His own station.
He was looking at the map on his office wall and Swineford was barely two miles from Keynsham.
“I wasn’t informed. I’ll take it up with them. Will you be emailing your findings?”
“All you need to know.”
“Please make sure it reaches me personally. And, Frankie…”
“Yes?”
“I wasn’t really casting doubt. You knocked me for six.”
After ending the call, he went straight to the most senior uniformed officer on duty, Chief Inspector Richard Palmer.
“Was there a body fished out of the Avon recently?”
Palmer knew straight away. “Woman in her thirties, about two weeks ago. She hasn’t been named yet. Doesn’t match anyone reported missing.”
“We weren’t told about this in CID.”
“Get off your high horse, Peter. We’re dealing with it. If we gave you every death that got reported you wouldn’t be too thrilled. Accident or suicide, we believe. There’s no evidence of anything else.”
“It could tie in with a case we’re working on. I should have been informed.”
“It’s no secret. Been on the website all week. Don’t you look at it?”
A low blow that he ignored. “Show me.”
“Be my guest.” Richard Palmer found the Avon & Somerset Police website, clicked on “newsroom” and had the appeal on screen straight away:
unidentified woman-can YOU help?
The left side of the screen was filled with a photo of a blonde white woman you wouldn’t have known was dead unless you read the information. The eyes were open, as if looking at the camera. She had neatly shaped eyebrows, high cheekbones, a straight, small nose, fine, narrow lips and a dimpled chin. A good-looking woman probably in her late thirties.
The text at the side read:
A woman’s body was recovered from the River Avon, near the Avon Valley Country Park, Swineford, at 11 a.m. on Sunday, 29 March, and we are appealing for assistance from the public in identifying her. She is white, aged about 30-40, with tinted blonde hair and hazel eyes, of slim build and about 5ft 5in in height. She was wearing a light blue hip-length padded jacket made in China, white sweater size 10 from BHS and blue Chino style jeans and white socks with pink heels and toes. Her underwear was also from BHS, white, 34D bra and knickers. She was not wearing shoes or any form of jewellery. She is believed to have been in the water for up to twelve hours.
If you were in the vicinity of the country park on Saturday 28 or Sunday 29 March and remember seeing a woman of this description alone or in company or if you recognise her picture, please contact us on 101 and quote the reference number 7773250.
“Has anyone got in touch yet?” Diamond asked.
“No one useful. We still don’t have a clue who she is.”
“Has it got in the local press?”
“Not yet. It will soon.”
“And no signs of violence? What’s the thinking about her?”
“She could be an immigrant. To me, the shape of the face looks Slavic. The eyes, the cheekbones. I sent the DNA profile to Interpol in case she fits one of their mispers.”
“I meant, what’s the thinking about how she ended up in the river?”
“Accident, probably. Saturday-night drinking.”
“Round here, you mean?”
“Some of them are legless by the end of the evening, and not only the men. It’s either that or suicide.”
“Is there a pub at Swineford?”
“Nice one. The Swan.”
“I suppose you sent someone to ask?”
Palmer grinned. “Thinking of volunteering, Peter? Hard cheese. It’s been done. Actually the body was about a mile downstream from the Swan. It could have carried from there. Swineford weir gives a boost to the flow.”
“Was she checked for alcohol?”
“Negative, but it could have metabolized in the time she was in the water. Basically, we’re at a loss.”
Diamond decided he’d better share some of what he knew. “I may have some information for you, going by DNA evidence, but it won’t answer all the questions.” He told Palmer the little he knew about Jessie the housekeeper’s history, but he didn’t go into the case against Ivor Pellegrini. His feelings about the eccentric engineer had undergone another step change.
“Isn’t it likely someone in Little Langford knows this woman’s name?” Palmer asked.
Diamond shook his head. “I had a man doing door-to-door yesterday. If anything new turns up, I’ll let you know.”
“Likewise,” Palmer said.
“So how did he do it?” Ingeborg was quick to ask when Diamond told his small team how Jessie’s life had ended.
“Who are we talking about here?” he said.
Ingeborg and Halliwell exchanged startled looks.
“Come on, guv. Pellegrini, of course. It’s obvious Jessie knew too much and had to be silenced. She came back to the cottage that night and if she didn’t catch him red-handed murdering Cyril she was left in no doubt who was responsible. The only question is how an old guy in his eighties or whatever age he is succeeds in killing a fit woman forty years younger.”
“Seventy,” Halliwell said.
“What?”
“His age. He’s seventy. He may look older in his present state of health, but that’s his age.”
She swung round to face him. “How do you know that?”
“Because of that name-plate in his workshop. County of Somerset. The locomotive was built in 1945 and got its name the next year. I thought we’d all agreed they linked themselves to trains built in their birth years.”
“Did we?” She turned to Diamond.
The big man’s thoughts were elsewhere. “I’ve changed my mind about Pellegrini.”
“You don’t mean that,” she said, appalled.
“We assumed from the start that he was a murderer because of his wayward behaviour.”
“Wayward? I’d call it guilty.”
“Hold on, Inge. Highly suspicious, anyway, the night excursion, the cremation urns, the valuable gowns found in his workshop and the Internet material about perfect murders. We soon had him down as a serial killer, but we were forced to modify that when the death certificates came in and we found his railway friends died from things like flu and an aneurysm.” He could tell they were both on the point of interrupting again, so he raised his hand. “I know what you’re going to say, there were other deaths, Max’s and Cyril’s, and we found solid reasons why he might have wanted those two dead, basically to cover up the theft of the gowns. But Max and Cyril died in bed, like the others, and their doctors signed them off as natural deaths. No sign of a struggle, no marks. If he’d murdered them, we’d have found out by now.”
Ingeborg couldn’t contain herself. “I can’t believe what I’m hearing. Isn’t this the whole point, that he was researching murder methods? There’s a load of circumstantial evidence. We can place him at each scene shortly before the deaths. We just have to work out how he did it. We know why, basically-because his friends got wise to his thieving.”
And now Halliwell chimed in. “Let’s not forget the deaths of Trixie Pellegrini and Olga Filiput.”
Diamond shook his head. “They weren’t murders. Olga had a fall, which would be a crude and unreliable method for a man supposedly carrying out perfect murders. And there’s no reason for him to kill her.”
“Same motive,” Halliwell said. “She owned this stack of jewellery and antiques and he figured Max was easy prey once Olga was dead.”
“And his wife, Trixie? He didn’t murder her.”
“She probably found out she’d married a kleptomaniac and challenged him with it.”
“After a lifetime together? She would have found out sooner than that.”
“Okay, it was a long-term problem and she finally got sick of it and threatened to call the police.”