The Last Detective

Chapter Four

Too angry to speak to anyone, he left the building and crossed the street, only to realize that even the timing of his exit was ill-judged, for the pubs wouldn't be open for another hour. He started walking, past the bus station towards Stall Street, telling himself that by degrees the anger would recede. He didn't regret what he had said. Every word had been justified, and if he had expressed it more diplomatically, he would still have been there trying to find an exit-line. All right, he could be called impetuous, wrong-headed and insubordinate, but he still had balls. To have capitulated to Tott, allowing himself to be sidelined, excluded from the murder squad, condemned to see out the rest of his career from behind a desk, would have been emasculation.

Regrets? None that would cause him to reconsider. He hadn't been long enough with Avon and Somerset to make strong friendships. And – it was no less true because he beefed about it so often – his job satisfaction had been in steep decline in recent years. The scientists were taking over CID work. The great detectives of the past – the idols of his early years in the force, like Bob Fabian, Jack du Rose and 'Nipper' Read – now seemed as remote as dinosaurs. They were honest-to-God detectives. They'd have been hamstrung by the paraphernalia of modern technology – computers, cellphones, photofits, police programmes on television, ultrasonic surveillance and genetic fingerprinting. Maybe he was rationalizing what had just taken place upstairs, but he didn't see how he could have lasted much longer in the modern police. He'd chalked up some modest successes over the years. Pity he was denied the satisfaction of clearing up the Jackman murder. Yes, that was a genuine regret.

His biggest concern was the shock this would be for Stephanie. Poor Steph was going to hear it cold. If he was stunned by the suddenness of his going, how much worse would it be for her? At least he'd been there at the time and brought it on himself. Steph hadn't been given the slightest warning that this would happen. Her world was about to cave in and she was likely to cave in with it. Even after the shock subsided, she would sink into a deep despair about the mortgage and the bills and the cost of staying alive. He would deal with those things as they happened, but Steph was a born worrier.

On his right as he made his way up Stall Street was an electricity showroom, and the sight of all those appliances in the window gave him a thought. As impulsively as he had quit his job, he marched in and asked to see the microwave ovens. Big enough to cast aside his principles in an act of mercy, he decided to go for broke, selected the one with the biggest display of controls and paid for it by cheque. They promised to deliver it to Mrs Peter Diamond the same afternoon. That, he told the salesman, would be the good news.

Coming out, he continued past the colonnaded entrance to the Baths and came to the Abbey Churchyard, his lunchtime haunt in summer. At this end of the year there were fewer tourists, so he had a wooden seat to himself. Only the pigeons remained in any numbers, and they converged on him at once, too single-minded even to coo as they searched the flagstones by his feet for crumbs. Then a loose dog, a black retriever, came running from the direction of Abbey Green, and the pigeons took flight. Diamond watched their whirring ascent. They formed into a tight flock within a moment of taking to the air and when they had wheeled out of sight behind him, he was left gazing up at the Abbey front, those stone angels perpetually trapped on the ladders. The consoling thought came to him that he could stop identifying with them now. Just as he started to look away, something strange made an impression on his vision, demanding a longer inspection. He squinted up at the stonework. He had spotted a feature of the carving he had never previously noticed. It was not a trick of the light, nor a failing of vision. One of the angels – the third from the top – wasn't sculpted in the attitude of climbing, but was upside down. No question. That angel was coming down head-first.

He couldn't summon a grin, but he nodded and said, 'You and me both, mate.'

He didn't, after all, make straight for the nearest pub. Apart from the bitterness he felt towards Tott, something else rankled – his strong suspicion that the whole thing had been founded on a deception. He didn't believe Matthew Didrikson had blacked out. It couldn't have been more than twenty minutes after the alleged incident in the hall that he'd seen the boy lounging on his bed, not in the least distressed, doing his best to convince his mother that what had happened amounted to deliberate assault by the police. In his rugby-playing days, Diamond had seen a number of genuine cases of concussion and not only had the effects been immediate, but the victims hadn't been able to recall the events immediately before they were hit. If the kid was shown to be faking, Diamond still couldn't turn back the clock and get his job back: he accepted that. But a disturbing possibility was beginning to dawn on him. His sudden resignation might be interpreted as an admission that the boy had been treated violently. Taking the worst possible scenario, he might find himself being sued for assault, facing ruinous damages. And it was too late now to turn to the police for support.

In this sombre cast of mind, he resolved for his own protection to find out the truth about the Didrikson boy's condition. Back to Manvers Street, then, to collect the car and drive along the Upper Bristol Road.

He had no qualms about showing his police identity to the woman in reception at the Royal United Hospital. Matthew, she told him, had been moved out of Casualty into a general ward. There, the ward sister confirmed that the boy had been X-rayed and they were waiting for the results. He had not suffered any further symptoms of concussion since being admitted and, yes, he was well enough to receive a visitor. In fact, some people from his school had been in earlier.

She pointed out the room where Matthew was supposed to be, but Diamond didn't find him there. He tracked the boy to the day room, where he found him watching television, a cigarette drooping from his mouth, supplied, presumably, by the only other occupant of the room, an old man who had fallen asleep in his chair with an ashtray in his lap.

It wasn't Diamond's job to issue a health warning, so he asked without a hint of disfavour, 'How are you doing?'

'I might be going home this afternoon.' Matthew had the trick of speaking without removing the cigarette. His gaze didn't shift from the television screen. He was in a grey hospital dressing gown, slumped in a low, steelframed armchair, his slippered feet supported on a coffee table, hands clasped behind his head.

'You're obviously feeling better, then.'

'Mustn't grumble.'

'No more blackouts?'

Matthew swivelled his head enough to take in Diamond without otherwise altering his position. 'It's you. Did they send you to check up?'

'They can phone the sister if they want,' Diamond pointed out by way of denial. 'You must like this place.'

A wary look passed across the brown eyes. 'Come again?'

'It's the second visit this year, isn't it? You nearly drowned.'

'That was yonks ago,' the boy said scornfully. 'They didn't keep me in.'

'How's the swimming coming on?'

Matthew's eyes slid back to the television. 'I had to jack it in, didn't I? Mrs Jackman kicked up a stink about it. She's dead now, serves her bloody right.'

'Do you remember the day it happened?' As he spoke the question, he thought, this is crazy. Hardly two hours have passed since I chucked in the job, and here I am refusing to let go, hanging on to some chance remark by this bumptious kid in the hope of a new slant on the Jackman murder. Technically finished as a policeman, I can't let go. I'm continuing to function, like a headless chicken running around a yard.

'That was the day I went back to school,' answered Matthew.

'Monday, 11 September?' The question and answer routine – so much easier than small talk.

'Mm.'

'And your mother drove you there?'

'Yes.'

'Before you left, do you remember the phone ringing?'

'Yes. It was Greg, for my mother. You probably call him Professor Jackman,' he added with condescension.

'You don't recall what time he phoned?'

'Quite early. Well before eight. Ma was still in her nightie. She was hopping mad.'

'What about?'

'The phone call. She'd only just given Greg some really valuable letters some famous author wrote hundreds of years ago and they were missing. Greg thought some American guy had swiped them and he was going after him.'

'And your mother – what was her opinion?' Diamond asked.

'She was certain Mrs Jackman had them.'

'How do you know?'

'She was certain Mrs

'She told me when she was driving me to school.'

'What time was that?'

'Half-eight. We have to be there by quarter to.' He reached for the remote control and switched channels.

'Don't you like school?' reached for the remote control 'Don't you like school?'

'It's full of little kids. I have to wait till next year to take Common Entrance. Then I'll just move up to the main school.'

'If you pass.'

'No problem. I'm in the choir.'

Diamond had transferred to a grammar school at eleven and to his mind there was something wrong with a system that held back boys of Matthew's size and maturity. 'Do you mind being driven to school by your mother – a big lad like you?'

'It's better than walking.'

'You could take a bus.'

'I'd rather take a Mercedes.'

The remark confirmed how much emblems of status still mattered in school, any school. The boy's manner grated with Diamond, but he remembered his own adolescence well enough to understand the insecurity that lay behind it. Just as well, because the impulse to box the kid's ears – if only metaphorically – was strong, and a set-to would be disastrous. So with restraint – and curiosity unslaked – he concentrated on Matthew's memories of the day Geraldine Jackman had been killed. The choristers, he learned, had passed a dull morning in and around the Abbey vestry being issued with a clean set of robes; and in the afternoon the timetables and textbooks had been given out for the eight Common Entrance subjects.

'And was your mother there to meet you at the end of the day?'

'She never is. I get a lift with my friend's father as far as Lyncombe Hill. It's only an old Peugeot, but he's a schoolteacher, so what can you expect?'

'You're interested in cars, Matthew?'

'If you mean decent cars, yes.'

'Ever tried driving one?'

'Give me a break-even if I had, I wouldn't tell one of the fuzz.' The last word held more disdain for being spoken in the well-honed accent of a private education.

Diamond followed up the possibility he'd raised. The assumption behind it – that the boy had contrived to murder Geraldine Jackman himself, then transported her body to Chew Valley Lake and dumped her there -bordered on the absurd, but now that he had started, he might as well go on. 'Some kids of your age manage to learn without going on public roads. It isn't illegal. I've heard of schools that give driving lessons on the premises.'

'All we get is piano lessons,' Matthew said, making plain his discontent.

'Maybe your mother -'

'You're joking, of course.'

'She could take you somewhere quiet, like an empty beach or a deserted airfield.'

'She won't even let me ride the dodgems.'

It wasn't deception. It was the authentic protest of a frustrated child and the end of Diamond's short-lived speculation. He had to dismiss the notion of Matthew at the wheel of the Mercedes or any other vehicle.

'Anyway, as soon as I'm old enough I want to get a Honda MT5,' said Matthew.

'So you do fancy yourself as a driver?'

'It's a bike, you dingbat.'

'Watch it lad.' The reproof sprang unbidden, and Diamond added more jocularly, 'I might just mention cigarettes to sister on the way out.' Doggedly, he reverted to the original line of questioning. 'That evening we were talking about… you didn't actually say if your mother was at home when you got back from school.'

Matthew took a last drag on the cigarette and stubbed it out. 'She was there.'

'How did she appear?'

'What do you mean?'

'Her manner. Was it different from other days?'

Matthew turned to look at Diamond again. 'You think she did the murder, don't you?'

'Did she go out in the car that evening?'

'No.'

'You're telling the truth, I hope.'

'Of course.'

Diamond said, 'Let me put something to you, Mat. You might think that what you're doing is the best way to help your mother out of a tight spot, but it might not work like that.'

Matthew flicked the televison to the testcard and looked up. 'What do you mean?'

'For a start, creating this diversion. The reason you're here in hospital. I don't believe you cracked your head that hard. I don't believe you blacked out. My first thought was that you were making a protest about having to spend the night at school.'

'That's not true!' Matthew said vehemently.

'But now I think it wasn't selfishness. I reckon you did it for your mother's sake. You thought we'd stop questioning her if you were taken ill. We'd have to bring her to see you.'

The boy was frowning. 'Well, you will, won't you?' Once again, it was the child speaking.

'It isn't up to me, son.'

The significance of what Diamond had just admitted went over Matthew's head. 'My ma wouldn't kill anyone.'

'If that's what you really believe, acting up as you did last night isn't going to help her.'

'You did shove me against the wall. That was the truth.'

'Yes,' said Diamond, 'and you kicked me in the goolies, but I didn't make a production number out of it.' but I didn't make a production Matthew grinned.

Matthew grinned.

Given time, Diamond reckoned he could achieve an understanding here, if nothing more. The bravado was paper-thin. Behind it was a kid pining for his father.

But they were interrupted by the ward sister. 'Your X-rays are through, Matthew, and we can't find anything amiss. I think we can safely send you back to school.'

'Right away?'

She winked at Diamond. 'After four, I think.'

Steph took the news infinitely better than he'd expected.

'When the microwave oven arrived, I knew something ghastly must have happened. I'm glad you thought of me. Of course, it's barmy getting me a present.'

'Stupid.'

'Not stupid. No, I won't have that. Daffy, if you like, but I always knew you were daffy – well, ever since that day you brought the donkeys to the brownies' camp.' She smiled. 'Not everyone appreciates you.'

'Too true. I wasn't right for the job. I was an ogre.'

'You're not a violent man.'

'Tell that to Mr Tott. Steph, let's face it, man-management wasn't my strongest suit. I got by because I drove people hard. No one was given any favours.'

'That isn't bad management. After all, you weren't running a playgroup.'

He was forced to smile.

She said, 'In your job it was no good trying to be popular.'

'No, but I had to command respect, and I'm not sure it was there any more. I should have kept up with technology. I was the only one on the squad without a pocket calculator. I still do mental arithmetic'

'I don't think you ever settled down in this place.'

'It's not the place. It's the frustration. The top dogs provide you with all these aids and expect you to be super-efficient, but when all's said and done you're investigating people; dodgy people, dangerous people, frightened people. And the villains are more sophisticated than they would have been twenty years ago. You've got to talk to them, get inside their minds and tease out the truth. That's what I joined the GID to do. These days it's slide-rule policing. You have to justify the bloody hardware. Supposedly there's this infallible forensic back-up, but they're understaffed, and the results take weeks, months to come back. Meanwhile what do you do with your suspect? The law won't let us hold him indefinitely. Is it any wonder that we try for confessions? All these cases of statements taken under duress that you hear about – it's the result of pressure – pressure in a system that isn't functioning properly.' He sighed and shrugged. 'Sorry, love. I didn't mean to unload it all on you.'

'Better out than in,' Stephanie commented. 'But if you can face it, I'd like some help with my new piece of hardware. Let's see if we can work the microwave.'

Together they cooked a passable meal of steamed plaice and vegetables in a miraculously short time. They cracked open a bottle of Chablis and agreed that it wouldn't be wise for him to rush off to the Job Centre in the morning. He would take a week off, do up the kitchen (which now looked too scruffy to house the microwave) and think about his future.

In the morning he wrote his formal letter of resignation.