“Even with the burns on his hands,” he continued evenly, “there was certainly more he could have done to raise the alarm. The time window before the first fire engine arrived was about thirteen minutes. The fire kept on blazing for almost a quarter of an hour, and Street seems to have let it. With more time, who knows what could have been done?”
Once again, Moulson didn’t seem to have listened to a word he said. She was pursuing her own train of thought. Which was still about the boy. “Alex was alone in the flat that night?” she asked Paul. “That’s what his parents said, isn’t it?”
“Yes. Is that relevant?”
“I don’t know. But we’re sure? There couldn’t have been anyone else?”
Paul shrugged, feeling out of his depth again. “Well, yes. Of course there could have been. But the front door of the block is visible in the CCTV footage. We’ve accounted for everyone going in or out through that door. And as you know, the back door is only accessible from inside the building. You can’t open it from the parking area behind the block unless you’ve got the key. Which isn’t to say that someone couldn’t have come in that way. But unless they were a resident themselves, they’d have needed someone inside the building to open the door for them.”
Moulson’s frown intensified. In some way he didn’t understand, he was failing her. “Suppose there was someone else already up there with him. Is there any way we could find out?”
Paul had no idea what to say. The wounds. The mysterious someone. Was there a pattern here that he was meant to see? “We could go back to the witnesses, I suppose. But I’m not sure it would help. The appeal will review points of law; it won’t re-hear the case. Why? Do you have any reason to think there was someone else there? Someone the prosecution failed to call?”
“Or someone the family didn’t want to mention. A childminder? Might there have been a… a relative or a neighbour who was looking after Alex, and who…” The words tailed off but Paul could tell from the rapid darting of her eyes that they carried on inside her head where most of this argument seemed to be taking place.
“It might be worth exploring,” he said warily. “If there’s something you know, or even suspect, I’ll be happy to…” He was going to say “pass it along” – to the partners, to Mr Pritchard. But that wasn’t what he wanted to tell her at all. “I’ll be happy to investigate for you.” There you go. He’d put it right out there for her. Maybe she saw it, maybe she didn’t, but he’d said it.
“I want to see the autopsy report,” Moulson told him. “Would that be possible?”
“Of course. But I already gave you all the pertinent—”
“Yes, you did. You gave me a very clear summary. But I’d like to see it please. Actually I’d like to see everything. Photocopies of all the statements, and the trial transcript, and… whatever you’ve got.”
Paul made a note. “All right.” His hand shook just a little. After all the months of stonewalling, Moulson was engaging with her defence at last. That meant he’d be seeing more of her. More was fine in his opinion. More was excellent. This meeting was going very strangely, and he was sure he was missing a lot, but just being with her was lifting him on to another plane. He knew he would start to feel depressed as soon as he walked out of this room, and be depleted and fretful and dull until he was back here.
“What else are you looking at?” Moulson asked him.
He floundered a little. “Well, the broader… technicalities. Formal parameters. Strictly speaking we’re outside the limit for filing an appeal. In light of your medical condition over the past few weeks, we’re sure we can get around that, but we’ll probably have to take it to a hearing so the CPS can state a position too.”
Moulson did that thing again, striking off at a tangent so he didn’t know if she’d been listening to him at all. “When can you get me those papers?”
“Tomorrow,” he promised rashly. “I’ll have the copies made when I get back to the office and courier them to you. And then I can… I can come up again and go over them with you. In case there are any areas you don’t completely understand.”
“I’d like that. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. I’ll put down in my notes that you’ve made a request to that effect.”
Which was stretching the truth more than a little, but Moulson didn’t protest the point. Qui tacet consentire. If you don’t say no, you just said yes.
He had to go. His time had been up half an hour ago and he was amazed that nobody had come. He stood and held out his hand. Moulson took it.
“Thank you,” she said again. “I’ll see you soon then.”
Paul was careful not to hold on to her hand for longer than was appropriate. The contact was electrifying, of course it was, but nothing showed in his face. He walked out briskly, resisting the urge to look back at her.
But all the way through the checkpoints, to the gate, across the fell, down to London and the banal exigencies of his job, he was looking at her beautiful face in his mind’s eye and hearing her hoarse, half-broken voice whispering in his ear.
I feel safe.
In your hands.
Paul, I feel so safe in your hands.
41
Jess sat in the interview room after Levine had left, waiting for a guard to come and take her back across the yard to Goodall block.
She felt a little stunned. More than a little. She’d agreed to the meeting so she could start delivering on her promise – to find Alex Beech’s friend and Alex Beech’s torturer. But she’d gone running into a tripwire before she’d even got into her stride.
It was the smoke that killed him.
Of course it was. And she had known that. She remembered the salient points of the evidence in court, although she’d barely taken them in at the time. Smoke damage in Alex’s lungs. Soot deposits in his airway below the level of his vocal cords. Carbon monoxide in his blood. It was cut and dried. If there’d been any doubt at all, it would have come out at the trial, but there wasn’t.
Jess, I died because she hurt me!
The vehemence in the words made her wince. She didn’t look up. She could feel Alex standing at her side, but she knew he wouldn’t be visible in the bright sunlight streaming through the window.
“No, Alex. You died in the fire. Your body was examined by experts. There’s no way they could be mistaken.”
They could be lying though.
Jess shook her head. “Why would they lie?”
I don’t know. Because they’re scared of her.
“Scared of… You mean the bad girl? The one who cut you?”
Yes. They might be scared she’ll cut them too.
“I don’t think they’re scared of the bad girl.” Jess said it as softly as she could, trying to let him down gently. She’d thought he was the best authority on the manner of his own death, but there was no gainsaying this. He had to be mistaken. “There’s a person called the coroner, whose job is to—”
If they’re not scared, then they’re hiding something. That’s what the police do. They hide things. They make it look like you did something wrong when you didn’t, and they make it look like they’re always right.
His grimly matter-of-fact tone surprised her. It sounded as though he was talking from experience, although it couldn’t be his own. Was there some history of criminality in the family? Was there a memory there of some clash between his parents and the law where he’d been a piece of collateral damage?
Jess weighed up all the things Levine had just told her and finally, deliberately, set them aside. She wanted to do right by Alex. It was the only thing she wanted right then. Anything she might choose to do with the rest of her life – which she’d only just got back, thanks to him – could go on the back burner and stay there.
She was starting to be afraid that the bad girl was just something he’d dreamed. But she would keep on looking all the same, until he told her to stop.
42
As for the governor, his whole life was like a dream at this point.