Halliwell, who knew Diamond's limitations with technology as well as anyone at Manvers Street, listened to this with patience and then summed it up. 'So Ingeborg was right.'
'What?'
'She said the bones were worth comparing. She came up trumps.'
'This time, yes,' Diamond grudgingly conceded.
'Are you going to tell her?'
The thought had not occurred to him. 'Why should I?'
'Give her the exclusive. She's earned it.'
'If I do, the jackals out there will tear me to bits tomorrow.' He gave a rueful smile as he thought it through. 'And if I don't, she'll talk to her friend the ACC and I'll be serving on that cruddy committee for the rest of my days.'
He rummaged among the papers on his desk for Ingeborg Smith's business card.
Halliwell tactfully found something else to do.
ALL THE ballyhoo about the vault meant that hardly any media attention was being given to Peg Redbird's death. Out at Walcot Street, house-to-house enquiries were being conducted without any interference from reporters.
Before lunch, Diamond decided to take what the ACC termed as an overview. He went looking for Wigfull and found him downstairs in what had swiftly been set up as an incident room, with phones, computers and a board covered in maps and photographs.
'How goes it?'
'As well as I can expect at this stage,' Wigfull answered guardedly.
'Is the professor still in the frame?'
'Naturally.'
'You had another go at him, I heard.'
'I searched his hotel suite yesterday evening, yes.'
'For Mary Shelley's writing box? No joy?'
'It was a long shot anyway, but it had to be tried.'
'If he nicked it from the shop, he'd be a fool to keep it in the hotel. He isn't that.'
Wigfull shrugged.
'No news of the wife, I suppose?' Diamond continued to press for information. 'Do you take her disappearance seriously?'
'Is that meant to be sarcastic?' said Wigfull. 'Of course I take it seriously.'
'I mean when do you step up the search?'
'I'll run this in my own way, if you don't object.'
'Just enquiring, John. That's my job. Has anything come out of the house-to-house?'
Wigfull gave a nod so slight he might have been watching a money spider crawl down Diamond's shirt front.
Diamond pricked up his eyebrows. 'A witness?'
'Good Lord, no. Nothing so helpful as that. Just a name.'
'Who's this, then?'
'Oh, a fellow by the name of Somerset helps out in the shop. He was seen there on the day of the murder.'
'Acting suspiciously?'
'No, no. We've got nothing on him. By all accounts he was a big support to Peg. They got on well. I'll be talking to him later. He may give me something on the professor.'
'So Joe Dougan is still your main suspect?'
'Definitely. Motive, opportunity.'
'Means?'
'She was cracked over the head with something. It could have been that precious writing box he was so desperate to own.'
'Which has disappeared.'
'For the time being, yes.'
'The box has disappeared. The wife has disappeared. How will you stop Joe from disappearing with them?'
'I've covered that. The hotel people will call me the minute he tries to check out. But I don't think he will. He's too smart.'
'You could ask for his passport.'
Wigfull sighed.
'All right,' said Diamond. 'Do it your way.'
'This is a battle of wits,' said Wigfull. 'I know he killed her, and he knows I know. He'll put a foot wrong some time, and I'm going to keep going back to him until he does.'
'Like Columbo.'
'Who?'
'Detective Columbo on the telly.'
'I don't follow you.'
'That's his style,' said Diamond. 'The battle of wits. He knows who did it before the first commercial break. He always gets his man in the end.' But he couldn't help thinking that Columbo was light years ahead of Wigfull in wheedling out the truth.
IN THE spirit of Saturday, he took Halliwell across the street for a beer and a bite of lunch at the Bloomsbury, that unique watering-hole that combined Virginia Woolf, fried scampi and a pool table. Under a 'Duncan Grant' mural, they talked football and the prospects for the coming season. They were into their second beer before Halliwell looked out of the window and remarked that the press people seemed to have quit the front of the nick.
'It's Saturday, isn't it?' said Diamond. 'They file their stories early for the Sundays. I was giving them nothing, so they shut up shop. They'll be back tomorrow.'
'Did you speak to Ingeborg?'
'I did.'
'She was pleased, no doubt.'
'Mote 'I told you so' than pleased, but you were right, Keith.
She earned her scoop.'
'She wants a job on the force.'
'Don't I know it!'
'She's bright.'
He eyed Halliwell amusedly. 'Has she recruited you as her agent?'
'She'd fit in all right, that's all I'm saying.'
'Squeezed into your corner of the office?'
'No problem.'
Diamond's mood had improved. Regardless of whether Ingeborg claimed credit for the morning's work, it had given a boost to the inquiry. 'We've moved on, haven't we?' he said. 'We're looking for someone who dismembered his victim and disposed of the parts in more than one place. Someone with transport, probably in the building trade. A van, maybe. Someone who thought he'd got away with it until the news broke a couple of days ago. That will have come as a shock. He'll be even more shaken if he reads Ingeborg's report in the paper tomorrow.'
'A bloke?'
'Almost certainly. Dismembering is hard work. The way the bones shattered, my guess is that he used an axe or something like it, heavy as well sharp.'
'We're still looking at these two brickies, then? Banger and Mash.'
'One of them. Or bits of him, or bits of his victim.' He looked expectantly at Halliwell. 'Any progress?'
He wouldn't yet be shouting for drinks all round, if Halliwell's sigh was anything to go by. 'I called everyone-
