Peter Lovesey - The Vault

"Empty it yourself, if you like."

Joe co-operated. One of the first things out was the edition of Milton's poems.

Diamond reached for it, but Joe's hand curled over it first. "You know what this is?"

"That's why I want to examine it. The last time I was given a sight of it, you held onto it."

"You bet I did. Would you mind using both hands? The spine is weak." He handed the book across.

After the accident with Councillor Sturr's picture, Diamond was only too willing to take extra care. He glanced at the finely inscribed M.W.G., 5, Abbey Churchyard, Bath on the cover. Tentatively opening the book, he looked for the place at the front where the fly leaves were missing. The job had been neatly done. He would not have noticed unless it had been pointed out. The remnants of three sheets, tucked between the board cover and the title page. The cut was straight, sharp and as close to the hinge as you could get.

"I know all about that," said Joe. "The book is mutilated. If I were looking for an investment, I'd be worried, but the missing endpapers don't bother me. To me the value of this little property is who it belonged to, not the state it's in."

"I appreciate that," said Diamond, transferring the book to his other hand to look inside the back cover. "I see they've been cut from here as well. I was speaking to someone only this morning, an art historian. He was telling me forgers do this. They buy old books and cut out the blank sheets to get paper of the right age."

Joe's eyebrows twitched. "You think a forger damaged the book?"

"I wouldn't bet against it."

"In recent times, you mean?"

"I'd need a microscope to answer that."

Joe's interest in his book was sufficient to ride over all the day's frustrations. "I'm not sure if I buy this theory of yours. When I talked to the bookseller, Mr Heath, he told me something I should have appreciated, but didn't, about the scarcity of paper a couple of hundred years back. It was a valuable commodity. People would use those blank pages as notepaper. So it's quite possible Mary Shelley cut them from the book herself."

The possibility didn't much appeal to Diamond. His theory of the forger held more promise right now. "Maybe."

"She could have used them for sketching," Joe continued to speculate as he removed more things from the shoulderbag. "We know she sketched."

"We do?"

"She was having lessons from an artist while she was in Bath."

"Is that so?" Diamond said with the preoccupied air of someone working to a more significant brief.

"As a matter of fact, Miss Redbird told me a sketchbook was found in the writing box, along with the book and an ink bottle."

Abruptly Diamond's attention was focused again. "You didn't tell me that before."

"You didn't ask. You wanted to know about this book and I told you everything I know. The rest is only something I was told."

"This could be crucial information."

"You think I don't know? Dear God, I'd like to get my hands on Mary Shelley's sketchbook. No chance."

"What happened to it?"

"Sold-a long while back, she said."

"Did she say who bought it?"

"No, sir. You see, at the time she had no idea who it belonged to so it had no special interest," Joe continued implacably. "I'm trying to remember the name of Mary Shelley's art teacher. It began with a 'W'. Wood? No, West. Mr West. She mentions him in letters. She found the drawing tedious. I guess it would have been, the way it was taught at the time. Her imagination ran to more exotic things than still life and perspective."

"This sketchbook couldn't have been all that big," Diamond said. "To have fitted in the writing box, I mean."

Joe indicated some modest limits with his hands. "It wasn't so small. If she wanted to work small she could have used those sheets from the book to practise on." The sheets cut from the book had ceased to hold any interest for Diamond. The existence of the sketchbook had set him off on a more promising track.

"You can put the stuff back in the bag now." His brain worked through the possibilities while Joe began the task, sighing like a grounded balloon. Then Diamond said, "On Thursday evening when you returned to Noble and Nude, no one was there. That's what you told me?"

"That's the truth."

"But the place wasn't locked. Did that surprise you?"

Joe weighed the question before replying. "Not at first. It's such a warren, that shop, I took it that the owner was in another room somewhere. Called her name a couple of times and she didn't answer, so I started trying keys in the box. You know how it is. When you concentrate, really put your mind to a job, the time flies by."

"Did you have any suspicion someone else was present in the building?"

"What do you mean?"

"Isn't it clear? If I was in your situation that night, walking into an empty shop, my senses would be primed for someone to come in. If a floorboard creaked, I'd hear it."

"I heard nothing."

"And you estimated you were there from around nine-thirty to when? Almost eleven?"

"That's what I said."

"The writing box was still there when you left?"

"On her desk in the office, where I found it." Joe leaned forward, stressing the next remark with his open hand. "Listen, whatever else you think of me, I'm not stupid. If I'd walked out with the writing box, she would have known right off who took it."

"She was murdered," Diamond pointed out.

Joe, wrong-footed, blinked and frowned. "I didn't know that at the time. How could I have known that?"

Diamond left the question hanging.

Joe stared at him woodenly for a moment, then said, "And another thing. Her colleague, the guy in the bow-tie, knew all about my interest in the box."

"Ellis Somerset."

"He would have blown the whistle on me if I took it."

Diamond nodded. "Now I'll tell you something, professor. You have a way of making everything sound reasonable. Strange things happen to you through no fault of your own. You go down into a vault at the Roman Baths and you're mistaken for a forensic pathologist. Your wife disappears and turns up in Paris. You're trying to do deals with a woman on the night she is murdered. You can explain it all. There's one thing I wish you would explain because I can't see a way round it myself."

"Try me."

"The problem is this: someone stole the writing box on the night Peg Redbird was murdered and I haven't heard of anyone else but you with an interest in it. Only you. You worked out that it once belonged to Mary Shelley. No one else knew that."

Joe frowned. He had no easy solution.

Diamond twisted the knife. "Do you know of anyone else?

Anyone?"

"I told my wife, but she wouldn't…"

"And you wouldn't have let Peg Redbird in on the secret because she would have raised the price."

Joe partially closed his eyes, straining for an explanation. This was desperation point. "At the time I half wondered if the lady figured it out."

"Peg?"

"Right. I was never any use as a poker player. I may not have said anything-no, let's be clear, I didn't say anything-but I couldn't disguise my interest in the writing box. I wanted it badly. She was good at her job. She saw the initials on the cover of that book and she saw the address. Yeah, I reckon she figured it out."

"Letting you off the hook?"

"She could have talked to someone after she saw me."

"I get the drift," said Diamond with a wry smile. "They killed her for it?"

"Listen, I'm trying to help you with your inquiries. Literally. And I have one great advantage over you."

"What's that?" said Diamond, all interest.

"I know I'm an innocent man."

Diamond couldn't help grinning.

Joe was nodding solemnly. "Some other guy must have done these things."

"In the furtherance of theft, you think? Was it really worth killing for? Just an antique somebody famous once owned?"