The House Sitter

spring Matthew Porter.”

Barneston’s eyes flickered keenly. “So you had all this planned from way back?”

“No, I only decided to get my revenge on British Metal when I saw an item on TV about them putting a huge amount of money into a film, something about upgrading an arthouse film into a blockbuster movie. That really got to me. I mean, my bursary was peanuts to what Summers was given for this crap film about a two-hundred year old poem. How does mankind benefit from that? These ponces who make films are burning up millions on things that add nothing to people’s knowledge. My work was important, and real, and I’m not bullshitting when I tell you it would have been a notable contribution to computer science. A few days later I saw in the paper that this kid Porter had been handed a fortune by British Metal just because he can roll a small white ball into a hole. I flipped. I’ve never been so angry in my life.”

“But you didn’t kill in anger,” Diamond said.

A new quality came into Bellman’s voice, a distinct note of pride. “That isn’t my style at all. I approached it as a scientist should, starting by assembling all the information I had at my disposal and then deciding how to maximise its potential. The objective was to damage British Metal and its sponsorship programme.”

Hen said, “Couldn’t you have done that without resorting to murder?”

He gave her a surprised look. “How? I needed to make an impact with newspaper headlines. Letters to the editor won’t do that. Protest vigils? What do they achieve? Sudden death is the only thing that gets through to people in these violent times. Listen to the news any day and you’ll see that I’m right. I needed a campaign that guaranteed those headlines. I’m not squeamish. I can do what’s necessary to get attention.”

“Taking life?” Hen said, making clear her revulsion.

“How about my life?” he said, his voice rising. “My research was trashed, my academic reputation, my hopes and dreams and all the work I’d already put in. Nobody gave a damn about me. My future, my career, was tossed aside to give even bigger handouts to these fat cats. I saw no problem in putting them down. As I was telling you, I worked from my strengths. First, my inside knowledge of the security arrangements in the latest safe houses. Second, I’d seen a former university friend on TV.”

“Emma Tysoe.”

“Emma, yes.” He grinned at Diamond and there was total contempt in the way he said, “You tried to pin the wrong murder on me, didn’t you? Got it all wrong. I didn’t kill Emma. She was far too useful to me. But I mustn’t jump ahead. One evening I happened to watch this programme about psychological offender profilers and there was a face I knew, a girlfriend from my student days, being called out to all the most difficult cases of serial murder. She was now a star in the profiling world. Based at Bath University. Quite a celebrity. I decided to renew the friendship.”

“You moved to Bath just to get friendly with her again?”

“The timing couldn’t have been better. Once I’d decided to make use of my inside knowledge of safe houses it was sensible to get out of the security systems job as soon as possible, and I have no family arrangements, I can live anywhere I can find a job, so I applied for the IT post with Knowhow & Fix. Easy little number for me, low profile and flexible hours. And just as you were saying, I started going out with Emma. I knew she was likely to be brought into the investigation once they began to see how complex it was, and even if they used someone else, Emma was close enough to the police to feed me some inside knowledge.”

“Luckily for you, she was assigned to the case,” Diamond said. He wanted to encourage this frank talking. “So you were firing on all cylinders.”

But Bellman didn’t want anything to sound easy. “Luck didn’t come into it. Haven’t you been listening? I calculated that she would be of use to me. I went to no end of trouble to revive that friendship.”

“I follow you,” Diamond said, indulging him. “It was deliberate.”

Hen said, “As cold-blooded as that?”

He didn’t rise to the comment. Clearly he saw no problem in cynically exploiting a relationship. “Well, I got my plan under way. I put down Summers, the first of the fat cats. And seeing how everything comes down to presentation these days, I decided to dress up the action with an Ancient Mariner theme. Remarkable, isn’t it? A lot of that poem could have been written with me in mind.”

Jimmy Barneston made a sound of displeasure deep in his throat. He was a restless presence, locked into his own disappointment.

“The crossbow?” Diamond prompted Bellman. “Where did you get that?”

“A man in Leeds who works in the Royal Armouries Museum and makes replicas as a hobby. I heard of him through the Internet. You’ve seen the bow, haven’t you?”

“Pointing at my chest, thank you.”

He nodded. “It’s a beautiful weapon, easy to use, quick and efficient. I guess it will end up in the Black Museum. It deserves no less.”

“So you murdered Axel Summers…”

“… and set the whole thing in motion.” Bellman smoothly completed the statement. The memory of the killing didn’t appear to trouble him at all. “The blueprint was there from the beginning, as you know, because I shared it with you. I gave you people the names of the second and third victims. Has that ever been done before in the history of crime? I don’t think so. The whole point was to force you to send Porter and Walpurgis to the high security safe houses I could break into, and it worked. I knew a lot about the thinking of Special Branch.”

“Through Emma?”

“She was brought in very soon, as I calculated. She wasn’t all that keen to talk to me about the case, but she confided her thoughts to her computer-which, naturally, I updated and made secure for her-so, knowing her password, I could hack in when I wanted and read her latest findings. Highly instructive, even down to the progress of our relationship. I have to admit I’m not the world’s most expert lover, and it wasn’t all complimentary. In fact, my plans began to go adrift when that oversexed detective on the case started his own relationship with her.”

Barneston blinked and sat forward, jerked out of his introspection. “What did you say?”

Bellman continued with the narrative. “Emma did her best to dump me, as you know. That’s how I nearly got my fingers burnt, trailing after her, trying to cling onto her. She wasn’t indispensable to the project, but she was my window on you people, so I didn’t intend to lose her.”

A phrase Emma had used of the Mariner came back to Diamond: “emotionally disconnected.” Much of what she had deduced about him was accurate.

“You followed her to the beach and tried to talk her round,” Hen said.

Bellman said with his self-admiring grin, “And so became your number one suspect. I had to keep my nerve then. Have you found the actual killer yet? I’m sure it was an opportunist murder. Poor Emma! She didn’t deserve that, even though she was stupid enough to give me the brush-off.”

“You had your alibi, the petrol receipt,” Diamond said. “All that stuff about losing it under your handbrake wasn’t true, was it? You were stringing me along.”

“Dead right, Mr Diamond, and do you know why?”

“Because it distracted me from your real crimes.”

“Come on now.” He curled his fingers in a sarcastic beckoning gesture. “You can do better than that. Thanks to your interest in me, I was on the inside again, getting a sense of what was going on here, in the police station. I knew Walpurgis was in Bath at that hotel, and I guessed you would move her to some other house when you discovered I was on the scent.”

“It was on the radio about her being in Bath,” Diamond said to make clear he hadn’t been entirely taken in.

“Right. And give me my due. I played fair. I let you know I was up with the news. I sent a little message to Walpurgis at the hotel. I hope they passed it on.”

“ ‘… a frightful fiend doth close behind her tread.’ ”

“She got it then. Excellent. As I was saying, I was perfectly willing to spend time at your nick listening out for the gossip. When I was first brought in, the news was just going around that the ACC was going on holiday. When I came back to show you the receipt, I had a nice chat with the desk sergeant, a bit of a joke about the boss being away. He got very cagey when I mentioned her. It didn’t require rocket science to find out where you were holding Walpurgis.”

“Where did you get her address? She’s ex-directory.”