The Vault

'On who you know, I suppose.'

He was careful not to return her faint smile. 'That can be a factor. You're not serious about this, Ingeborg? It's not a bit like journalism.'

'Do you think I could do it-detective work?'

'You have some of the qualities.'

'But…?'

'But could you put up with the discipline? Can you handle routine as well as stress? Stupid colleagues? Coarse remarks? Idiot people doing idiot things? I have problems myself.'

'With coarse remarks?'

'I'm trying to see it from your point of view.'

'Don't try. If you're on about women being given a hard time, that's not unique to the police. You're not selling it very well, Mr Diamond.'

'That isn't my mission, Ingeborg. If you choose to join, don't ever say I talked you into it.'

Her eyes glittered amusedly. 'No fear of that.'

'Now can we talk about this student who disappeared?'

She nodded. 'When I heard about the skull being female, I asked around. My ex-landlady is a whiz with anything like that. She's convinced we're all going to be raped and murdered one of these days, and she memorises every case of violence and abuse that supports her thesis. Unsolved cases, missing girls. Her recall is amazing. She reels them off like the football results. I'd back her against your computers.'

'She remembered this case?'

'I didn't tell her what it was about. I simply asked her about women who went missing during the nineteen- eighties. She gave me upwards of a dozen names. This one fitted the best.'

'So who is she?'

'Violet Turner, known unofficially as Tricks.'

'Any reason?'

She turned her large shrewd eyes on him. 'Tricks Turner. If you can't work that out…'

'She was on the game?'

She shook her head.

'Generous with it?'

'After three years reading Ancient History at Durham, wouldn't you be?'

'I thought Ancient History was full of that sort of thing. So when did she come down here?'

'She was a postgrad at Bristol. Topped up her grant by working one day a week as a guide at the Roman Baths. I checked all this in the local press, and my landlady had the details right. In February, 1983, Violet Turner went missing. Never completed her course. Hasn't been heard of since.'

'Was it given much space in the papers?'

'Very little. There was never a time when they were certain she was dead. People assumed at first that she'd taken off on a trip with some bloke. When she didn't come back after two or three months, the alarm was raised. Her parents, up in Newcastle, knew nothing and heard nothing from her.'

'Was there a man in her life?'

'At least four.'

'They would have been questioned,' said Diamond. 'There should still be statements on file. Did they publish a picture?'

'Yes, in black and white. She was dark, apparently. Large eyes. Reminded me a bit of that girl who played Tess.'

'Nastassja Kinski? No wonder she was popular.' Up to now, he had only the image of the skull in the vault with its earth-filled eye-sockets.

'Is that helpful?' Ingeborg asked.

Wary of her agenda, he played it down. 'One thing you'd learn if you ever joined CID is that the most promising leads aren't always the right ones.'

'If it is her, when do you expect to announce it?'

'You want to scoop the others?'

'It's my job.'

'There are tests-once I finally get a pathologist to the scene. We're unlikely to get an identification for some days. Dental records may help. I can't see us going public on a named individual until we're sure. You'd be unwise to rush into print yet.'

'So what shall I write-that you haven't yet linked this with the disappearance of Violet Turner, who worked in the Roman Baths and disappeared in 1983?'

He almost snarled, 'Don't bait me.' As he was saying it, he spotted Jim Middleton striding across the yard. 'Stay in touch,' he heard himself tell her unnecessarily as he got up, but it softened the last remark.

He caught up with Middleton in the corridor. 'What happened?'

The pathologist swung around. 'Jesus Christ, Peter, you shouldn't creep up on people like that. I nearly dropped my guts-bag.'

'We expected you at two.'

'Sorry, old friend. The gearbox went on my Ultimate Driving Machine.'

'You could have phoned.'

'What with? I don't carry one of those ghastly mobiles.'

Diamond didn't pursue it. 'This way. It's down in the vault.'

'Where the hands were found?'

'Yes.' He escorted Middleton down to the vault.

'My word,' said the pathologist as he shook open the protective overall he was handed, 'you've got major earthworks here. Is the skull where you found it?'

'Exactly as it was. We brushed away some of the earth around it, that's all.'

'And no doubt brushed away the hairs I'll be hoping to find.' He stepped into the overall and zipped it up. 'Hair is durable. It often remains after other tissues have decomposed. No, I won't complain. Let me help you with that.' He grabbed the back of the garment Diamond was struggling with and hauled it up to shoulder height. 'Don't they make an XXL?'

They put on overshoes and walked over to the skull. Diamond said, 'The Scene of Crime team say she's female.'

'I wouldn't disagree with that.' Middleton took a torch from his bag and bent over the skull. 'No hair that I can see.' He tapped the cranium lightly with his gloved knuckle and stroked its surface with something like affection. Then, against all the rules, he burrowed with his fingers, took a grip and plucked the entire thing from the earth and placed it on the level above. 'And where were the hands found?'

'Some distance off. Over there, between two flagstones.'

Middleton flicked off some earth, pressed the skull backwards and opened the jaw. 'Because, you see, the evidence suggests that the hands and the skull are not related.'

He felt himself blush scarlet. 'Get away.'

'Have you noticed the colour? I know it's difficult under these lights, but I'd call this brownish-yellow. Caramel, shall we say? The hand bones I saw were paler, whitish in colour.'

'They were in concrete. They weren't stained by the soil,' Diamond pointed out.

'Fair enough. What clinches it for me are the teeth.' Middleton worked the jaw again, and for an instant the skull looked animated, seeming to enjoy Diamond's confusion. 'Several molars missing, but no dental work. Unusual in a modern adult.'

'True.'

'Now run your fingers gently over the cranium, like this.'

Diamond did as instructed.

Middleton turned to face him, smiling. 'I know it's not so obvious through latex, but do you feel the coarseness of the surface texture? I mean you can see the cracks in places. This is deterioration I would expect after many, many years of seasonal changes in temperature. Heat-waves, frosts. And I'm not talking ten or fifteen years,