‘If they’re not old, we can find out who made them and maybe where they were bought,’ John Leaman said.
‘You can hire costumes,’ Paul Gilbert said.
‘What’s your point?’ Leaman said.
‘They weren’t necessarily bought.’
‘Fine. That’s good,’ Diamond said at once, not allowing the session to be undermined by old antagonisms in the team. ‘As soon as anything is confirmed, we’ll start making enquiries with the manufacturers.’
‘Are the pants being checked to see when they were made?’ Leaman asked.
‘That’s already in hand. Marks and Spencer have a company archive up at Leeds. It’s vast. They do heritage tours and lectures. I’ve spoken to the lady in charge and emailed her pictures of the back and front and the label. She promised to get back to me shortly. If we can focus on just a few years, we’ll be in a far better position.’
‘To check missing persons?’ Gilbert said.
‘Right — and that won’t be easy. The numbers who go missing every week never fail to amaze me and a high proportion of those are elderly, but it’s got to be done. That’s going to be your task, Paul.’
‘Okay, guv.’
‘Then there’s the Twerton connection. John, you were checking the deeds of the house.’
‘I did,’ Leaman said, emphasising that it was a job completed. ‘I spent a day and a half at the records office.’
‘Getting the ancient history of the terrace? That’s no help now. We’ve homed in on the past fifty years.’
In this business-like session even Leaman resisted the urge to complain. He’d save his moan for later.
Diamond asked, ‘Did you root out anything at all about who lived there?’
‘In recent years? The place was condemned and became a squat. Before that, the owner lived abroad and did the letting through an agency that went bust. I can’t tell you any more because like everyone else I thought the skeleton had been shut in the loft for hundreds of years.’
‘You’ll make enquiries now?’
‘Can do.’
‘Will do. Directly, this morning.’
Leaman swivelled his chair from side to side and said nothing.
‘Don’t just rely on official records,’ Diamond added. ‘Knock on doors. Visit local shops. Talk to the postman.’
Knocking on doors wouldn’t come easily to Leaman. Tapping on a keyboard was more to his liking.
Ingeborg asked, ‘Is anything being done about the crime scene? I know it’s been levelled, but the murder weapon could be buried in the rubble.’
The same point had come up at the press conference. ‘I drove past last night,’ Diamond informed them. ‘Unfortunately, the developers were quick off the mark. All the loose stuff has been loaded on to lorries and driven away to some landfill site. You wouldn’t know a building had been there. I’m not optimistic about finding anything at this late stage, but I’ll ask uniform to do a fingertip search.’
‘Uniform are doing massive overtime already this week,’ Leaman said.
‘What for?’
‘The fireworks. Haven’t you heard them going off? The World Fireworks Championships.’
‘Here in Bath?’
‘Two nations put on a display each evening. It has to be policed.’
So that was why his quiet evening in Paloma’s garden had been ruined. ‘I did hear something. Bugger it, if I want plods for a search, I’ll get them, fireworks or no fireworks.’
Halliwell added, ‘To be fair to Dr. Waghorn, he spent a lot of time sifting through the rubble around the skeleton before it was hoisted out.’
‘Yeah, and missed the hat.’ Diamond felt no need to be fair to Waghorn. ‘He wasn’t doing a search. He was moving bits of slate and masonry from around the chair. He wanted to get the sling in place and lift the whole thing out in one piece.’
Ingeborg said, ‘The clothes must be our best lead, and not only the pants. Could the frock coat and breeches come from the theatre? They’ve done a few period dramas in recent years.’
‘Restoration comedies. The Beaux’ Stratagem with the National,’ Diamond threw in, surprising everyone.
Some looks were exchanged.
He wasn’t telling them he’d pulled this plum from his earlier meeting with Estella. ‘Would you ask them? I’m sure their wardrobe mistress keeps a record of the costumes they make over the years.’
‘It does seem the victim was dressed as Beau Nash and not just any man from that time,’ Ingeborg said. ‘If there was a play that featured him as a character...’ She turned to Diamond as the newly revealed theatre buff. ‘Any thoughts?’
‘Can’t say it rings a bell,’ he said. ‘Is anyone else a theatre-goer?’
It seemed unlikely and so it proved.
‘Check with them anyway, Inge. Go to it, people. We can crack this.’
With the team as usefully deployed as the few hard facts allowed, he went to the entrance to meet Paloma. His new workplace didn’t run to a front desk and a helpful sergeant. Anyone who wanted that sort of service went to the One Stop Shop in Manvers Street, where the guardians of law and order were now slotted in with waste and recycling, Age UK, housing benefits, Shopmobility, healthy lifestyle and even a small café. The days of the blue lamp and a central police station were over.
Paloma was in the building already, business-like in glasses and with her hair back from her face in a French twist, distinctly different from the look Diamond was used to. She was in a grey trouser suit and carrying a leather bag.
‘Heck of a way from Bath,’ was the first thing she said.
‘You’re telling me.’
‘It’s like a foreign country out here. I stopped to ask where the police building is, and the locals didn’t have a clue.’
‘I’m responsible for Bristol and South Gloucestershire as well now,’ he said. ‘It’s a bigger empire.’
‘Does the emperor get paid more? I can see from the look on your face that he doesn’t.’
‘What’s in the bag?’
‘My inspection kit. Things you won’t have here.’
He took her to the section at the back of the building where the evidence sergeants zealously guarded their collection of exhibits waiting to be produced in court. Even though Diamond vouched for Paloma, the Cerberus behind the desk insisted she produced her driving licence and a business card.
As a riposte she requested two sets of PPE.
Flummoxed by initials as always, Diamond was too proud to ask.
The clothes rack with its cover was wheeled out. They were shown into a small room containing an inspection table, shelving and little else.
‘The lighting isn’t great,’ Diamond said.
‘I came prepared.’ Paloma took out a torch.
She emptied her bag completely and like a surgeon arranged the things she would use in a row along the shelf: magnifiers, torch, tweezers, calipers, tape measure, camera, pen and paper.
Overshoes and protective suits contained in plastic film covers had been supplied by the sergeant and one mystery was solved: PPE was personal protective equipment. The protection wasn’t for the people, but the exhibits.
‘Face-mask first,’ Paloma said when Diamond unwrapped the paper suit and prepared to step into it. ‘There’s a sequence.’
How did she know this? She didn’t routinely handle evidence. He could only surmise that she’d checked the drill before starting out.
The complete professional.
They did the dressing. Mobcap (and hairnet in Paloma’s case), pair of latex gloves, suit, overshoes and a second pair of gloves for disposal after handling items and before touching others.
Looking the part, however weird they appeared, they set to work.
‘This looks awfully like the real thing,’ Paloma said as she eased the thin, heavily stained shirt from the bag with as much respect as you’d give to one of Shakespeare’s first folios. She arranged it on the table and a pungent smell came from it, dust, death and rotting fabric. ‘It’s in a pitiful state.’