Peter Lovesey - The Vault

After ten minutes Diamond said in an aside to Leaman, "Is there much more of this, do you think?"

"They must be running out of puppets."

"They could easily bring them on again."

The puppets themselves were superbly crafted, no question. It was a pity the script-if you could call it that-was so abysmal. Even a half-intelligent four-year-old must have found it repetitive.

The performance reached its finale-or ran out of puppets- mercifully soon, with the slaying of a giant and the release of Daniel's little sister from a spell that had put her to sleep.

There were cheers from the kids and the grown-ups clapped.

"That's the end of the show, boys and girls," announced the female puppeteer in her natural voice. "Don't all move at once, will you? And, whatever you do, please don't touch the puppets."

Just about everyone stampeded towards the activity area. A few tried to go against the tide in search of their mums. Some gave up, some cried and others used their elbows. Three remained helpless on the serving counter, sucking their thumbs. At the front, the puppeteers were totally occupied in preventing their stage being pulled apart.

Scattering plastic balls, the murder squad stumbled out of their vantage point, getting puzzled looks from some of the small children coming the other way.

In a short time, the area where the audience had been was almost clear. The hidden interior of the building must have been large to absorb so many.

The puppeteers started dismantling the stage. Diamond went over, tapped the man on the shoulder and said, quietly, "Police."

He turned, startled. "What's up?"

The woman was more controlled. "Is it the van? Did we park in the wrong spot?"

"Nothing to do with the van. Would you mind telling me your name, your real name?"

The man frowned and ran his fingers nervously through his blond hair. "Paul Anderson. What am I supposed to have done?"

"Where do you live, Mr Anderson?"

"Larkhall."

"Up near the Brains Surgery?"

"That direction, anyway."

"Where you're a regular?"

"I wouldn't call myself that."

"You met a man there a few days ago-Thursday of last week-Professor Joe Dougan, from Columbus, Ohio."

"Did I?"

Diamond was beginning to be annoyed, but he persevered.

"American, middle-aged, on the short side."

"Doesn't mean a thing to me." He added, gathering confidence, "Listen, mate, I think you may have got your wires crossed. I visit the pub, yes, but I'm not Uncle Evan."

"That's the truth," said the woman.

"Annie and me, we're filling in for him. Couldn't you tell from the crap show we just did?"

This, more than anything, made Diamond hesitate. It had been a godawful show, even though the puppets were beautifully constructed and painted. He would have expected something more classy.

"We had to wing it," said Annie. "We haven't seen Evan's show. There wasn't time."

The man who called himself Paul Anderson said, "He only asked us yesterday. We used to have our own show, right? We got fed up. Everyone wants you to do it for peanuts."

"It's not worth it. It's bloody expensive, setting up the gigs," Annie said in support.

"So Evan asked you to fill in. What's he up to?"

"God knows. Well, he did say something about a family crisis," said Paul Anderson. "I've never heard him talk about his family before. Didn't know he had one. We don't know him all that well. It's just that with all our experience…"

"When somebody's in a spot, you help them out, don't you?" said Annie.

They had convinced Diamond. He was disappointed and elated at the same time. Uncle Evan's behaviour was deeply suspicious and his "family crisis" looked like a flimsy excuse to avoid being traced and questioned. He was behaving like a guilty man. Diamond continued to question the couple, but they said nothing more of substance. They claimed not to know Evan's real name, or where he lived. He had handed them the keys of the van containing everything they needed for the show and they had driven it away from the pub the previous afternoon. He didn't want it back for a week.

"That's handy," said Diamond, "because we're going to take it over."

LEAVING LEAMAN to arrange for forensic to pick up the van, he set off to keep an appointment in Mells, a few miles west of Frome. He sang a little in the car, something he only ever did when alone, and feeling upbeat. The Queen number, Another One Bites the Dust. The words were right, even if he had to strain to get the notes.

He didn't know Mells. Driving through the village looking for a particular cottage, he quickly understood how an expert on English art fitted in there. The ambience was orderly, understated, timeless and redolent of decent living. Personally, he would not have lasted there a week. Many of the gardens were surrounded by high walls, but what you could see through the gates was as clean as a cat's behind, and a pedigree cat at that.

Stuart Eastland was one of the team of specialists who advised Avon and Somerset Police on stolen property. Diamond had met him only a couple of times before, and then briefly; others dealt with thefts of art and antiques. "This isn't the usual problem," he explained, setting the bubble-wrapped parcel on a round oak table in Eastland's thatched cottage. "I have it on loan from the owner. I'd like an opinion."

"On what, precisely?" Eastland had a pair of half-glasses lodged at the top of his forehead. He flicked them downwards with his little finger on the bridge. All his movements were elegant.

"I'll show you." Diamond grappled ineptly with the first knot in the string.

"May I?" Eastland had it open almost at once, smoothing the bubble-wrap to reveal Councillor Sturr's watercolour. "What happened here, then?"

"The glass? My fault. An accident in the kitchen." Diamond didn't mention the cat. His admission that a work of art had been taken into a kitchen was shocking enough.

"A Blake," said Eastland, more to himself than Diamond. "What sort of Blake? William-or Sexton?"

Diamond waited.

"Am I permitted to touch?"

"No problem."

He picked up the picture and turned it over, and a chip of glass fell on the table.

"Sorry," said Diamond. "Thought I'd got it all out."

"Since it will have to be repaired," said Eastland, "presumably it won't matter if we remove the painting?"

"I don't see why not."

After some deft work with a knife and pliers, Eastland eased the paper from the frame and held it close to an anglepoise lamp. "The thing about Blake is that his style is so mannered. In one sense, he's a gift to a forger. I mean, the Blake hallmarks are well known and very persuasive, the pen and wash technique, the detailed musculature, the statuesque effect, the rather ineptly drawn background. He took immense trouble over the figures and then got bored with his backgrounds. You get some laughable trees." He put a jeweller's magnifier over his right eye and bent close to the painting. "This is all very suggestive of Blake. On the other hand, he's devilishly difficult to copy. Well known forgers like Tom Keating and Eric Hebborn left him well alone. It's one thing to mock up a Samuel Palmer, quite another to tangle with Blake."

"So is this genuine?"

"I'm not sure yet. If it's a fake, it's an exceptionally skillful one, I'll tell you that for nothing."

Diamond chose not to say at this point that he would be telling him everything for nothing. The murder squad was well over budget this year. Good thing Eastland was so obviously enjoying this.

"Dear old Blake was one of the most prolific of all artists. He never stopped. The list of works runs into thousands. As an engraver by training, he worked in series, you see. He would take a subject like the poems of Thomas Gray or the Book of Job and produce scores of pictures. This one, I can't place. The solitary figure in what looks like a frozen landscape with mountains." He turned the sheet over and held it at an angle, studying the grain. "Very old paper. A Whatman, I would think. No watermark, unfortunately."