The Stone Wife

by Peter Lovesey

  “Are you certain?” Diamond asked.

  “As near as I can be.”

  “They’ll have police tape and cones in the bus. See you presently.”

  The car and the second bus drove right up to the house. The armed police in their Kevlar jackets poured out and spread wide across the frontage. Diamond marched up to the already partly open front door and flashed his ID to the middle-aged woman barring the way. She looked aghast at such a large police presence.

  “You must be Stella, the housekeeper.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “We’re coming in to search the building. A warrant has been issued. Where’s Nathan Hazael?”

  “He went out earlier with some of his staff. He didn’t say where.”

  “Some of his staff, or all of them?”

  “The catering people are still here.”

  “So has he taken all the cars?”

  “I expect so. I didn’t see them leave.”

  “Step aside, please. We’re coming in now.”

  “I don’t know if Mr. Hazael would like that.”

  “We don’t give a toss what he would like. Do you want to be charged with obstruction?”

  She stepped back to avoid the inflow of armed officers. Halliwell asked her which way the garage was and she pointed to a passage on the right. He led a group straight through.

  Diamond remained with Stella, reminding himself she was only one of the staff, low in the pecking order. He’d let rip at the door and now he needed to keep his emotion in check. In a measured tone, he said, “I’m going to warn you that withholding information is an offence. We have reason to believe there was a violent incident here overnight. A man was attacked and possibly murdered in the grounds. You must have heard the alarm go off.”

  She nodded, wide-eyed. “I didn’t know anyone was murdered.”

  “Come on. Everyone must have been talking about it. What did you see?”

  “Someone came through my bedroom in the night, a woman, a journalist who was staying here. I don’t know what it was about.”

  “That was before the alarm, right? What did you do when you heard the alarm?”

  “I got out of bed and ran downstairs. I thought there must be a fire, but there wasn’t. One of Mr. Hazael’s personal staff was in the front hall and told me to go back to bed. He said a guard dog had found a trespasser in the grounds and they were dealing with it. I took him at his word and went back to my room. Soon after that I heard shooting.”

  “Where from?”

  “Outside.”

  “More than one shot?”

  “I wasn’t counting. Several.”

  “And when you got up in the morning? What time were you about?”

  “My duties start at eight, so I was up soon after seven.”

  “What was going on at that time? Did you speak to anyone? See anything?”

  “Plenty was going on, but I’m not sure what. People up and down stairs, in and out of the house. I was told by the kitchen staff that no one was eating breakfast. They were all too busy with other stuff. Lily—that’s Mr. Hazael’s partner—had left the house in the night with the journalist and taken the sports car from the garage. They drove off while the men were out in the grounds dealing with the intruder.”

  “Does anyone know what exactly happened with this intruder? Did they attack him?”

  “He was hiding up a tree, I was told, and fell out.”

  “Fell out? He wasn’t shot?”

  “I don’t know about that. I wasn’t there.”

  “Who told you this?”

  “The cook.”

  “But you say you heard gunfire in the night. Didn’t you get up to look?”

  “In this house it’s not wise to be too curious. I covered my ears and stayed in bed.”

  “Was an ambulance called for the man?”

  She shook her head. “I couldn’t tell you. I didn’t hear one.”

  “The man was a police officer keeping the house under surveillance,” Diamond told her. “It’s possible he was murdered. You won’t need telling how serious that is. I’ve warned you already about withholding information. The man isn’t out there now. Do you know what they did with him?”

  “I was told they took him away.” She was clearly frightened and the answer sounded genuine.

  “The cook told you this?”

  She nodded.

  Diamond’s phone buzzed. It was Halliwell. “The garage is empty, guv.”

  “Get onto the PNC and find out which vehicles are registered to Hazael. Do we know what make the limos are? Ask Ingeborg. And then get an all-units out. Two black limos, possibly together.” He turned back to the white-faced Stella. “Did you see them lift the body into one of the cars?”

  Her voice shook. “I didn’t myself …”

  “Someone else did?”

  “Cook mentioned seeing something.”

  “Take me to him now.”

  “Cook is a lady.”

  The lady—the fount of all knowledge about the morning’s events—was in a white linen jacket outside the kitchen door, mid-fifties, reed-thin, twitchy and lighting a cigarette. Diamond went through the necessary cautions and added some veiled threats of his own. These women knew their employer was a monster and must have realised instant dismissal would be the least of their problems if they grassed to the police. But they were up against another ogre and today he was fired up by emotions of his own. Last night he’d left young Gilbert to fend for himself, unarmed in this hostile place. Conscience strikes deep into the soul.

  “Did you hear the shooting in the night?”

  She was a cooler character than Stella. She took her time stubbing out the cigarette on the stone wall, then gave a nod.

  “And was that before the alarm went off or after?”

  “After.”

  “How many shots?”

  The answer was a shrug.

  He moved on to the more crucial incident. “I heard what you witnessed this morning. I want to hear it in your own words. What time was it?”

  “Six, or soon after.”

  “And where were you?”

  “In the dining room, trying to find out if anyone wanted a cooked breakfast before I started. No one was in, so I looked out the window.” She was probably lying about her reason for snooping, but it didn’t matter if she spoke the truth about what she had witnessed.

  “What exactly did you see?”

  “One of the cars on the drive with the back open. Mr. Hazael under the trees with two of his staff. There was shouting, but I couldn’t hear the words. He seemed to be angry. I saw the men bend down and pick something up and carry it across the grass towards the car and when they got nearer I could tell it was a person.”

  “Dead?”

  “You should have seen the way it was being carried. They dumped it in the boot and shut the lid down.”

  The “it” was chilling. “Then what?”

  “Nothing.”

  “What do you mean—nothing?” For all his good intentions, he was getting irritated with this cold-eyed woman.

  “Nothing happened for a long time.” After some hesitation she seemed to sense his anger and decide more had to be revealed. “No one came in for breakfast except Stella, the housekeeper. I told her what I’d seen and we talked about the disturbed night we’d had. After she went, when I was clearing plates, I saw them drive off.”

  “Who?”

  “Mr. Hazael and his men.”

  “So how long had the limousine been waiting on the drive?”

  “An hour, easy.”

  “With the man shut in the boot?”

  “Must have been, mustn’t he? The second car came round the side of the house and they all drove off.”

  “Which car was Hazael in?”

  “The first.”

  “The one with the body?”

  “Yes.”

  Diamond checked his watch. “That was about two hours ago and they haven’t returned. How many
were in each car?”

  “Three in the first. I’m not certain, but there must have been two in the second.”

  “And you didn’t overhear anything about their plans?”

  “I told you already. They were too far away.”

  He left her and rounded the house to the front. Ingeborg and her team had taped off the area under the oak. The dog-handlers were making a wider search of the grounds. He went over.

  “Plenty of shoeprints,” Ingeborg told him, “and four shell cases we spotted and left where we found them. There could be more.”

  “They were firing at you when you drove past.”

  “Right. So I expected to find something.”

  “I’m trying to find out precisely what happened, and when. The housekeeper heard some shooting, several shots, and I assume that was the bodyguards firing at you in the Aston Martin. Whatever happened to Paul must have been done before then, right?”

  “The body was under the tree when I drove past. They were there with the dog.”

  “So Paul could have been attacked at any time in the night?”

  Ingeborg tapped a finger against her lip, remembering. “When I was escaping from the tower, out on the battlements, I heard a lot of barking down below. I reckon he was still alive then.”

  “What time was that?”

  “Not long before the alarm sounded. Say about four or four thirty.”

  “But you didn’t hear shooting?”

  “No.”

  “Up the tree he’d be an easy target, so I doubt if it was a volley of shots.”

  “Even a single shot so close to the house would surely wake people,” Ingeborg said.

  “Both the women I just questioned talked of shooting after the alarm, but not before. It’s possible we’re hearing the truth—that he wasn’t shot, but fell from the tree.”

  “Or was pushed.”

  “The bodyguards went up the tree, you think? I can’t see it happening. Has Keith asked you about the make of the limos?”

  She nodded. “They were both Daimlers.”

  “Where would they be making for?”

  She spread her hands. There were limits even to Ingeborg’s knowledge.

  The image Halliwell had mentioned, of Paul’s corpse being slung into the river, was haunting Diamond’s thoughts. Hellish as it was to face the unthinkable, he had to be professional and outguess the perpetrators. “They’ll dispose of the body first and then go into hiding. They may well make for the airport. He probably has houses abroad. We’d better alert all the ports and airports. Would you get onto that?”

  “Keith has already done it, guv. Every patrol in Avon and Somerset is looking for them.”

  The next phase would be tough to endure. The real action—if any—was out of his immediate control. He would remain here in Leigh Woods until there was some sort of breakthrough. Unlikely as it seemed, Nathan could yet return.

  Back in the house, he used his abundant manpower to begin a search of the building and outhouses. He called everyone to the hall and announced his wish list of items, starting with Nathan’s passport, credit cards, wallet, iPhone, address book and keys, any of which might have been left in the house in the hurry to get away, and going on to documentation for the cars. He added that there might also be stray firearms about the building, even though it was known where the main cache was stored.

  “Do you want to take a look at the gunroom now?” Ingeborg asked him. In all the concern over Paul’s fate, her big discovery had been pushed down the agenda.

  “It’s as good a time as any.” Action of any sort was welcome.

  She led the way up the main staircase to the corridor she knew floorboard by floorboard and pointed out Nathan’s room at the end, the door still open. “While I’m here, I must remember to collect some of Lee’s clothes,” she said. “She’s only got her night things with her.”

  “Is she still in your flat?”

  “I left her asleep. I doubt if she’ll leave. She should be safe from Nathan there.”

  “I hope so, for both your sakes.” To Diamond’s eye, the décor in the bedroom was nauseatingly kitsch, the huge double bed under a coronet drape in pink chiffon and the oversized soft toys on the lace-edged pillows. Lee’s choice, he imagined. He didn’t say anything to Ingeborg in case she, too, had the home life of a fairytale princess, but he doubted it. He opened every one of the cupboards and drawers and found nothing of help to the inquiry. “So where’s the gun collection?”

  The panic in this place a couple of hours earlier must have been extreme, because the door to the secret bathroom had been left ajar. Ingeborg showed him inside. “You’ve got to give them credit for deception,” she said. “It’s amazing. Doesn’t it look genuine? The plumbing is in place and it works. The only thing that doesn’t work is the shower and you’re unlikely to turn that on and risk getting a soaking if you’re making a search. It took me two goes to suss it.” She gripped the sides of the shower cabinet and rattled it to demonstrate how robust it was. Then she pressed her foot on the drain and demonstrated how it clicked to its lower position, allowing the cabinet to move.

  “Full marks,” Diamond said. “I’m damn sure I would never have worked it out.”

  With the confident air of one who had been here before, Ingeborg pushed the whole structure forward and slid the door open and a dog leapt at her throat, teeth bared, snarling hideously.

  The Dobermann had been shut inside the gunroom, making no sound. Ingeborg swayed back, karate-trained to react against sudden attacks, if not from dogs. But her shoes slipped on the metal floor of the shower and she keeled into Diamond’s arms with the dog’s front paws clawing at her chest. All three, a shrieking, growling melee, crashed heavily on the bathroom floor. Forced away from Ingeborg’s neck, the dog closed its jaws on Diamond’s shoulder. He was wearing his suit, but he felt the points of the teeth penetrate the cloth. With a yell, he rolled away, taking Ingeborg with him. His right hand came in contact with soft fabric that he supposed was Ingeborg’s cotton shirt until he felt how chunky it was. He’d grasped the bathroom mat, a large oval of white candlewick. Taking a stronger grip, he tugged. He rolled some more, got to a kneeling position, jerked the mat from under Ingeborg and swung it free.

  Extreme situations call for extreme reactions. In a continuous movement, Diamond flung the mat over the Dobermann, wrapped, lifted and slung the snarling and snapping beast through the shower cabinet into the gunroom and shut the sliding door.

  Ingeborg sat up. “Christ almighty.”

  “Are you okay?”

  “I think so. How mean was that, leaving the dog in there?”

  “There are no rules in this game.” He held out his hand and helped her upright. She was shaking, and so was he. “At the back of my mind, I knew something didn’t add up about this place. I clean forgot to ask where the dog was. Are you sure you’re not hurt?”

  She shook her head. “I’m fine. More than I can say for your jacket.”

  He checked it. The sleeve was ripped from the shoulder.

  Ingeborg said, “Thanks, guv. It would have had me. The gunroom will have to wait for another day.”

  “Not necessarily. I’ll get one of the dog-handlers to subdue the brute.”

  As if in defiance, there was growling from the other side.

  They returned to the entrance hall and told Halliwell about their experience.

  Inside ten minutes, the Dobermann was caged and brought downstairs.

  “Are you game to resume the tour?” Diamond asked.

  Ingeborg stepped through the shower and said, “Shit.”

  The gunroom had been cleared of every weapon, every piece of ammunition. The cupboards and racks remained, but there was nothing left to incriminate Nathan.

  “Now we know what kept them busy for an hour this morning,” Diamond said when he’d followed her in.

  “The place was stacked to the ceiling,” she said. “What did they do with everything?”

  �
�Lugged it all downstairs and loaded up the limo in the garage,” he said. “That’s why they didn’t drive off immediately with Paul in the boot of the other car. They knew you were certain to be back shortly.”

  “I’m an idiot. I should have collected the two Webleys when I had the chance. I didn’t want my prints all over them.”

  “Don’t beat yourself up over it. You were trying to escape. And the law wouldn’t look kindly on evidence seized undercover.”

  She was incensed and it showed in her voice. “Where would he take all those guns? He can’t fly out of the country with them.”

  “He’ll have a safe address somewhere near, a lockup maybe. The guns are his source of wealth and also his biggest risk. He would always have had an emergency plan for them.” He rapped the inner wall with his knuckles. “This isn’t a plywood partition. It’s brick. Whoever built it did a good job.”

  “Oh my God.” Ingeborg clapped her hand to her forehead. “There’s something I didn’t tell you when I reported on what happened last night. I heard it from Lee when we got back to my flat this morning. The sound studio and gym, which you haven’t yet seen, were built by Wefers Construction.”

  “Bernie?” He gave a low whistle.

  “He came here in person. He knows Nathan. And it wouldn’t surprise me if he installed this gunroom as well. They go back some way, apparently.”

  Diamond took this in, frowned and made the considerable mental effort to shift his attention from the current emergency to the case that had started all this. “Bernie and Nathan? Who would have thought it?”

  “I meant to tell you sooner. It got overtaken by all this.”

  “It’s okay,” he said, still making the connection and trying to see how it played.

  Ingeborg filled him in more fully. “I asked Lee about each of the main suspects. I think she’s in a little bubble of her own. She didn’t know about Gildersleeve being killed and she hadn’t heard of Dr. Poke or Monica, but when I mentioned Bernie, she knew him straight away as someone who came here and discussed the specifications for the studio and the gym.”