The Vault

twenty-eight

DIAMOND LET HIMSELF IN, not expecting to find Steph still up. They had an understanding that if ever he got home late, she would be in bed. So he took off his shoes by the front door and padded through to the kitchen to see if she had left anything in the oven. Some hours had gone by since his visit to the canteen, though the half-price lamb was not forgotten. Bad meals have ways of lingering on the palate that good meals do not.

Under his arm he had Councillor Sturr's Blake, cocooned in bubblewrap. Easing the picture from its owner had been a triumph of persuasion. The lure: the chance to have it examined by forensic scientists specialising in art works, who, using the latest technology, would surely confirm it as genuine-or so Diamond had suggested. Sturr could then announce to the art world that he possessed an accredited Blake, and moreover that it was one of a previously unknown series illustrating Frankenstein.

No one excelled the big detective at exploiting a suspect's vanity.

He switched on the light, put the picture in a place of safety on top of the fridge and looked for Steph's note about supper. It wouldn't be like her to go to bed without leaving a note.

No note this time, but there was a chicken dinner on the table covered in clingfilm. Steph had not let him down. Roast potatoes, runner beans, peas and carrots. It was still slightly warm. He would give it a whirl in the microwave and shortly expunge the memory of the lamb.

An ice-cold lager would go down nicely with the chicken. He reached for the fridge door and was surprised by a sudden movement at the edge of his vision that made him lean sharply to the left and put up a protective arm. Something dark leapt up from the floor. Warm fur brushed the back of his hand, Raffles, expecting to be fed.

A cat will judge the minimum effort required to make a leap, and will always succeed unless the unexpected happens. Nudged in mid-air by Diamond's flailing hand, Raffles lost some momentum, got the front paws up, but not the rest. Two sets of claws caught in the bubblewrap covering Councillor Sturr's Blake. The hind paws scraped frantically against the side of the fridge, trying for a purchase that was not there. The package was dragged inexorably to the edge and tipped over. Cat and picture crashed to the tiled floor. There was the sickening sound of glass breaking.

Diamond shouted, "Bloody hell, I'll skin you."

Raffles bolted out of the kitchen and upstairs, all prospect of a late supper gone.

So unfair. Diamond was notorious for being clumsy, but this time he'd taken special care. You'd think the top of a fridge would be a safe place.

He picked the package off the floor. It chinked. He placed it on the kitchen table and untied the string.

"What was that?"

He jerked again. His nerves were bad. Steph had come in, as silent as the cat.

He explained the accident, while she watched him ease aside the bubblewrap. The splintered glass was mostly still in place, but a few pieces had fallen out of the frame. Steph warned him not to touch. They upended the picture and let the loose fragments fall onto the wrapping.

"The worst thing is it doesn't belong to me."

"Thank God for that," Steph commented.

"Why do you say that?"

"It's not the sort of thing I'd want on the wall, that's why. It's a Blake print, isn't it?"

"It's an original."

"Oh, Pete!"

"Well, I can't see that it's damaged." He let out the tension with a long breath. "Where did you come from? I thought you'd gone up."

"I was dozing in my armchair in the back room. You gave me a proper shock."

"The cat did."

"It wasn't the cat that shouted. All right," she said, lifting a hand to pacify him. "You've had one hell of a Sunday. Did you find who attacked John Wigfull?"

"Not yet."

"They say there's a slight improvement. He's drifting in and out of consciousness. I phoned a friend at the hospital two hours ago."

One of Steph's network. Nothing happened anywhere without her hearing about it.

"They won't let us near him," he said. "They never do."

"He won't remember anything," she said.

"You're probably right."

She put the dinner in the microwave and pressed the reheat pad. "It isn't obvious, then?"

"What isn't?"

"The person you're after."

"Not obvious, no." Steph had a remarkable gift for unlocking mysteries, so he summarised his day, the interviews with Somerset, Dougan, Pennycook, Heath and Sturr. "I can't see any of them bludgeoning a police officer. Well, old Heath isn't in the frame, anyway. He's too old and too frail."

"Why did you bother with him, then?"

"Checking back on Joe Dougan-who was the man most likely to be chased across a field by Wigfull. There's no question Wigfull had him top of the list. But everything the little rogue has told us is true."

"Sounds as if you like him."

"That means nothing, but, yes, I do. In spite of everything, he's chirpy."

"And the others?"

"Not so lovable." He returned to the fridge for that lager. "But I haven't caught them seriously lying. Somerset is the bloke in a bow-tie you don't see out of doors, let alone wielding a bludgeon in a Wiltshire field. Pennycook is a junkie without a car. And Sturr doesn't have any reason to bash Wigfull. He wasn't even seen by Wigfull. What's more, he has an alibi."

"There's no one else?"

"No one I would call a suspect. I tried to see a character known as Uncle Evan who Wigfull may conceivably have gone to interview, but he's proving elusive."

"Where does he fit in?"

"He was one of the people Joe Dougan visited the day Peg Redbird was killed. At one time he owned the book that started Joe on this trail-Mary Shelley's copy of Milton."

"Uncle Evan?" The microwave pinged and she opened it and peeled the clingfilm off the plate. "I'm sure I've heard of him."

"Puppet shows. He tours the fetes and fairs all summer."

"That's it, then. I've seen his advert in the paper. Do you want to eat here?"

"Fine."

"Brown sauce?"

"Please."

"Better take the picture off the table, then. You know what happened last time you shook the bottle."

She moved it to the safety of the front room. While Diamond ate, Steph gave some thought to the problem of Wigfull's attacker. "This all happened out Stowford way, didn't it?"

"A field between Westwood and Stowford."

"Where did they start-Westwood?"

"Must have. We found his car there."

"John Wigfull's?"

"Yes."

"Presumably he was following someone-or someone followed him. Have you worked out where he was going?" She doggedly thought through the logic of events, as she liked to do, but this time she appeared to have come full circle.

"Stowford, like I said."

"Why Stowford?" Steph persisted. "Not for a cream tea, surely?"

He thought about that, frowning. Then he smiled.