Bloodhounds

'And you want me there?'

'In case she has an attack of the vapors.'

'Oh, thanks,' she said, flushing at the man's insensitivity to her rank and experience. 'What do I bring- smelling salts and a paper bag?'

'Just a pair of handcuffs.'

Julie's eyes opened wide. Her resentment was put on hold. 'You don't seriously think she's the murderer?'

'I'm seriously asking you to have a set of cuffs with you.'

The address, appropriately for someone of Miss Chilmark's reputation, was the Paragon, a terrace dating from the eighteenth century. Jane Austen stayed there when she first came to Bath. It was in the area they had visited that morning, actually quite close to Rupert's seedy abode in Hay Hill. Rather to Julie's surprise, Diamond proposed to walk there.

'Why not?' he said. 'We won't be late if we step out.'

'But if you're planning to bring her in…'

'You think the lady might object to walking half a mile in handcuffs?' He grinned at the picture it conveyed. 'If necessary we'll radio in for transport. All right?'

Diamond was not a quick walker, so the timing was about right. They stepped up to a white painted door at two minutes past the hour. The gracious curve of the Palladian terrace stretched away in pleasing perspective. Traffic zoomed past unendingly, but the broad pavement with its triple-stepped curb kept the vehicles from encroaching too obviously on the Georgian formality.

After some delay the door was opened by a frail white-haired old lady in a lavender-colored suit.

Diamond was slightly thrown. This wasn't the kind of person he'd been led to expect. 'Miss Chilmark?'

'I'm afraid you've come to the wrong door. She lives in the basement. Don't worry. It happens all the time.' She extended a shaky hand toward the railings to their right.

Miss Chilmark in the basement? They leaned over the railings and peered down. True, it was in better order than basements generally are, whitewashed, clear of litter, and with a dwarf conifer in a pot by the door. They went down the stairs.

The bell was answered quickly by a sturdier woman, probably twenty years younger, who ushered them inside. The light was poor down there. Diamond's strongest impression of Miss Chilmark was of the heavy floral scent that wafted from her. In the cramped entrance he couldn't avoid passing so close that his eyes watered. She was in a black jacket over a garish multi-colored dress that rustled when she moved. She glittered at the ears, throat, and fingers.

'We came to the wrong door,' Diamond explained, just to get the conversation started, but it was an unfortunate start.

'Oh,' said Miss Chilmark in a long, low note of despair. 'Did you tell her who you were?'

'No, ma'am. Simply asked for you and got directed down here.'

This wasn't reassurance enough. 'Where's the police car? I suppose she saw that.'

He told her that they had come on foot, and got such an improved reaction that he wished he had started with it. They were led through a narrow hallway at some risk to the china plates clipped to the walls. Shown into what Miss Chilmark announced as her drawing room, they had a first impression of a dry atmosphere smelling like the inside of a biscuit tin. It was a place noticeably less colorful than its owner. Faded Indian carpets on a wood- block floor. Pale blue emulsioned walls with a number of gilt-framed portraits of po-faced Victorians and smug, tweed-suited figures from between the wars, judging by their clothes. Two ancient armchairs and a settee with blue-and-beige covers. A gas fire from the nineteen sixties with a mantelpiece over it, on which were six or seven books and some rock specimens acting as paperweights for letters. Above that a large print of a cathedral with a spire.

'You see, it isn't a basement at all from this side,' Miss Chilmark was quick to point out, striding to the window to draw the chintz curtain farther aside. 'I have the ground floor and the garden.'

'This is because it's built on a slope?'

'Yes. That's Walcot Street at the bottom. The whole house belongs to me, only it's too much for a single lady, so I let out the other floors.'

This might have been more credible if she had retained the floor above as well, with the front door access. She was not the kind of woman who willingly moved into a basement in her own house, even with the view of Walcot Street from the rear. The furnishings told a different, more convincing tale; that this was the last retreat of someone who had known more affluent times.

'Salisbury, isn't it?' Julie remarked, having stepped to the fireplace to admire the print.

'The tallest spire in England,' Miss Chilmark said with some pride. 'And built seven hundred years ago of Chilmark stone.'

'You own a quarry?' said Diamond.

'The stone came from the village of Chilmark.'

'You own a village?'

'Of course not.' Lesson one: She had little sense of humor. 'I thought everybody had heard of Chilmark stone. It's known as the architects' stone, because it's unmatched as a building material. Salisbury Cathedral, Chichester, Wilton House. I'm afraid my best sherry ran out when I had some visitors at the weekend, and my wine merchant hasn't delivered yet. Would you care for Earl Grey tea instead?'

He told her not to bother. 'We're here to investigate a crime. You heard about the death of Sid Towers, no doubt.'

'Dreadful,' said Miss Chilmark. 'Such an inoffensive man. Why do these things always happen to the nicest people?'

'Is that a fact?' Diamond said, tempted to challenge such a sweeping statement, but needing to move on. 'You and he belonged to the same club, of course. The Bloodhounds.'

'Yes.'

'You're one of the senior members, right?'

'I joined a long time ago, so I suppose I'm entitled to be so described.'

'Before Sid?'

'Yes. Why don't you sit down?'

Acting on the suggestion, he felt the shape of a spring press into his rump, confirming that the settee, like its owner, had seen better days. 'We're finding it difficult to get a sense of what Sid Towers was like. Maybe you can help us, ma'am. Outside the Bloodhounds, did you know him at all?'

She reddened. 'What on earth are you implying, Superintendent?'

'Is the answer 'No'?'

'Of course it is.'

'I meant nothing defamatory. He worked in a security firm. What's the name? Impregnable. Have you had any dealings with Impregnable, Miss Chilmark?'

'I can't think why you imagine I should.'

'Have you got an alarm system, for example?'

'On the house? Certainly not. One of those bells would be unthinkable on a listed building like this.'

'Security inside? Sensors, fingerbolts, window locks?'

'I have excellent locks. I've no need for anything else.'

'That's clear, then,' said Diamond. 'On the evening he died, last Monday, you went to a meeting of the Bloodhounds. I'd be grateful if you would tell me what you remember of that evening, and of Sid in particular.'

She clicked her tongue. 'It was all extremely distressing for me personally, I can tell you that.'

'Before you tell me that, what happened at the very start? Were you the first to arrive that evening?'

'No, Polly-Mrs. Wycherley-was there before me, and so was poor Mr. Towers.'

'Those two arrived first? I want you to think hard about this. When you got there, were they in conversation?'

'Mr. Towers never had anything amounting to a conversation with anyone.'

'Where were they standing?'

'How do you mean?'