The football talk had worked a miracle. “What do you want to know?” Rex said, as if the topic had only just been raised. “He was a good tipper. Gave me twenty extra at the end of the evening. I told him I do cards, but he paid cash.”
“You charged for the waiting time?”
“Yeah, it was on the meter. He was under the half-hour, if that. He said he wouldn’t be long and he wasn’t.”
“Where did you wait? In the lane?”
“There was this yard, so I parked there.”
“No sign of any other car at the cottage?”
“Not when we drove up. There was just me. I got out and had a smoke. It wasn’t raining or anything.”
Halliwell was doing the job, so Diamond let him carry on.
“About what time was this?”
“Nine-thirty, I’d say. No, I tell a lie. It was ten. When I got back in the cab, I turned on the radio and caught the news. I was listening for the Chelsea result. They were playing an evening match. Spurs. Three one.”
The football talk had paid another dividend. They could fix the date from this.
“I just about caught the result when there’s someone knocking on my window.”
“He was back?”
“No, it was the lady of the house.”
“Who?”
“Jessie the housekeeper,” Diamond put in for Halliwell’s benefit.
“She’d driven up in a Fiat, one of them two-seater jobs, and I hadn’t even noticed. I put my window down, thinking I must be blocking her, but it was okay. She only wanted to know who my fare was.”
“Did you tell her?”
“I couldn’t, could I? He never told me his name. She goes, is he from Bath, and I’m like, yes, and she goes, is he alone? Then she wants to know if I’ve heard of Larry Lincoln. Jesus Christ, she only thinks I had Larry bloody Lincoln in my cab, one of the hardest men in Bath.”
Hearing this, Diamond slopped some coffee on the table. “She was expecting Larry Lincoln?”
“You know the evil bastard. You must,” Rex said.
Any police officer who said he didn’t know Lincoln would be a liar. “One of the hardest men in Bath” was no exaggeration. This thug had done long stretches for various forms of assault. He was a walking affront to the effectiveness of the prison system. If Cyril had been expecting a visit from Lincoln that night, he was really in deep.
“Do I know what Lincoln looks like, she asks me, and she’s dead worried, just about wetting herself. Lady, I goes, the geezer I brought is old enough to be Larry’s dad.”
“Did that calm her down?”
“A bit. She goes into the cottage then. Not long after, my old fellow comes out and tells me he’s ready to roll again.”
“How did he seem? Keen to be off?”
“He didn’t say much. He wasn’t sitting beside me. He rode in the back, which I take to mean they don’t want to chat. I just checked he wanted to go straight back to Bath, and he did.”
“Nothing more was said?”
“Not for some time. About twenty miles down the road he asks me if the woman spoke to me and I said she wanted to know who my passenger was and I wasn’t able to tell her. I didn’t say she thought he might be Larry Lincoln. Some people might think that was a laugh, but you never know how anyone’s going to take stuff like that. Personally I wouldn’t be happy with it. So I kept it to myself.”
“Probably a good decision. Have you met Lincoln?”
“I seen him a few times, mostly in pubs. I stay well clear.”
“Good thinking.”
“No problem.”
“Was that all that was said in the cab?”
“Just about. When we was near Bath I asked if he wanted me to drive him to his house and he said I could put him down at the rank and that’s what I did. Like I said, he paid cash and give me a good tip. I still can’t tell you his name.”
The two detectives made their way through the Ashmead Road industrial estate towards the glazed monolith that was their temporary (they hoped) place of work.
Halliwell was using his iPhone as they walked, much to Diamond’s irritation.
“What’s so important? Can’t it wait till we get there?”
“It’s a football app. It shows all the fixtures. I’m checking the date of that Chelsea-Spurs game. An evening match, he said. We can find out when it was Pellegrini called on Cyril. February, should be.”
Diamond stopped complaining and presently had it confirmed that the date of the taxi journey must have been Monday, February the sixteenth. “Spot on,” Halliwell told him. “The night before Cyril was found dead.”
“Was that Bristol City football club you and he were talking about?”
“The Robins, yep.”
“I should have guessed from the badge.”
“I saw a lot of them at one time when I had the flat near Ashton Gate.”
“You did well, loosening him up. By the end, he was almost volunteering things, but I wouldn’t risk him in the witness box.”
“What is it with the Larry Lincoln stuff?” Halliwell said. “Do you really think a sad old gambler like Cyril was expecting a visit from the likes of Lincoln?”
“My guess is that it was scare tactics.”
“From whoever he was owing money to?”
“Right, Lincoln’s reputation as an enforcer is enough to make anyone stump up.”
“He must have told Jessie. She swallowed it.”
“We need to trace her,” Diamond said. “I wonder if she came from an agency. Is that how housekeepers find jobs?”
“They call them carers these days, guv.”
“Housekeeper is how it was put to me,” he said with irritation. “If you want to call her a carer, fine.”
“I’m only saying the agency would be a care agency.”
“As you’re so well informed, get on to it, would you? All the local care agencies. She could be our key witness.”
“Do we know her surname?”
“Oh Christ.”
“No problem.”
“Don’t mess with me,” Diamond said, at the limit of his patience. “I’ve had it up to here with no problems.”
“I’m telling you I’ll go at it the other way, like I did with the taxi companies-give them Cyril Hardstaff’s name and ask if he was their client.”
“Fine.” He felt a twinge of conscience for snapping at his deputy. “If I didn’t know better, I’d call you a genius.”
Back in his office Diamond’s mood improved on finding that Miss Hill had sent through the valuation photos he’d requested of the missing jewellery. He spread the sheets across the floor.
Twenty grand’s worth of bling. Had Cyril swiped the lot or had Pellegrini taken some, along with the gowns?
He unlocked his desk drawer and took out the serpent necklace and compared it with one of the pictures.
No argument. It matched.
Any uncertainty over motive stopped here. Olga’s collection of jewellery and antiques had been there for the taking after she died. Dozy old Max wasn’t capable of managing it. The vultures had swooped-or at least one vulture had.
For Diamond, this should have been decision time. He had enough information to go public and order a full-scale investigation into the theft. The question whether murders had also been committed would follow on as part of the operation. He’d be able to use the full resources of CID and forensics.
But there was a catch.
He was sure to be asked about the source of his intelligence. Entering and searching a building without a warrant and seizing property was a no-no. He’d gone in twice and taken Ingeborg with him the second time to obtain the computer data, all based on suspicion he couldn’t yet substantiate.
Imagine what Dragham and Stretch would make of his conduct.
Then there was the added pressure of Pellegrini being comatose and on the brink of death. Anyone with compassion was going to be sympathetic. Labelling a helpless man a killer was high risk.
Even Halliwell had doubts. “Are we clinging to the idea of murder on not much evidence?”