The Vault

'Newsnightl Who interviewed you?' Unexpectedly the ACC's voice piped in excitement, 'Don't tell me you met Jeremy himself, my all-time favourite television presenter? You did. I can see it in your eyes. I can't possibly miss that! What time do they show it-ten-thirty? We'll switch on and let everyone have a goggle.'

'Ma'am-'

She flapped her hand. 'You don't have to be formal… Peter. It's Georgina tonight.'

'Understood,' said Diamond. 'About Newsnight, Georgina. I don't know if that's such a good idea.'

The advice wasn't heard. Georgina had rushed away to serve the supper.

With Diamond blanching at the prospect of people being ordered to watch that mortifying interview, he and Stephanie started the process of meeting other guests. Rarely had so many local bigwigs been gathered in one small space. Directly ahead, the Chief Crown Prosecutor was in serious conversation with the two other ACCs. 'Not that way,' Diamond murmured to Steph. 'Go right.'

'Straight for the blonde in the corner?' said Stephanie. 'The story of your life.'

'At least it's someone I don't have to say 'sir' to.'

'Don't be so sure. Wait till Blondie turns round.'

But it was a woman. Ingeborg Smith gave a wide smile of recognition and said, 'Hi, you're late.' She was in a black sparkly outfit that left one shoulder and a good deal of leg exposed.

Diamond had the feeling this was one of those nights that would sear his soul for ever. He stumbled through the introductions, stressing-without actually nudging Steph-that Ingeborg was a freelance reporter. Ingeborg laughed and said she wasn't on duty now.

'I'm forgetting,' he said. 'You know our hostess through the choir.' To Stephanie he explained that Ingeborg sang with the Bath Camerata. 'I'll get you ladies a drink,' he offered.

'I'm being looked after,' Ingeborg said at once. 'A gorgeous man called John Sturr is fetching me a refill from the other room. I think I've struck gold. He's on the Police Authority.'

Diamond winced. 'Councillor Sturr?'

'Councillor? I don't think anyone stands on ceremony here.'

He turned to Stephanie, 'Ingeborg won't want us around when her friend comes back. Let's head towards the drinks ourselves.'

'Go for it, guys,' Ingeborg cheerfully urged them. 'You've got some catching up to do. It's bubbly-the real thing. I don't know how many I've put away.'

The food was served soon after from a huge table in the dining room.

Georgina had lashed out on an amazing array of exotic dishes and was helpfully explaining to the more wary guests how to tell a spicy Chicken Tikka from a milder Kashmiri concoction. Steph, knowing Diamond's tendency to panic in the presence of foreign food, took his arm and steered him firmly past the multicoloured sauces to a tray of dishes topped with mashed potato, with steamed vegetables nearby.

'So much for my forecast,' Diamond murmured.

'I did wonder where the peanuts were,' Steph murmured back.

Besides helping people to food, Georgina was waving them outside to the patio, where they could sit at garden tables. The warmth of the day was lingering nicely. The Diamonds found places with a couple they didn't know who introduced themselves as Danny and Karen. 'Better than a barbecue, this,' Diamond said, to start a conversation. 'Burnt things on skewers taste all the same to me.'

'I know just what you mean about barbecues,' said Danny. 'This is recognisable food.'

'Marks and Spencer.'

'Peter, you've got to be a detective,' said Karen. 'How do you know that?'

'Can you prove it?' said Danny.

'We could check the kitchen for empty packets.'

'Oh, Pete!' said Steph. She explained, 'If he doesn't get his M & S shepherd's pie at least once a week, he isn't safe to be with.'

'I'm still impressed,' said Karen.

'Don't take my word for it,' said Diamond. 'You ought to check.'

'No need,' said Karen. 'I believe you absolutely. Nothing gets past our lads in CID.'

Diamond was beginning to like Karen. 'I'll let you into a secret,' he said, with exaggerated glances right and left before leaning confidentially forward and dropping his voice. 'Outside the nick in Manvers Street we've got some tubs of flowers. Have you ever noticed them?'

Karen nodded.

Diamond nodded, too. 'We lads in CID pass them hundreds of times a week. Not one of us spotted some extra foliage among the pansies. It took a member of the public to tell us we had a fine crop of cannabis growing in front of the central police station. Some joker had scattered cannabis seeds in there. That's how smart our lads in CID are.'

'Is that true?' said Danny.

'Gospel truth.' Diamond tapped the side of his nose. 'Keep it to yourselves. We don't want our new boss to find out.'

They talked on for a while before he asked Danny how long he had known Georgina.

'Only since I took over as Chair of the Police Authority,' said Danny.

The food didn't taste so good after that. The Diamonds made

fifteen

AS USUAL, FROM EARLY on Friday, people were staring over the parapet on Grand Parade, watching the water flow over the weir-a flight of broad, shallow steps in an elegant inverted horseshoe tapered at the ends. Even when the current is slow, as it was this day in August after a week without much rain, the patterns created in the foam are worth a few minutes of anyone's time.

The watchers will notice anything floating towards the weir. After heavy rain, there can be quite an accumulation of broken foliage and driftwood caught on the rim, waiting to tip over. In these conditions, however, all was sublimely clear until twenty to eleven, when an object more like a bundle of fabric than driftwood glided slowly down the Avon from the Walcot stretch. For a time it lodged unnoticed against one of the piers under the bridge. Then a small fluctuation in the current allowed it to ease free and float sedately towards the first of the descending steps.

Of all the people watching-and there must have been thirty or more ranged along Grand Parade-none noticed that the bundle was human in origin until it reached the lip of the weir. There, its form appeared to divide. A narrow portion flopped over the edge and hung, still attached, causing foam to fan out on the level below. The overhanging part was a sleeve and it was not an empty sleeve. At the end was a white hand.

The sightseers were more horrified than alarmed. It was obvious that the body was lifeless. Somebody went to look for a

fourteen

THE MORNING PAPERS HAD gone bananas about human remains found in a cellar they called Frankenstein's vault. Here, in Bath.

He read every word with grim fascination. The press cynically mixed fact and fiction, severed hands, decapitation and Frankenstein. There was stuff about the miles of vaults under the city. No one with a cellar would sleep easy until the killer was arrested, his paper said-as if Mary Shelley's monster was alive and out for blood, living the life of a rat and coming up to kill at nights.

They had no conception.