‘We know he’s in a relationship,’ Vicky added.
‘And they go to functions together.’ Anita clicked her fingers. ‘I reckon we’ve identified the go-between, the woman who meets city break man and collects the tickets.’
‘Could be. Could well be,’ I went. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen her.’
‘You can get his name from the shop. They’ll have copies of receipts. They must have.’
‘I’ll try and get it tomorrow.’
‘We may still need to do surveillance to find his line of work. Don’t you chat him up when you go to the house?’
‘We’re not all as chummy as you,’ Vicky went, smiling at Anita.
‘I can’t let clients think I’m nosy,’ I explained.
Anita gave me a pained look with her Nefertiti eyes. ‘Friendly isn’t nosy. You learn a lot by being friendly.’
There was a second or so of thoughtful silence while I’m certain each of us was wondering how many of our innermost secrets we’d revealed to the others.
Then I was like, ‘All right, leave it with me and I’ll definitely find out who he is, or who he claims to be. Then we can decide what to do next.’
I was already wishing I hadn’t opened my big mouth. I was putting my job at risk here, giving out information about clients. You may not think a flower deliverer is in a position of trust, but she is. She knows about the passions and desires of half the town. I didn’t take an oath when I started the job, or sign the Official Secrets Act, but it gets home to you day by day that you’d better keep certain things to yourself. Once you break a confidence, where do you stop?
Maybe I do know the true identity of Heathrow man and something in my brain is blocking it out.
16
In sunshine early next morning Diamond drove down to the cathedral city of Wells, through a series of places that sounded as if they had been dreamed up by Agatha Christie: Peasedown St. John, Midsomer Norton and Farrington Gurney. In reality much of this was former mining land rather than the English countryside at its most picturesque. When the Somerset coal industry withered and died in the fifties and sixties, these little communities, much extended by affordable housing, became dormitory outposts for Bath.
The journey was not much over twenty miles, and he took it sedately in his Honda using most of the hour to get there, thinking not about social change in rural England, but where he would get breakfast.
In Wells, he found a privately owned cafe open before eight-thirty, so rare a discovery in the West Country that he was tempted to believe this would be his lucky day. Over a plate of fried bacon, two eggs, mushrooms, tomatoes and baked beans, he studied the file he’d brought with him. He was in Ossy Hart territory now, but with a different agenda from the one he had given Ingeborg. First he was going to find the spot where Ossy had been gunned down. Then he would call on Mrs. Hart.
He marked both locations on the street map, checked his watch, drained his cup, paid up and moved on. The city was barely awake. Window-cleaners were at work on the shop fronts. How they got clean results with so little water he couldn’t fathom. His own efforts at home always left smears that he rubbed with paper tissue and usually made worse.
He had no difficulty finding the scene of the shooting. The tree house the sniper had used as a firing position was in a private garden west of the town. A walnut tree with a massive trunk towered over the street from behind an eight-foot brick wall. Where the first great limbs thrust out from the bole, a platform had been erected twelve feet above ground and stabilized with struts bolted into the trunk. A child-size wooden cabin was built on it and a ladder of split logs gave access. You could just see the top rungs above the wall.
It could have been purpose-built for murder.
Across the road and a short way to the right, between twenty and thirty yards off, was a street lamp. Anyone walking under there by night was an easy target. Enclosed, crouched in this snug hideout built for play by some loving father, Ossy Hart’s killer had pointed his assault rifle from an open window. With a secure position and a ledge to prop his elbows, he’d taken aim across an unimpeded view. When his victim had stepped in front of the cross hairs or been pinpointed by the red spot the sniper had released the bullets. Then he’d climbed down the ladder and escaped unseen, sheltered by the wall. A convenient garden gate was only thirty yards off.
Diamond didn’t cross the road to examine the spot where Ossy had died. The police tape had long since been removed, any blood washed away. Forensics had scoured the street for traces twelve weeks ago. Nothing would have escaped their attention. Instead he stood below the tree in empathy with the dead constable. Up to now, his prime concern had been the shooting of Harry Tasker and the attack on Ken Lockton. Today he felt kinship with PC Hart, the ex-teacher. Was it sheer bad luck that you happened to be the copper walking by, Ossy, or was your name on the bullet? Did you know your killer? Either way, a young married father had been picked off with one impassive squeeze of the trigger.
The murder of a police officer on duty is a rare event, rightly rated among the worst of crimes, sure to produce an eruption of outrage. SIOs will always say they treat every homicide with the same investigative zeal, yet the pressure to make an arrest for a police killing is unrelenting. Getting it done is a petrifying responsibility. Getting it right is no certainty.
He returned to his car and sat for a long time in silence, feeling that burden, an ordinary man doing his best to deal with the extraordinary. The tree house was still in sight through his windscreen. On this bright morning, yesterday’s theory that the sniper must have been a brother officer felt less tenable. The notion of a policeman sneaking into that hide and waiting for one of his own kind to come within firing distance was hard to accept. If Bath CID refused to swallow the new scenario for the shooting of Harry Tasker, what would they have made of Ossy Hart’s murder? Diamond knew the answer. And now he, too, was at risk of being swayed into disbelief.
Better do what I came here to do, he decided. He started the car and drove north to the estate where Ossy had lived. A small end-terrace house with a door painted red.
9:43 A.M. He’d spent longer contemplating the crime scene than he realised. He hadn’t made an appointment. He’d fixed 9.30 in his own mind as a reasonable time to call, after the kids had been taken to school.
Sounds from inside came as a relief. Juliet Hart opened the door and she was not the red-eyed widow he expected. Flushed with health, lean as a streak, bright-eyed and welcoming. Natural red hair combed back and fastened with a green ribbon. Silver jumpsuit, matching Nike trainers.
‘Hi.’
His hand went to raise a non-existent hat before he remembered his trilby was on the back seat of the car. He tried a polite smile. ‘Mrs. Hart? Sorry to bother you so early in the day. Sorry to bother you at all.’ He felt in his pocket for the ID. ‘But it’s necessary.’
‘Are you collecting for something?’ she asked, not unfriendly. She must have seen his stick and decided he was disabled.
‘No, ma’am. Surprising as it may seem, I’m a police officer.’
‘You’re on the investigation. Good for you,’ she said without looking at his warrant card. ‘But I doubt if there’s anything more I can tell you.’
‘I’m not from Wells Police. I expect you heard about the shooting in Bath at the weekend. That’s why I’m here.’
‘You’re over from Bath? Did you know the man who was killed there?’
‘Not all that well. I’m CID. He was uniform.’
‘Same as my Ossy.’ Said in as measured a tone as if she was talking about matching hats.
She’s over-compensating, he thought, remembering the sudden avalanche of anger from Emma Tasker. He prepared for something similar, or tears, at the very least.
But she added as if discussing last night’s TV, ‘Do you think it was the same gunman who shot Ossy?’
This wasn’t the way it was supposed to be, the interviewee asking the questions. ‘Everything points to it.’
