The Tooth Tattoo (8 page)

Quite when Doug returned wasn’t clear. By then the concentration was pretty intense. He must have been standing nearby for some minutes waiting for a break. He wasn’t fussed. He was like the cat with the cream.

‘Sorry to interrupt. Breaking news, as they say. You asked
for a residency and I may have got one, a university with a substantial endowment for a series of masterclasses and concerts. They are willing to engage us for six months when the new term starts.’

‘Who are?’ Ivan said.

‘Bath Spa University.’

‘Bath.’ Ivan spoke the word as if it were Lubianka Prison.

Cat overrode him. ‘Not a bad place to spend half a year. Is there enough for us to live on?’

‘Approved lodgings, all meals found and twenty grand each plus concert fees.’

‘I could survive on that. When do they need to know?’

‘I said I’d give them an answer today. It’s a fantastic deal. To sugar the pill I said you’d also make a recording in aid of university funds.’

Cat looked at the others. ‘Any objections?’

Anthony said, ‘How many concerts?’

‘You’re going to like this,’ Doug said. ‘What they suggest is a series of soirées, fortnightly musical evenings in private houses, chamber music as it was originally performed. The audiences will be limited to the size of the venue and in most cases this will mean twenty-five to thirty at most. There are some beautiful houses around Bath. I can picture you by candlelight in gracious rooms of the sort the composers themselves must have known.’

‘By Jesus, you’re a wicked salesman,’ Cat said.

‘That’s what you pay me for.’

‘I’m in. How about the rest of you?’

Ivan was straight to where the shoe pinched. ‘Fortnightly, I think I heard you say. With a new programme each time? That’s a tall order.’

‘What I’m suggesting is no more than one string quartet per evening, followed by a champagne interval and then some solo pieces. How does that seem?’

‘I could endure that,’ Cat said.

‘If you like, you can repeat the programmes,’ Doug said. ‘Your audiences will be different each time, I expect.’

‘Presumably they pay for the privilege?’ Ivan said.

‘The sale of tickets and all profits are handled by the university. They intend to put it towards the sponsorship – which I may say is very generous.’

‘So we perform for nothing?’

‘It’s all part of the deal, Ivan, as I’ve tried to explain. Personally, I’d be thrilled to play in such surroundings if I had your talent.’

‘You think Ivan plays the fiddle well?’ Cat said. ‘His main instrument is the cash register. He’s a virtuoso.’ She turned to Mel. ‘Are you up for it, new boy?’

Mel was still in a spin from being admitted to the quartet. Right now, he would have agreed to anything.

Doug asked for a show of hands.

Nobody objected. Ivan seemed to have changed his mind about Bath.

‘I’ll confirm, then,’ Doug said. ‘That was a good sound, by the way. What’s the piece?’

‘That’s our manager talking,’ Cat said, ‘and he doesn’t know what we were playing.’

‘Schubert,’ Ivan said. ‘Quartet Number 14 in D minor, better known as “Death and the Maiden”.’

I
ngeborg Smith said, ‘Something is up with him.’

The rest of the CID room must have heard, yet nobody else spoke. The central heating was set too high for a mild October afternoon. Lethargy was the prevailing mood.

‘He’s been out of sorts all week. Longer really.’ No one could be in any doubt who she meant. Ingeborg was the Diamond-watcher on the squad.

And on a day like today no one except Ingeborg cared much.

She tried a third time. ‘I don’t think he’s had a civil word for any of us.’

DI John Leaman finally responded with, ‘Tell us something new.’ Which was rich coming from the misery-guts of CID.

From across the room, Paul Gilbert, the youngest on the team, said, ‘It’s the trend, isn’t it? All those Scandinavian detectives, so depressed you wonder if they’ll hold out until the last chapter.’

‘What the hell are you talking about?’ Leaman said.

‘Don’t you read?’

‘Read what?’

‘Some of them get on TV as well.’

‘I don’t have time for that stuff. I look at science-based series like
CSI
and
Bones.’

‘Be fair, you guys,’ Ingeborg said. ‘The boss treats us right and he can be amusing when he’s on form. You have to tune in to his sense of humour, that’s all.’

‘My tuning must have gone to pot, then.’

‘Bosses come a lot worse than him.’

Gilbert was quick to take her up on this. ‘Why do you say that, Inge? Do you know something we don’t?’

‘I’m wondering if
he
knows something we don’t.’

Leaman swung round in his chair. ‘Hang about – do you think Diamond’s on the way out?’

This possibility galvanised everyone. Keith Halliwell, the most senior man present, said, ‘Get away. He’s said nothing to me.’

‘Whatever is bugging him, he’s internalising it,’ Ingeborg said. ‘With all the government cuts he could be looking at early retirement.’

‘Voluntary, you mean?’

‘He wouldn’t walk,’ Halliwell said. ‘Not the guv’nor.’

‘But he’d take it badly if they forced him out.’

Mental pictures of Diamond being dragged from the building.

‘There is another possibility,’ Gilbert said.

‘Give it to us, then.’

‘It could be some of us for the chop. He’s been told and he doesn’t want to break the news to us.’

Rumours of redundancies had been circulating for months and now something close to panic ensued.

‘They can’t do that,’ Leaman said. ‘We’re overstretched already.’

‘Overstretched when there’s a major enquiry,’ Halliwell said, ‘but that isn’t every week of the year. We could be vulnerable.’

‘All the public services are taking cuts,’ Gilbert said. ‘We can’t expect to escape.’

Leaman said, ‘And it’s always last in, first out. So don’t look so pleased with yourself, young man.’

By now every head was buzzing with thoughts of unemployment. Some twenty minutes later, Halliwell stood up. ‘I’m going to ask him.’

Diamond was at his desk with his chin propped on both hands like a medieval gargoyle, but chunkier. He’d discarded his jacket and loosened his tie. ‘What is it now?’

‘Nothing special, guv. I was wondering … do you fancy a cuppa?’

‘A cold drink would suit me better. They never get the heating right in this place.’

‘Want to slip out for ten minutes?’

‘While you mind the shop?’

‘Actually I was thinking you might want company.’

‘Something on your mind, is there? All right. John can hold the fort. It’s not as if we’re snowed under. Be better if we were.’

In the Royal Hotel just down the street, Halliwell brought the drinks to the table where Diamond had resumed his chin-in-hands posture.

‘Did you want crisps or anything?’

‘No. What’s your problem?’

‘Not mine specially, guv. There were some murmurings in the office about lay-offs.’

‘Why? Do they know something?’

‘They’re thinking maybe you do, and you don’t want to tell us.’

Diamond grinned faintly. ‘Have I ever shied away from passing on bad news?’

‘So we’re safe?’

‘I wouldn’t bet on it, but I haven’t heard yet, and if I do I’ll fight tooth and nail to keep the squad together, even the layabouts.’

‘That’s all right, then.’

‘What put this into their heads?’

‘Nothing really.’ Now that the team’s concerns were put at rest Halliwell was ready to talk about the weather, or television, or the quality of the beer.

But Diamond wasn’t. ‘Murmurings, you said. Who was murmuring?’

‘No one in particular.’

‘Leaman, I bet.’

‘To be fair, he isn’t the only one, but I didn’t come here
to tell tales. They study your moods and they reckon you’ve been under a cloud these last weeks.’

‘Study my moods sounds like Ingeborg.’

‘So the general opinion is that there has to be something you’re hiding from us, such as redundancies.’

‘Bullshit.’ Diamond rolled his eyes. ‘For as long as I can remember, Keith, the politicians have banged on about getting more coppers on the streets. Even now, with all the cuts, they’re saying it. How will it be done? By cutting down on the backroom staff. Backroom is the dirty word. That’s you and me if we’re stuck in the office all day. We need to get out more.’

‘Like this?’

He couldn’t raise another smile. ‘Front-line is the buzzword. If you’re front-line you’re in no danger of the chop.’

‘There hasn’t been much serious crime lately.’

‘Too true. A major incident would solve everything, keep us in work, get us away from our desks and stop stupid rumours flying around.’

‘What do we do – tell the criminal class to step up productivity?’

‘Not a bad idea.’

They brooded on this until Halliwell said, ‘You do seem more depressed than usual. Is anything wrong?’

‘With the CID room? Where shall I start? A DI who likes nothing better than spreading alarm and dissension. A recently promoted sergeant who watches my every move. A DCI who believes all that garbage enough to dump it on me.’

‘You once said you wanted to be told if anyone was unhappy.’

Diamond shrugged. ‘Fair enough, Keith. I’d forgotten.’

‘When I asked if there’s anything wrong, I meant in your life.’

The big man glanced away, across the room. ‘If there was, I wouldn’t tell you.’

‘Your health is okay, I hope?’

‘Now you’re sounding like the idiot doctor who does the
annual medical. Of course I’m okay. I don’t make a point of taking my blood pressure or weighing myself, but I’m as fit as you or anyone else. Shall we end this pointless conversation and go back to work in case some of them think I’ve decided to end it all and jump off Pulteney Bridge?’

He’d had enough of this probing. Well intentioned it may have been, but he wouldn’t be telling Halliwell or anyone else about the break-up with Paloma. Months had gone by since that walk along the towpath. Yes, he was unhappy, bloody miserable, and now CID had picked up on it, but he wouldn’t be calling Paloma to try and make up. He had his pride and she had hers.

Two days passed before the team was gifted the suspicious death they needed. A couple walking the towpath near Lower Weston – much as Diamond and Paloma had done – spotted a floating object that at a closer look turned out to have arms and legs. They called the emergency number and a patrol car and an ambulance went to the scene.

Normally a dead body is left where it is found so that the police can inspect the scene. This one was moving with the current and there was no telling when or where it had entered the water. A boat was used to retrieve it near Weston Lock and it was stretchered to a waiting van and taken to the Royal United Hospital mortuary.

The first duty of the police was to identify the dead woman, but this was difficult. She was way past the point when anyone would recognise her. A body in water will sink to the bottom and only rises to the surface when decomposition begins and gases form within the stomach and lungs. The time this takes depends on the water temperature. In icy conditions, months. In the Avon in a typical English summer, not much less.

In this case the decomposition was plain to see. Significant areas of the skin and tissue had peeled away.

The deceased was short, at just under five feet, and slight in build. Her hair was natural black, and cut sheer at the back. She had a full set of teeth, with some whitened fillings. The
white T-shirt and black jeans she was wearing gave no clue as to her identity. Nothing was in the pockets. She wore no jewellery.

The missing persons register was consulted. Nobody from the local area matched the description, such as it was.

An early decision was taken by the coroner to order an autopsy. It was carried out by one of the hospital’s team of clinical pathologists. The police, who provided continuity of evidence, were in attendance. Sometimes new information is discovered at this stage. Not this time.

Identity: unknown.

Cause of death: uncertain.

The pathologist – a man who didn’t like wasting time – was unwilling to speculate how this young woman had died. The obvious assumption would have been that she had drowned – difficult to prove in any case and impossible in this one. Drowning is one of the most problematic of all causes of death to diagnose. For one thing, the immersion in water, possibly for a considerable time, rots the body and vitiates the evidence. If the internal organs have deteriorated, as they do in quite a short time, they won’t provide confirmation that the victim was struggling to breathe.

In this case, the classic signs, the plumes of froth at the mouth and nostrils, must have dispersed long ago and any internal froth at the trachea and bronchi would have vanished. There were no obvious external marks of injury apart from minor lacerations probably caused by the body being moved with the current and striking submerged rocks and objects. Anyway, the state of putrefaction would have masked anything less than severe wounding. All the pathologist would say was that from the general deterioration she must have been immersed for a minimum of two weeks and probably longer.

He added that a diagnosis of drowning is invariably a best-guess situation and this would be a very inferior guess that he wasn’t willing to hazard.

He estimated her age at between twenty and thirty.

As for identification, her own family would not have
recognised her. Under water the body assumes a face-down position, with the face, arms and legs dragging along the bottom.

It was only after the post-mortem, when the clothes were being put in a bag for storage, that a medical student assisting the pathologist happened to draw his attention to a faded label on the white cotton knickers.

‘Sir, have you noticed this?’

He had not, whatever it was, and he was not overjoyed to be told. ‘Noticed what?’

‘I believe this writing is Japanese.’

‘Why? Can you read it?’

The student reddened. ‘No, but I spent some of my gap year in Tokyo. I can tell the difference from Chinese.’