The King of Diamonds. Simon Tolkien

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      Bedrooms were private places; in bed you were supposed to be safe, inviolate, free from the attentions of the bogeyman. ‘Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John guard the bed that I lie on.’ He remembered the prayer from his childhood: his mother’s voice intoning the words in the semi-darkness; his voice following hers. But no one had guarded Katya’s bed when it mattered. No one had been there to protect her.

      It was unbearable. Trave swallowed and closed his eyes hard, feeling for a moment like one of those parents that he had to take down to the hospital morgue from time to time to identify the remains of their dead child. And yet his days as a parent were over. He was a policeman now. That was what was left to him. He looked down again at the dead girl on the bed, past her sunken cheeks and into her unseeing blue eyes. He remembered Katya’s eyes. They had been her best feature. Large and luminous, eyes a young man could fall into. But now the light had gone out of them and they stared sightless up at the ceiling.

      ‘You were wrong about her being asleep, Adam,’ he said without turning around. ‘She saw whoever it was before she died. She saw the gun. She wasn’t spared a thing. She knew.

      ‘If the eye was like a camera and we could just unroll the film,’ he went on musingly, talking to himself as he leant over and closed Katya Osman’s eyes forever.

      He was about to turn away, but something made him linger, picking up the girl’s hand from where it lay, lifeless, on the coverlet.

      ‘Look at that,’ he said, beckoning Clayton over to join him at the bedside.

      ‘What, sir?’

      ‘Her nails. They’re bitten down to the quick. And she must weigh half of what she did when I last saw her,’ he added, pulling back the quilt to expose Katya’s upper body.

      ‘Close to malnutrition I’d say,’ said a voice behind him. It was Davis, the police doctor, standing behind them in the doorway, dressed in his own personal uniform of brown corduroy jacket and silk bow tie. The outfit never changed – in all the years he’d known him, Trave couldn’t recall ever seeing Horace Davis wear anything else.

      ‘Not the first time we’ve run across each other here after hours, Bill,’ said the doctor drily, taking Trave’s place beside the dead girl.

      ‘No,’ said Trave. They were alone now. Clayton had left the room to talk to a uniformed policeman who’d been waiting outside in the corridor for some time, trying to attract his attention.

      ‘Who is she?’ asked the doctor.

      ‘Katya Osman. She is or was the girlfriend of the corpse you were here for last time.’

      ‘And them?’ asked Davis, nodding toward the photograph that Trave had idly picked up from the top of the bookcase: a laughing woman with a scarf around her head holding on to the arm of a bald-headed man wearing an old suit and round-rimmed glasses; behind them the sea and a sense that the wind was blowing them off balance.

      ‘Her parents.’

      ‘How do you know?’

      ‘I asked her about them before. She showed me the photograph.’

      ‘And where are they now?’ asked the doctor, continuing his examination of the dead girl as he carried on the conversation.

      ‘Dead. In the war. I don’t know how.’

      Davis looked up, picking up on the bitterness in Trave’s voice.

      ‘Different, this one, is it?’ he asked.

      Trave put back the photograph, saying nothing, but Davis nodded as if he understood.

      ‘She was beautiful,’ he said, looking down at Katya. ‘It’s a waste. That’s what it is. A bloody awful waste.’

      He turned away from the bed, resuming his professional air as he snapped his battered old medical bag shut.

      ‘She’s been dead just over an hour, so I’d put the time of death at about half past twelve, give or take a few minutes. And whoever did it knew what they were doing, although I suppose that’s obvious,’ he added, pointing to the wound in the centre of Katya’s forehead.

      ‘Oh, and you should also take a look at this,’ he said, beckoning Trave back over and pulling up Katya’s left sleeve to expose the puncture marks above the elbow. ‘She’s been injecting or someone else has been doing it for her.’

      ‘Are any of those from tonight?’ asked Trave.

      ‘I don’t know. But the autopsy’ll tell us. I’ll let you know. I hope you catch the bastard, Bill,’ Davis added, looking back for a moment as he went out of the door. ‘Whoever did this isn’t one of our usual punters.’

      ‘No,’ said Trave to himself. ‘No, that he’s not.’

      Clayton waited patiently while Trave stood over by the window, looking out into the night. There were other things he needed to explain, including the news he’d just heard outside, but he knew better than to interrupt his boss while he was lost in a train of thought.

      ‘Something’s been happening in here,’ said Trave without turning round.

      ‘Happening, sir?’ Clayton repeated, sounding mystified. Of course something had happened. A young woman had been shot in the head.

      ‘It’s too damned tidy. I remember when I went round the house after the Mendel murder, this room didn’t look anything like it does now. Everything was strewn about everywhere: clothes, makeup, magazines, books – you name it. A typical girl’s bedroom. This is like a room in a hospital. Or a gaol,’ he added, taking hold of the steel bars over the windows with his hand. ‘What the hell are these for, I wonder?’

      Clayton had no idea.

      ‘All right, so tell me about Swain. Anything new?’ asked Trave, turning back from the window with a sigh.

      ‘Yes, he’s definitely escaped. And it was from Oxford Prison. Samuels got through to them a few minutes ago. Swain’s with a man called Earle, apparently. They got over the wall.’

      ‘Earle. Eddie Earle?’

      ‘Yes, that’s right. Edward James Earle. Doing five years for deception,’ said Clayton, glancing down at the piece of paper in his hand. ‘Do you know him?’

      ‘Yes, I know him. He’s a confidence trickster, quite a good one, specializes in conning old ladies out of their life savings. Easy Eddie he likes to be called – easy with other people’s money.’

      ‘They had help,’ said Clayton. ‘Apparently someone threw rope ladders over the perimeter wall, and they think there was a getaway car.’

      ‘How long ago? Have you got a time?’

      ‘Just after midnight. They’d have had time to get here, sir.’

      ‘I know,’ said Trave. It made no sense but Clayton thought he sounded disappointed.

      ‘All right,’ Trave went on СКАЧАТЬ