Peter Lovesey - Skeleton Hill

‘And a snip of hair,’ Halliwell added.

‘Teeth?’

‘She was headless.’

‘You have got a problem.’ Louis picked up his glass and drank. ‘It sounds professional. If you’re right about the trafficking, she could have rebelled and been dealt with by her pimp.’

‘And if that’s the case,’ Diamond said, ‘her killing will have been used as a threat to keep other women in line. So I reckon someone may remember her.’

‘From twenty years ago?’ A belch from Louis testified to his reaction. ‘You always were an optimist. There’s a new generation of working girls now.’

‘But the older ones may have graduated into madams.’

‘There he goes again. All right, let me tell you who I’ve fixed for you to meet. Two people at opposite ends of the spectrum. Olena is a pillar of the community and she’s been here twenty-five years. She’s a babusya, a granny, much respected, a kind of church social worker who looks out for vulnerable girls and does her best to link them up with families. Ukrainians are regular church-goers.’

‘Which church?’ Halliwell asked.

‘They have more than one church?’ Diamond said.

‘The Catholics have their own cathedral in Mayfair,’ Halliwell said.

Being well informed wasn’t earning Halliwell the credit he craved. He might have come from another planet, going by the look he got from Louis. ‘Olena is Ukrainian Orthodox. The church is in Ealing, no great distance from here.’

‘We’d like to meet Olena, whatever her religion,’ Diamond said.

‘Almost any girl who visited that church in the last quarter of a century has been given the once-over by Olena.’

‘Thanks, Louis. You’ve spent time on this.’

‘More than I intended.’

‘Who else have you lined up?’

‘The second contact couldn’t be more different. Andriy is a disgrace, an alcoholic who has never done a day’s work since he got here. There’s a Ukrainian pub in Addison Road called the Crimea and he gets his glass filled up through the day by passing on the lowlife gossip. Amazingly his brain still functions. If anything in the way of scandal is remembered about your lady, Andriy is the man to ask. Treat him with respect. He has powerful friends.’

‘So we know where to find Andriy,’ Halliwell said. ‘How about Olena?’

‘Right now she’ll be arranging flowers at the church in Newton Avenue, Ealing. I told her to expect you around twelve-thirty.’

Short, slim and with the steady gaze of an icon, Olena met them at the church door and said, ‘You will come to my flat.’

‘We can talk here,’ Diamond offered, trying to be amenable.

‘Not in the church, or outside.’

She was the kind of woman you didn’t argue with. ‘As you wish.’

The flat was in Meon Road, as close to the church as a loyal parishioner would wish to be. Olena lived on the ground floor. ‘I prepared chorni khlib and salt for you. It is the custom,’ she said, unlocking the door.

Unseen by their hostess, Halliwell raised his eyebrows at Diamond, who gave a nod meant to say eat your chorni khlib and salt and look happy about it.

Olena had the treat ready just inside the door on a tray covered by an embroidered cloth. She removed the cloth to reveal a black loaf and a small bowl of salt. She offered it first to Diamond.

‘Break a piece and dip in salt,’ she told him.

He did as asked. The bread had a hint of vinegar, but he swallowed it and thanked her.

‘No need to speak. You bow your head, so.’

So he bowed his head.

Halliwell received his portion in the approved way, in silence.

‘That is good,’ Olena said. ‘Now we talk in my living room.’

The room was small, with only two chairs at either side of an old-fashioned fireplace, the mantelpiece crowded with black and white photos in metal frames. In an alcove to one side was a patriarchal crucifix with the extra crosspiece. On a shelf below, a silver-plated vase held some wax flowers.

‘You sit,’ Olena said, gesturing to the chairs. ‘Both.’

She was pouring something from a jug into three wineglasses. There was no arguing with this lady. If she offered you a chair, you sat; and if she said drink, you drank.

‘Is called kvas ,’ she said as she handed the glasses to her guests. It looked dark and bubbly. ‘After chorni khlib , you have thirst so you drink this. Made from black bread and sugar. All Ukrainians drink kvas .’

‘Children as well?’ Halliwell asked.

She nodded. ‘No alcohol.’

‘Good health, then,’ Diamond said, trying not to catch Halliwell’s eye. The drink reminded him of cold Ovaltine and he didn’t care much for it. ‘We came to ask you about a young Ukrainian woman who we think travelled to Bath about twenty years ago and was murdered there. We don’t know her name. She would have been about twenty and it’s likely she came to London first.’

‘Murdered? Why?’

‘She must have met bad people, here, or in Bath.’

‘With God’s help I try to stop girls from meeting such people,’ Olena said. ‘I would not know.’

‘But you may remember a girl who was going to Bath and wasn’t heard of again. It would be unusual, wouldn’t it, in about 1990, for a Ukrainian girl to be heading for Bath?’

‘Or 1991,’ Halliwell added, ‘when your country gained independence.’

‘Regained,’ Olena said with a look that put him to the bottom of the class. ‘No, I cannot help. I remember nobody like this.’

‘It was a time when people gained the freedom to travel,’ Diamond said, unwilling to give up. ‘Were you already living here?’

‘I am here before then,’ she said. ‘The church helped me to find work here and at home, so I give back. Many who came were young women. In Ukraine so many without job are women. I cannot begin to describe.’

‘Can you remember the names of those you helped?’

‘Many. Not all. Some we lost to evil men who take them to be Scots.’

Diamond was mystified.

Halliwell said, ‘I think you mean escorts.’

‘Yes. Scots.’

‘And do you keep any sort of record of where they are now?’ Diamond asked.

‘Record. What is that?’

‘Name? Address?’

‘Some write to me still.’

‘Even from 1991?’

‘A few.’

‘We’d like to hear of anyone you’re still in touch with from that time in case they remember this woman.’

She took down one of the photo frames. ‘This is Viktoriya. She arrive here 1991 to be waitress. The men who offer this job are lying. Soon they force her to sell her body. You understand?’

‘What happened? Did she go missing?’

‘No. Still here, with family now, married to Englishman, living in Barnes, thank the blessed Lord Jesus.’

‘She escaped from that life?’

‘By his mercy.’

‘Barnes isn’t far from here,’ Diamond said.

‘Yes. Sometimes she come to see me.’

He glanced at Halliwell. This was promising. ‘Where exactly in Barnes?’

Olena gasped in horror and wagged her finger from side to side. ‘You stay away. She will be frightened.’

‘Why? You said she’s given up the bad old life.’

‘That is what she tell me.’ But uncertainty remained, even in Olena, who wanted to believe the best.

‘All we want is to speak to her.’

‘You are secret police.’

‘Detectives in plain clothes. Not the same thing at all. Not in this country, I promise you.’

She was tight-lipped.

‘We talk to witnesses all the time,’ Diamond said. ‘We can do this without scaring her. In fact, only one of us needs to chat to her.’ He smiled in a reassuring way intended to underline his credentials as Mr Nice.