‘I was, yes. The whole terrace was declared unfit for human habitation. There’s always a delay before the bulldozers move in. We were in the same day the previous tenant moved out.’
‘Did you know who it was?’
‘I didn’t meet him, if that’s what you’re asking. He was Polish or something. Letters arrived with names we couldn’t speak.’
‘No family?’
‘No kids. There was a woman and an old guy who slept downstairs. He could have been the father of one of them.’
‘Do you know how long they lived there?’
‘Couldn’t tell you.’
Headmistress returned from placing the order. She’d brought a tray with coffees and a dog bowl filled with water. ‘We should come here more often.’
Tank said to her, ‘Before you say anything else, these people are dicks.’
‘What the fuck...?’
‘Avon and Somerset’s finest,’ Diamond said, untroubled, ‘but as I keep saying we’re looking for information about the Twerton gaff. The Royal Crescent will be someone else’s problem.’ He asked Ingeborg if she had a paper tissue. His trouser leg was damp where the dog had rested its muzzle. He mopped up and turned back to Tank. ‘The old guy you mentioned. Did you actually see him?’
The ghost of a smile crossed Tank’s lips. ‘Are you thinking they left him behind in the loft?’
‘It’s worth asking.’
‘He died. There was a funeral. They carried him out in a box.’
‘You kept an eye on them, then?’
‘On the house, while we waited for them to move out. Getting a squat is all in the timing.’
‘Was anything left behind?’
‘What do you mean — curtains, carpets and fittings? We didn’t sign a contract.’
‘Any idea what the man did for a living?’
‘He was in the building trade. Had a rusty white van parked outside.’
‘Did the woman go out to work?’
‘Yes. Don’t know where, though.’
Headmistress said, ‘School meals service. I used to see her in the kitchen at Oldfield Park when we collected the lunches for our kids.’
‘So you really are a headmistress?’
She laughed. ‘Supply teacher. That’s just a name the others call me.’
‘You said you “used to” see her.’
‘She left before he did. Probably made the money she wanted and went back to Warsaw or wherever. A lot of the East Europeans come here just for the wages. It’s big bucks compared to what they can earn back home.’
‘And you said the man was a builder.’ Diamond was thinking about the expert job that had been done to seal off the loft. ‘Did he leave the country as well?’
‘Must have,’ Tank said tight-lipped.
‘I don’t think so,’ Headmistress said. ‘I see his van around still. I saw it in Manvers Street yesterday turning into the old police station. I reckon he’s found work there. The university took over the building and they’re having all sorts of work done on it.’
Manvers Street.
Diamond glanced at Ingeborg, who had raised an eyebrow.
Their former workplace, much derided in its day but regarded now as a lost home-sweet-home. What a cruel twist of fate if a murder suspect was employed there knocking the guts out of the old place.
‘How do you know the van?’ Diamond asked Headmistress.
She was getting looks like guided missiles from Tank, but she wouldn’t be silenced. ‘By the rust marks. He’s bumped it a few times. There’s no writing on the side, if that’s what you’re asking. With a name as long as his, you’d need a van twice the size to get it all on.’
‘You wouldn’t remember the name?’
‘You’re joking. It began with a W and ended with a Z with about fifty letters in between.’
‘She’s making this up,’ Tank said.
‘Slight exaggeration,’ Headmistress said. ‘It was more like fifteen. And his first name was easy to remember. Jerzy.’
Tank turned towards her accusingly. ‘How do you know that?’
‘It was on the letters that came for him. Jerzy, kind of warm and cuddly, I thought.’ She gave him a mocking smile.
Diamond said, ‘I’m thinking you knew these people better than you’ve made out. Was there an arrangement when you took it over as a squat? Did you get a copy made of the front-door key?’
She was about to respond when Tank gave her such a nudge that she slopped coffee over the twenty-pound note still on the table. She picked it up, shook it and handed it to Tank.
‘Shouldn’t have asked,’ Diamond said. ‘I’m not the least bit interested in how you got in, believe me. Whatever you did is history now.’
Ingeborg said, ‘I think the food is arriving.’
‘And when we’ve eaten,’ Diamond said, ‘we’ll walk the dog. I’d like you to come with me to Manvers Street and see if Jerzy is there.’
13
It was a well-fed but far from friendly party that progressed down the sloping streets towards the former police station. Diamond, at Tank’s side, was remarking on changes to the city scenery he’d noticed over the years he’d served there, but the squatter didn’t join in. To him new buildings were opportunities. A short way behind, Ingeborg and Headmistress were in debate about the rubbish problem in the streets. Only the dog was at ease, loping ahead with the light-footed agility of the breed.
Billboards had been erected around the decommissioned police station.
‘It wasn’t a bad old place,’ Diamond said with an upsurge of nostalgia. ‘Do you know how much Bath University paid for this prime site? A mere seven million. I hope they’re not demolishing it entirely.’
‘Why?’ Headmistress asked.
‘It was twenty years of my life.’
‘Move on,’ she said.
‘We have. We moved on to Emersons Green and I flog thirteen miles along boring roads each time I drive there.’
Ingeborg cut short the rant by asking the others, ‘Where did you see Jerzy’s van go in?’
‘The site entrance up ahead.’
‘Let’s check.’
No one was on the gate but there was a sign about unauthorised persons and hard hats that the quartet ignored. Headmistress did take the precaution of using the braking mechanism on the dog lead to put the greyhound on a shorter leash.
Two large skips loaded with rubble stood as objects of reproach in front of the old police station.
‘Even the asphalt has gone from the forecourt,’ Diamond said in a hurt voice.
‘Contractors’ parking up ahead,’ Ingeborg said. ‘Is that where the van might be?’
A row of vehicles included two silver vans, but no white ones with rust marks and dents. A man was sitting inside the cab of a small truck, so Diamond asked him if a Polish guy called Jerzy was on site.
‘What’s his trade?’
‘Some kind of builder. Drives an old white van.’
‘Never heard of no Jerzys here.’
Ingeborg said, ‘You might know him as Yurek.’
‘Yurek? Why didn’t you say? A sparky called Yurek is round the south side working on the lift. He was when I last looked, anyway.’
They were already moving on when the man called after them, ‘Are you lot supposed to be on site?’
They ignored him.
‘Where did that come from?’ Diamond asked Ingeborg.
‘Yurek? It’s a nickname for people called Jerzy.’
‘How do you know?’
‘Friend of a friend.’
‘I thought you said Yorick.’
‘Oh yes?’
‘The skull in the gravedigger scene.’
She smiled. ‘What is it with you and skulls, guv?’
Headmistress added, ‘You should get out more.’
The staircase Diamond had used daily for twenty years had gone and was replaced by an external lift shaft. He gave it the sort of look a polar bear gives a snowmobile. ‘They wouldn’t want the students getting tired climbing all those stairs.’