Peter Lovesey: Diamond Dust

He spent the next hour with his door closed, looking at the paper mountain on his desk, the filing cabinets that wouldn't close and the stacks of paper on the floor. Was it admitting defeat to tidy up? Wasn't it better to leave everything as it was, just to demonstrate that he'd be back?

He didn't go to the canteen for his usual coffee. And they had the sense not to disturb him.

At lunchtime he got out of the place for a walk, not towards the Abbey Churchyard, where he sometimes went when life had dealt him a wicked hand, but round the back of the railway station, across Widcombe Bridge and along the bank of the Avon as far as Pulteney Bridge -as dull a stretch of river as any he knew. Whenever he told people where he lived, they said how lucky he was, but in truth he wasn't attracted to the postcard scenes of Bath. The stately buildings, the rich history, the setting among green hills didn't excite him. He would have been just as content to work in Bristol if he'd been posted there six years ago. But he hadn't. Stuffy old Bath was his patch. He was in tune with it now. That was why he resented Georgina's attempt to move him.

He picked up a 'ploughman's' baguette – a contradiction, in his opinion – and a can of beer and sat on a bench in Parade Gardens. By now his rebellious thoughts were being toned down. He was starting to accept the inevitability of obeying orders. Georgina hadn't proposed a permanent move to Bristol Central. The best tactic was to let everyone know this was a short-term investigation. He'd make a point of calling in most days at Manvers Street and keeping track of what was going on there.

Still far from satisfied, he ambled back to the nick without any urgency. After all, nobody could expect him to drop everything and beetle off to Bristol the same day.

There was a sense of important things going on when he walked through the door.

'Mr Diamond, there you are,' the desk sergeant called across the room.

'Something up?'

'A shooting in Victoria Park. A woman is dead.'

His spirits soared. Bad news for someone could be a lifeline for him. 'Suicide?'

'Apparently not'

'So who's dealing with it?'

'DI Halliwell.'

Keith Halliwell was his deputy, and well capable of sussing out the scene. 'Even so, I think I'll take a look,' he said as calmly as if a rainbow had appeared over the city. 'Which part of the park?'

'Crescent Gardens. Down at the bottom, back of the Charlotte Street Car Park.'

On his way through the building he thought about leaving a message for Georgina – just to rub in the fact that sudden deaths did occur in Bath – and then decided against it. First, he'd find out for himself what this shooting amounted to. It could be one of those incidents that get cleared up the same day.

Please God, no.

The Royal Victoria Park, on sloping ground to the west of the city, is in effect two parks, one rather gracious, with lawns descending to a wooded area providing the Royal Crescent with its leafy view; and the other, larger and containing the Botanic Gardens, a fishpond and a children's playground overlooking the gasworks. They are bisected by Marlborough Buildings and its long gardens. The shooting had happened in the gracious part, near the bandstand on the south fringe of the park below the Crescent.

They had sealed off the scene with police tape. The inevitable gawpers had gathered at the margin, but helpfully the trees screened the place from the car park.

The scene-of-crime lads – with at least one lass – in their white zipper overalls were already at work. Halliwell was standing with the constable guarding the access path. Spotting Diamond, he came over to meet him, rubbing his hands.

'We're back in business, guv.'

'What do we know?'

'Middle-aged woman, shot twice in the head at close range. No sign of the weapon.'

'Apart from two holes in her head.'

Halliwell grinned. 'Well, I guess that counts as a sign.'

'Let's have a look, then.'

Halliwell led the way to where the SOCOs were combing the ground for traces of the crime. The corpse was covered with a white plastic sheet.

'Who found her?' Diamond asked.

'A Mr Warburton, walking his dog. About ten-twenty this morning he heard the shots and came over.'

'Did he see the killer?'

'No. Too far away. He was up the hill, not far from the Crescent. When he got here, there was just the woman lying dead.'

'Other people must have heard it. Well into the morning. People are about. The car park would have been filling up.'

'Yes, but he was the only one who bothered to check.'

Diamond didn't question this. The common reaction to the sound of shooting isn't to go and investigate. Most people dismiss it as a car backfiring. If they know it's a gun they head in the opposite direction. He stood over the covered corpse. 'What am I waiting for – someone to introduce us?'

Halliwell stooped and lifted the sheet from the head.

Diamond ran an experienced glance over the blanched face, one blood-red hole almost exactly in the centre of the forehead and another in front of the left ear. Then he stared. His skin prickled and his muscles went rigid as if volts were passing through them.

From deep in his throat came a sound more like a vomit than distress. He sank to his knees and snatched back the plastic sheet and looked at the woman's clothes. No question: she was wearing the black Burberry raincoat she'd bought from Jolly's last summer and the blue silk square he'd given her on her last birthday. He fingered a strand of her hair and it felt like straw. 'It's Steph,' he said, gagging on the words. 'The bastards have shot my wife.'

Halliwell was speaking into his mobile. 'We have a positive ID on the body in Crescent Gardens. Confirmed as Mrs Stephanie Diamond, wife of Detective Superintendent Diamond. I repeat…'

Diamond remained on his knees beside his dead wife, registering nothing of what was going on around him. This was not self-pity. The focus of his grief was entirely on Steph, and her life so abruptly ended. Dry-eyed and blank-faced, he was weeping inwardly for her, for her compassion, her wisdom, her sense of humour, her integrity, her serenity, her mental strength, her brilliant insights. It had been almost a psychic gift, that ability of hers to draw his attention to hidden truths. With uncanny timing, she had reminded him only the night before how he hated surprises. Here was the worst surprise ever. He hadn't remotely imagined it could happen. Had she? Without the faintest idea of why she had come to this place, he wasn't going to make sense of it now, or in the next hour, or the next day. He knew only that Steph had been the one love of his life and she had been shot through the head at point-blank range. Too dreadful.

Halliwell put a hand on his shoulder and suggested he sat in the car for a bit.

He said from the depths of his grief, 'Back off.'

Wisely, Halliwell did.

The SOCOs continued their fingertip search of the area, less talkative now. Professionals working at murder scenes often insulate themselves from the horror with black humour that might offend anyone unused to what goes on. Diamond was quite a joker himself. No sign of the weapon – apart from two holes in the head. Trust him to make a crass remark like that. Since word had passed round that she was his own wife, the jesting had stopped.

The police photographers (a civilian couple) arrived and Halliwell explained the situation. 'Hang on a minute, and I think he'll move away.'

They waited five minutes.

'Can't you tell him we're here?' the woman said. 'He knows the routine as well as anyone.'

'He's not functioning as a cop at the moment.'

'Who's in charge, then? You?'