Peter Lovesey - The Secret Hangman

‘He’s got something to hide,’ Halliwell said.

‘Or he’s dead,’ Leaman said.

Diamond struck a more positive note. ‘We’ve got three named suspects, apart from Geaves. That’s a start.’

There was a pause. He looked round the room. This time he seemed to be inviting contributions.

Paul Gilbert flushed all over his young face and asked, ‘Would DNA help?’

The focus shifted to Diamond. ‘What did you say?’

‘DNA, sir.’

‘It would if we had some.’

Ingeborg almost cut Diamond off in her eagerness to help her new colleague. ‘Up to now forensics haven’t found any, or they would have told us. This wasn’t a sex crime. And if Delia fought her attacker she didn’t scratch him. There was no skin under her fingernails.’

Paul Gilbert should have stopped there, but after waiting so long he wanted some credit for contributing. ‘It doesn’t have to be a skin sample,’ he said. ‘Just a touch can leave a contact.’

‘Are you lecturing me on DNA?’ Diamond said, and everyone waited for the explosion. Instead he leaned forward and lowered his voice. ‘I’ll tell you something in confidence, constable. Upstairs on the top floor’ — his eyes turned upwards, as if he was speaking of something religious — ‘up there they have our personal records, yours and mine and everyone else’s. We’re all on computer. The high-ups like Georgina spend a lot of time looking at those records. And there’s a special file labelled “professional training”. It goes without saying that any of us with ambition should keep up to date by going on those courses they run at Peel Centre and Bramshill. Anyone notice last month’s on forensic science? I was asked to go. The ACC thought it would do me good. My name is now on that all-important file, and beside it you’ll see the letters DNA.’ He gave young Gilbert a penetrating stare, and then a slow smile. ‘Did Not Attend.’

The rest of the team enjoyed it. Given time, Paul Gilbert would appreciate it, too. Working for Peter Diamond was no picnic, but every so often you got a helping of sauce.

The trip to Wimbledon was a day out for someone, definitely a perk. Diamond bagged it for himself, with John Leaman in support as his driver, note-taker and sympathetic ear. They reached the M25 when the traffic was building.

‘What’s all this for?’ Diamond asked.

‘Football,’ Leaman said. ‘It’s Saturday remember?’

‘All right for some.’

Secretly he was relieved to go slowly. Fast driving was no pleasure for him. His stomach was behaving like a sack of frogs. He produced some extra strong mints and insisted Leaman had one. ‘Reward for the driver.’

Leaman wondered if Diamond was telling him he had bad breath, but decided the boss wasn’t so subtle as that.

The address they had was a turning off Worple Road. The CID at Wimbledon had checked Dalton Monnington’s routine and he was due home at lunchtime.

‘What his line of work?’ Leaman asked.

‘Hot tubs.’

‘What — jacuzzis?’

‘He’s the West Country sales rep for a company called Give it a Whirl. Ho ho ho. Probably seemed a good idea at the time.’

‘I wonder if he’ll offer us a cut price.’

‘Dream on.’

‘I wouldn’t mind having my own jacuzzi.’

Diamond turned to see if Leaman was serious. ‘Have you ever sat in one? Give me a six-foot bath I can lie in. And I like my water still.’

‘It’s not the same as having a bath, guv. You take your girlfriend with you and drink champagne.’

‘Is that what you get up to of an evening?’

‘I haven’t got one yet, guv.’

‘Girlfriend or hot tub?’

Leaman didn’t have to answer. They’d found the street. Monnington’s house was a suburban semi like all the others, with a Honda on the drive in front of the garage. They cruised past two more and found a space to park.

A woman in an apron opened the front door. Before they could wave an ID she said, ‘Hold on a mo. I’ve got a stir-fry and two boys on the go.’ She left them standing there and dashed back to the kitchen at the rear.

‘Sounds like cannibalism,’ Diamond said.

‘How long is a mo?’ Leaman said.

Diamond spread his hands as if boasting about the one that got away.

‘Do we go in?’

‘Better not.’

She was soon back, wiping her hands on a tea towel.

Diamond showed his warrant card. ‘We picked the wrong time, obviously, but we came to see someone else. Dalton Monnington lives here, doesn’t he?’

‘What’s he been up to now?’ she asked.

‘It’s just questions. He may have witnessed something.’

‘Well, you’d better come in. He’s due any minute.’ She showed them into a front room with toys spread across the carpet. ‘Kids,’ she said, picking up bits of a plastic train set and throwing them into a cardboard carton. ‘There’s nowhere you can bring a visitor.’

‘Are you Mrs Monnington?’

‘Mrs? Some chance. Angie Collier, Dalt’s partner. Look, I’ve got to go up to the boys. They’re supposed to be tidying their room, but it sounds like a water fight. You don’t mind if I leave you to it?’

Left alone, they tossed a few more toys in the box and looked at the photos on the cupboard behind the sofa. Angie with a baby in her arms and a young man, presumably Dalton Monnington, with his arm round her shoulders. Another in a gilt frame, one of those studio shots against a blue background, the two adults with the boys in front. Monnington had the black hair and brown eyes they’d heard about from Jenny at the hotel. Diamond decided he looked the part of the proud father, then asked himself how much you can really tell from a photo.

‘I wasn’t expecting him to be a family man,’ Leaman said. ‘Doesn’t chime in with what happened in Bath.’

‘We don’t know what happened in Bath,’ Diamond said on his way across the room to the window. ‘We may find out shortly.’

A Ford Mondeo had drawn up behind the Honda on the driveway. Out of it stepped the man in the photo, wearing a striped shirt. He pressed his hands against the back of his neck and stretched and yawned as if to remove the tensions of work. He was home and his stir-fry would be waiting. He wasn’t to know two detectives were standing in his front room.

He entered the house and shouted, ‘Hi, guys.’

‘Hi, Daddy,’ came in unison from above. Angie was heard running downstairs. It wasn’t possible to pick up her hurried exchange of words with her partner.

Then he opened the front room door, well in control, the sales manner keeping any anxiety well hidden. ‘Dalton Monnington. You wanted to speak to me?’

Diamond did the introductions and said, ‘It’s in connection with the death of a woman in Bath a few days ago. Delia Williamson.’

Monnington’s first reaction was to turn and close the door behind him. Then he said, ‘The death of…?’

‘A waitress from Tosi’s restaurant. You were in Bath on Tuesday, right?’

‘Er, Tuesday. I think so.’

‘Can’t you remember?’

‘OK. Tuesday. I was there on business, visiting clients.’

‘People wanting to install hot tubs?’

‘Correct.’ He hesitated, as if to ask himself how much more these policemen knew. ‘I had three appointments in the area.’

‘And you stayed overnight. Why was that?’

‘They tend to be evening appointments, after my clients have finished work. I go to their homes, you see. It can finish quite late. The last appointment was at eight. I wasn’t away until gone nine. I don’t enjoy night driving, so I put up at a local hotel.’

‘And went out for a meal at Tosi’s?’

‘Off-hand, I couldn’t tell you the name.’

‘George Street.’