The Tooth Tattoo

by Peter Lovesey

  Diamond put in a mid-morning appearance at Ferry Lane, alongside the cricket ground, and watched the unfortunates making slow progress through the undergrowth. He didn’t have much sympathy, especially when he learned that nothing of interest had been found. He’d endured worse in his days as a rookie sifting the contents of a London council tip for bits of a dismembered corpse.

  While he was there someone picked up a clay pipe and said it might interest the local historians. The sergeant in charge said it was probably at least a century old and could have been smoked by one of the bargees who once navigated the canal.

  ‘It’s a river, not a canal,’ Diamond said.

  ‘A waterway,’ the sergeant said.

  ‘So what?’

  ‘So it was used by the barges that used the Kennet and Avon canal. To all intents and purposes it’s part of the canal. The man-made bit feeds in at Dolemeads. They came down from Reading and linked up with the river for the last stretch to the docks at Bristol.’

  The man was right. Never having taken much interest in the canal system, Diamond hadn’t given any thought to the river as a waterway. In his mind there was a clear distinction between a river and a canal. A canal was a man-made thing, like the one he’d walked beside in Vienna.

  And now that the Danube canal popped into his mind, he thought fleetingly about the woman murdered there.

  One dead Japanese woman in a canal in Vienna and another here in the Kennet and Avon.

  Coincidence?

  Sensible thinking suggested nothing more. It wouldn’t be wise or profitable to start constructing theories of an international killer.

  ‘Keep up the good work,’ he told the sergeant, ‘but tell them I’m not really interested in clay pipes.’

  Back in Manvers Street, he found John Leaman practically turning cartwheels in excitement. ‘It’s all under way, guv.’

  ‘What is?’

  ‘The facial reconstruction. I found a really helpful technician at the Royal United who arranges the CT scans and he knew exactly what I wanted. In fact, he’s really chuffed to be helping us.’

  ‘Probably watches CSI on the telly.’

  Leaman took this as encouragement. ‘He does. So he’s already done the scan and emailed it to Philadelphia.’

  ‘Whatever for?’

  ‘I found Professor Hackenschmidt through the internet. He’s a world expert in plastic surgery and uses computer imaging all the time. We’re hoping he can use his skills to recreate her face. We could have a result in a matter of hours.’

  ‘Let me get this straight,’ Diamond said. ‘The skull was put through the scanner in Bath and the pictures sent to Philadelphia?’

  Leaman’s face betrayed some nervousness, as if he knew he’d overstepped the mark. Budgetary considerations were always a worry. ‘Correct.’

  ‘Did you ask for any to be sent here?’

  ‘Well, no. We wouldn’t know what to do with them.’

  ‘Oh yes we would,’ Diamond said. ‘You missed the point, John. We’d stick them on our board and look as if we’re going places with this investigation. Get on to your friend at the RUH and tell him this is our baby and we need a copy of everything.’

  In other respects the progress was less spectacular. All the listed hotels and boarding houses had been checked and there was not a single report of a missing Japanese woman.

  ‘If some of you can’t look busier than this,’ Diamond said, ‘I’ll tell the search party on the river bank that reinforcements are on the way.’

  After he’d gone into his office and slammed the door, there was a spell of silence. Then Paul Gilbert said, ‘Who’s that Swedish detective Kenneth Branagh plays on TV?’

  Better news came through after lunch. The coroner had reviewed the autopsy report and decided on a second post-mortem to be conducted by a Home Office approved forensic pathologist at 8 A.M. next morning. Diamond was invited to attend. He thanked the coroner and said he would do his level best to be there. If, however, something came up, his deputy would attend. After switching off the phone, he called across the room, ‘Keith.’

  Halliwell looked up. ‘Guv?’

  ‘Are you a big breakfast man, bacon, eggs, the full English, as they say?’

  ‘When I can get it.’

  ‘Have a light one tomorrow. Early start for you.’

  Autopsies and Peter Diamond didn’t mix.

  Later in the afternoon came a call from the search squad. They’d found an iPod on the Green Park stretch of river bank between the Churchill Bridge and Midland Bridge. It looked as if it had been there some time.

  Diamond said he would come at once. He asked Ingeborg to join him.

  Green Park is a wedge-shaped space on the north side of the river, a piece of land that somehow escaped the builders of centuries past and enjoys some seclusion simply because it borders on the river and is a good distance from the main shops and tourist attractions.

  ‘I lose track,’ Diamond said to Ingeborg as they drove along Green Park Road. ‘What’s an iPod?’

  ‘You really don’t know?’ she said in disbelief.

  ‘I don’t have the patience to keep up.’

  ‘There are iPods and then there are iPods,’ she said.

  ‘Now you’re poking fun. It’s some kind of audio device, right?’

  ‘Or much more. There are touch-screen versions, video versions. Technology moves on.’

  ‘I can use a mobile phone.’

  ‘After much prodding.’

  ‘Am I missing something, not owning an iPod?’

  ‘Depends,’ Ingeborg said. ‘They can be good if you work out at the gym or go for a jog.’

  He looked out of the window instead.

  The sergeant from the search team was waiting for them beside a section of the river bank below the towpath now cordoned off with crime scene tape. Alder trees and bushes would have provided a useful screen for anyone up to no good.

  ‘Where is it?’ Diamond asked.

  A transparent evidence bag was handed over. The object inside was small and square and so coated in mud you couldn’t tell what colour it was. A lead with two earpieces was coiled in one corner.

  ‘Good spotting on someone’s part,’ Diamond said. ‘This would have been easy to miss.’

  ‘There’s no certainty it belonged to the dead woman,’ the sergeant said. ‘On the other hand, people aren’t in the habit of slinging things like this away.’

  ‘One of the earpieces is broken,’ Ingeborg said. ‘It looks as if it’s been crushed, stepped on, or something.’

  ‘We noticed.’

  ‘The iPod itself looks all right. You might chuck out the earphones, but not that.’

  ‘I agree.’

  ‘The damage could have been done in a struggle.’

  Diamond took a closer look. ‘Are there any signs of violence where it was picked up?’

  ‘Hard to tell, sir,’ the sergeant said. ‘Take a look if you like. We’ve marked an approach path. I made sure my lads didn’t trample all over the scene.’

  Diamond could take a hint. His big feet wouldn’t aid the investigation. ‘We’ll get the crime scene professionals out here and have it mapped and photographed. Where are your people now?’

  ‘The other side of Midland Bridge continuing the search.’

  Diamond turned to Ingeborg. ‘What do you think? Any way we can link the iPod with the victim?’

  ‘The best chance is to find some hair at the scene or match some fibres with her clothes.’

  ‘Put a call through to the men in blue overalls, then. I’ll get a sense of where we are and how she might have got here.’ He told the sergeant that the search could stop at Windsor Bridge. The body must have entered the water way before there.

  If, as he was tempted to suspect, the Japanese woman had been murdered, this little triangle of parkland was as good a spot as any to dump the body in the river. Quiet, well away from houses, with plenty of trees and scrub screening the view, the site had
much to commend itself to a killer. You could get a vehicle right to the end of the road known as Green Park, no great distance from the river bank.

  And no one would hear the screams.

  10

  Georgina Dallymore, the Assistant Chief Constable, had spent the past week attending a Home Office course. Rumour had it that the top bananas were being instructed on how to maximise resources, government-speak for cuts. So a collective shudder should have gone through CID when she reappeared. In fact, the team were so busy that Georgina was scarcely noticed.

  ‘What’s going on here?’ she asked Peter Diamond. ‘I wasn’t told we had a major incident.’

  ‘You’ve been away, ma’am.’

  ‘I wasn’t away from my BlackBerry, if you know what that is. I expect to be kept informed. What’s it about?’

  ‘A body found in the river. We’re treating it as suspicious.’

  She eyed the display board. ‘It looks like a full blown murder investigation. Is all this justified?’

  ‘It is when there’s an international dimension.’

  She twitched in alarm. ‘In what way?’

  ‘The victim – the deceased, I should say – is almost certainly from Japan.’

  ‘A tourist?’

  ‘Possibly. We’re working closely with the Border Agency and the Japanese embassy.’

  ‘Do you know who it is?’

  He shook his head. ‘Female, below average height, twenty to thirty, with a tooth tattoo as the only distinguishing feature.’

  ‘What on earth …?’

  Diamond explained. After the dig about the BlackBerry he wasn’t missing a chance to let the boss know he was street smart.

  Georgina peered at the close-up. ‘It looks like a music note.’

  ‘A quaver, actually.’

  ‘I didn’t know you read music, Peter.’

  ‘I have hidden depths, ma’am.’

  ‘I’ve known that for a long time, but music is something else. So is this the only clue?’

  ‘An iPod has been found on the river bank in Green Park.’

  ‘Hers?’

  ‘We can’t say yet. I’m having the scene examined for evidence of violence.’

  ‘Was she attacked, then?’

  ‘Unfortunately she was in the water too long to tell.’

  She paused as if to play the statement over. ‘I hate to say it, but this has all the hallmarks of an unsolved case.’

  He wasn’t being goaded into submission. ‘You’re entitled to your opinion, ma’am.’

  ‘What makes you think this isn’t an accidental drowning?’

  ‘In all my time here, I can’t recall any accidents below Pulteney weir, where she was found. You don’t find swimmers or canoeists there.’

  ‘She could have climbed over the railing,’ Georgina said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Suicide, obviously.’

  ‘But the iPod was found on the river bank further down.’

  ‘So you’re working on the basis that she was murdered and dumped in the river? A pretty big assumption from one lost iPod.’

  ‘We’ll know more when the crime scene investigators report.’ He decided this wasn’t the best time to tell her he’d asked for a second autopsy.

  ‘You may know more. Have you checked with missing persons?’

  ‘The first thing we did. Since then we’ve enquired at all the colleges and hotels.’

  ‘No names yet?’

  ‘So far, no.’

  ‘You’ve hit the buffers, then. Better scale everything down and get the room back to normal.’

  ‘I haven’t told you about Professor Hackenschmidt.’

  She blinked rapidly. ‘Who’s he?’

  ‘The world expert on facial reconstruction using computer imaging. He and his team in Philadelphia are already at work.’

  ‘Did you say Philadelphia?’ Georgina was tight-lipped now.

  ‘He works from CT scans.’ Another bit of technological jargon coming to his aid.

  ‘Is this coming out of your budget?’

  Diamond’s way of dealing with awkward questions was to ask one himself. ‘I expect you’re up with computer imaging, ma’am?’

  ‘I’ve heard of it, but I didn’t expect you of all people to give any credence to it. How much will this cost?’

  ‘I’m told the professor is only too pleased to be involved.’

  ‘Small wonder, if we’re paying. I hope you asked for an estimate.’

  ‘One of my team is dealing with it.’

  ‘Who’s that?’

  ‘John Leaman.’

  ‘Good. He’s no fool.’ Having said this, even Georgina seemed to realise Diamond could take offence. ‘This is just the kind of outsourcing we’ve been discussing on the Home Office course. These are tough economic times. We can’t employ experts for this and that and go way over budget. We need to make better use of our own resources.’

  Diamond wasn’t backing down. ‘I wouldn’t trust this lot to reconstruct a face. We’d end up with something out of Frankenstein.’

  ‘Be serious, Peter.’

  ‘I am. You asked if we’ve hit the buffers and I’m telling you we haven’t. It’s all in train, if you’ll excuse the pun. Can’t be stopped now. As soon as the professor sends us a likeness we’ll forward copies to Japan and get them on TV and in the papers. Speeds up the whole enquiry. Once the woman is identified we’ll get to the truth of it, I promise you. Maximise our resources.’ The last words tripped off his tongue so glibly that Georgina was caught off guard. She drew a long, fatalistic breath and returned upstairs to consider her options. Dismantling the incident room might not be the best way forward.

  At mid-morning, significant news came in from Keith Halliwell at the mortuary. The second autopsy had been conducted by Dr. Bertram Sealy, as Diamond had hoped.

  ‘And what did he find?’

  ‘He asked me to tell you he was sorry to have missed you, guv.’

  ‘Typical bloody Sealy.’

  ‘But he did find something the first man missed. There’s a bone called the hyoid in the throat, above the Adam’s apple, quite small and delicate and shaped like a horseshoe and not attached to any other bones. He removed it and pointed out that it was damaged, fractured at one end.’

  ‘Meaning that violence has been done to the neck?’

  ‘It’s the only sign of violence he could find, because of the bad condition of the flesh.’

  Diamond whistled. ‘Fracturing of the hyoid bone is a common sign of manual strangulation. This could be it.’

  ‘I think it must be. He says it’s highly unlikely this was caused accidentally when the body was being recovered from the river, or while it was submerged. To break a young person’s hyoid bone you have to exert real pressure on the neck.’

  ‘Is this going into Sealy’s report?’

  ‘I asked him. He’s a pain. He kept me dangling for about ten minutes while he went through all the other symptoms of strangling: bruising, facial congestion, bleeding into the neck muscles. None of this showed because so much of the flesh had gone rotten in the water. Finally I got it from him. Cause of death: asphyxia by compression of the neck. His words.’

  ‘That’s all we need, Keith. We’re in business.’

  ‘I thought we were already.’

  ‘Nothing can stop us now, not Georgina, the coroner, Portishead. Tell Bert Sealy he’s my hero.’

  There are times in police work when nothing goes right. Most days seemed like that to Diamond. Just occasionally there’s a break in the clouds and you have to make the most of such moments. Within twenty minutes of the call from Halliwell he heard from the search team at Green Park. Fibres had been found on a bramble bush on the river bank, and there were twin lines in the mud suggesting somebody had been dragged down the slope to the water.

  ‘Heel marks?’ Diamond said on the phone to the supervisor of the crime scene team. These days crime scene investigations were farmed out to private firms: o
utsourcing, as Georgina would put it.

  ‘Very likely.’

  ‘If she was wearing shoes, they may be in the water. I’ll arrange for the sub-aqua team to take a look. Is it deep there?’

  ‘Don’t know. I haven’t been for a swim.’

  Now Diamond remembered the voice of a man he’d tangled with before, a smart-arse with a liking for sarcasm. ‘You’re Duckett, aren’t you?’

  ‘Who else did you expect? We’re a small business, not the Co-op.’

  ‘Surely you can tell at a glance if the river’s deep.’

  ‘It shelves steeply.’

  ‘And did you find any shoe prints near these marks?’

  ‘Far too many. We’ll need to check what every one of your search team was wearing.’

  ‘You’ll be telling me we corrupted your scene.’

  ‘A line of policemen tramping through? Give me a break. And presumably you had a look yourself?’

  ‘Only by the access path.’

  ‘Was there one? It’s like a football field here.’

  ‘The fibres,’ Diamond said. ‘What are they like?’

  ‘Like fibres.’

  ‘Wool, cotton, man-made?’

  ‘We won’t know until we get them under a microscope.’

  ‘And I suppose the iPod has gone to the lab as well?’

  ‘Where else?’

  After the call had ended, Ingeborg said, ‘I heard you asking about the iPod, guv. I wonder if it’s still in working order. They’re well constructed. It would be good to know what music she liked.’

  ‘How will that help?’

  ‘It kind of brings her alive.’

  He gave her a baffled look.

  Ingeborg added, ‘Well, it tells us more about her. Any new information must be welcome.’

  ‘Give them a call at the lab if you like. I don’t fancy discussing music with the guy at the scene.’