildford.'

'What for?'

'My wife's first husband, Dixon-Bligh, used to have a restaurant there. McGarvie says he's holed up somewhere, and I want to know why.'

'He's the one who could have been mentioned in the diary?'

'Right. "T" for Ted.'

'You think he's gone back to Guildford?'

'I wouldn't rule it out, but if he's covered his tracks, as the Met seem to think, we're not going to find him that easily. We've got to go at him by a different route. I want to trace his ex-partner in the business – if possible.'

'Who is he?'

'She, actually.'

'A woman.' Stormy twitched as a dire thought struck him. 'What if he killed her?'

Diamond had thought of this a long time before. He remarked as if recalling some ancient mystery, 'It would be helpful to know.'

Stormy was still grappling with the implications. 'But there's no link between Dixon-Bligh and my wife's murder.'

'None that we know of – yet.'

After some ninety miles of Diamond's ultra-cautious driving they reached Guildford well past coffee-time and had to go looking for a place that would serve them. 'To settle my shattered nerves,' he muttered. 'I don't like the motorways.'

'You should have told me,' Stormy said. 'I could have walked in front with a red flag. We'd still have got here in the same time.'

'Cheeky sod.'

The first place they looked into after the cafe was a secondhand bookship. Diamond, better for the intake of caffeine, explained his thinking. There was always a shelf near the door of out-of-date guides, yearbooks and catalogues. He picked off a 1998 restaurant guide and found the address of Dixon-Bligh's former establishment, the Top of the Town. 'See if this gets your juices going, Dave. "'The welcome is warm, the cooking classy at this easy-to-miss haven towards the top of the High Street. Edward Dixon-Bligh recently took over after a career of catering for the top brass in Royal Air Force establishments across the world. The menu reflects his international pedigree, with chowders, cassoulets and pestos, terrine of pork knuckle with foie gras, cinnamon-spiced quail with cardomom rice and fine green beans and pan-fried salmon with sarladaise potato and horseradish cappuccino sauce. Desserts include Thai coconut with exotic fruit sorbets. A fine cellar, mainly French and New World, is expertly managed by Dixon-Bligh'spartner, Fiona Appleby, who is pleased to advise."'

'It's probably a McDonald's now,' Stormy said.

'Can't get more international than that.'

But it was no longer in business as a restaurant. They found a body-piercing studio where the Top of the Town had been. A window filled with tattoo-patterns and pieces of metal designed to be inserted into flesh. The shaven-headed, leather-clad receptionist almost fell off her stool when the two middle-aged detectives walked in. She thought their generation wasn't privy to the charms of pierced nipples and navels.

Diamond confirmed the impression. He explained he was only interested in the former owners.

'Them? They blew out of here ages ago. They split up, didn't they?'

'What do you do with the mail?'

'It stopped coming.'

'They must have left a forwarding address.'

'The woman has a cottage at Puttenham. We used to send stuff there.'

'Is that far?'

'Take the A31 on the Hog's Back. You'll see the sign.

It's about three miles.'

'Do you have a note of the address?'

'I remember it. Duckpond Cottage.'

'And you think she's still there?'

'Don't bank on it, mister. Are they in trouble, then?'

'It's just an enquiry. Why do you ask?'

"Cos you look like the police.'

'It's personal.'

Stormy said with a beam across his tomato-red face, 'You can't tell a book by its cover.'

Out at Puttenham they found Duckpond Cottage on its own at the end of a rutted track that Diamond refused to drive along. The place wasn't a picture-postcard cottage. It was built, probably in the nineteen-sixties, of reconstituted stone slabs that had acquired patches of green mould. But efforts had been made with the garden and the paintwork was recent. No one answered when they rang the doorbell. 'Par for the course,' Stormy said.

Through the letter box a few items of mail were visible inside.

Everyone in a village is supposed to know everyone else's business. At the nearest house a small, elderly man in a cap was standing in his doorway before they reached it.

'Who are you, then?' he piped up.

'Enquiring about your neighbour, Miss Appleby. Does she still live at Duckpond Cottage?'

'Why – has she gone missing?' He was more interested in asking questions than answering them.

It seemed she hadn't moved away.

'You're not from the council, about the drainage? Shocking, the state of that lane.'

'She doesn't appear to be at home.'

'Gone away, hasn't she?' Now there was a note of certainty in the voice, even if it ended as yet another question.

'Did she tell you?'

'I may be old, but my eyes are all right. I saw you prowling around, didn't I?'

'You did.'

'She hasn't been at home for the past three weeks.'

'As long as that?'

'Easily.'

Diamond was not entirely convinced. 'We looked through the letter box. I wouldn't say there's three weeks' junk mail on the carpet.'

'That's because someone comes in.'

'Really? Who's that – a cleaner?'

'In Puttenham? We don't have cleaners in Puttenham. Them's for fancy folk in Guildford.'

'Who could it be, then – Miss Appleby herself?'

'Nothing like her. This young lady is taller, with a good figure. She comes in a car once a week.'

'So it's a young woman we're talking about. Have you seen her yourself?'

'From a distance. I've watched her come and let herself in. Not Miss Appleby – she's different altogether. This one drives up in a fancy sports car, a red one, and leaves it where yours is, at the top of the lane. She doesn't stay long. Just goes inside for a couple of minutes and comes out carrying stuff.'

'What stuff? The post?'

'I reckon. I've seen her with a couple of bags, them plastic sacks. Pretty well filled up, they was.'

'Not just the mail, then?'

'Some of Miss Appleby's property, I expect. Clothes and things.'

'Didn't you ask her what was going on?'

The old man looked affronted. 'I'm not nosy.'

'But you don't even know who she is. Could be pinching the stuff.'

He shook his head. 'She don't act like a burglar. She lets herself in with a key in broad daylight. Must be family, wouldn't you say?'

'And always at the same time?'

'Once a week, round about two. What's today – Wednesday? If you're willing to wait you could see her for yourselves.'

Not much fell into Diamond's lap, so he was disbelieving when it did. 'You're expecting this woman to visit the house today?'

'It's her day, isn't it?'

They moved Diamond's car to the old man's driveway. There would be under an hour to wait. Flattered by all the attention, their host offered them some of the chicken soup he was cooking for lunch, but each of them declined when they saw the state of his kitchen. In matters of hygiene the fancy folk in Guildford had the edge.

'You'll get the best view of Duckpond Cottage from my bedroom window,' the old man informed them while he dipped chunks of bread into his soup and sucked on them noisily. 'Go on up if you want.'

His bedroom promised to be no more salubrious than the kitchen, and wasn't, but they were policemen, and their work had taken them into more squalid places. They opened the window that looked out along the lane, leaned out and gulped some fresh air.

'If this woman turns up,' Diamond said, 'I think we should play this cautiously. I don't know what's going on here, but my instinct is to watch and wait and see where she goes.'

'Agreed,' Stormy said, then, after an interval, 'No offence, Peter, but if she drives off, as she probably will, and we get in your car and follow, would you mind if I took the wheel?'

A sniff from Diamond. 'Think you can do better?'

'I'm thinking of your faultless driving. We could find ourselves having to ask which way she went.'

He shrugged. 'All right.' Then added, 'I'd better warn you. I'm a nervous passenger.'

They heard the car's approach a few minutes after two, just as the old man had predicted. It was an Alfa Romeo convertible with a fawn-coloured top, and it halted at the top of the track leading to Duckpond Cottage. The driver, a woman, youngish, with black hair teased into fine loose wisps, stepped out and touched the switch in her hand that locked the doors. She was in a turquoise sweater, black jeans and ankle-length boots.

'See what I mean about the figure?' the old man's voice piped up from behind the watching detectives. He must have finished his lunch and crept upstairs. 'Isn't that arse a peach?'

Diamond murmured, 'Haven't you got something else to do?'

'This is my time for a nap, but I can't get into bed with you here.' A strange fit of modesty.

Meanwhile the focus of all the interest was picking her way between the ruts along the track with the confidence of a regular visitor.

Diamond asked Stormy if he'd taken a note of the car's number. He had not.

'You're no better than he is, watching the floor show.'

She took a key from her pocket and entered the cottage. Diamond checked his watch.

Three minutes passed.

'Could be checking the answerphone,' he said. 'It can't take this long to pick up the mail.'

And shortly after, she emerged carrying what looked like letters in her right hand.

'We'd better get to the car,' he told Stormy. To the old man, he said, 'Siesta time.'

As the Alfa Romeo moved off in the direction of the main road to Guildford, they started up, Stormy at the wheel.

'I don't fancy our chances if she steps on the gas in that thing,' Stormy said.

'Keep your distance, and she won't have any reason to speed.'

'Which way do you reckon?'

'The A3 to London, I guess.'

Instead she turned south and immediately accelerated. 'Hope your motor is up to this, Peter,' Stormy said, putting his foot down.

Diamond braced. 'The motor may be, but don't count on the owner.'

'Got to keep her in sight. Do you think she spotted us?'

'She doesn't know us or the car. She's burning rubber for the hell of it.' He hunched down in the seat with arms folded, trying not to watch the speedometer.

They had some overtaking to do. Fortunately, the Portsmouth Road is as good as a motorway in places. Stormy drove with skill and nice judgement, getting the best out of Diamond's old Cortina, staying within sight of the Alfa Romeo without being too obvious about it. Right up the steep approach to Hindhead and the Devil's Punch Bowl the Cortina had power in reserve. 'This old heap handles well, Peter.'

'It gets good treatment – usually.'

'Who is this woman?'

'Never seen her before.'

'Heigh-ho, she's turning left at the lights.' Stormy jerked the car into the left lane and took the turn tightly, tyres screaming. They were now on a narrow two-way stretch through a wooded area, and she hadn't cut her speed.

'Think she's spotted us yet?' Stormy asked.

'I told you. She won't know who we are.'

'It's mutual.'

They passed more than one sign to Haslemere. 'We're still going south,' Diamond said.

'Now she's using a car-phone.'

'Bloody dangerous at this speed.'

'Maybe she noticed us.'

In another mile the brake-lights of the convertible suddenly blazed for no obvious reason. It happened twice.

'She's looking for somewhere to turn off,' Stormy said.

'Don't crowd her, then.'

When they crested the next hill the Alfa Romeo was no longer in sight.

'What the fuck…?'

'Slow up, man. There's got to be a turn here,' Diamond said.

A narrow lane came up on the right, and Stormy did well to spot it and make the turn. They hadn't travelled more than sixty yards when there was a flash of metal ahead and another vehicle came fast towards them, so fast that they were forced off the hard surface onto a mud path, the wheels skidding and screeching against the wood of a low hedge. A white Mercedes with a woman at the wheel. A mop of dark hair in wisps, pale, staring face, turquoise top.

'She's switched cars.'

'Flaming hell.'

She was past, heading for the road they'd just left and there was nowhere to turn. Diamond swung around in his seat and watched the Mercedes through the rear window. 'Back up. Reverse.'

Stormy slammed into reverse and steered them back towards the road whilst Diamond strained to see which direction the Mercedes would take at the top of the lane.

'Right. She's gone right.'

'Say your prayers, then. We're going arse-out into the road.'

By a miracle nothing was passing when they did. Stormy spun the wheel again and they zoomed off in the direction the woman had taken. Two cars were on the road ahead. Neither was a white Mercedes.

'How did she do that?' Stormy shouted over the acceleration.

'Switch cars? Trying to shake us off, I suppose.'

'I didn't say why. I said how.'

'Someone must have had it ready. That phone call from the car?'

'Whatever, she's left us for dead.'

They overtook the two cars. Nothing else was in view.

'Have you thought why we're risking our bloody lives?' Diamond said as they hurtled along well in excess of the speed limit. 'We're chasing a woman who might or might not lead us to another woman who might or might not be able to tell us the whereabouts of a man who might or might not have committed murder.'

'Want to give up?'

'No. Keep going.'

And persistence paid off. Around the next bend was a sign for road works and temporary traffic lights. In a few hundred yards they joined the end of a stationary line of traffic held by a red light. Three ahead was the white Mercedes.

Back in touch.

'Is it worth getting out?'

'No. We want to know where she's going.'

The lights changed and everyone moved again. It was sedate progress behind a container lorry, which suited Diamond. He was looking at signs.

'The next place of any size is Midhurst'

The driver of the Mercedes was getting impatient, repeatedly edging out into the oncoming lane for a chance to overtake the couple of vans and the truck ahead. Each time something appeared in view.

'She must have a death wish if she goes for it.'

'So what do we do then?'

The lorry peeled off into a layby and the vans eased towards the kerb, enabling the Mercedes to cruise past and pick up speed again. Nothing was approaching, so Stormy made the same move. Diamond cautioned him yet again to keep some distance back. They didn't have to be obvious.

Without any indication the Mercedes left the Midhurst Road at a right turn. About a hundred yards in the rear, the detectives followed, along a twisting, bumpy road through a dense wood.

'Pull over,' Diamond said suddenly. 'She's stopping.'

They slid into an overtaking bay with enough foliage around it to hide them from the road ahead.

'Think she saw us?'

'Who knows?'

'Let's get out. Don't slam the door.'

Diamond's legs felt as if he had run every yard of the trip from Puttenham, and he was mightily relieved to get his feet on the ground again. Dipping low, he trotted across a carpet of dead leaves to a place among the trees that gave reasonable cover. Stormy did the same.

They could see the Mercedes standing in a cobbled driveway in front of a large red-brick house. The woman got out, raked a hand through her hair, stretched, and stood looking along the road, probably to check that she'd shaken off her pursuers. Then she stepped towards the house. They heard a door open and close.

'So?' Stormy said.

'Let's get closer.'

There was a point where the wooded area ended and the landscaped garden began and it was surrounded by a ring fence six feet high that looked in good condition.

Diamond felt a nudge from his companion.

'What?'

Stormy was pointing at a video camera mounted on a post inside the fence and swivelling, scanning the area where they stood. They dipped out of view.

'Strong on security.'

'But you and I know that sometimes these things are just for show.'

Diamond decided on the next move. 'Give me ten minutes to size up the place,' he told Stormy. 'Better if one of us goes in first'

Stormy said he would wait in the car.

The only way in was through the front gate, so he used it, conscious that he was likely to be picked up by a camera. The surveillance equipment looked state of the art.

He crossed the cobbles to the porch and hesitated. To his left was a large, low, mullioned window with leaded panes. It probably gave a view of one of the front rooms. He stepped closer. Inside were two large sofas and a vast coffee table with a few magazines arranged symmetrically on it. He was reminded more of a dentist's waiting room than a private home. A door stood open at the far end and he was conscious of a movement and saw someone cross the space behind. Female, he was certain, and he assumed she must be the woman they'd been following. At least she wasn't sitting in front of a CCTV monitor watching his movements.

Feeling bolder, he decided to reconnoitre the place from outside. Keeping close to the wall, he edged around the side of the building.

Straight ahead was a sunroom with metal lounging chairs and pink and green cushions. It had an exterior door that he tried and found locked.

He was totally still when he heard the scrape of a stone close by.

He spun around.

She was right behind him, the woman they'd followed from Puttenham, legs apart, leaning slightly forward, hands in front of her in a martial arts stance. There wasn't time for words. He put up a hand defensively and she grasped it with both of hers and tugged him towards her. Totally unprepared for this, he lurched forward and suddenly she executed a twist, thrust out her left leg and he crashed over her thigh and hit the ground hard.

Fortunately he'd landed on turf, or he would have broken a limb for sure. Winded and shaken, he tried to raise himself. But the combat wasn't over yet. She threw herself on him and straddled him with her thighs, forcing him face down. She grabbed his right arm and yanked it across his back. He felt something cold tighten around the wrist, like wire. Then round the other arm.

He was handcuffed.