She nodded and reached for the milk. “Are you going to pour?”
It seemed a fair distribution of the duties. “OK, I’m sorry about Seton,” he had the grace to say. “As you probably noticed, he’s a one-subject man. I had two hours of it in the car.”
“Do you think the professor picked him specially?”
“I’m sure of it. And I’m sure everyone had a good laugh about it after we’d driven away.”
“You could have tipped me off.”
“But how? It’s not the kind of thing you can whisper in a lady’s ear.”
She weighed that. “Probably not,” she conceded finally. Then: “For pity’s sake, how does he carry out this research? Oh, never mind. I’ll hear it all from Stella.”
“When I get back to Bath, I’ll speak to the prof,” Diamond said, putting down the teapot. He hadn’t done too well. Two pools of tea had spilt on the table. “Don’t you find metal pots always pour badly? The prof should be able to tell me more about the cases this woman was advising on. I’m assuming her death is in some way related to her job.”
“It has to be followed up,” Hen agreed, dropping a paper napkin over the spillage and wiping it.
“So what’s been happening down here?” he asked. “Do you have anything else under investigation?”
“Serious crimes? Nothing we’d need a profiler for, if that’s what you’re getting at.”
“Sleepers? We’ve all got sleepers.” He meant the unsolved crimes that stayed on file.
“A few of those, but none we’re actively pursuing. Believe me, I didn’t ask her to come and neither did anyone else I know.”
“Who are your neighbours? Hampshire police? Did anything happen in Portsmouth? Now there’s a place with a reputation. Naval base. All kinds of scams at the docks.”
“Portsmouth docks are more of a theme park these days,” she told him. “I’ve spoken to them, and they haven’t used her either.”
“She must have been down here for a reason.”
“Unless it was a holiday. People do go on holiday.”
“Dr Seton didn’t seem to know about it.”
Hen said, “Dr Seton seems to have narrow vision.”
He smiled. “It’s supposed to turn you blind, isn’t it?”
Her real reason for setting up this tête-à-tête had to be faced. “You’ll report back to me on this?”
“Full consultation,” he said after a slight pause. “It’s a joint investigation.”
“It was initiated here,” Hen made clear. “The incident room is at my nick. I’ll take the decisions.”
He said, “I wouldn’t want to pull rank.”
“Then don’t. It’s a West Sussex murder.”
“She’s a Bath and North-east Somerset woman. You may find the focus of the investigation is off-limits for you. Then you’ll need my help.”
“Need it? I’m depending on it,” Hen said. “Bath nick is my second home from now on.”
He grinned. Without getting heavy, they had reached an understanding. “And you’ll be welcome. So what’s happening at this end?”
She told him about the TV appeal and the difficulty in finding a genuine witness. “Plenty of people offered help, but not the ones we want most.”
“Who are they?”
“A family of three who were sitting close enough to notice her failing to move when the tide came in. The man fetched the lifeguard.”
“A responsible citizen, then?”
“But we’ve heard nothing from him since.”
“Do you have a description?”
“We have a name.”
“Good. What is it?”
She told him and he smiled. She told him about the daughter called Haley who had been lost for a short time.
“Haley is better than Smith,” he said. “Not so many Haleys about. Have you tried the local schools?”
“No joy.”
“People drive miles to the seaside,” he said. “They could be Londoners, or from anywhere. My way, even. Do you want me to take it on?”
She was guarded in her response. “For the present, I’d rather you found out what you can about Emma Tysoe’s life and work in Bath.” But it had not escaped her that he’d deferred to her. Maybe this man Diamond was more manageable than people said. “Now that we have her name, it’s going to open up more avenues.”
“As you wish,” he said. “And let’s get our names into the open. I’m going to call you Henrietta from now on.”
“Try it, and see what happens,” she told him with a sharp look. “I’m Hen.”
“Fair enough. Is it time we rescued your colleague from the one-gun salute man?”
“Stella? Not yet,” she said with a steely gleam in her eye. “I think I’d like a second cup. How about you… Pete?”
Haley Smith’s teacher, Miss Medlicott, was telling the class about their project for the afternoon. “We’re going to do measuring.
Presently I’ll ask some of you to come to the front and collect a metric rule. Not yet, Nigel! Then you’ll work in pairs with the person sitting on your right. Anyone without a person sitting on his right put your hand up now.”
Without fuss, she made sure everyone had a partner.
“You’ll also need a pencil and a large sheet of paper. One rule for each pair, one pencil and one piece of paper. Decide now who will collect the rule, and who comes for the pencil and paper. Quietly. Is everyone ready? Then we’ll begin now.”
They carried out the instructions well. She explained that they would be measuring the length of their shoes, and showed them how to make two marks on the paper, and measure in centimetres. Most of the children understood and started making marks. She moved among them, assisting the slower learners.
After twenty minutes she said, “Now we’ll see what results we have.”
Not all of the kids had fully understood, so there were a few strange answers causing hilarity among those who had done the thing properly. Aidan, who was Haley’s partner, reckoned the length of his shoe was eighty-four centimetres.
“I expect you used the wrong end of the rule,” Miss Medlicott said. “What about you, Haley? What was your measurement?”
Haley held up the paper. She seemed to be hiding behind it.
“No, I’m asking you to tell me the length of your shoe in centimetres.”
Haley turned and whispered something to Aidan.
Aidan said, “She says fifteen, miss.”
“Thank you, Aidan, but I’d like to hear it from Haley.”
Again Haley whispered to Aidan, who said, “She can’t, miss. Her daddy said she isn’t to speak to you.”
After a moment, Miss Medlicott said, “Very well. Who’s next?”
She thought about asking Haley to remain behind to explain exactly what her father had said, but she decided the child was under enough pressure already. Something very wrong was happening in that family. She would have another word with the mother.
Diamond didn’t mention to Hen Mallin that he intended visiting Wightview Sands beach before returning to Bath. She might have taken it as interference. He was going there, he persuaded himself, purely from altruism. To contribute as fully as possible to Hen’s investigation, he needed to visualise the scene.
He didn’t inform Dr Seton either, until they were most of the way down the road to Wightview Sands and Seton remarked, “I don’t remember coming this way.”
“We didn’t. I thought you’d like to see where your colleague was found.”
“Not particularly.”
“Well, I do, and as I’m driving…” His stock of altruism was all used up.
This being towards the end of the afternoon, the oncoming lane was busy with cars leaving the beach, but the southward side was clear. At the car park entrance, they were asked for a pound.
“We’re not here for the beach,” Diamond told the attendant. “I’m a police officer, here about the murder.” He held his warrant card up to the cubicle.