injured.”
Barneston agreed. “If she can be believed, she saw him drive off. She’ll have had the epileptic fit after he left. Have you any idea why he came home at all?”
Diamond told him about the bank statement they’d found. “If the cash deposits are dodgy, as we suspect, he could have panicked.”
“That’s more than likely,” Barneston said. “It’s got to be followed up. And I’m even more doubtful that Michael Smith has anything to do with the killing of Emma Tysoe.” He held out a hand to Diamond. “Good luck with the investigation. You need it.”
After he’d gone, Hen asked Diamond, “What do you make of him?”
“Young for a DCI.”
“They’re getting younger all the time,” she said, grinning. “Too brash for your liking? Plenty of people think so, but he gets results.”
“That’s all right, then.”
“You’re not going to commit yourself, are you?”
“Does he wear suits all the time?”
“Whenever I’ve seen him,” Hen said.
“He makes an impression.”
“But you’re not going to say what sort?”
He smiled faintly and looked away. In his years in CID, he’d seen a few meteors rising high. They looked brilliant for a time, and then they fizzled out. A shooting star is just a small mass of matter made luminous by the earth’s atmosphere. But maybe Jimmy Barneston had more substance to him. Time would tell.
Hen asked, “Was that just a hunch?”
“What?”
“The epilepsy. What made you suspect Olga Smith might be epileptic?”
“The driving ban. At first, I took it to mean she’d been banned by the courts, but I checked with Swansea, and there’s no record of her ever having had a licence. So it crossed my mind that the ban could be on medical grounds. No epileptic can get a licence.”
11
Mr D?”
Diamond squeezed the mobile against his ear, as if more “ pressure would help. He’d heard the voice before, and it was friendly enough, yet he couldn’t put a face to it. “Yes?”
“Is this a good time?”
“A good time for what, my friend?”
“I mean, are you on your own?”
“I am.”
“I thought I ought to tell you I had some visitors this afternoon, two heavies from the CCU.”
The modern over-reliance on initials was enough to drive anyone down the paranoia road. “You’re losing me.”
“The Computer Crime Unit.”
The penny dropped-twice. This was Clive, the computer expert.
“What did they want?”
“They, em”-a long pause-“they seized Dr Tysoe’s hard disk.”
“What-the thing you’re working on?” This was devastating. “For crying out loud, Clive. Didn’t you stop them?”
“I couldn’t do that. They’re part of SO6.”
This was one abbreviation he recognised. “The Fraud Squad.”
“That’s who they work for, but they handle any kind of computer crime. They said they had authority, waved some piece of paper in front of me. It was no use arguing.”
The moguls at Bramshill were behind this, he guessed. If Jimmy Barneston were the instigator, he would have mentioned it, surely. “We’re down the pan, then. And I suppose you were still trying to crack the code?”
“It’s a brute, Mr D. The geeks in the CCU can give themselves a headache now, can’t they?”
“You didn’t succeed, then?”
“Sorry. No.”
“I was banking on you, Clive.”
“I put some hours in, believe me. I could save those guys some time by telling them what doesn’t work, but I guess they want to find out for themselves.”
Diamond said with a sigh, “I’m whacked-flat out on the canvas with my eyes closed.”
Taking him at his word Clive made a silent count of five before asking, “Do you want me to stop now?”
“What?”
“Should I give up?”
“But you have to, if they’ve got the disk.”
Clive said in the same calm tone, “It’s all right, Mr D. I can use the zip.”
“The what?”
“The zip disk. It’s a back-up of everything on the hard disk. I wouldn’t do a job like this without at least one back-up. I can carry on trying to decrypt those files if you want.”
With one bound…
Mightily relieved, Diamond asked, “Do the Fraud Squad know you’ve got this copy?”
“They’d expect it. I’d have to be a complete nerd not to back up something as important as this.”
“Get back to it, then. Pull out all the stops, or whatever you do with computers. You’re still ahead, lad. You’ve done all this work already.”
“What do you mean-‘ahead’? We’re all on the same side, aren’t we, Mr D?”
“Don’t push me, Clive.”
He told Hen the news over a cup of tea made and served by the WRVS in the main waiting area of Crawley General Hospital. The next moves had to be discussed.
“I’m not surprised,” she said. “Bramshill gave Dr Tysoe the job, so they’re entitled to know what progress she made. The files could tell them.”
“I might be reading too much into this, but I thought it was a cynical move to stop us finding out stuff they want to keep secret.”
“Such as?”
“The names of the two other people this killer is out to get. She could have named them.”
“Let’s hope she did. And let’s hope your computer wizard delivers.” Hen gave an unexpected chuckle. “It would be a hoot, wouldn’t it, if this encrypted stuff turns out to be some other secret enterprise she was working on, like a thirty-something novel? Or erotic poetry?”
He winced. “You’re not helping my confidence.”
“Look on the bright side,” she said. “A window into Emma Tysoe’s thinking will be fascinating, whatever’s there. Up to now I haven’t felt I know her.”
“Me neither.”
“It could be a diary. We might get all the dirt on the Psychology Department.”
“Spare me that. I had five hours in the car with Dr Seton. I can only take so much.”
But he was forced to agree that Emma Tysoe’s university colleagues had to be investigated further. And Hen promised to make another effort with the beach staff at Bognor, the lifeguard and the car park attendants and cafe staff.
Hen was stubbing out her cigar prior to leaving when one of the tea ladies came over to the table and asked if they were from the police.
“At your service, ma’am,” Diamond said, uncertain what was coming next.
