Sally added for Diamond’s benefit, ‘He’ll go on denying he has a charmed life, but just don’t get into a poker game with him.’
Diamond asked what time the gatecrashers had started arriving and was told they first appeared around 9pm and soon it became unstoppable. The pressure only eased about 10.30, after the two policemen had called, following the complaint from a neighbour. By that time all the drink was gone and the clubs and discos were opening in town.
‘And some remained?’
‘Plenty,’ said Sally. ‘For hours.’
‘But you had no knowledge that anyone was on the roof?’
‘Not until we were told.’
Diamond went downstairs and talked to the sergeant at the door, a grizzled man with a face you could have struck a match on. ‘Do you have a personal radio?’
‘Yes, sir. Want to use it?’
He might as well have invited Diamond to perform brain surgery. ‘No. Has there been any word about the victim? Has anyone reported her missing?’
‘Nothing’s come through to me, sir.’
‘Were you here when they took her away?’
‘I helped put her on the stretcher, sir.’
‘In that case, you can tell me what she was like.’
‘A right mess, to tell you the truth. The crack in her head-’
‘Yes, I know all about that,’ Diamond firmly cut him off. ‘I was wanting some idea of her normal appearance.’
‘She was a brunette, sir. Quite short hair actually. Good figure.’
‘Clothes?’
‘She was covered with a blanket when I arrived.’
‘But you helped lift her onto the stretcher, right? What did you take hold of? Her arms?’
‘The legs. Well, the feet. She had black jeans, white socks, black and white trainers. Only one trainer, in point of fact. One was missing.’
‘Fell off, you mean?’
‘I suppose so.’
‘Was it in the yard? Did anyone pick it up?’ Diamond’s voice had an edge of urgency that produced a nervous response from the sergeant.
‘Em…’
‘Think, man.’
‘I couldn’t say, sir.’
The missing trainer had galvanised Diamond. ‘Get on that radio of yours and find out if anyone has the shoe. Tell Manvers Street from me to contact everyone who was here at the scene, including the SOCOs, the police surgeon, the mortuary. If we have the shoe, I want to know exactly where it was found, on the roof, in the basement, or any other place. Do it now, Sergeant.’
Sixteen
Early the same afternoon, the filming of
Inside the house the reinforcements began a ‘sweep’; collecting, bagging and labelling each item discarded by the party-goers the previous night. The residents took turns to make tea and coffee, and tried without much conviction to behave as if it were a normal Sunday. Diamond had asked them to remain indoors until the sweep was over. Complications could occur, he said darkly, if people weren’t present when their house was being checked for evidence. To encourage co-operation, he asked Julie to stay there. Any hope she had of lunch with Charlie had long since been abandoned.
The big man himself made a reluctant appearance at the Royal United Hospital mortuary. The corpse of the young woman, still in her bloodstained clothes, was wheeled out for his inspection.
He held his breath, but the injuries were less disfiguring than he had prepared himself for. The back of her skull had taken the main impact. Blood had congealed and encrusted in a patch not strikingly different from the dark brown of her hair. The unmarked face had the look of wax. Its serenity was an appearance, not an expression, confirming the melancholy truth that a detective’s job is doomed to be unsatisfying, for the best it can do is reconstruct facts and determine what happened and who was responsible. Nothing he could discover or deduce, however brilliant, would diminish the tragedy of a young life lost.
He stepped away for a moment, and the attendant asked if he’d finished.
‘Far from it.’ He approached the other end of the trolley and spent some time examining the black and white Reebok trainer on the left foot and the white sock on the right. The remaining shoe was fairly new, with little wear. It fitted snugly and was laced and tied with a double bow. The sock on the other, shoeless foot had been tugged down a little, so that the heel was hanging slackly. He attached no importance to this. It could easily have been done as the body was being moved. But he was intrigued to find the underside of the sock perfectly clean.
‘What it shows clearly,’ he told DCI John Wigfull in his Manvers Street lair, ‘is that she didn’t put her foot on the ground without the shoe. The dirt runs off the roof and collects in the gully behind the balustrade. You can’t avoid stepping in muck.’
‘What did she do, then? Hop?’
Diamond shot him a surprised look. Sarcasm wasn’t Wigfull’s style. He was about as waggish as a Rottweiler.
‘I suppose she kicked the shoe off as she jumped,’ Wigfull said, more soberly.
‘But where is it? That shoe is missing. I’ve checked with everyone. No sign of it, on the roof or down in the basement yard.’
‘The adjoining basement?’
‘My lads aren’t amateurs, John. I said it’s missing.’
Wigfull’s unappreciative gaze rested on Diamond for a moment. ‘You have a theory, I suppose?’
‘Someone picked up the damned shoe and took it away.’ Having delivered this startling opinion, Diamond paused. ‘You’re going to ask me why.’
A sound very like a snort of contempt escaped from under the Mexican moustache. ‘I wouldn’t give you that satisfaction.’ Wigfull was definitely getting uppish.
‘Suit yourself.’
‘Before you dash off, I think I’m entitled to know what you’re doing about this woman up at the Crescent.’
‘She isn’t up at the Crescent any more. She’s down at the RUH.’
‘This missing shoe. What does it mean, in your opinion?’
A grin spread across Diamond’s face. ‘I thought you weren’t going to ask. There are two questions, aren’t there? How did the shoe get parted from her foot, and where is it?’
‘Well?’
‘Question One, then. If you take it from me that she didn’t put her foot to the ground, then the shoe must have come off while she was sitting on the balustrade. She was seen up there some time around eleven-thirty to midnight, “dangling her legs”, so I was told. If her legs were visible, she was facing outwards looking at the lights of Bath. Of course, she
‘Slipped off her foot?’
‘Yes. Or, more likely, she struck her heel against one of the stone things underneath. What are they called?’
‘Balusters.’
