The Last Detective

Chapter Four

THE MURDER SQUAD WORKED FROM a mobile incident room from Sunday morning onwards. It was a large caravan parked on a stretch of turf as close as possible to the reeds where the body had been found. Each time Peter Diamond crossed the floor it sounded like beer-kegs being unloaded. The sound was heard until well into the evening as he directed the first crucial stages of the inquiry. Five telephones were steadily in use and a team of filing clerks transferred every message and every piece of information first on to action sheets and then on to cards. The standard four-tier carousel for up to 20,000 cards stood ominously in the centre of the room. Diamond felt comfortable with index cards, even if some of his younger staff muttered things about the superiority of computers. If there was no quick resolution to the inquiry, he'd be forced to install the despised VDUs, and God help the moaners when the things broke down.

The search for the dead woman's clothes was first concentrated on the sections of shoreline with easiest access from the three roads that enclosed the lake. A bizarre collection of mislaid garments began to be assembled, tokens of the variety of human activities around the lake. The items were painstakingly labelled, sealed in plastic bags, noted on the map and entered on the action sheets without much confidence that any were linked with the case.

Divers were brought in to search the stretch of water where the body had been found floating. It was not impossible that the clothes or other evidence had been dumped there. This was an exercise that had to be gone through, although most people, including Diamond, reckoned that the body had drifted there from further along the shore, or even across the lake.

At the same time, house-to-house inquiries were made in the villages and at each dwelling with a view of the lake, seeking witnesses to any unusual activity beside the water after dark in the previous month. A sheaf of statements soon confirmed what the squad already knew, that the area was popular around the hour of sunset with anglers, bird-watchers, dog-owners and courting couples. Nothing remotely resembling a naked body being dragged or carried into the water had been seen.

For Peter Diamond this dragnet process was a necessary, if largely unrewarding, preamble to what he thought of as real detective work: the identifying and questioning of suspects. For all the care that was being taken to refer to what had happened as an 'incident', this was a murder inquiry. He was as certain of that as the fact that one day follows another. Since his appointment to the Avon and Somerset murder squad three years previously, he had led five investigations, three domestic, two large-scale, all but one resulting in convictions. The odd one out was an extradition job, still to be resolved. It could drag on for another year. However, he was satisfied that he had nailed his man. An impressive record. And it might have been more impressive if his service in Avon had not been regularly interrupted by all the ballyhoo over the Missendale affair.

Four years earlier, a young black man called Hedley Missendale had been convicted of murder in the course of theft at a building society in Hammersmith, west London. A customer, an ex-sergeant-major, had tried to tackle the thief and had been shot in the head, dying almost immediately. The investigation had been headed by Detective Superintendent Jacob Blaize, of 'F' Division of the Metropolitan Police. Diamond, then with the rank of detective chief inspector, had been Blaize's second-in-command. Missendale, a known thief, had been pulled in quickly and had confessed under interrogation from Diamond. Then more than two years later, after Diamond had won his promotion to superintendent with the Avon and Somerset force, a second man had confessed to the crime after undergoing a religious conversion. He had produced the gun used in the killing. A second investigation by a fresh team of officers had been ordered, and late in 1987, after serving twenty-seven months of a life sentence, Hedley Missendale had been pardoned on the recommendation of the Home Secretary.

The press, of course, had roasted the police. Blaize and Diamond had been openly accused in the tabloids of beating a confession out of an innocent black youth. An official inquiry had been inevitable. Jacob Blaize – broken by the strain – had accepted full responsibility for the errors and had taken early retirement. The press had switched the full force of their attack to Diamond. They had wanted his head on a platter, but he had stood up well to tough questioning at the inquiry. What had yet to be seen was whether his strong rebuttal of the criticism had influenced the board of inquiry. People said he was on a hiding to nothing, because the principal charge was that his forceful personality had secured the bogus confession, and he had fought his corner ruggedly at the hearings.

Eight months on from the hearings, the inquiry team had yet to publish its findings. Meanwhile, Peter Diamond was unrepentant, and willing to argue the rights of his conduct in the case with anyone rash enough to take him on. No one did; the mud-slinging went on from a safe distance. His response was to prove his worth as a detective, and this he was doing – between appearances in London – with fair success. The string of cases he had investigated in Avon had been properly handled without a suggestion of intimidation.

He was still finding the going tough in the new job. Although the men on the murder squad gave him professional support, they hadn't accepted him on a personal level. He had come in first as the streetwise detective from Scotland Yard, which understandably had created a certain amount of scepticism among detectives who had served all their careers in the West Country. Then, with ruinous timing, the Missendale story had broken.

The work somehow had to continue amid all the distractions. He had learned to live with stress. On any murder squad, the nerve of the man in charge was severely tested in those first hours at the start of a case. It was a kind of phoney war when nothing was happening. All these expensive resources were being deployed. Men were wanted for other policing duties. How long could you justify employing so many if results weren't apparent? Inevitably the CID were regarded as the top dogs, enjoying different conditions of service from the uniformed branch, working flexible hours, more mobile, more independent, and able to snap their fingers and call up reinforcements as soon as someone went missing, or a body was found. A certain amount of resentment was understandable. It was built into the system and it existed at all levels. Maybe it was more subde nearer the top. It was there. So you lived with it.

Diamond had learned to hand off the opposition as if he was still playing rugby. He was proving a hard man to stop, a burly, abrasive character who spoke his mind. Computer technology was 'gadgetry', accepted with reluctance as an aid to the real detective work. Some of the career-minded people around him thought it a miracle or a travesty that a man so outspoken and with the Missendale Inquiry hanging over his head could have progressed to the rank of superintendent. They failed to appreciate that his bluntness was a precious asset among so many backbiters.

Whether he would ever earn respect in Avon and Somerset it was too soon to predict. His detractors said that his successes so far owed too much to help from paid informants. They couldn't fault him for using grasses; but they waited gloatingly to see him handle an inquiry when no help could be bought.

The Chew Valley case might be the one.

Sunday was disappointing. Nothing of significance was found.

On Monday Diamond recorded interviews for BBC Television and HTV West for their regional news broadcasts after the early evening news. An artist's impression of the dead woman was shown, followed by Diamond beside the lake appealing for help in identifying her. He asked for information from anyone who might have witnessed suspicious behaviour over the last three weeks. An invitation, he commented afterwards to the TV crew, to all the voyeurs in the valley to wipe the steam off their glasses and share their secondhand thrills, but he had to admit that it was worthwhile. A thirty-second spot on TV brought in more information than a hundred coppers on house-to-house duty all the week.

Late that night, while the calls were being processed, he called Jack Merlin and asked for the results of the laboratory tests.

'What exactly were you hoping for?' the pathologist asked in that benign, but irritating way he had of sounding as if he were from another, more intelligent form of life.

'The cause of death will do for now.'

'That, I'm afraid, is still an open question until all the results are in, and even then -'

'Jack, are you telling me those flaming tests are still going on? The autopsy was yesterday morning, thirty-six hours ago.'

For this petulant outburst, Diamond was given a lecture on the time-scale necessary for the processing of histological tissues, which required at least a week, and on the pressures the Home Office Forensic Laboratory was under. 'Currently they're so pressed that it could be weeks before they deliver.'

'Weeks? Have you told them it's a suspicious death? Don't they understand the urgency?' Diamond had picked up a pencil and put it between his teeth. He bit into the wood. 'You're still not willing to say if she drowned?'

'All I will say is that as yet the cause of death is not apparent.' Merlin was retreating behind the form of words he used in giving evidence.

'Jack, my old friend,' Diamond coaxed him. 'Can't you speak off the record to me? Can you help me with an estimate of the date of death?'

'Sorry.'

'Terrific!' The pencil snapped into two pieces.

There was a longish silence. Then: 'I am doing the best I can in the circumstances, Superintendent. I won't be steam-rollered. You must appreciate that the service is undermanned.'

'Jack, spare me the charity appeal, will you? Just call me the minute you reach an opinion.'

'I always intended to.'

Diamond dropped the phone and left it dangling below the worktop. The telephonist retrieved it without complaining and removed the pieces of pencil. Diamond ambled across the floor again to see what had come in as a result of his television appeal, knocking the carousel out of alignment as he went.

John Wigfull, his second-in-command, summed up. 'We've heard from seven callers convinced that the victim is Candice Milner.'

After a pause to decide whether the question should be taken seriously, Wigfull said, 'The Milners – that soap on the BBC. Candice was written out of the story a couple of years ago, at least.'

'Give me strength! What else?'

'Two deserted husbands called in. In one case the wife left a note saying she was going away for a week to unwind. The home is in Chilcompton. That was six months ago.'

'Six months. She ought to be in missing persons.'

'She is. The photo doesn't bear much resemblance. We passed it over.'

'I'll take another look at it. You'd better send someone to talk to the bloke tomorrow. What else?'

'Slightly more promising, this. A farmer by the name of Troop from Chewton Mendip had a row with his wife three weeks ago and she hitched a lift with the lorry-driver who collects the milk-churns. Husband hasn't seen her since.'

'Didn't he report it?'

'He was giving her time

'He was giving her time to come to her senses. There's a history of fights and walk-outs.'

'And he reckons the picture looks like his wife?'

'He's not saying, sir. His sister-in-law thinks so. She was the one who phoned us.'

Diamond's eyes widened a fraction. 'Anything on file? Complaints of violence?'

Wigfull nodded. 'Just the one, on 27 December, 1988. Farmer Troop seems to have kicked his wife out of the house, literally, and refused to let her in again. The sister reported it. A PC from Bath was sent out and saw the bruises. The woman refused to proceed. She said it was Christmas.'

'Goodwill to all men.' Diamond took a deep, disapproving breath and let it out slowly. 'What can you do? You and I had better follow this one up ourselves, John. Chewton Mendip can't be more than five miles from the lake. I'll see the sister-in-law in the morning – and you'd better find out the name of the gallant knight of the churns.'

Wigfull grinned appreciatively. Any sign of good humour in the superintendent had to be encouraged. They weren't exactly bosom pals. Wigfull had been named as Diamond's assistant in the worst of circumstances, when the Missendale scandal had first made banner headlines. In the few preceding months, Diamond had made an impressive debut with Avon and Somerset and cleared up two murders, assisted by an inspector he had got along well with, called Billy Murray. But within hours of Diamond's involvement in the Missendale case becoming known, instructions had come from County Headquarters that Murray was to be transferred to Taunton, where a vacancy had arisen. John Wigfull, from CID (Administration), was his replacement. Rightly or not, Diamond was convinced that Wigfull was a plant, the Headquarters man under instructions to report any excesses. Unlike Billy Murray, Wigfull did everything by the book. He'd gone to a lot of trouble to ingratiate himself with the squad. He hadn't succeeded yet with his superior.

'Anything else?' asked Diamond.

'A fair number of sightings.'

'But of what?'

'Horizontal jogging, mostly.'

'No reports of violence?'

'Nothing yet.'

'Not much, is it? I may go on the box again towards the end of the week. Let's see if Chewton Mendip amounts to anything. Is that where the sister lives as well?'

She was Mrs Muriel Pietri, and her husband Joe owned a motor repair business beside the A39 that had a sign that promised, 'Low Cost High Class Repairs. We Get You Back On The Road.' The police often visited the place to follow up hit and run accidents. Diamond himself called there early next morning. Someone lower in rank could have handled the interview, but the prospect of question and answer was so much more appealing than another morning in the caravan.

The sickly-sweet vapour of cellulose paint hung in the air as he manoeuvred his bulk unskilfully through a narrow passage between damaged vehicles, collecting rust on his grey check suit. He had brought a sergeant with him to take the statement.

Mrs Pietri stood at the open door in a floral print frock that she probably wore for visitors. She was made up for the occasion – the works: foundation, lipstick, mascara and some sort of cheap scent that made the paint quite fragrant in retrospect. A slim, dark-haired, slow-speaking woman, burning with the enormity of what she believed had happened. 'I do fear the worst this time,' she said in the broad accent of Somerset as she led them into her scrupulously tidy front room. 'Carl's behaviour is a proper disgrace. He do clout my sister summat wicked. Terrible. I can show you photographs my husband took with one of they Instamatics last time poor Elly came here. Black and blue, she were. I hope you'll be giving the bugger a dose of his own medicine when you visit him. He do deserve no blimmin mercy, none at all. Won't 'ee sit down?'

'You saw the artist's impression of the woman we found?' said Diamond.

'On Points West last night. That be Elly, without a blimmin doubt.'

'Sergeant Boon has a copy of the picture. Take another look at it, would you? It's only an artist's sketch, you understand.'

She handed it back almost at once. 'I swear to it.'

'What colour is your sister's hair, Mrs Pietri?'

'Red – a gorgeous, flaming red. It were her best feature, and it were natural, too. Women spend fortunes being tinted at the hairdressers for hair that colour and it never looks half so good as Elly's did.'

Her use of the past tense reinforced her conviction that the dead woman was her sister. Diamond made it just as clear that he was keeping an open mind. 'Flaming red, you say. Is that what you mean – pure red?'

'Natural, I did say, didn't I? Nobody's hair is pure red, except for they punks and pop stars.'

'I need to know.'

She pointed to a rosewood ornamental box that stood on the sideboard. 'That colour, near enough.'

'Her eyes – what colour are they?'

'Some folk called they hazel. They always looked green to I.'

'What height is she?'

'The same as I – five-seven.'

'Age?'

'Wait a mo – Elly were born two years after I. St George's Day. She must have been thirty-four.'

'You said that your husband took photographs of her.'

'Not of her face, my dear. The backs of her legs, where she were marked. It were in case she wanted evidence for a divorce. I don't believe I got a picture of her face, not since her and I were kids at school, anyways. We were never a family for taking pictures.'

'But you said your husband has a camera.'

'For his business. He do photograph the damage in case the insurance people get funny.'

'I see.'

'It were his idea to take they pictures of Elly's legs.'

'Photographing the damage.'

'I can find they if you want.'

'Not now. Tell me how you heard that your sister is missing.'

'Well, being that she lived so near, she used to call in here regular for a bit o' gossip Tuesday morning. She didn't come last Tuesday, or the Tuesday afore that, so I got on the blower and asked that bugger of a brother-in-law what happened to my sister.'

'And?'

'The blighter tells I this bit o' hogwash about Elly taking off with Mr Middleton who collects the milk. Your sister is a shameless woman, he did tell I, no better than the whores of Babylon. He called her other things, too, that you wouldn't find in the scriptures. Riled I proper, I can tell 'ee.'

'When is this supposed to have happened?'

'Last Monday fortnight, he did say. I didn't believe a word of it, and I were right. She must have been dead already, lying naked in Chew Valley Lake, poor lamb. Do you want I to come with 'ee to identify her proper?'

'That may not be necessary.'

'Will you be going over to arrest the bugger?'

'I want you to sign a statement, Mrs Pietri. The sergeant will assist you.' Diamond got up and walked out.

Over the radio he made contact with Inspector Wigfull. 'Any news?'

'Yes,' Wigfull answered. 'I just called at the milkman's cottage.'

'Middleton?'

'Yes.'

'And?'

'Elly Troop opened the door.'