‘Let’s talk about William Wright,’ said Strike.
‘Of course, anything you need to know, ask away,’ said Ramsay, but he pressed on before Strike could speak. ‘Our security’s really top notch, as you can see, but Knowles was a professional, wasn’t he?’
‘Did you interview him for the job?’ said Strike.
‘Yes, with Pamela, and she liked him at the time, whatever she said afterwards. She was the one who’d been saying we needed someone else, because she wasn’t up to lifting the heavier stuff, especially taking it up and down the stairs – none of us are getting any younger and she’s got problems with her eyes.’
‘What sort of problems?’ asked Strike.
‘She had that laser eye surgery, and it didn’t work. She’s had a lot of trouble since. So we advertised.’
‘Did you have many applicants?’ asked Strike.
‘Not many. Young people have unrealistic expectations of salaries these days, very unrealistic,’ said Ramsay, bristling slightly, ‘but Wright seemed ideal. Short, but a strong lad – our security chap had resigned a couple of months previously, you see, so I thought Wright could cover both bases, as it were. He did jujitsu.’
‘Was he given the alarm and vault codes when he started here? Keys?’
‘Oh, no,’ said Ramsay. ‘No, of course not. Absolutely not.’
‘Did you see much of him yourself?’
‘Not really. I’d pop in here at lunch sometimes, see how things were going. No, it was really just Pamela – oh, and Jim, coming in to clean two mornings a week. He’s been with us since the start, couple of years now.’
‘This would be Jim Todd?’ asked Strike.
Ramsay didn’t question how Strike knew his cleaner’s surname, but said,
‘That’s right. Lovely man. Fell on hard times, so we helped him out with a job. He cleans for a few different businesses.’
‘So it would’ve been Pamela who had most to do with William Wright?’
‘Yes, and Jim would’ve seen a bit of him, too. More than me. As I say, I’ve been very busy, but it was important to keep the shop going. It’s our baby, you know, and—’
Ramsay’s voice broke, and Robin, thinking again of the dead son, said,
‘This must all have been incredibly difficult for you.’
‘It has,’ said Ramsay hoarsely. ‘Yes. It has.’
His gaze roved, apparently absent-mindedly, back to Robin’s chest. She folded her arms and he looked hastily away.
‘So William Wright was on your security footage, all that Friday the seventeenth of June?’ said Strike, his tone less sympathetic than Robin’s. He’d noticed the ogling.
‘Yes, yes, we’ve always got the camera on, in case of shoplifters. The police took that footage away, after the burglary, or – no, maybe it’s still on here,’ said Ramsay, peering dimly at the computer, ‘but I wouldn’t know how to…’
‘Could I have a look?’ asked Robin. ‘We’ve got a similar camera feed in our office. I might be able to find it.’
‘Yes, of course,’ said Ramsay. ‘Password,’ he muttered, and after a couple of attempts, he succeeded in entering it correctly, then ceded his chair to Robin.
‘I understand Wright left the shop for a while, that Friday?’ said Strike.
‘Yes, very briefly, in the afternoon,’ said Ramsay, taking Robin’s vacated seat. ‘Stupid thing. The delivery driver mixed up two crates. Sent the Oriental Lodge centrepiece – you’ll see it in the catalogue, magnificent, it really is – to Bullen & Co by mistake, and delivered some of the things they’d bought to us. Pamela realised what had happened and sent Wright out to Bullens to get it back. Embarrassing for Pamela, actually,’ said Ramsay, his face growing a little pinker. ‘If that hadn’t happened, we wouldn’t have known she and her husband had bid on some of the Murdoch collection. We had a gentlemen’s agreement that Bullen & Co wouldn’t set themselves up in competition with us. We were to concentrate on masonic silver.’
‘And Wright brought this centrepiece back, did he?’ said Strike.
‘Yes, in a taxi. He wasn’t gone long. The Silver Vaults are only just up the road.’
‘I think,’ said Robin, her eyes on the computer monitor, ‘I might be able to download the relevant camera footage. Would you be comfortable with us taking a copy, Mr Ramsay?’
‘Yes, yes, of course,’ said Ramsay.
‘Would you have phone numbers for Pamela Bullen-Driscoll and Jim Todd?’ Strike asked.
Ramsay gave them. Strike now brought out the photograph of Rupert Fleetwood that Decima had given him.
‘In your opinion, is there any possibility that William Wright was this man?’
Ramsay glanced down at Rupert Fleetwood.
‘Oh, no,’ he said. ‘No, no. What is he – a waiter? Wright wore glasses, and had a beard. He was dark.’
‘Disregarding the outfit,’ said Strike, ‘and trying to picture this man with a beard, and dyed hair—’
‘No, no,’ repeated Ramsay, who seemed annoyed, ‘no, he doesn’t look at all like Knowles.’
Strike took the picture back.
‘Did the police show you pictures of two men called Niall Semple and Tyler Powell?’
‘Yes, yes, but it wasn’t them, it was Knowles,’ said Ramsay, now almost agitated. ‘I’m certain it was Knowles.’
‘OK,’ said Strike, making a note. ‘Did anyone offer you a different nef for sale, around the time Wright came to work here?’
‘A different nef?’ said Ramsay, confused. ‘No, the Carolina Merchant’s the only one we’ve ever had in stock. We don’t deal in ornamental objects that aren’t masonic.’
‘Right,’ said Strike, making another note. ‘And is there anything you remember about Wright that seemed odd, or distinctive?’
‘No, not at all. As I say, I didn’t really – oh, but there were the things he searched for. The police found that out.’
‘“Things he searched for”?’
‘Yes, he’d looked things up, on this computer,’ said Ramsay, nodding at the monitor on the desk. ‘The police went all through the what-have-you, and they found he’d been looking at some odd things.’
‘They found his search history?’
‘Yes, exactly. He wasn’t supposed to be on that computer at all. It’s only there for website orders and our client database. I said to Pamela, “what was he doing, messing around on the computer?” She said it must have been when she went out for lunch. You know, a lot of this is down to Pamela’s carelessness,’ said Ramsay, in a sudden burst of temper. ‘We were supposed to be so grateful for her help, but she was the one who left early on Friday, which meant Wright could close the door without setting the alarm!’
‘Really?’ said Robin, who’d just successfully cut, copied and emailed the relevant portion of camera footage to the agency’s address. ‘Why did Pamela leave early?’
‘She – it was a private matter,’ said Ramsay, looking uncomfortable. ‘But even so – damn careless of her.’
‘What had Wright been doing online, d’you know?’ asked Strike.
‘He’d been looking up things about Freemasons, and he’d been on some website that was all about clearing your name and escaping prison and things like that.’
‘It’d be very helpful if you could remember the details of that website,’ said Strike.
Kenneth screwed up his cherubic face.
‘It was called something like “Innocent and Accused”. People complaining they’d been framed, or blamed for things they hadn’t done, and advising each other how to get out of it. Some really nasty stuff on there. Advocating vigilantism, some of them. How to get their own back.’