Bloodhounds

"I think it's fairly common knowledge, Mr. Shaw. There were plenty of people at the party."

"Yes, but they didn't all see the writing. In fact, nobody remarked on it until we noticed it ourselves. It wasn't very obvious with all the lights on in the gallery. One tended to look through the windows, not at them."

"I see. And did your wife have any idea who was responsible?"

"No idea whatsoever, but she was pretty upset about it."

"Which was why you decided to wipe it off without reporting it?"

"Left to herself, Jess would have called the police."

"Why didn't she?"

"Because we persuaded her that it wasn't a serious matter. It was better to ignore it."

"You say 'we.' Who was involved in this decision?"

"AJ. and I and Miss Miller."

"So Shirley-Ann joined in, did she?"

"Jessica brought her out of the party to look at the writing. I think she was the first one of the Bloodhounds she could grab. There were others there, but-"

"Which others?"

"Milo Motion and that character with the beret. Rupert."

"Anyone else from the Bloodhounds?"

"No, the two women, Miss Chilmark and Mrs. Wycherley, aren't on the gallery mailing list."

"Why is that?"

"You'd have to ask Jessica."

Diamond resolved to do that. Before leaving Barnaby, he had one more question of significance. "You saw the message on the gallery window. Has it crossed your mind, just fleetingly, that it might be true?"

"That Jessica did for Sid?" Barnaby was candid. "I gave it some thought later, yes. But I honestly couldn't think of any reason why she would do such an immature thing. My wife is an unusually clever woman."

In the car he took a call from Keith Halliwell, reporting that Miss Chilmark wasn't at home. The old lady upstairs in the Paragon house had said that she might have gone away. She'd seen her the previous evening getting into a taxi-a black cab-and carrying a small suitcase.

"Miss Chilmark did a runner?" Diamond piped in amazement.

"It seems so."

He told Halliwell to start checking with taxi firms and heard the faint sigh of despair.

He drove to Orange Grove, left the car in front of the Empire Hotel, and walked the short distance up the High Street to Northumberland Place. A.J., unflustered, welcomed him to the gallery and offered him a coffee. Jessica, he told Diamond, should not be long. She was with a dealer upstairs. "If your business can wait a few minutes, Superintendent, I'm sure she'll be immensely grateful. It isn't often she gets a chance to do business with the big boys from London."

"I'll start with you, then."

"With me? I shouldn't think I can help much."

"You can save Mrs. Shaw from some tedious questions about things that happened last week."

"Is that all?" AJ. was reassured. The smile was reinstated. "Fire away, then. I thought this must be about the frightful business this morning in Sydney Gardens."

"You heard about it?"

"From Shirley-Ann Miller a short time ago. Of course, we know nothing firsthand."

"She was quickly onto it," said Diamond, slightly deflated.

"The jungle telegraph works well in Bath. I think she works in public relations, doesn't she?"

"Tourism."

"Well, she's pretty hot at public relations as well. Did you say you'd like a coffee?"

"No, thanks."

He was shown to the tall-backed Rennie Mackintosh chair. After making up his mind that it really was a chair, though unsuited to his physique, he tried his weight on it, perched awkwardly, and then got up saying, "I'm happy to stand. You knew Rupert Darby, sir?"

"A slight acquaintance only," said AJ. "Jessica invited him to the preview we had here. Rather a carrying voice, which can be an asset at a party, because everyone else then raises the volume, and it all sounds wildly successful."

"You hadn't met him before that?"

"No. I'd seen him around in Bath. Easy to recognize from Jessica's description. The beret, the voice, the dog."

"Was the dog at the party?"

"No, I'm speaking of seeing him in the street. You want to know about the party. He and I didn't exchange more than a few passing words as he came in. He isn't the sort who waits to be introduced to people. He was in there straightaway. I wouldn't have thought he was the suicidal type."

Diamond gave a shrug. His thoughts were no longer on Rupert's personality. At this minute AJ. interested him more. He might have stepped out of a holiday brochure with his welcome-to-paradise smile and designer shirt and jeans. Barnaby had spoken of a private income, and some of it must have gone on the teeth, which were as even as computer keys. Was this young buck likely to be content with "intellectual flirting"?

"I understand you have a large stake in the gallery, Mr. er…?"

"AJ. will do."

Diamond was shaking his head. "Not any longer, sir. I'm gathering evidence, you see. I have to insist on full names."

AJ. frowned. "Does it really matter? The A is for Ambrose. I cringe each time I have to own up to it."

"And the J?"

"Jason. Hardly much better."

"That isn't your surname, is it?"

"No. That's"-he cast his eyes upward-"Smith. Ambrose Jason Smith. Now can we talk about something more important, for pity's sake?"

This business over the name had quite upset AJ. All the more incentive for Diamond.

"Are you a local man… Mr. Smith?"

A glare. "No. Born in Devon, but the next twenty years I spent in and around Winchester. I went to school there."

"The public school?"

"Yes. If you want the whole sordid truth, I was not a credit to them. Got expelled eventually. Went to art college and then had a few poverty-stricken years in Paris."

"And now you're stricken no longer?"

"That is correct."

Diamond waited.

AJ. explained, "The family forgave me."

"To come back to my question, you have a large stake in the gallery. Is that so?"

"I help out with the overheads. I'm also a regular exhibitor. I wish you would tell me what this has to do with the police."

"You're a close friend of Mrs. Shaw's."

"That's a sinister-sounding phrase. She's a married woman, Superintendent. If you're inferring what I think you are, you'd better have a care what you say."

"Some words were sprayed on the gallery window on the night of the preview party."

A.J.'s reaction was less dramatic than Barnaby's. He was still well in control. His brown eyes looked into Diamond's and then toward the window. "How did you hear about that?"

"The words, I was informed, were 'She did for Sid.' "

"So?"

"You were one of the people who decided to remove them without reporting the matter."

"To put it in context," said A J., adopting a lofty tone, "it was obviously a piece of misplaced fun. We were having a party. People have a few drinks and do daft things. We thought it was in bad taste and wiped the window clean. If that's a crime, you'd better arrest us all."

From above came the sound of footsteps. Jessica was about to descend with her dealer.

"Another question," said Diamond. "Where were you last night from seven onward?"

"God, you really are taking this seriously. In the bar at the Royal Crescent Hotel and afterward at the Clos du Roy Restaurant, where I dined alone. But if you wish to make inquiries, a dozen bar staff and waiters can vouch for me."

"And after you'd eaten?"

"I went home and watched television. Would you like me to tell you what the program was?"

Jessica's black-stockinged legs and blue strappy shoes appeared at the top of the spiral stairs. She led down a small silver-haired man in a black overcoat and a bow tie. Quick to sense that the deal she'd been doing upstairs might be undermined if she introduced a policeman, she said smoothly, "My dear Mr. Diamond, how good of you to call again. This is quite a morning. If you'll forgive me for a moment, Mr. Peake has come specially from London, and he has another gallery to see. I'll just point him in the right direction, and then we'll do business, I promise."