‘Can you operate the bloody crane?’
‘Of course not. I expect your people to do that.’
The manager folded his arms and said nothing. The movement in a telescopic crane is controlled through hydraulics. The boom is made up of many tubes fitted inside each other and the jib at the top works from the tower, swinging the lifting apparatus through wide angles. The hoisting block is heavy and capable of damage if misused.
‘Very well,’ Waghorn said finally. ‘Attach the sling your way. I’ll watch from here — if I can bring myself to look.’
Without more fuss the sling was passed under the chair and secured.
The man in the cab had been waiting hours for this. The cables tightened and took the strain and the chair and its fragile burden ascended at a rate that seemed quite shocking after the long wait. There were some cheers and a few laughs at what was quite a comic spectacle.
‘Not very dignified,’ Diamond said. ‘I don’t think the King of Bath is enjoying this.’
‘He doesn’t have much choice,’ Halliwell said.
Looking uncannily like a rider on a chairoplane, the skeleton was swung clear of the building and out towards the deck of an open lorry, where it was lowered and steadied by a couple of assistants and secured to the sides. The skull had shifted position and some finger bones had to be recovered from the sling, but otherwise everything seemed to be in place.
‘Job done,’ Halliwell said and called out, ‘Happy, Dr. Waghorn?’
‘Hardly the word I’d use,’ said the anthropologist. ‘I’ve aged ten years in the last ten minutes.’ He marched over for a closer look.
‘A coffee would be good after that,’ Halliwell said, unstrapping his hard hat.
Diamond appeared not to hear.
‘Shall we go?’ Halliwell said.
His boss was gazing at what was left of the terrace. ‘The demolition men are going to move in soon and finish the job.’
‘That’s for sure. Delays cost money in the building trade.’
‘I want one more look inside the loft before they reduce it to rubble.’
Halliwell sighed. Coffee would have to wait.
Diamond was pensive. ‘I wonder if I can do any better with the cherry picker than I did before.’
He stepped across and climbed into the basket. Waghorn had controlled the thing like a professional. Diamond needed to remind himself which of the small levers gave upward movement. The one he chose simply caused a judder. Trial and error, he told himself. Another did the job and he was borne smoothly to the height he wanted. Now it was a matter of finding forward movement.
He managed it without mishap and got his aerial view of the space the skeleton and chair had occupied. More of the boards were revealed, some of them splintered and caved in, and he saw just how unstable the flooring was. Nowhere would it be safe to stand.
A little to the left of where the chair had been was what he first took to be some sort of mould. On closer inspection he saw it was a piece of dust-covered fabric.
Curious, he manoeuvred the basket a short way to the side and then forward and leaned over cautiously for a better view.
Now he could see what it was, flat as a dried cowpat but distinctive in shape.
A white three-cornered hat.
The Archway café was the only choice for coffee in Twerton. Located under the railway embankment arches on the Lower Bristol Road, it was more spacious inside than the temporary-looking shopfront suggested. On entering and catching the whiff of fried bacon, the two detectives remembered how hungry they were and ordered the full English.
The place was busy and they were lucky to find a table for three against the wall on the far side. Not wishing anyone to join them, Diamond put a claim on the spare chair with the flattened tricorne belonging to the skeleton. Before leaving the demolition site he had borrowed a useful tool resembling a litter picker and fished the hat out of the loft with that.
‘Will it be all right there?’ Halliwell said.
‘Best place,’ Diamond said. ‘I’m not putting it on the floor.’
‘It’s a bit spooky.’
‘Why?’
‘Like Beau Nash left his hat on the chair and is coming back for it.’
‘Maybe we should order him a breakfast.’
‘You’re freaking me out, guv.’
Two mugs of coffee were put in front of them.
They had barely taken a sip when someone from behind Diamond said, ‘What’s your opinion, then, officer? Is it really Beau Nash?’
He didn’t recognise the voice. As a film buff, he thought it resembled Alfred Hitchcock’s ponderous delivery, trying to sound grand but with a touch of cockney in the vowel sounds. And when he turned, the large-bellied figure standing over him was not unlike Hitchcock. Sir Edward Paris, with Spearman the chauffeur a little to the rear.
‘Were you listening to our conversation?’ Diamond said without getting up or even making eye contact. He was annoyed at being waylaid like this and he didn’t give a toss for titled people.
‘Not at all,’ Paris said. ‘I happen to take an interest in Beau Nash, that’s all.’
At the mention of the name, Diamond turned to face him. ‘What’s your opinion, then?’
‘I’m just a humble rate-payer who helps to fund your salaries,’ Paris said. ‘You’re the investigators.’
‘We investigate crime.’
‘Is that his hat on the chair?’
‘I can move it if you want to join us.’
‘No, we just had our coffee. We’re on the way out. I didn’t want you to think we had a guilty conscience and were trying to avoid you.’
‘We hadn’t even noticed you,’ Diamond said.
‘You noticed us at the demolition site. Bloody trespassers, you thought, what do they want? We got through the security, no problem. I’m well known for that.’
‘And for other things, no doubt,’ Diamond said.
‘We won’t go into that,’ Paris said. ‘But if you have a decent-sized piece of land you want to sell, I’m your man.’ He nodded to his chauffeur and made for the door.
After watching them leave, Diamond said, ‘Pompous twit. I’m glad they didn’t stay. I’ve had enough of him already.’
‘What were they doing at the site?’ Halliwell asked.
‘I thought you asked the chauffeur that. Getting a close view, so Paris can boast about it to his friends.’
‘How would he have known?’
‘About the skeleton? Come on, it’s in all the papers, much as I wish it wasn’t.’
‘About Nash.’
‘He isn’t the first to come up with that. People have been calling since yesterday.’
‘Is the hat the clincher?’ Halliwell asked.
‘Not unless we can think of a reason why he ended up in that loft. But there are strange coincidences. Nash owned a white hat and wore a black wig. Unusual in both cases. Paloma told me the clothes are right for 1761, the year he died. There were no teeth left in the skull, which is what you’d expect of an old man. He lived to eighty-six. That ticks a lot of boxes.’
‘They can estimate someone’s age at postmortem, but not with much accuracy.’ No one in CID was better qualified to speak about postmortems than Keith Halliwell.
‘We’ll see what Waghorn comes up with. He may discover something else that ties in with what we’re thinking.’
‘Would DNA prove it? Can it be extracted from bones?’
‘Yes, even old bones. But it’s no use having a DNA profile if you’ve nothing to match it against.’
‘His descendants?’
‘He didn’t marry, so there’s no official bloodline. I expect there were offspring, because he put himself about, but where do you start? No, I can’t see the DNA thing helping us.’