Another One Goes Tonight

by Peter Lovesey

  “The National Railway Museum.”

  He smiled and nodded. “Typical of Max. An inspired idea.”

  “Who did you think was stealing from him?”

  “He’s dead himself now, so I suppose it won’t hurt to say. A fellow called Cyril who used to visit Max to play some board game. I met him at the funeral. Personable character who actually delivered a remarkably fine eulogy, but I thought he was a shade too full of himself. He and his chauffeur lady may have been in league, taking opportunities to deprive poor old Max of his prized possessions. That was my reading of it, anyway. Wide of the mark, would you say?”

  “Not at all,” Diamond said. “That isn’t all you suspected them of, is it?”

  Pellegrini flushed and smoothed his pale hands along the chair arms. “Well, it was uncharitable of me, but I was suspicious about Max’s death. He went quite suddenly, just at the time he convinced himself that pieces of jewellery were systematically disappearing. It crossed my mind how convenient it was for Cyril—if indeed he was the thief—to have Max out of the way. Fanciful, no doubt, but once the idea was planted, I had to pursue it, even though my old friend had died peacefully in his own bed. I went about it in my usual way, doing some research, looking on the Internet for methods of murdering people. Clever methods, I mean, likely to escape detection by professionals such as yourself.”

  Exactly the confirmation Diamond had needed, and he’d got it without admitting he’d made a copy of Pellegrini’s hard disk.

  “Did you find anything?”

  “There are forums where people discuss this sort of thing in a superficial fashion. It’s not scientific by any stretch of the imagination, and I didn’t learn anything of relevance, but I downloaded some of the material and read it again. My best hypothesis was that some sort of toxic drug was administered, something that metabolised rapidly and wouldn’t be detectable at postmortem. I’m not a chemist and I wouldn’t know what. Mind you, there was no postmortem on Max. His doctor decided he’d died naturally. So you see, I was up against it, but when I get the bit between my teeth, so to speak, I don’t give up.”

  “Did you take it further, then?”

  “In a bull-in-a-china-shop fashion. At the funeral reception I got it into my head that Cyril’s chauffeur lady called Jessie may have taken one last opportunity to steal more of the jewellery.”

  “Ah, yes,” Diamond said. “The coffee incident.”

  “I deliberately spilt some over her clothes at a moment when her handbag was on the floor. She went outside to change.”

  “Leaving the bag in the room? You picked it up, expecting to find a stolen necklace or something similar?”

  “More fool me, there was nothing of interest inside except a USB, a computer flash drive.”

  “You took it?”

  “The temptation was too much. I wasn’t sure if there was anything on it, but just in case there was a clue to her identity, I kept it. No use to me at all, as it turned out when I slotted it into my laptop, because it was encrypted.”

  “But you didn’t give up?”

  “I don’t—ever. A week or so later, I went to see Max’s solicitor, a Miss Hill, who had arranged the funeral. Ostensibly I was there about Max’s request for me to dispose of his ashes, but I mentioned his concerns about the possible thefts. She had an inventory of the jewellery collection at the time of Olga’s death and it became clear that upwards of ten important pieces had gone missing by the time Max died.”

  “As many as that?”

  “Miss Hill was looking for an innocent explanation, saying Max was getting confused in his last months and may have given them away or even sold them.”

  “Unlikely,” Diamond said.

  “I thought so. I suggested asking the police to investigate, but she was as tight-lipped as only a solicitor can be. I may be wrong, but I rather thought she didn’t intend to take any action in the matter. And of course she was under no obligation to tell me anything.”

  “I’ve met Miss Hill,” Diamond said. “I know what you mean.”

  “Well, eventually I visited Cyril Hardstaff at Little Langford to have it out with him.”

  “‘Eventually’ is right. The funeral was in May last year. Why did you wait so long?”

  He sighed heavily. “For the greater part of last year, I was preoccupied with troubles of my own. My poor wife Trixie was developing serious dementia. My life was on hold. She needed constant care. Everything had to wait, including Max’s ashes, I must add. She died in November.”

  Diamond nodded and passed no comment. Trixie’s death certificate had finally arrived with the morning mail. She had suffered a stroke and died in hospital.

  “You were telling me about your visit to Little Langford.”

  Pellegrini nodded. “I only got round to it in February, when my life was returning to normal. I took a taxi and saw Cyril on his own. He admitted everything almost as soon as I brought up the subject of the missing jewellery. He’d got into trouble through gambling and was deep in debt to some very unpleasant people. He’d started stealing in desperation, an item at a time, knowing Max was hardly aware of what was there. He pleaded with me for a chance to put things right.”

  “Difficult.”

  “Yes. Put me on the spot. The main loser at this stage would be the legatee, the National Railway Museum. I said we’d both better sleep on it. The next morning Cyril was found dead.”

  “Discovered by his housekeeper.”

  “Yes, and she was impossible to contact. That was where my part in the matter ended. I still had Max’s ashes to dispose of. I’d collected them from the funeral director months before, but I’d better not say where I planned to scatter them in case I get into trouble with you.”

  “That won’t happen,” Diamond said. “I’m nothing to do with National Rail. This was the night of the accident, which your brain has blanked out?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “If it’s any consolation, I can tell you the urn was empty when it was found, so I think you must have kept your promise to Max.”

  He beamed with pleasure. “That’s a relief.”

  “You were prepared for a long night. You’d packed some food, including a banana and some cake. Do you remember where the cake came from?”

  “That would have been the lady from the church.”

  He still had no inkling of the truth.

  “Elspeth Blake.”

  “Is that her name? I didn’t get the chance to thank her properly. She became friends with my domestic help, Mrs. Halliday, and started calling out of the goodness of her heart with things she’d cooked. Between you and me, I wasn’t comfortable accepting charity. I’m not in need of it. And I don’t normally buy cake for myself.”

  “Difficult to turn down a kindness?”

  “Exactly. She seems to have kept an eye out for elderly men who live alone.”

  And how! Diamond thought. “Was it good cake?”

  “Delicious. I should have thanked her personally, but I kept her at arm’s length. Until I could think of some way of putting her off, I let Mrs. Halliday deal with her.”

  This answered a question Diamond would have needed to ask at some point. Pellegrini had never got close enough to think the lady looked in any way similar to Jessie the chauffeur. With a wig, glasses, contacts and different make-up and clothes, a woman can turn herself into someone else. The thing you can’t disguise is the voice, but he’d scarcely spoken to the Elspeth Blake persona.

  “Had she been visiting your house for some time?”

  “A couple of weeks, I believe, no more.”

  “We think the cake contained a strong sedative.”

  “Really? Why was that? I have no trouble sleeping.”

  Such innocence.

  The old man had suffered enough shocks already, so Diamond didn’t enlig
hten him. “When you’re feeling better we must get together again. I won’t trouble you now with the nitty-gritty of what happened. It was as cunning a series of crimes as I’ve come across. Unless you have any other question, I’ll leave you to get some rest.” He got up and moved to the door.

  “There is one thing I’d dearly like to know,” Pellegrini said.

  “What’s that?”

  “Who is Hornby?”