Peter Lovesey - Diamond Dust

'Technically, Mr Diamond is, but…'

They looked across. Still the big man knelt, hunched beside his dead wife. 'How long has he been there?'

'Ten, fifteen minutes. It's one hell of a shock.'

'Was he the first officer on the scene, then?'

'No, I was.'

'Didn't you warn him?'

Halliwell reddened. 'I didn't recognise her. I should have, because I've met her a couple of times. I didn't look at her as you would a living person. Saw the injuries and shut myself off from the victim. Your mind is on what happened and what has to be done. Didn't dream it's someone I know.'

'He's got to move away if we're going to get our pictures.'

'All right, all right.'

Halliwell went back to his boss and explained about the photographers. Diamond didn't take in one word of it. He was holding his dead wife's hand, cradling it between both of his.

Halliwell tried again. 'They've got to get their pictures, guv.'

Nothing.

'The photos of the scene.'

He wasn't listening. The police and their procedures were part of another existence.

Halliwell turned away and went back to the photographers. 'I can't shift him.'

'Someone's going to have to.'

'You can wait, can't you?'

The woman made a performance of looking at her watch. 'We're self-employed, you know.'

'Bollocks.' Halliwell stepped away from them and took a call on his mobile.

It was Georgina, the ACC. 'Is this true – about Mr Diamond's wife?'

'I'm afraid so, ma'am. He's here at the scene.'

'Dear God. I'd better come and speak to him.'

'With respect, ma'am, I don't think he's fit to speak to anyone just now.'

'Where is he exactly?'

'Kneeling beside his wife.'

'Poor man… I don't think he has any other family, does he?'

'None that I've heard of.'

'Close friends?'

'Outside the police? I wouldn't know.'

'It's up to us to help him through, then.'

Difficult. Halliwell doubted very much if Diamond wanted the ACC to help him through, but he'd told her already to stay away and he couldn't keep repeating it. He looked towards Diamond and saw him reach for the plastic covering and replace it over his wife's face. 'I'm going over to him now, ma'am. He may be ready to leave.'

Diamond stood up, paused for a moment more beside the body and then walked across to Halliwell. His eyes had the unfocused stare of the freshly bereaved, but he was able to find words now, and he made it clear that he wasn't thinking of leaving. 'What have we found, then?' he asked in a flat voice.

'Not much so far, sir. It looks professional.'

'You're searching for the bullets?'

'Of course.'

'And the cases? If they used an automatic…' He lost track of the sentence for a moment, his voice breaking up. Then he managed to control it. 'The weapon could still be around. Get some back-up. All this area has to be combed. Every yard of it.'

'Right, sir. Can the photographers get their pictures now?'

'I'm not stopping them.'

The hiatus was over. He was making a huge effort to show he was capable of carrying out the familiar routines. He checked that the police surgeon had been by to certify death, and Halliwell confirmed it.

'And the pathologist?'

'On his way, sir.'

'Middleton, I suppose?'

'Sir.' Halliwell found himself slipping in that 'sir' far more than usual. Normally he was more relaxed with his old boss. 'I'd just like to say-'

'No need,' Diamond cut him short. 'We understand each other. Take it as said.'

The cover was removed entirely from the body for the photographs and video record. More sightseers had gathered behind the police tapes to watch. A violent death in broad daylight was a rare event in Bath. Stephanie Diamond was fully clothed, yet it still seemed offensive that she should be an object of ghoulish interest. Her husband knew if he told them to move on, more would take their places.

So the painstaking process continued. The body was on the grass to the rear of the old bandstand, obscured from Royal Avenue, the road that crossed the lawns below the Crescent. The Victorian shrubbery nearby fringed the car park and trapped the litter that blew across the open lawns. The search for traces of the killer would be a long job.

The forensic team arrived in their vans. While they were putting on their sterile overalls, Halliwell hurried across to warn them who the victim was. Diamond didn't want sympathy from anyone, but he could be spared the backchat that went with the job.

The next twenty minutes passed slowly and mostly in silence, with the white-suited figures clustered around the body.

Someone must have tipped off that old motormouth, Jim Middleton, the forensic pathologist, before he arrived – a merciful act. He said nothing. Just put out a hand and rested it briefly on Diamond's shoulder in a gesture of support. Then took the taped route to the corpse and studied the scene. Diamond followed.

'Has anyone touched her?' Middleton asked.

'The police surgeon,' Diamond said. 'And forensics. And me. She hasn't been moved.'

Middleton crouched for a closer inspection. 'Bullet wound to the frontal, almost dead centre. Very close range. You shouldn't be here, you know. You're too involved.'

'I can handle it.'

'I don't doubt you, old friend, but that isn't the point.'

'This is the work of a hitman,' Diamond said, ignoring the criticism.

'Do you know something?'

'I'm talking about the bullet wounds.'

'Two, to be sure, you mean? I wouldn't read too much into that. They look very deliberate, measured almost, but that's speculation. Could equally be some crazy with a gun who happened to point the muzzle towards her and pull the trigger twice.' Middle ton crouched and peered closely at the powder burns around the neat hole the bullet had made in her forehead. 'Are you sure you want to be here?'

Diamond didn't answer, but remained where he was.

Middleton took a small tape recorder from his briefcase and started describing the wounds. He lifted each eyelid, the beginning of a slow, methodical examination. He inserted a thermometer into a nostril and noted the temperature. Felt the arms and tested for rigor by moving one. Looked at the hands and fingernails. Loosened the clothes around the neck and searched for other signs of injury. Turned the body and studied one of the blood-encrusted exit wounds at the back of the head.

'Have they picked up the bullets?'

'Not yet.'

'Buried in the ground, I dare say.'

'We can use a metal detector.'

The pathologist remained for over an hour before signalling to the waiting funeral director that he was ready to have the body removed to the hospital mortuary. Diamond stood back and watched his dead wife being lifted into a plastic zipper-case, and then into a plain fibreglass coffin, which was carried up the slope, through the crowd, loaded into a van and driven away.

With self-disgust he thought back to his first reaction to this, how he had been elated at the news of a shooting. And later joked about waiting to be introduced to the victim.

'Big shock,' Middleton said to Diamond. 'You want to go home now, take a Valium.'

'There's work to do. You know as well as I do – the first twenty-four hours are crucial.'

'Yes, but it shouldn't be you.'

He didn't dignify the suggestion with a response. Instead, he walked over to Halliwell. 'The bloke who found her – where is he?'

'Went off home, guv. He had the dog with him.'

'That's no reason to leave.'

'We took a short statement'

'A dog doesn't need to go home. Dog would stay in the park all day if it got the chance. Does he live nearby?'

'The Upper Bristol Road.'

'Which end?'

'This end, I think.'

'Get him here fast. I want to speak to him.'