Reluctantly, Gull was persuaded. He chewed at his thumbnail. ‘Are you recommending we step up the numbers on watch in Becky Addy tonight?’
Diamond shrugged. ‘Put out as many men as we can spare. The odds are still stacked in his favour.’
John Leaman made a point of his own. ‘Especially with local knowledge.’
‘We’ll stake out all the footpaths leading up to the wood,’ Gull said.
‘He’ll have thought of that,’ Leaman said.
‘What’s he going to do, then, smart-arse? Parachute in?’
‘He’ll avoid the footpaths,’ Diamond said before Leaman got into a slanging match. ‘He’ll cut across country. We’d do better looking at the map and deciding where he might leave the motorbike. I’m assuming he’ll arrive on wheels and park it somewhere out of earshot. That’s the biggest risk he takes. Does he leave it along a country lane where it would stand out or in a street with other vehicles?’
‘The street option sounds more likely.’
‘Agreed. Shall we look?’
The map of Becky Addy Wood was already pinned on the incident board. ‘You’ve got Avoncliff down in the valley with the canal, the river and the railway acting as barriers,’ Leaman said, spreading his hand across the features he mentioned. ‘Above the wood you’ve got the village of Westwood and quite a few small streets.’
Diamond weighed the options. ‘This morning he escaped down the hill and presumably along the towpath. He’ll figure that we’ll have that route covered. I doubt if he’ll come by way of Avoncliff.’
‘Westwood, then?’
‘It’s more likely.’
‘What’s this?’ Gull asked. He traced his finger along the fine double line that snaked from Westwood eastwards to the edge of the town of Bradford on Avon, about a mile off. At the top end it passed close to Becky Addy Wood.
‘Jones Hill.’
‘We should stake that out.’
‘Fine, but I don’t think he’ll come that way,’ Diamond said. ‘There’s no obvious point where he can change route if he’s seen. You know what local lanes are like, with high sides. He’s got better options through Westwood.’
‘You’re really getting into this guy’s head,’ Gull said.
‘He almost got into mine, literally.’
‘Right, then.’ Needing to assert himself, Gull inflated his chest and jutted his chin in a posture reminiscent of Mussolini. ‘We warn Wiltshire Police Authority that we expect the sniper to return to Becky Addy tonight or tomorrow, so they can get a strong presence there, and we tell them we’re blanketing Westwood with our own people. Cross-border co-operation. Will you take care of that?’
‘I was thinking in view of these …’ Diamond lifted one of his crutches a few inches off the floor.
‘Are you in pain?’
‘Not acute pain. I took something for it.’
‘My role as head of serial crimes is to decide the strategy,’ Gull said, regardless that Diamond had been deciding it for the past ten minutes. ‘It’s up to you to implement the action. If you’re unfit, you’d better say so and we’ll appoint a deputy.’
‘I’m okay.’
‘Good. I’ve been on the go some hours and I’m going to leave you in charge for the time being.’ He noticed Leaman checking the clock. ‘No need to log my comings and goings, by the way. The SCU is free ranging.’ He stalked out.
‘Free-range, as distinct from battery birds, like you and me,’ Diamond said to Leaman.
‘If you want a rest, guv, I can set things up for tonight.’
‘You heard me say I’m okay,’ Diamond said. ‘Would I lie to Jack Gull?’
No response.
Diamond eased the crutch from his right arm and let it fall to the floor. ‘I don’t need both of these any longer. I can manage with one.’ He hobbled a few steps to the board plastered with photos of all three shootings. ‘Gull and his people are convinced these attacks are random. They say they researched the murdered officers and there’s no reason anyone would want to shoot them for who they were.’
A frown from Leaman suggested he, too, had taken this as gospel.
Diamond continued, ‘They made up their minds before Harry Tasker was killed.’
Leaman scratched the back of his head, unsure where this was leading. ‘They must have gone into it carefully.’
‘I’m sure.’
‘But you think they could be mistaken?’
‘Put it this way, John. They’re the Serial Crimes Unit. Serial killing is their business and serial killing is usually random. After two shootings they look at the history of the victims and can’t see any link between PC Hart, the Wells guy, and Richmond, the Radstock guy. So it’s random. And when shooting number three occurs — same weapon, same time of day, same MO — their suspicion hardens into certainty. They’re so sure that they don’t even consider checking whether victim three has anything in common with victim one or victim two — apart from being a cop.’
Leaman’s eyes widened. ‘Is that possible?’
‘It ought to be looked at. We have Harry Tasker’s file here and more importantly we have people who knew him. Personally I know sweet FA about Hart and Richmond.’
‘Their records will be at headquarters. Must be, if Jack Gull and his team were studying them. I can ask them to share them.’
Diamond shook his head. Some craft was wanted here. He didn’t want headquarters thinking he’d pulled the rug from under Gull. ‘Rather than dealing with Portishead, I’ll speak to Wells and Radstock, where these guys were based. Their personnel units must have supplied the profiles. They can supply us as well. I’ll tell them we have an incident room here and we need everything in our system. We’re not dealing with one case in isolation.’
In twenty minutes, he had the information he wanted. Leaman brought it up on the screen. Diamond wheeled his office chair closer.
PC Hart, Martin, aged 31 at death, had joined the police only four years before, after a short career teaching physical education. Born in a village near Wells, he had attended a local comprehensive where he had excelled at sport, notably basketball and fencing. As a fencer, he’d been on the fringe of international selection and this had helped him to a sports course at Bridgwater in spite of mediocre exam results. He’d trained as a teacher and taken up water sports. While still at college he’d met Juliet Strang, from Portsmouth, a swimmer, and they lived together until after obtaining their degrees, when they married. He was appointed teacher of PE at a state school in Minehead. His wife gave birth to twin daughters in the first year. Schoolteaching hadn’t suited Martin Hart’s temperament. He found working to a timetable restrictive, preferring games and leading school teams to the daily routine of lessons. But there had been no problems over discipline. If anything, he was too demanding of the students and expected standards they were unable to match. After six years of teaching, he decided on a change of career and applied to join the police. He was regarded as a good candidate, physically fit and with satisfactory references from the school. He’d completed the training and joined Wells as a probationer and impressed everyone with his communication skills and confidence dealing with a variety of situations. Confirmed as a fully fledged constable he was tipped to get promotion to sergeant within another year. His home life appeared good. After the twins, another child, a son, had been born, and the family lived in a rented house in a well-regarded estate north of the city. His wife Juliet worked part-time as a lifeguard at the local sports centre and coached the swim team.
‘A sheltered life, really,’ Leaman said in summary
Diamond nodded. ‘Family man, lived in Somerset all his life. How would a country boy like this give offence to a gunman?’
‘Are we assuming it wasn’t a random killing?’
‘That’s the point of this exercise,’ Diamond reminded him.
‘Maybe the gunman happened to have been a kid at the school where he taught.’
‘Not bad, John. Not bad. And had a grudge about the way he was treated? Compulsory games?’