The King of Diamonds

by Simon Tolkien

  Clayton walked slowly back up the footpath. He knew there was no point in hurrying now. Jacob would have disappeared into the Monday-morning traffic long before the pursuing police could catch up with him on the other side of the valley.

  Osman and Claes returned to Blackwater Hall in the late afternoon, followed shortly after by Macrae. Clayton had spoken to his boss on the phone at the Old Bailey soon after he had got back to the house, but Macrae had decided to remain at the Swain trial, where he was required on a daily basis as the officer in the case, once he had established that Jana Claes was shocked but otherwise unharmed and that nothing had been taken.

  ‘Well, Mr Osman’s very grateful to you, Constable,’ said Macrae once they were alone, standing out in the courtyard in the gathering twilight. ‘You’re quite the hero, aren’t you, stopping an armed burglary and saving the damsel in distress? Almost worth a medal if you can just answer me one question.’

  ‘Sir?’ asked Clayton, feeling he had a pretty good idea of what was coming next.

  ‘Just this,’ said Macrae mildly. ‘How did you know to come here? What gave you the idea that this Jacob Mendel character was going to be breaking into Blackwater Hall at seven o’clock in the morning? Was it your sixth sense or something a bit more specific?’

  Clayton swallowed apprehensively. He knew that he had no option but to put Macrae fully in the picture, given the seriousness of what Jacob had done and was likely to do again, but he also realized that a full report was not going to do anything to help his career prospects.

  ‘I saw him here yesterday watching the house,’ he began nervously. ‘And I followed him back to his flat – it’s off the Iffley Road. There were a lot of documents on the walls – photographs and newspaper articles about Claes, about him working with the Germans during the war . . .’

  ‘Ah, so that’s where all that came from,’ said Macrae, looking interested.

  ‘What came from?’ asked Clayton, not understanding.

  ‘Allegations that Swain’s barrister put to Mr Claes today in cross-examination. Just a sideshow – they didn’t amount to anything,’ said Macrae with a dismissive wave of his hand. ‘Carry on – I’m sorry for interrupting.’

  ‘Well, it was like Mendel was obsessed with Osman and Claes, and his glasses matched those that the burglar left behind last summer when he broke into Osman’s study. I was going to arrest him, but he pulled a gun and got away. And so I came out here and left a note to warn Osman, but Mendel must have removed it, and the phone line was down . . . I tried to call you as well, sir, but you weren’t home,’ Clayton spoke in a rush, trying unsuccessfully not to sound defensive.

  Macrae looked at Clayton quizzically as if assessing whether he was telling the truth and then nodded as if temporarily satisfied. ‘All right, I understand why you came back here this morning,’ he said in the same easy-going tone as before. ‘But what I don’t quite grasp is what you were doing here yesterday when you saw Mendel watching the house. Can you enlighten me on that, Constable?’

  ‘I was looking for him,’ said Clayton.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I thought he might be the one who broke in here last summer.’

  ‘So you’ve been devoting your valuable time to investigating a six-month-old failed burglary?’ asked Macrae with a sneer. ‘I’m afraid you’ll have to do a bit better than that. I’ll repeat the question: Why were you looking for Jacob Mendel out here yesterday afternoon?’

  ‘I thought he might have something to do with what happened,’ said Clayton reluctantly. He felt like he was being slowly backed into a corner.

  ‘Happened to whom?’ asked Macrae. There was a dangerous edge to his voice.

  ‘To Katya Osman.’

  ‘But we know what happened to her,’ said Macrae, making no effort now to conceal his anger. ‘She was brutally murdered by Mr David Swain, who’s being prosecuted for the offence up in London, while you’re busy trying to undermine the prosecution case against him down here. Just like your ex-boss tried to do, and now he’s about to become an ex-policeman. I’d say you’re in way over your head here, Constable.’

  Macrae stared at Clayton, who looked away, determined not to rise to Macrae’s challenge. But Macrae hadn’t finished. ‘Look at me when I’m talking to you,’ he ordered, raising his voice. ‘Were you alone when you went to Mendel’s flat yesterday? Tell me the truth.’

  ‘No,’ said Clayton quietly.

  ‘Who were you with?’

  ‘Inspector Trave. I was with Inspector Trave, sir,’ said Clayton, suddenly defiant. Macrae could do what he liked. In his conscience Clayton didn’t feel he’d done anything he should be ashamed of. He was keeping an open mind, trying to find out the truth. That’s what a detective was supposed to do, after all.

  ‘I thought so,’ said Macrae, who clearly didn’t see it that way. ‘Trave never gives up, does he? Well, you’ve hitched your horse to the wrong wagon this time, Constable. I’m not a good enemy to make. Trave’ll tell you that. And just to think that you told me I could count on your loyalty. I thought you had a bright future, but it looks like I was wrong.’

  Macrae paused for a moment, sizing Clayton up as if deciding what to do. ‘I’m sure I’ll regret this,’ he said quietly, ‘but I’m going to give you a chance to make up for your misconduct. Find Mendel. You’ve done it before and you can do it again, and this time you’ll have Jonah to help you. Find him fast, and when you’ve got him, bring him to me. Don’t ask him any questions, just bring him to me. And stay away from Trave if you want to stay a detective. I’ll be watching you,’ Macrae added with a thin, spiteful smile before he turned away and went back into the house, leaving Clayton alone in the gloomy courtyard.

  CHAPTER 22

  On the same Monday morning that Jacob Mendel broke into Blackwater Hall, Vanessa Trave finally forced herself to make the phone call to her husband that she had been putting off from day to day ever since she had promised to marry Titus Osman two weeks earlier. She did not fully understand her own reluctance. She had no wish to go back to her husband, and yet she found it extraordinarily hard to make the formal break with her past that was now required. It felt like she was closing the book not only on her husband but also on her dead son: divorce was not just an acknowledgement of failure but also somehow an act of cruelty, a betrayal of the past. She hadn’t been able to explain any of this to Titus when he’d gently but insistently pressed her about her continuing inaction during dinner in Oxford two days earlier, but she realized that the delay was only making it harder to do what she had to do, and so she went straight to the telephone almost as soon as she’d got out of bed, determined to seize the bull by the horns.

  Trave answered on the second ring, and she was momentarily at a loss for words. She hadn’t spoken to her husband in months, and the sudden sound of his voice disconcerted her. When she said her name it hurt that he sounded so pleased to hear from her.

  ‘Could I see you?’ she asked. She knew that she couldn’t tell him what she had to say on the phone. As she’d told Titus, he deserved better than that.

  ‘Now?’ he asked. ‘I’ve got to be in London this afternoon.’

  ‘Yes, all right,’ she said, taken aback. And yet it was better this way, she thought – an amputation should be done quickly or not at all. And she didn’t need to be at work until ten.

  She named a coffee house on St Michael’s Street – neutral ground where they had never met before – and noticed that her hand was trembling when she put down the receiver.

  She dressed carefully. Her instinct was to wear black but eventually she compromised, settling for a simple grey dress that she’d recently bought in a second-hand store in the market, with her old black overcoat on top. Frowning, she looked down at the two rings on her hands: the simple gold wedding band on the right and the perfect diamond on the left: Bill’s ring and Titus’s. Worlds apart, and yet set in permanent conflict. Slowly and carefully she took both rings off and put them away in a sma
ll jewellery box by her bed. Today she’d be herself only, she decided. It was better that way.

  Trave was already sitting in the café when Vanessa arrived, and he insisted on queueing up at the counter to order her a coffee while she sat opposite his half-drunk mug at the table by the window, feeling more awkward by the minute. She wished there were set rules for this kind of meeting: she’d come here to tell her husband that she wanted a divorce, not to drink coffee. And yet here she was sitting amid a throng of women and their shopping as if she was just meeting an old friend. It was all wrong. She wished she’d chosen some sombre venue – the back of a church or some out-of-the-way corner of the public library. But it was too late now – she’d have to get on with it.

  When Trave finally sat down, Vanessa was struck by how run-down he looked. There were dark circles under his eyes, and his suit was crumpled as if it hadn’t been hung up in weeks. And something told her the dishevelment was not just superficial. He’d aged since she’d last seen him, turned some corner in his life that she hadn’t been there to see.

  ‘I’m sorry about your job,’ she said. She really was sorry, but her words sounded awkward, artificial.

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ he said, even though it was obvious that it did. ‘You can’t keep making compromises forever. I’ll find something else to do.’

  ‘What?’ Vanessa asked, genuinely curious. The concept of Bill as anything other than a policeman was inconceivable to her.

  ‘Something,’ he said with a sad smile. ‘You look wonderful, Vanessa. Better than you’ve done in years.’

  She flushed, touched and yet upset by the genuine pleasure in his voice. And she couldn’t cope with the way he looked at her so intently, as if memorizing every detail of her face. The meeting was painful, more painful than she could have imagined. She needed to tell him why she was here, to get the words out while she still could.

  ‘I need a divorce,’ she said. She spoke softly and didn’t know at first whether he had heard her. He looked away out the window, averting his face, gazing sightlessly at the people hurrying by in their winter overcoats. And when he turned back, there was an awful desolation in his pale blue eyes, which made her feel suddenly sick, as if she was an executioner disgusted by her own handiwork.

  ‘You want to marry Osman,’ he said. It was a statement, not a question.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘He’s not like who you think he is, he’s . . .’ Vanessa stopped in mid-sentence, seeing the weary disbelief in her husband’s eyes. ‘It’s a second chance,’ she said. ‘Everyone deserves a second chance.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Trave quietly. ‘You do deserve that. You deserve the sun and the moon and the stars, Vanessa. And what I regret most in my life is that I failed to give you any of them.’

  Vanessa wanted to cry. Her husband had never said anything as simple and loving to her before in all the years they had been married. He’d saved it up for now, when it was all too late. She couldn’t bear it. She steeled herself against him. She knew she had to if she was going to survive.

  ‘So you’ll help me,’ she said. ‘It’ll have to be your petition with Titus as co-respondent. There’s no other way.’

  Trave nodded, and then he reached out and took hold of her right hand, the hand that was now missing its wedding ring. ‘Be happy,’ he said. ‘Try to be happy, Vanessa.’

  She nodded, squeezed his hand once as if sealing an agreement, and got up to go. But then, at the doorway, she turned back, unable to leave him when she felt so in the wrong. He looked up, surprised, when she got back to the table, taken aback by her sudden return.

  ‘Titus didn’t kill Katya,’ she said, blurting out the words. ‘You believe it because he’s with me. Admit it, Bill. That’s why you’ve done all this.’

  ‘Done all what?’

  ‘Ruined your career, been so pig-headed.’ She spoke accusingly, harshly, but he also sensed the desperation in her voice, as if she was pleading for exoneration, and that was something he could not provide.

  ‘No,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘I hate Osman because of you. That’s true. But that’s not why I think he killed Katya.’

  ‘Why then?’ she asked, challenging him.

  ‘Because I don’t believe David Swain killed her or Ethan either for that matter,’ said Trave, choosing his words carefully. ‘Swain’s a fool, an angry fool, but he’s no murderer. But Claes is. I know he is. In fact I think he’s been responsible for many people’s deaths, even though I can’t prove any of them,’ he added bitterly. ‘And if Claes killed Katya, then he couldn’t have done it without Osman.’

  ‘No, that’s where you’re wrong,’ said Vanessa vehemently. It was years since Trave had seen her so passionate. ‘Maybe you’re right about Claes. I don’t like him either. He’s got some hold over Titus which I don’t understand, but that doesn’t mean Titus knows what he’s doing. Titus isn’t like Claes. I know him and you don’t. That’s the difference. He was taking care of Katya after she’d gone off the rails. It wasn’t his fault she blamed him for keeping her at home. He did it to help her, for her own good.’

  ‘How do you know she blamed him?’ asked Trave, leaning forward.

  ‘Because she told me,’ said Vanessa quietly, lowering her eyes.

  ‘Told you what?’

  ‘She said: “They’re trying to kill me.” It was ten days before her death. I was there for dinner and she came into the drawing room. I was on my own, and that was all she said. She was in a bad way and she fainted afterwards. Titus said his sister-in-law had tried to give her a sedative, and he explained about the state she was in, about why he was so worried about her, about why he had to keep her at home for her own good.’

  ‘I’m sure he did,’ said Trave sarcastically. ‘He’s an expert at playing the do-gooder. The man’s a professional philanthropist.’

  ‘I knew you wouldn’t understand,’ said Vanessa angrily. ‘That’s why I didn’t tell you. I knew you’d have used it against Titus when he hasn’t done anything wrong. I know he hasn’t,’ she added fervently.

  ‘It doesn’t matter what you think. You should still have told me.’

  ‘I told that inspector who took over from you.’

  ‘Macrae?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘A couple of weeks ago.’

  ‘And I suppose he told you to say nothing?’

  ‘Yes.’ Vanessa sounded defensive now.

  ‘And you felt okay with that?’

  Vanessa stirred uneasily in her seat, not answering. She resented the cross-examination, and yet she also felt its justification. Her interview with Inspector Macrae had not set her conscience about Katya at rest, however much she had hoped it would.

  ‘You’re going to have to tell that court up in London,’ said Trave quietly. He spoke as if what he had to say was obvious, not a subject for argument or discussion.

  ‘I can’t. I won’t,’ said Vanessa, refusing to see it that way. Her eyes blazed with defiance, but Trave stood his ground.

  ‘It’s your duty. You know it is,’ he told her. ‘A man’s on trial for his life. If Osman loves you then he’ll understand.’

  ‘And you hope he doesn’t, don’t you?’

  ‘I hope you’ll do what’s right. That’s all.’

  Vanessa looked at her husband and suddenly the fire went out of her, extinguished in a moment. Her sharp retort died on her lips and she bowed her head, realizing that he was right: she had no choice. She wished with all her heart that Katya hadn’t crossed her path that night at Blackwater Hall, but she had, and in those few moments the girl had placed her under an obligation that she could only ever discharge by standing up and telling the whole world what Katya had said. Until she had done that she would have no peace. Bill had only told her what she knew already.

  Vanessa felt exhausted suddenly. It was like she’d finally put down a burden that had been weighing her down for months and only now realized how heavy it had been. She needed to be alo
ne, to gather her strength for what lay ahead. She stood up and leaned across the table, bending down to kiss her husband on the cheek.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said. And as she turned and walked away it occurred to her that she didn’t know whether they were parting on her terms or his.

  That day and most of the next went by in a blur. Vanessa went to work and did her job, typing letters and filing correspondence on automatic pilot, while underneath her mind raced from one thought to another as she tried to work out what she could say to Titus to make him understand her decision. She knew that this time she could not delay. The Swain trial was already into its second week, and Swain’s lawyers would need to take a statement from her before she gave evidence. But she couldn’t go to see them without telling Titus first. She owed him that much. Several times she picked up the telephone, intending to dial Blackwater Hall, but then replaced the receiver like it was hot to the touch, reproaching herself for her cowardice. It wasn’t that she was frightened of Titus; it was that she was frightened of losing him. She wished she could abandon her conscience, discard it into the waste-paper basket on the floor beside her desk, but she knew she couldn’t. She was who she was, and perhaps Titus would understand that. But she knew she would have to see him to explain. A telephone call was not enough. And so after work on Tuesday she got into her car and drove out to Blackwater with a heavy heart.

  Jana answered the door. Dressed as always in funereal black, Claes’s sister showed no warmth of recognition when she saw Vanessa on the step, shivering in the cold. There was something frozen about the woman’s face, Vanessa thought – as if it was a door that had been shut and locked against the world. It unnerved Vanessa, and she felt forced to explain herself, to justify her visit.