Peter Lovesey - Cop to Corpse

‘It crossed my mind too, I don’t mind telling you, Inge.’

‘But what?’

‘But the case against Royston has been ratcheted up by this. He has easy access to a whole armoury of assault rifles. If it’s true that Harry Tasker was leaning on Royston, giving him grief, it doesn’t take a genius to work out what may have happened.’

‘And the others, in Wells and Radstock?’

‘Right now I’m thinking mainly of what happened in Walcot Street, but there is another angle. You saw the target you found, the policeman figure. Royston could have been trophy-hunting, to put it crudely. We have a duty to find out.’

She nodded, reluctant still, but forced to accept his advocacy. ‘All right, but let me phone Headquarters now and tell them about all those guns.’

‘Absolutely not. Wait until we’re through. I don’t want some high-up ordering us to return to base.’

More at cross purposes than ever, they covered the open ground to the house in silence, each troubled, yet knowing they must prepare for confrontation.

Then Diamond said, ‘We’re being watched. Third window from the right. I saw a movement. Keep going.’

‘He’ll know we’ve been at the range.’

‘Hopefully he won’t know everything.’

Leaving the grassed area, they reached the tiled surround of the house. ‘Front door this time,’ Diamond said. ‘Are you still up with your shorthand? I want a note of whatever’s said.’

‘I’m carrying a mini-recorder.’ In an afterthought she added, ‘Don’t ask where.’

‘Good thinking. Make sure it’s switched on.’

The front door looked as solid as the door of a jumbo jet. No bell, no letter-flap, no means of announcing their arrival.

‘What are we meant to do, rap with our knuckles?’ Ingeborg said.

‘They know we’re here,’ he said with a glance at the security camera above their heads. ‘The question is will they let us in?’

The sound of bolts being released answered that. The door swung inwards.

‘Who the hell are you?’ The speaker was in a blue bathrobe and flip-flops. He didn’t seem to be wearing anything else. Dense tattoos down each side of his neck looked as if they were an extension of the robe, like a stand-up collar. In his late forties, broad-shouldered, with shaven head, but bristly face and hostile grey unblinking eyes, he plainly wasn’t overjoyed to have callers. And, to be fair, Diamond’s get-up — like a character out of a Whitehall farce — didn’t encourage respect. ‘How did you get through the bloody gate?’

‘My colleague has a way with dogs,’ Diamond said, held up his ID and gave their ranks and names. ‘Would you be Mr. Nuttall senior?’

‘If you’re any use at your job, I don’t have to answer that. What’s it about?’

‘May we discuss it inside?’

‘I want to know what there is to discuss.’

‘Your son Royston.’

‘Him?’ The eyes narrowed. ‘What’s he been up to this time?’

‘We’re investigating the murder of PC Tasker in Walcot Street last weekend.’

Soldier Nuttall rocked back as if avoiding a punch. ‘You won’t pin that on my boy.’

‘Is he at home?’

‘In bed. He keeps late hours. What’s all this about, then?’

‘Would you ask him to get up and answer some questions?’

‘Is that all it is — questions?’

Diamond nodded.

Soldier Nuttall snatched a mobile phone off a table behind the door and pressed a key. Several seconds passed. Then: ‘Roy, get down here quick. The fuzz have come calling.’ With that, he stepped aside and let them in.

The hallway was large enough to be called an entrance court. A full-size stone lion dominated on a plinth in the centre, jaws forever open in a silent roar. Hanging above it was a large flag of St. George. Beyond was a flight of marble stairs that wouldn’t have looked out of place at Buckingham Palace.

‘You’d better come in here.’ He led them into what appeared to be a military briefing-room with ordnance survey maps and photos of uniformed groups on the walls and a huge table with about twenty chairs around it. There was a screen and some kind of projector.

‘The games room?’ Diamond said.

‘Why do you say that?’

‘War games.’

‘Nothing done in here is games,’ Nuttall said. ‘What were you doing poking around my firing range?’

‘Just that — poking around,’ Diamond said. ‘We couldn’t make ourselves heard at the door so we went looking for you. Saw those targets you use. Not nice.’

‘What’s wrong with them?’

‘Taking shots at policemen?’

‘Chipboard policemen. It’s harmless. You’ve got to see the funny side,’ Nuttall said without smiling.

‘Funny, is it?’

‘It’s a free country. I can do what I like in private.’

‘If it’s legal. It looks like a military range. You wouldn’t get a licence for the assault rifles the army use.’

He gave Diamond a long look before answering, ‘We do things properly in my organisation.’

‘Fight for Britain?’

‘That’s our name, yes. Do I have to explain that it doesn’t mean violence? You can fight for your rights, and sometimes you need to in this ineptly led country. You can fight for your health, your future, your right to live in peace. Everything we do is lawful, or they’d have clapped me behind bars years ago.’

This could have been a nice moment to raise the matter of the hidden arsenal, but Diamond had something else on his mind.

‘When you phoned your son just now,’ he said, ‘did you get an answer? I heard what you said. I didn’t hear his end of the conversation.’

Nuttall frowned and walked over to the doorway. ‘He said something. He ought to be down by now.’ He stepped out into the hall and yelled, ‘Royston, get your arse down here double-quick.’

Diamond murmured to Ingeborg, ‘Could have scarpered.’

She nodded.

They heard Nuttall’s flipflops slapping the stairs as he stomped up them shouting his son’s name.

‘I’m going after him,’ Diamond said.

‘Both of us are, guv.’

Large as this house was, it was easy following the owner through it. The uncarpeted corridors acted like soundboxes. Nuttall had stopped at a door on the middle level and was rattling the handle when Diamond and Ingeborg caught up. He didn’t seem to mind that they’d followed him. He was fully focussed on his unresponsive son.

‘If you don’t open this sodding door, son, I’ll kick it in and you can pay for the repair.’

Not with those flipflops, you won’t, Diamond thought.

Nothing was heard from Royston.

‘I’m not messing. It’s up to you.’ Nuttall stepped away, opened the door opposite, went inside and staggered out carrying an entire bedside cabinet and heaved it at Royston’s door. The panel above the door handle burst inwards and Nuttall had to be nimble to avoid the cupboard bouncing off and hitting his feet. He thrust his arm through the hole and turned the key. High-stepping over the cupboard, he went in.

‘Bloody hell.’

Diamond and Ingeborg followed him in. The interior was typical of any adolescent’s bedroom in its clutter of clothes, shoes and magazines scattered across the carpet. A huge built-in wardrobe dominated one wall and was stuffed with what were obviously expensive clothes, among them a rail filled with studded leather jackets. The walls were covered with posters of pop groups, motorcycles and body-builders flexing their muscles. Two guitars were propped against a keyboard. A quilt with the red cross of St. George was on the bed. But Royston wasn’t.

Soldier Nuttall was at the open window, leaning out. ‘He must have climbed down the wall.’

Diamond joined him and looked out. ‘Down the creeper, anyway.’ The branches of the wisteria, some as thick as drainpipes, would certainly have given enough support. Down on the ground there was no sign of a teenager. The bare lawns and the driveway stretched for a long distance. ‘Can he get the front gate to open?’