Diamond shrugged. “Can’t tell until we interview him.”
Ingeborg was nodding. “So we hit him with what we know.”
Not the best choice of words for a recovering coma patient, but Diamond knew what she meant. “And the more we have up our sleeves, the better chance we have. We need to delve deeper, investigate his past and look at every death with a possible link to him.”
There was a moment when nothing was said.
Ingeborg frowned. “When you say ‘we,’ are you talking about the three of us? That’s a massive undertaking.”
“I don’t underrate it.”
“Can’t we turn this into a major inquiry now we’ve got the evidence of the journal?”
“Not yet,” he said.
She frowned. “Why not?”
“As you said a moment ago, we’re relying on illegally obtained evidence. He’s got to be persuaded to make a confession statement.”
Halliwell said, “The guv’nor’s right. If Pellegrini denies everything and wants his day in court, we’re mincemeat.”
“Yes, but…” Running out of words, Ingeborg let go of the hair and let it slide over her shoulders.
Halliwell added, “And we really must discover the method he uses. Isn’t there anything in these pages that gives it away?”
“No more than you’ve just read,” Diamond told them. “If we can believe him, they don’t know anything about it, which I take to mean they don’t suffer-unlike Young’s victims, who were put through serious pain.”
“Confirms what we worked out for ourselves,” Ingeborg said. “It’s some sort of knockout drug. Has to be. They’re found dead in bed without marks. What do those clinics in Switzerland use for assisted death?”
“Pentobarbital,” Diamond said. “They administer an antiemetic first, and then about an hour later the lethal dose. The patient goes into a coma and dies.”
“Peacefully?”
He nodded.
“How would Pellegrini get hold of the stuff?” Halliwell asked.
“Get with it, Keith,” Ingeborg said. “You can buy anything online: landmines, Kalashnikovs, a US army tank if you want.”
“Can’t we find out from his computer?”
She sighed. “Don’t you think I spent enough hours on this already?”
Halliwell was in dog-with-bone mode. “Is there a second computer somewhere in the house? He must have a laptop or a tablet he uses for emails.”
“Are you suggesting we break in again?” she asked.
“Please,” Diamond said. “We didn’t break in. I borrowed the key.”
Ingeborg swung back to him. “That’s the workshop key. You don’t have the key to the house?”
“No.”
“We could get inside with the help of that cleaning woman you met.”
“Mrs. Halliday?”
“She must have her own key. She’d let herself in the day you called. It’s worth a try, guv. Did she say where she lives?”
“Fairfield Park.”
“Let’s find her, then. We need to do it fast if he’s coming out of the coma.”
22
First he phoned the hospital and this time he didn’t get the usual ward sister. No need to start with the bulletin about Hornby’s well-being.
“Mr. Pellegrini’s condition has improved in the past twenty-four hours,” he was told, and it sounded as if the sister was reading from notes. “He is responding to auditory and visual stimuli and he’s clearly trying to communicate. It’s too early to say if he’ll make a full recovery, but the signs are promising.”
Ingeborg had been right. There was reason for urgency.
“I’ll visit him later.”
“You won’t.”
“I beg your pardon.”
“All visiting is stopped for the rest of today.”
“Why is that? I was allowed to see him yesterday.”
“Patients emerging from comas can get agitated and confused. He may need to be sedated.”
“I thought the whole idea was to wake them up. I can help with that.”
“You’ll allow us to decide what’s medically appropriate, sir?”
“Well, yes,” Diamond said. “But how soon can I expect to get some sense out of him?” Immediately he knew how callous he’d sounded and rephrased the remark. “That is to say, as he’s trying to communicate, when can we look forward to hearing from him?”
“Impossible to say. Recovery rates vary enormously.”
“Hours rather than days?”
“Don’t push me, sir. I answered your question.”
“Sorry, sister. But I need to see him again at the first opportunity. I’m the police officer dealing with the incident. Detective Superintendent Diamond. Would you make a note of my name? Anyone calling here needs to ask for me in person.”
Before he put down the phone Georgina had glided wraithlike into his office and was pulling up a chair.
“Was that the hospital?”
“It was,” he said, and added smoothly, “I haven’t forgotten you asked me to keep tabs on the man found at the scene of the collision. It’s better news. He’s definitely coming out of the coma.”
“Thank God for that,” she said. “I was fearing the worst. I must tell the IPCC team.”
He’d almost forgotten Grabham and Squeeze. “Be sure to tell them visiting isn’t allowed yet.”
“I’m sure an exception will be made in their case.”
“No chance. I can’t even get in myself. He mustn’t be distressed.”
“I can understand that,” she said with a smile. “You distress me on a regular basis. Do we know any more about this poor man?”
He had to rack his brain to remind himself how much she had been told. “Retired engineer, widower, lives alone in Henrietta Road.”
“I know that much,” she said. “What was he doing out on the road at such an early hour?”
He could safely tell her about the HOPS, and did so without once leading her on.
She listened and was satisfied. “That clears up the mystery, then.”
“Er, yes.” If Georgina believed there was no more to uncover, who was he to disabuse her?
“You can get back to what you do best.”
He waited for another sarcastic dig, but she spared him.
“Investigating crime,” she said.
“Business as usual, ma’am.”
Within the hour he was at Pellegrini’s house with Ingeborg and Mrs. Halliday. The helpful help-as Diamond thought of her-had been collected in a patrol car from her flat in Fairfield Park.
“Believe me, we appreciate this,” he told her.
“I’m pleased to do it,” she said. “I enjoyed the ride. I usually cycle over. Anything I can do to help Ivor get his memory back has got to be good.”
Ingeborg gave her boss a sharp look. She would never entirely fathom his deviousness.
Mrs. Halliday produced her house key and let them in. “I can’t let you into his workshop. That’s where he spends most of his time, but it’s private, like.”
“I remember. You called it his holy of holies.”
“I’ve never so much as flicked a duster in there.”
“We don’t need to go in,” he said in all honesty.
“Where shall we start, then? I showed you the library, didn’t I?”
“With the rolling ladders. Yes. Where does he go when he isn’t in there or the workshop?”
“His bedroom. He’s got an enormous telly in there and a phone.”
“We’ll start there. We may find some object that will trigger his memory when I take it to the hospital.”
She led them upstairs, talking as she went. “Even when Trixie was alive they had their own bedrooms. He suffers from insomnia, you see. He likes to get up in the night and turn on the TV.”
“Does he have any favourite programmes?” Ingeborg asked.
“Anything to do with trains, I expect. Sometimes they show old films at night, don’t they?”
“Murder on the Orient Express?”
“That would appeal to him, yes.”
“Brief Encounter?” Diamond said. His preference was always for the older films.
“Beautiful,” Mrs. Halliday said. “I weep buckets each time I watch it.”