Upon A Dark Night Read online

  Emma Treadwell had changed from her bath-robe into a pale blue dress. Made-up, bright-featured and pretty, she still showed some strain, fingering the ends of her long, dark hair.

  Diamond glanced at the way the cards were arranged. ‘Whist?’

  ‘Solo whist, actually,’ said William Allardyce. His tracksuit top was unzipped lower than before and the lettering entirely revealed. Aptly for the man Julie had found the more friendly, it read MR RIGHT.

  ‘Finish the hand, then,’ Diamond urged them. ‘You can’t stop in the middle. Is someone on an abundance?’

  ‘Misère,’ said Treadwell, without looking up from the cards in his hand. ‘It’s me, and it just about sums up the weekend.’

  Sally Allardyce said, ‘We were only filling in time. Your inspector -Julie – said you’d be along soon. I’ll make some fresh tea.’

  Diamond seized his opportunity to earn some goodwill. He became masterful. ‘No, you won’t. You’ll take your place at the table and give Mr Treadwell the chance to glory in his misère. Where’s the kitchen? Through there?’

  ‘What exactly…?’

  ‘Julie and I will prepare – what is it you call it in all the best circles? – high tea. I heard you were cleaned out by all your visitors, so I brought some food in. Is anyone game for scrambled eggs on toast? My specialty.’

  After some hesitation, it was agreed. They would finish the game and take their chances with Peter Diamond’s specialty.

  In the kitchen, he grabbed an apron off the back of the door and tied it on. ‘I’m a clumsy bugger,’ he explained to Julie as if it were news to her. ‘This is my best suit. There’s a cut loaf in the bag. Why don’t you get some toast and tea on the go and leave the eggs to me?’

  Mastering the cooker was the first challenge. It was electric and easy and he popped in half a dozen plates, informing Julie that nothing was worse than serving a warm meal on a cold plate. The gas hob proved less amenable. The spark wouldn’t ignite the burner for some seconds, and when it finally did with a small explosion, there was a distinct whiff of singed hair. He rubbed the back of his right hand.

  Sally Allardyce called out from the card-game, ‘Are you managing all right?’

  Julie answered that they were and Diamond began robustly cracking eggs into a large bowl and tossing the shells across the room, aiming for – and not always reaching – the sink. ‘You need a dozen for a party this size, so I got some extra in case of accidents,’ he informed Julie with a wave of his sticky hand covered in bits of broken shell. But he seemed to know what he was doing. When she offered to pass him the milk he said, ‘Never use milk in scrambled eggs. Cream, if you want them rich. But I prefer to serve them fluffy. A little water, that’s the secret. The whole thing will be light as air.’ He found an old-fashioned whisk and attacked the mixture vigorously. ‘How’s the toast?’

  ‘Almost there.’

  ‘The tea?’

  ‘Will be.’ Julie hesitated. ‘What’s misère, Mr Diamond?’

  ‘A call in solo. You have to lose every trick.’

  ‘And then what?’

  ‘You make your misère – and the others pay up. Being a total loser isn’t so easy as you think.’

  ‘Guy Treadwell should be all right. He’s supposed to be the lucky one.’

  He worked with two frying pans and generous knobs of butter, tipped some of the mixture into each and worked it into the right consistency with a wooden spatula. At this moment the cooking took priority over police work. He was absorbed. ‘I hope to God they’ve finished the hand. Timing is everything.’

  Some deft work from Julie ensured that six portions of approximately equal size were carried steaming into the living-room. Place mats and cutlery were quickly produced.

  ‘They’re going to like this,’ he murmured to Julie.

  Until they see the state of their kitchen, she thought.

  ‘Did you get it, Mr Treadwell?’ Diamond asked after compliments had been paid to the scrambled eggs on toast.

  Treadwell looked up inquiringly.

  ‘The misère.’

  ‘He got it,’ said his wife. ‘With a hand like that he could have made misère ouverte.’

  ‘When the cards are exposed on the table,’ Diamond explained to Julie. ‘Do you tip horses, Mr Treadwell?’

  A sour-faced shake of the head.

  ‘I only wish William were half so lucky,’ said Sally. ‘He’s never found a blessed thing on his country walks. Not so much as a bad penny.’

  The attention of the CID shifted to Allardyce. ‘You’re one of those ramblers I see out with their trousers tucked into their socks?’

  William Allardyce smiled. ‘Nothing so ambitious as that. Just a Sunday afternoon walk when I can get it. It’s good to get out after a week in the office.’

  ‘Public relations – what does it come down to?’

  ‘It doesn’t come down to anything – ever. If PR is doing what it should, it’s rising. We raise the profile of our clients by increasing the goodwill and understanding they achieve with their customers.’

  ‘Through the media?’

  ‘Much more than that. We’re concerned with the entire public perception of the client and his product.’

  ‘The image?’

  ‘If that’s what you choose to call it, yes.’ Mindful of his own public perception, he raked his fingers through his dark hair, tidying it.

  ‘You buff up the image?’

  ‘We begin by examining what they’ve achieved already in public esteem, if anything. Good opinion has to be earned. Then we suggest how it may be enhanced. We don’t distort, if that’s what you mean by polishing.’

  ‘You’re freelance?’

  ‘A consultancy, yes.’

  Diamond turned to Sally Allardyce. ‘And are you in the firm?’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘I work in local television.’

  ‘So you must be a useful PR contact.’

  ‘Not really. I’m in make-up.’

  ‘Useful with the grooming of the clients?’

  She smiled in a way that told him it was a damn-fool comment. That avenue was closed.

  Diamond turned back to the husband. There was still some mileage in this topic. He hadn’t brought it up simply to make conversation. ‘I was wondering what PR could do for me – assuming the police could afford your fees and I was a client. Would you change my image?’

  Allardyce smiled uncertainly and looked down at his empty plate. ‘I’d, em, I’d need to know a great deal more about you and the nature of your work. All I know is that you’re a detective superintendent.’

  ‘I’m head of the murder squad.’

  The statement had the impact Diamond expected, some sharp intakes of breath and a general twitching of facial muscles. Across the table, Treadwell tugged at his bow tie as if it was suddenly uncomfortable.

  His wife rested a hand on his arm. ‘Surely there’s no suggestion that this woman was murdered?’

  ‘That’s all we wanted to hear,’ said Treadwell, grinding his teeth.

  ‘It was an accident,’ said Sally Allardyce. ‘She was playing about on the roof and she fell.’

  ‘I wish we could be certain of that, ma’am,’ said Diamond. ‘It’s my job to consider all possibilities. To come back to my image, Mr Allardyce…’ He got up from the table and executed a mannequin-like half-turn. ‘…I suppose you’ll tell me I should get a sharp new suit and a striped tie.’

  ‘I wouldn’t presume to advise you as to clothes,’ said Allardyce, his voice flat, unwilling to continue with this.

  Julie told Diamond, ‘But I will. You should definitely leave off the apron.’

  The head of the murder squad looked down at the butcher’s vertical stripes and smoothed them over his belly. ‘Ah. Forgot.’

  The tension eased a little, but Treadwell continued making sounds suggesting his blood pressure was dangerously high.

  Allardyce made an effort to recoup. ‘I suppose a detective needs to blend i
n easily with his surroundings.’

  ‘Should I lose weight?’

  ‘No, I was about to say that there’s a paradox. If there is such a thing as a detective image, you don’t want it, or you give yourself away.’

  ‘Fair comment, sir – except that I don’t often go in disguise. No need to make a secret of my job. I don’t always announce myself at the outset, but sooner or later people get to know who I am – the murder man.’

  That word again. In the short pause that followed, Diamond picked a volume off the bookshelf and flicked through the pages. It was a book of local walks. Whilst pretending to take an interest in the text he studied the contrasting reactions of the two couples. The Allardyces were flustered, but staunchly trying not to show it, whereas the experience of the night before and this day’s infliction of policemen seemed to have reduced the Treadwells to red-faced gloom, certainly the husband. Misère was right.

  On balance, the Treadwells’ reaction was easier to understand.

  ‘I’d like to get a couple of things clear in my mind and then we’ll leave you in peace, Julie and I,’ said Diamond. ‘Which pub was it last night?’

  ‘The Grapes,’ said Sally Allardyce.

  ‘Down in Westgate Street? Long walk from here.’

  ‘It has a TV. Not so many pubs do.’

  ‘And when your numbers came up…?’

  ‘There was rejoicing, obviously. People started asking if it was drinks all round. We bought a round, but if we’d remained we’d have been cleaned out.’

  ‘So you left the Grapes and came back here and got cleaned out at home.’

  ‘They just assumed it would be open house here.’

  ‘Are you sure you didn’t invite people?’

  ‘A few friends – but only a few friends,’ Allardyce admitted. ‘We were misunderstood. These things happen.’

  ‘Did you walk back?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Mr Allardyce enjoys a walk.’

  ‘For God’s sake,’ said Treadwell in a spasm of anger. ‘Are you trying to catch us out on drunk driving? Look, only one of us has a car, and that’s William, and his bloody car was sitting in Brock Street all evening. We took a taxi. Satisfied?’

  ‘I’m getting the timing right in my head,’ said Diamond, who wasn’t noted for fine calculations. ‘The lottery is announced about eight. You buy a round. At let’s say eight-fifteen, or eight-twenty, you decide to return here. You go out and look for a taxi – or did you find one?’

  ‘They line up in Kingsmead Square. We got one there.’

  ‘And were back here by – what? – eight-thirty?’

  ‘Later than that. We stopped at the off-license and picked up some booze.’

  ‘It was planned as a party, then?’

  ‘Drinks for a few friends,’ said Treadwell with disdain. ‘I don’t call that a party.’

  ‘The trouble is, the rest of Bath did,’ said his wife.

  The daylight was fading when Diamond and Julie emerged from the house.

  ‘Do you do the lottery?’ she asked.

  ‘Do I look like a winner?’ he said. ‘We tried a few times. Nothing. Then someone told me a sobering fact. No matter who you are, what age you are, what kind of life you lead, it’s more likely you’ll drop dead by eight o’clock Saturday night than win the big one. So I don’t do it any more.’

  ‘If you did drop dead and won, you’d be given a lovely send-off.’

  He didn’t comment.

  ‘So are we any wiser?’ she asked.

  ‘About what?’

  ‘The dead woman.’

  He ignored the question – more interested, apparently, in the scene in front of the Crescent. ‘Something’s different.’

  ‘Well, the cars are back,’ said Julie. ‘Or a lot of them are.’

  ‘Cars?’

  ‘The film crew wanted them out of sight by this morning. The residents got twenty pounds a car for the inconvenience.’ She studied his face to see if a joke would be timely. ‘Not many Mercedes in The Pickwick Papers.’

  ‘You’re right. That was why Allardyce’s car was parked in Brock Street last night.’ He shook his head, chiding himself. ‘I should have asked when he moved it and what he drives.’

  ‘About six-thirty last evening,’ said Julie. ‘Before they went out to the pub. And it’s a pale blue BMW.’

  Not for the first time, he had underestimated Julie. Her hours stuck in this house with the tenants had been put to good use. He received the information as if it went without saying that she would have discovered such things, but she may have seen his eyebrows prick up.

  He glanced along the rank of parked cars. ‘Then it isn’t back yet.’

  ‘He hasn’t been out,’ said Julie. ‘None of them have.’ She waited a moment before asking, ‘Are you suspicious of him?’

  ‘Wouldn’t put it as strongly as that, but there’s something. Got to be suspicious of a man with MR RIGHT written across his chest.’

  ‘He is in public relations.’

  ‘Mm.’ He got into the passenger seat of the car. ‘Drive us out of the Crescent and stop in Brock Street. We’ll wait there for a bit.’

  Seventeen

  This being Sunday evening, Julie had no trouble in finding space to park on the south side of Brock Street, the road that links the Royal Crescent to the Circus. She took a position opposite a wine shop, facing the entrance to the Crescent. Anyone approaching would be easily spotted under an ornate lamp-post that from there looked taller than the far side of the building, just visible across the residents’ lawn. In the next ten minutes five individuals came by. Three collected their cars from Brock Street and returned them to the front of the Crescent. William Allardyce was not among them, though his blue BMW was parked in the street, opposite an art gallery.

  ‘What are you expecting to see exactly?’ Julie asked when the clock in the car showed they had been there twenty minutes.

  Diamond took exception to the last word. I wouldn’t put it as strongly as that. “Possibly” is more like it.’‘Exactly?

  ‘Possibly, then?’

  ‘There’s a possibility that we may see Allardyce come round that corner and walk to his car. There’s a chance – and I wouldn’t put it higher than that – a chance that he’ll have the shoe with him.’

  ‘I don’t see how. We covered every inch of that house.’

  ‘And every inch of the tenants?’

  ‘Come off it, Mr Diamond,’ said Julie, reddening. ‘We had no authority to make body searches. Besides, you can’t hide something as big as a shoe…’ Her voice trailed off and she stared at him with wide, enlightened eyes. ‘The tracksuit. William could have been carrying it around all day in the tracksuit.’

  ‘Baggy enough to hide a shoe, I’ll grant you,’ he said as if the idea were hers.

  ‘But that would mean he…’

  ‘Yes.’

  But it seemed to Julie that on this occasion the magus of the murder squad had picked the wrong star to follow. Inspired as he may have been in the past, his record wasn’t perfect. And now he waited smug as a toad for her to tease out the arcane reasoning that had them sitting there. She leaned against the head-restraint and composed herself. She was not too proud to put a direct question to him. Others might balk at the prospect. Not Julie. ‘What makes William Allardyce a suspect?’

  As if marshalling his thoughts, he was slow to answer. ‘The missing shoe is the key to it. She was wearing it when she sat on the balustrade. Must have been. Her sock was perfectly-’ He didn’t complete the sentence.

  Someone had just come into view around the railings fronting the end house of the Crescent, a man of Allardyce’s height and build. He was wearing a cap and raincoat and carrying a plastic bag that clearly contained an object whose general shape and solidity demanded their whole attention. Neither Diamond nor Julie spoke. They watched the man cross the cobbles to a shadowy area at the edge of the lamp-post’s arc of light, close to the residents’ lawn. Ther
e he halted. After glancing right and left, he stooped, as if to examine the low stone ridge that supported the railings. Still crouching, he took the object from the bag and they saw that it was not a shoe, but a trowel. Next he scraped at the ground with the trowel and shoveled something into the bag. Then he gave a whistle and a large dog bounded out of the shadows and joined him. With his dog, his trowel and the contents of the carrier bag, he walked back with pious tread towards the Crescent.

  That was not William Allardyce.

  Diamond resumed without comment. ‘That shoe disappeared, so we can assume that someone is concealing it. Are you with me?’

  After the day she had spent exploring every inch of that house, she thought his ‘Are you with me?’ was the bloody limit.

  ‘I kept asking myself why,’ he said, oblivious. ‘If we are dealing with a killer here, what’s his game? The fact that the shoe is missing is what gives rise to suspicion. If it had been found beside her, you and I wouldn’t be here, Julie. We’d have thought it came off when she hit the ground. An accident: that’s what we’d have taken it to be. So why didn’t our killer chuck the shoe where the body was? I think I have the answer.’

  She stared impassively ahead. She’d had about enough of Peter Diamond for one day.

  ‘Theoretically,’ he said in the same clever-dick tone, ‘any one of the scores of people who crashed the party could have shoved her off the ledge. They didn’t. This has to be one of the tenants, and I’ll tell you why. The killer didn’t realise that the shoe had come off until it was too late to do anything about it. The next morning. If you recall what happened, the paper-boy discovered the body and knocked on the door of the house. Treadwell came out. He alerted Allardyce, who also came to have a look. That was the moment when one of them – and it must be Allardyce for a reason I shall explain – saw to his horror that the dead woman was missing one shoe. It had come off in the struggle and was still lying somewhere on the roof.’ Diamond turned to face her and stepped up his delivery. ‘What can he do? It’s too late now to plant it beside the body. The police are on the way and two witnesses have viewed the scene. He belts upstairs and finds the shoe, maybe with a torn lace, scuffing, signs of the struggle she put up. So he hides it, meaning to dispose of it later.’