“This is so sad. He is — was — lovely man, top trainer. I am getting much help from Tony. New treadmill, rowing machine, exercise bike.”
Much help and much expense with it, Diamond thought. What was the betting that Pinto took backhanders from the sales team? “Are all these machines in the house?”
“My exercise hall downstairs. You like to see?”
He shook his head. “No need.”
“Is boring, anyway,” she said. “Fitness machines. My husband everywhere.”
An interpreter would be helpful. “Your husband watches you training?”
“No, no. Photos, certificates, newspaper stories all over walls. Gold this. Silver that. Black belt. Ivanov win again.”
“He’s a sportsman?”
“All sports. Marathon. Lift weights, karate, football, swimming. Are you sportsman?”
“I played some rugby. I don’t think it’s popular in Russia. Getting back to Tony, did you get to know him well?”
She reddened. “What does this mean — get to know?”
“Did you talk much with him?”
“I am trying to breathe.”
A pause to decide what she meant. Distressed as she was by the news of Pinto’s passing, she seemed to be inhaling normally. Her problem was linguistic, confusing the present and past tenses. She meant there had been no chance to chat with Pinto during the exercise sessions. “How did you find him in the first place?”
“Where is this first place? I have not been.”
Diamond took a deep breath. He was trying his best to keep things simple. “Did somebody recommend Tony?”
“My husband Konstantin I am thinking.”
“Excellent. That’s all I wanted to know.”
“Niet.”
Everyone turned to see who else had spoken. The man in the serf costume had stepped back into the room, and it soon became obvious they’d got him badly wrong. He spoke in Russian to Olga in a tone of voice that scuppered all their assumptions. This guy couldn’t be a servant. He had to be the husband. He must have been standing outside listening to everything that was said and wanted it corrected.
“I am sorry,” Olga said when the tongue-lashing was over. “I make bad memory. My husband Konstantin tell me I find Tony in Bath Chronicle.”
Whereupon husband Konstantin sprang his second surprise, a grasp of the vernacular. “And I had fuck-all to do with it. I was out of the country on business. My wife got this absurd idea into her head that she would lose weight.”
Feeling sympathy for Olga, Diamond said, “Sir, we’re here about Pinto, not your wife. Did you meet him?”
“Not at the beginning. She chose to be secretive about him and this cock-eyed training regime. As a result, she was mugged.”
“Literally mugged? You’re not talking about all the fitness equipment?”
“Physically attacked. At Pinto’s suggestion, she went out walking at night and was set upon by some thug and robbed of a gold chain. She could have been seriously injured.”
“When was this?”
“Some months ago. I was away on business and I heard nothing of it until recently. Ask her. She’ll tell you herself.”
Diamond turned back to Olga. “Where did this happen?”
“In Great Pulteney Street,” she said in a low voice. All the ebullience had drained away. “I am not hurt.”
“Did you report it?”
“No. Like Konstantin say, I am foolish woman to go out alone. I make my own problem.”
“If you were robbed, you should have called the police.”
“Now I am telling you.”
“It’s a bit late, Olga. We needed to deal with it at the time.” In truth, he was more interested in her experiences with Pinto than the mugging, but he felt compelled to ask, “Do you remember what your attacker looked like?”
“No. He hold me from behind like so.” She mimed the action with a grasping motion. “Chain break and he is running off to car. Favourite chain I wear all day, every day.”
“A birthday present I had made for her,” Konstantin added as if to let it be known that he wasn’t entirely unforgiving. “White and yellow twenty-four carat. Not cheap.”
“What do you remember about the car?” Diamond asked Olga.
“I do not see. I am scared, run away. I hear car start and drive off. That is all.”
It didn’t need Sherlock Holmes to suggest a scenario. This was no spur-of-the-moment mugging. Someone knew that the rich Russian woman sporting a valuable gold chain went for evening fitness walks along Great Pulteney Street. Pinto had been well placed to tip off an accomplice or even do the job himself. It would have been simple to wait in the line of parked cars for her to come along and grab her from behind.
She hadn’t finished talking about the incident. “I run down steps, fall down, cannot move, big pain in leg and shout for help.”
“I don’t know of any steps in Great Pulteney Street.”
“Basement steps, guv,” Gilbert prompted him.
“Got you. Someone’s basement entrance?”
“And nobody there. Dark, smelly, dirty place. No chance I ever get out of here, I am thinking, but some person is hearing me.”
“Bit of luck.”
“Maeve.”
“Who’s Maeve?”
“Bloody fine Englishwoman pick me up and carry me home.”
Difficult to believe as stated unless Maeve was Superwoman, but the general drift was clear. A Good Samaritan had come to the rescue. “Where did she come from? Does she live in the street?”
“Larkhall. She is training for Other Half.”
Another runner, for Christ’s sake. “Did she know you?”
“No. I am strange.”
“Okay,” Diamond said, trying to stay focused on the facts. “She happened to be jogging by and heard your cries for help?”
“And now she is true friend we sponsor for five hundred pounds.”
Konstantin rolled his eyes, plainly unhappy she had parted with five hundred, for all their millions.
“For a good cause, no doubt,” Diamond said in Olga’s defence.
“Heart.”
She pronounced it as “Art” and he tried to think of a charity for destitute painters.
“What’s Maeve’s second name?”
“Kelly.”
“From Larkhall, you said?”
“Bella Vista Drive. She is schoolteacher.”
“Getting back to your personal trainer, Tony Pinto, when did he start working with you?”
“Five or six months and I lose many pounds.”
Pounds sterling were in Konstantin’s mind, going by the exaggerated sigh.
“Is true,” Olga said, doing her best to ignore her husband. “I can show you photograph. I was big fat woman. Tell them, Konstantin. You know I am burning calories like crazy.”
“They’re not interested in your weight problem,” he said. “They’re here about your trainer.”
“Tell them I walk the half marathon, thirteen miles.”
“You were in the big race?” Diamond said. “We were there. We must have seen you go by.”
“Not unless you stayed to the end,” Konstantin said. “She took longer than four hours.”
“Four hours walking,” Olga said.
You’d think the husband would have been proud she’d completed the course. There was bitterness between these two and most of it was coming from Konstantin. “Did you know your trainer Tony was in the race?”
“Of course I know. He tell me,” Olga said, “but running. He is fast runner.”
“I’m not sure that’s true. He took as long as you did. What was your time?”
“Four hours fifteen minutes and some seconds.”
“In that case, you finished ahead of him. He did four twenty-three. Do you remember overtaking him?”
She laughed at the idea. “I am walking and overtake Tony? Not possible. No, no, no.”
Konstantin said, “Four twenty-three? Are you sure this was the right guy? He was supposed to be a fitness expert.”