The Fall - By Claire McGowan

Part Six



Charlotte

Dan’s trial started on a Monday in October. Reporters gathered early at the Crown Court, setting up camp on the wet morning streets, among the hum of street-cleaners pushing machines. There were TV, radio and newspaper reporters, everyone agog for this one case of a wealthy banker who’d slipped, and fallen. Charlotte, trembling and white, arrived in a taxi at the back entrance, all pipes and concrete, and was led through bleach-smelling corridors to the witness room. As she sat there with her empty stomach churning over and over, she could hear the next-door room begin to fill. She heard the clatter and stamp of feet and dry coughs and murmurs. Still she sat, head down, staring at her feet. The floor was the same, the speckled plastic, the little islands. Charlotte closed her eyes, breathing deeply, trying not to pass out.

She heard a swell of shouting that rose and died away. Now they would be bringing in Daniel Stockbridge, possible murderer, disgraced banker, and her fiancé. If he was even that any more. So long since she had seen him. She shut down the memory of kissing Matthew Hegarty, of pressing herself in so close she could breathe him. She hadn’t spoken to him since then. Not now. This wasn’t the time.

She knew Kylie was planning to start right off with a plea for a mistrial, based on the huge amount of media speculation into the case. How could it be a fair trial when they were calling him a Banker Butcher? But as she waited, nothing happened. It must have been turned down.

She waited. Right now, she knew, they’d be doing the plea. And if he said he was guilty – if he did what he’d threatened to do – they would all be going home and that would be that. Charlotte held her breath: Oh, please, no.

The door opened and in came one of the guards, hair combed over his bald skull. She looked up, her heart in her mouth. ‘Is it . . .’

He shook his head. ‘They’ve called you, miss.’ She breathed out. Thank God. He’d pleaded Not Guilty. She stood up and her legs buckled.

‘OK, miss?’

‘Yeah. Yes, I’ll manage.’ She willed herself to walk.

As Charlotte went in, a murmur went up. Scarlet, she kept her eyes on the floor. One step, then another, like Dan had said.

She looked up at the dizzying heights, the seats where the spectators sat, the seal of law on the wall. Into this room Dan had come to receive an idea of justice. These people, the row of faces in the jury box, would look only at the facts as they were packaged by Kylie and the prosecuting lawyer. They’d choose which package they liked best. They’d judge.

Dan had on his five-thousand-pound Prada suit, which his mother had delivered to him in prison. He stood up straight in the dock, but the difference in him was shocking. His tanned skin had turned yellow from months inside, like an old dried-out tea bag. She could see what looked like a healing bruise over his eye, and his hair had been cut severely short. Dan was vain about his hair and this shocked her more than the rest, that he could let it be cut so badly, all tufts and patches. He looked like someone else. His eyes roamed, dazed, and found her sitting there. What she saw hurt her so much she was the first to look down.

There was the judge, a white-haired cliché of a man, brisk and no-nonsense. He had a wig over his own white hair. Then there was a whole lot of preamble, Kylie standing up in her robes and white wig and the prosecuting lawyer, Adam Hunt QC.

There was a pause. Then Adam Hunt QC was looking right at her. She swallowed hard; it was like being caught in class. ‘The Crown calls Miss Charlotte Miller.’

That was her. She got up, feeling her hot legs stick to the seat in nervous sweat. She walked over the floor in her clip-clopping heels. She sat down in the box, did her swearing on the Bible, confirmed her name and address. It was like being on the stage, a sea of heads swimming before her. Her hands felt slick and cold.

Adam Hunt was waiting to question her. ‘How do you know Mr Stockbridge?’

She cleared her throat. ‘I was his fiancée. I am, I mean.’

‘You still are?’

She scanned the crowd; there were Dan’s parents, and Sarah, but no Matthew Hegarty. ‘Yes,’ she said, licking her lips. She didn’t look at Dan but heard him sigh across the space of polished wood.

‘Can you explain what happened on the night in question?’

‘Dan and I went out to a club in Camden. It was some kind of Jamaican place . . . we were meant to go there on our honeymoon.’ She explained how she’d come home that day, and Dan was there, and what he’d told her, their decision to go out. Dan didn’t look up once as she spoke.

‘So you went with your fiancé to the Kingston Town club, is that correct?’

She nodded, then, remembering she had to speak out loud, said, ‘Yes.’

‘How would you describe his behaviour?’

She glanced over; Dan’s head was bowed. ‘He was very upset at first. But after that he seemed better, I thought.’

‘Was anything else influencing your behaviour that night?’

She cringed. ‘We – Dan brought home some cocaine.’

‘You took illegal drugs, is that correct?’

‘Well, yes, but—’ She looked at Kylie – Just answer the questions. ‘Yes.’

‘Do you regularly take drugs, Miss Miller?’

‘No. I don’t.’ Don’t sound defensive, Kylie had said, but honestly, it was hard.

‘Tell the court what happened with Mr Johnson. Did you witness anything out of the ordinary?’

‘Well,’ she hesitated. ‘Not really. I went to the ladies’, and when I came back I saw Dan talking to him. Then they went off – to the office, I think.’

‘What did you do then?’

‘I got our coats, and went to wait outside. Then Dan came, and we went home. He seemed fine. I didn’t notice anything strange.’

‘How long was he gone?’

‘Not long at all. Just a few minutes.’

Adam Hunt narrowed his eyes at her. ‘You’re sure about that? The court has seen taxi records and CCTV, which indicate it was more than ten minutes, Miss Miller.’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Can you tell us, Miss Miller, about your journey home?’

She said nothing.

‘Miss Miller?’

‘No. I . . . I don’t really remember it, you see.’

‘You said in your first statement: “It’s a bit hazy, I wasn’t used to drugs.” Is that correct?’

She blushed. This was awful, your drunken ramblings dragged out for all to hear. ‘Yes. But I remember the rest of it. The rest of the night. I remember he was fine.’

‘Hmm. All right, Miss Miller, that’s all for now.’

The judge raised his head. ‘Miss McCausland, your witness.’

Kylie got up, not making much difference in her height, since she was barely five feet tall. ‘Miss Miller.’ She gave Charlotte a quick flickering wink, almost unnoticeable, and Charlotte had to bite down a sudden nervous laugh. ‘At the time of Mr Johnson’s death, you were about to be married to Mr Stockbridge?’

‘It was meant to be a week later, yes.’

‘And this was cancelled after the arrest?’

‘Postponed.’ She lifted her chin, trying to believe it was true.

‘Miss Miller, you’ve commented in papers recently about this case. Why did you do that?’

‘I felt I had to. I don’t believe Dan could ever have done something like this – not kill someone. I’m so afraid a mistake’s been made.’

‘Yet Mr Stockbridge admitted to throwing a punch at the victim. Could you imagine that?’

‘Well, maybe. He was very upset that night, very humiliated.’

Kylie let that sink in, not commenting either way. ‘While you waited for Mr Stockbridge outside, did anything happen?’ She kept the question bland, not leading.

‘A man pushed past me. I think he was running.’ She said it firmly, because it was true, wasn’t it? She remembered – mostly.

‘Did you get a good look at this man?’

‘Not really. It was a white man. He had a shaved head, I think.’

‘Well.’ Kylie’s eyes opened wide and blue at the jury. Here was a new angle. ‘Let’s proceed. Miss Miller, you have since lost your job, I believe – can you say why?’

‘I was very upset over Dan,’ she said. She couldn’t help but look at him, yellow and hunched. He didn’t know she’d been fired.

‘And what have you done for money?’

‘I’m working as a waitress,’ Charlotte said defiantly. Let them judge her. ‘And I sold my engagement ring.’

‘So it’s fair to say you lost your wedding, your ring, your job, and you were also followed, harassed at home. Yes?’

‘Yes.’

‘Let me ask you, Miss Miller. After all this, do you still want to marry Mr Stockbridge?’ She was deliberately not calling him ‘the defendant’.

‘How is this relevant, my Lord?’ said Adam Hunt QC.

Kylie’s eyes went wide again. ‘Love? I’d say that’s always relevant, my Lord.’

There were titters of laughter round the room.

‘Get on with it, Miss McCausland,’ said the judge drily.

‘Miss Miller, do you?’

Charlotte scanned the room again, and there he was, down the back near the door. His green eyes found her and she felt hot and cold. Oh, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.

‘Of course,’ she said, not looking at Hegarty. ‘Of course I do.’

Adam Hunt QC rose again, irritated. ‘This man you say pushed you, Miss Miller. You were, were you not, in an intoxicated state at the time?’

‘I said I was. Yes.’

‘So you can’t be sure.’

Charlotte made herself smile. ‘As sure as I can be about anything I’m saying.’

‘Hmm. That’s all. Thank you.’


Hegarty

Hegarty didn’t take much to this Adam Hunt. The lawyer was nice, as if he wanted to show he respected the police, but it wasn’t real respect, because he was a lawyer and Hegarty just a DC.

‘Good morning, Officer,’ he said, with his lizardy smile. It was the second day of the trial, and the courtroom was hushed. ‘You were the arresting officer on the Kingston Town case, is that correct?’

‘I was.’ Christ, Stockbridge looked even worse than before. In the gallery sat Charlotte, pale and worried. Opposite, Adam Hunt and Kylie, watching.

‘Can you talk us through what happened that night?’

Hegarty went through it, the call to the station that sent him rushing down to the club, the office with the man, wondering for a second was he still alive, blundering in. All the blood spattered on the floor in little round drops.

‘So, to summarise, you answered an emergency call as you were in the area.’

‘Yes.’

‘And when you went in, what did you see?’

‘Blood. Lots of blood.’ He remembered how the red of it had shocked him. It was so red it looked fake, like ketchup. ‘We ascertained that the victim had been stabbed in the neck, most likely with a broken bottle, severing his c . . .’ shit, he’d forgotten the right word ‘. . . the artery in the neck, and he bled to death within minutes.’

‘Did you find the bottle in question?’

‘We recovered a Red Stripe beer bottle from the scene.’

‘And did you fingerprint it?’

‘Yes.’

‘And?’ Hunt looked impatient.

‘The prints matched the defendant’s.’

A murmur went up; Hegarty saw Charlotte flinch.

‘I see.’ Up went Hunt’s eyebrows. ‘Was there anything else to link the defendant to the scene?’

‘The CCTV, several witnesses, and his credit card was found actually in the office, on the desk.’

Hunt turned to the judge. ‘My Lord, statements were taken from a Miss Rachel Johnson, the victim’s sister, who was present on the night. Miss Johnson was too upset to appear before the court, but you will find her statement in your dossier about the row over the credit card in question, and how the defendant made racist comments to the victim.’

Hegarty was increasingly doubting what Rachel had said, but he kept quiet.

‘Then what happened?’

‘I proceeded to the defendant’s residence, cautioned him, and made the arrest.’

‘Did the defendant reply to the charge?’

‘Mr Stockbridge said, “It’s that guy from the club.” ’ Hegarty read from his notebook.

‘Was anyone else there?’

‘Yes. Miss Miller – his, er, his fiancée. She was upset. She said, “I don’t even do drugs”.’ He held his tongue to keep from defending Charlotte, and did his best not to look over to where she sat. ‘Mr Stockbridge was taken to the station where he gave fingerprints, and was questioned. He admitted punching Mr Johnson, but said he then left. I then showed him pictures taken at the scene of the death.’

‘And what was his reaction?’

Hegarty cleared his throat. ‘It was my opinion that he was genuinely shocked to learn the victim was dead. He said, “But it was only a light punch”.’

‘Interview transcripts are available in your packs, my Lord, ladies and gentlemen. At this time, Officer, was the defendant protesting his innocence?’

‘Yes. He appeared to be very surprised by the arrest.’

‘And did he continue to protest so?’

‘Er, not entirely. He said he might have had some kind of blackout.’

Here the judge interrupted. ‘Mr Hunt, it would be useful here to clarify what is medically meant by “blacking out”. As I understand it, this term is rather meaningless.’

There was then a lot of talking and shuffling of papers. Hegarty stopped listening, looking the whole time at Charlotte’s bent fair head. She looked miserable; so did Stockbridge. The man stared at his feet but his hands were visibly trembling.

The judge was still talking. ‘So we can enter that the defendant had some kind of stress-induced memory loss, can we describe it so? Miss McCausland?’

He was speaking to Kylie. She blinked calmly. ‘That is acceptable to the defence, my Lord.’

Hunt finally came back to Hegarty. ‘You took statements from the defendant’s former place of work, I believe. Could you please summarise these for us, Officer?’

Bloody hell, he wished he couldn’t. ‘Well, there was a complaint on record from a former colleague.’

‘And the nature?’

‘Bullying,’ said Hegarty reluctantly. ‘Racist bullying, was the claim. But it was the team, not—’

‘Just a brief summary, please, Officer. No further questions. Thank you.’

F*ck. Charlotte must hate him. He looked around for her, but couldn’t see her face.

Next Kylie stood up, pulling her too-big robes round her like a little girl on Bring-your-daughter-to-work Day. ‘Officer Hegarty,’ she said softly, and tipped him her quick wink. ‘You found prints on the bottle. This was the drink that Mr Stockbridge was trying to pay for with his declined credit card, was it?’

‘I believe so, yes.’

‘Wouldn’t his prints be on it from that, then?’

‘Yes, of course they would be.’

‘My client was at the scene, obviously, that is not in dispute. He touched the bottle, obviously – it was his drink. He got into a row, picked up the drink, and followed Mr Johnson to his office. He then came out several minutes later, and was captured on CCTV exiting and meeting his fiancée. Taxi records show they then went home. Is that an accurate summary of the facts?’

‘I suppose so.’

‘You said there was a lot of blood, Officer.’ Her voice was soft. ‘Would you expect the perpetrator then to be sprayed with it?’

Hunt stood up. ‘My Lord, the witness is not forensically trained.’

Kylie looked innocent. ‘He is an experienced police officer, my Lord.’

‘Proceed.’ The judge didn’t look up.

Hegarty said, ‘In my experience, yes. Usually.’

‘Did you find any on my client’s clothes?’

‘A small drip on his sleeve.’

‘Which might be consistent with the sort of light punch my client admitted to?’

‘Objection! This is not the witness’s area of expertise!’

Kylie just smiled. ‘Withdrawn. You yourself contaminated the defendant’s home, did you not, Officer?’

‘Yes, I inadvertently tracked in some blood during the arrest, but it was catalogued and disregarded.’

‘My Lord, you will find in your pack a statement from the taxi driver who took the couple home. Like Miss Miller, he also noticed nothing odd, certainly not the copious sprays of blood that the scene shows came from the victim.’

‘Get on with it, Counsel.’ The judge was tetchy.

She smiled. ‘R-i-i-ght. The HR report you found, Officer. Was this against my client only?’

‘No, it was more about the atmosphere in the bank generally.’

‘Where is this report you refer to?’ The judge was leafing through his papers.

Oh,’ said Kylie, mock-innocent. ‘Did the prosecution fail to include this paper?’

‘I will see that the report is submitted, my Lord,’ said Hunt quickly.

‘Do so. And in future kindly do not call on a report which the court has not seen.’

Slight titters. Hegarty smiled, but lost it quickly when he caught a glimpse of Stockbridge out of the corner of his eye. The man was swaying; he looked as if he might collapse at any moment.


Keisha

The last kid had already come streaming out of the primary school, but there was no sign of Ruby. The bushes were dry, half-dead compared to when Keisha had hidden in them back in June. Covered in the dust of a long London summer.

Well, the kid wasn’t there today. Was she sick? Had they moved her? Keisha had no idea. She pushed her way out from the wall and walked away from the school. Where to go now? She didn’t want to go home – there was too much she was hiding from Charlotte. The club door, and – well, other things.

Where else? She couldn’t go to work; in fact, she’d rung in sick the last few days. Afraid to see Ron and have to explain what she couldn’t even understand herself. Afraid he’d kiss her again, afraid he never would if he knew what she’d done.

Shit, coppers! Keisha flattened herself into a shop doorway as on the other side of the road two officers went by. Yellow vests. Community Support, but still. She was staying well away. They could get you too, Chris had said. She didn’t want to think about that, or anything he’d said. Best to lie low.

Keisha walked on, and after a while, she wasn’t really surprised to find herself opposite the Church of Holy Hope. Maybe it was the last place that reminded her of Mercy, with the house gone. She slipped in the open doors – they left churches open, it seemed – and sat down at the back on one of the plastic chairs. The building hummed round her, empty and quiet, homemade God-bothering posters peeling off the wall.

She thought about Charlotte, how she was spending all her time rushing round with Dan’s parents, doing interviews, swotting up on what happened at court each day. Keisha hadn’t even gone yet. She’d stopped asking how it was going. She heard Charlotte crying at night; that told her pretty much everything she needed to know. Meanwhile all the shit in the papers went on, even though the judge had told them to stop. They didn’t stop.

‘Mum,’ she whispered. ‘I need some help.’ Of course, nothing. Then she heard a noise and nearly jumped out of her skin. ‘Jesus!’

‘No, only myself, I fear.’ It was the pastor. He had slippers on his feet. ‘It’s young Keisha, is it? Sister Mercy’s child.’

‘Yeah, that’s me.’ She wanted to explain what she was doing there, but realised she couldn’t.

He sat down beside her, joints creaking. She stared up at the altar, glowing slightly with security lighting. ‘What’s it for?’ she said out loud. ‘Why do people come here?’

He rearranged his empty sleeve. ‘Many reasons – comfort, company. Why have you come?’

‘Dunno.’

‘For answers, perhaps? For help?’

‘I want to know what I should do.’ She was speaking quietly in the silent room. ‘You see, there’s this thing – a thing people want me to do. But I don’t know if I should do it or not.’

‘But I think you already know what the right thing is. We always do.’

She stared hard ahead. ‘I’m scared.’

‘It’s normal.’ He held up the sleeve. ‘You have seen this? This hand was taken from me because I did what I thought I should. Yes, I said, not, No. I was scared then, when they brought the machete.’

She wanted to say, Yeah, but, you were probably in a war or something, not North London. ‘I can’t be brave like that.’

‘You don’t know if you can be brave until you have to. I promise you, there is no way to know.’

‘Oh, great.’

He laughed quietly and got up, laying his good hand on her shoulder. She smelled his fusty smell.

Keisha sat for a while in the cool dark of the church, then got up and ventured out to the noise of the thundering traffic. If she got there before six it would be OK, she thought.

The library was still open when she arrived, the windows glowing warm and orange. She’d been worried Julie mightn’t be in, but there she was, stamping books behind the desk. It was a sign, if you believed in things like that. ‘Ah, it’s you! “Shondra.” ’

‘Yep. Back again.’ Keisha grinned nervously.

‘Don’t tell me, you wanted to read Jordan’s next autobiography. How you doing?

‘I’m all right.’ She realised that she still had no real home, no proper job, and no Ruby, but somehow she was better than when she’d last seen Julie. She wasn’t sure how, but she was. ‘Surviving.’

Julie peered over her glasses. ‘Course you are. What can I do you for?’

‘Well.’ Keisha leaned over the counter on her elbows. ‘You got any legal books?’

Julie pushed back her wheely chair. ‘Finally! I told you life was exciting here.’


Charlotte

Jamie checked his watch for the third time. ‘We should just make it. These people don’t hang about, you know.’ The heel of Charlotte’s stiletto caught in the lift door as she got in, it was so long since she’d worn them. Her brother caught her arm. ‘Careful.’

As the lift soared silently up, out of the glass walls Charlotte could see palaces of steel and light, reflected in the rough grey water of the docks. Down below, small figures hurried, tapping into phones, oblivious. Had Dan really been one of them just months ago?

‘You ready?’ Jamie cast a critical eye over her, red-faced from rushing from court, roots growing through. We’re so far away from what we were, she thought, the two of them zooming up this tunnel of light. Dan had always said the higher you went in Haussmann’s, the more important you were. On the very top floor were the executives, god-like, alighting in helicopters. She fidgeted with her hair in the mirrored door.

‘Calm down. You can’t show fear.’

‘But I’m scared.’

‘Well, don’t be. This happens all the time here. It’s routine.’ He was twiddling with his own BlackBerry.

Routine. The rapid collapse of her life and Dan’s, being forced to sue the place where he’d worked for eight years, that was routine? No wonder Dan had gone into shock when he thought all this was falling down: it was like a small city, she thought, as they swished past floors and floors of plush carpet and glass. A city with its own laws. Its own punishments.

The lift voice said, ‘Thirty-second floor.’ If not quite top-floor material, they were certainly up there. Jamie put his hand out to hold the door. ‘This is it. Sure you want to do it?’

‘Of course. Why?’

‘It’s just – it doesn’t sound like the trial’s going so well. And when I saw him at the prison, well, I told you. He’s not looking too good.’

She pushed out. ‘It’ll be fine. He hasn’t had a chance to speak yet. You’ll see. Come on.’

They were ushered into a hushed boardroom by one of the sleek smiling women who seemed to run these places. Charlotte gaped at the floor-to-ceiling views of the city, the sun sinking over the O2 dome.

‘Don’t fidget,’ said Jamie, taking out his files.

But she was worried. These people had ruled Dan’s life. Through the glass walls she saw a bald man with a moustache look their way, talking to the receptionist. ‘Oh my God, Jamie, look.’

‘Yeah,’ Jamie whispered. ‘I know. He does look exactly like Phil.’

She couldn’t help but let out a nervous trill of laughter, and Jamie’s tired face creased, and they had to smother their giggles as the man who looked so much like their step-father came towards them.

Just like in court, Charlotte couldn’t follow much of what was being said in the meeting. Yes, she told them, Dan had appeared stressed for months, sleeping badly, snapping easily.

The suits looked unmoved. They’d already talked about the responsibility of employees to ‘manage their own stress’. ‘We don’t require anyone to work more than EU laws state,’ said Moustache Man, pompously. He had the stale breath of the corporate luncher.

‘That’s rubbish,’ Charlotte burst out. ‘Dan knew he’d be fired if he didn’t do at least sixty hours a week.’

‘You will find nowhere that’s stated, Miss Miller.’

‘You don’t have to write it down to make it true.’

Jamie gave her a warning look. ‘Why don’t you go and grab a coffee, Charlotte? We’ll go over some figures here.’

‘Well, OK.’ Glad to get out of the stuffy room, she flounced to the ladies’ and splashed cold water carefully over her make-up. She kept imagining how Dan would have felt, stuck inside this steel box all day, watching clouds dissolve into the water. Maybe prison wouldn’t seem so strange if you’d been locked up here for years. She tried to remember why she was here. Dan needed something from these people, and she had to get it for him. She had to help him.

In the reception area there was a familiar face, leaning over the desk at the girl. ‘Hello, Alex,’ she heard herself say. It was almost funny, how he looked. As if he’d seen a ghost.

‘Charlotte! How are you?’

She stepped back in case he tried to kiss her cheek. ‘Not great, my fiancé’s in jail.’

‘Yes – um, how’s he doing?’ Alex Carter, Dan’s former boss, fiddled with the knot on his tie.

‘How do you think? You can always go and visit, if you want to know.’

‘Yes, well. I must get back.’

She raised her voice. ‘You don’t blame yourself then, Alex?’

‘Me?’

‘I know you gave him the coke in the first place. I know you gave stuff to the police – his HR record, told them all about his blackouts. I know why you did it, too.’

His head swivelled frantically. ‘Er, I’m not sure—’

‘He had stuff on you, right?’

‘Charlotte!’ he hissed. ‘Stop this.’

She spoke quietly. ‘I’ll keep my voice down if you help him.’

‘But how? I can’t . . .’

‘In there.’ She nodded at the boardroom. ‘I know you can influence it. Don’t you think Dan deserves something, since you all hung him out to dry?’

‘I—’

‘He told me what goes on here,’ she risked. Her heart was pounding. ‘I’ve got his documents and everything. I can tell the police, you know.’

‘I’ve no idea what you mean. Of course it’s against our terms of employment to take confidential papers from the office . . .’

‘Good job you already fired him, then.’

The man’s mouth twisted. There was a film of oil over his forehead. ‘I don’t know what you mean. Charlotte, I can see you’re upset.’

‘Of course I’m bloody upset!’ Her whisper was vicious. ‘You set him up. You leaked all that stuff to the papers, that racism stuff. I know you did.’

He dipped his eyes, professional cool coming down like a curtain. ‘Of course we want to help Dan. We’ll do what we can – of course we will. But you must see we’re under no obligation.’

Charlotte stood looking at this corporate man, his rumpled pink shirt, his face sagging. It was like looking at what Dan might have been in five years, if he hadn’t fallen so far. It was a long way down from the top floor. A long way to fall.

As she turned to go back to the boardroom, she wondered if DC Hegarty might like to take a look at the papers she’d found hidden in Dan’s desk.


Hegarty

The judge looked sternly down on the courtroom. ‘It is unfortunate that I must once again remind members of the press to remember their obligations in reporting this case. If this carries on, it would not be the first time I have held one of your members in contempt.’

Then there was a lot of chat with the jury about whether they’d heard some TV report the day before. Hegarty shifted in his seat. It was a warm and muggy day, and already the atmosphere in the courtroom was like Golden Syrup.

They were still bogged down in a long array of Forensics witnesses. Today’s was an Asian woman (deliberate, of course), who wore a short skirt that got the male members of the jury paying attention. Dr Amit gave evidence about the death of Anthony Johnson, which had been quick but perhaps not quick enough. She had a handy PowerPoint diagram and a laser-pointer. ‘The bottle penetrated here, severing the carotid artery. That’s the artery carrying blood and oxygen to the brain. It pumps at a very high pressure, and so if severed it’s extremely messy.’ She shook back her glossy hair, eyeing the jury. ‘You can see from these crime-scene photos that the splashback was considerable.’

As the pictures flashed up, several people groaned and turned away. Hegarty himself closed his eyes slightly. He’d seen it first-hand, after all, the spatters up the walls and door and the dark pool oozing over the floor. Dr Amit then concisely outlined how they’d found a broken bottle, matched it to the shards in Anthony Johnson’s neck, and identified Daniel Stockbridge’s prints. ‘We can also tell,’ she said with a flourish, ‘that the direction of the wounds suggest the attacker was some inches taller than the victim, perhaps six feet tall or more.’ All eyes swivelled to Stockbridge, who even with his head bowed in the dock clearly fitted this description.

During this testimony Adam Hunt said little, nodding with a tiny smile on his face. When Kylie got up Hegarty could almost hear her take a deep breath. This wouldn’t be easy to recover from.

‘Dr Amit,’ she began. ‘Your lab analysed the clothes Mr Stockbridge wore that night, is that correct? Did you find blood on them?’

‘Just a small drop on his sleeve.’

Kylie eyeballed the jury as she asked, ‘But in your model a large amount of blood came from the victim?’

But Dr Amit had her own theories on why Daniel Stockbridge could have got away without being splashed in blood. ‘In one scenario, the victim was left with a shard in his neck, effectively plugging the wound. This would have given the defendant time to leave the room. The victim then most likely attempted to remove the shard – and tragically, this would have been what killed him. We see evidence of this kind of “plugging” in many trauma cases . . .’

Kylie did her best, but it was clear this round was lost.

As the court adjourned, Hegarty was about to race off, late for his night-shift. Then he saw Charlotte standing in the lobby, pale as milk. They hadn’t spoken in weeks, not since that day at his house. ‘Hiya.’

She looked at her shoes. ‘Hi.’

‘I . . . er, I went to see that Alex Carter, like you said. Bit of a twat, eh?’

‘I never liked him. He tried to grope me once. Never told Dan.’ She still didn’t look at him. Hegarty waited to see would she say anything else, about the kiss, about him. Anything. She rubbed at her bare arms in the evening air. Nothing.

‘So anyway, I’ve passed the papers on to the Fraud Squad for now, to look into.’

‘Thanks.’

‘See you, then,’ he said.

‘See you.’

He watched her walk away.

After the night-shift – the usual round of drunks and fights and screaming women – Hegarty went round the corner to the pub that opened at six, catering for those dregs of humanity who couldn’t wait till lunchtime for a drink. Them, and off-duty policemen. Because what did you do when you were so full of doubts you could hardly think? Drowned them, to start off with.

The morning rain washed vomit off the pavements as Hegarty sat hunched by the bar, hoping the other sad-eyed punters also wanted to get drunk alone.

‘You’re a hard man to find.’ Kylie was standing in the door, shaking drops off her umbrella. There was rain in her hair, curled damply on the shoulders of her coat.

‘That’s the idea.’ He took a sip. Whisky wasn’t really his drink.

‘Liquid breakfast, huh? Not a good sign, Officer.’

‘It’s evening to me.’ He looked solidly ahead; maybe if he ignored her she’d go away.

In the bar mirror he saw her struggle on to the high stool. Her feet didn’t touch the floor. ‘I’ll have what he’s having,’ she said to the barman.

Hegarty looked at her in the mirror, curious despite himself. Who was this strange woman, tiny as a child, drinking whisky at seven a.m.?

She gulped hers without grimacing. ‘So, how come you’re hiding out in this dive?’

He looked round him, the harsh wet light showing up the shabby seats, dirty carpet, fruit machines. ‘Not hiding.’

‘Still upset about the papers getting into you? I’m sure Charlie didn’t mean it to turn out like that. You know the press.’ She met his eyes in the mirror. ‘She’ll call you, I’d put money on it. After all this is over.’

He shrugged. ‘You came to tell me that?’

‘No.’ She put down her glass. ‘Hate to say it, but I need your help.’

‘Really.’

‘Yep. Look, I know you’re not exactly my biggest fan—’

‘You could say that.’

‘But I got to tell you, I’m getting worried.’

He turned to her, surprised. He’d never heard her be anything but annoyingly upbeat about Dan’s case. ‘You think he’ll go down?’

‘All the evidence, it sounds pretty bad when they read it out. And he’s a banker . . . he sounds posh. No one likes a banker right now. I need our Keisha to testify, really. But so far, she won’t. And if you arrested her, say, she’d probably lie, let’s be honest.’

He sighed. It wasn’t his problem. He just brought them in. Didn’t he?

Kylie was watching him very closely. ‘There’s something else, isn’t there? Something I’m missing. I know you didn’t check the CCTV across the street in time – it’s wiped now. I know you couldn’t find the taxi that took Chris Dean home – if it ever existed. What else?’

He drank more whisky. ‘Should you not be – well, looking more closely at the evidence in favour of your client?’

‘You got a problem with this approach?’

‘Yes, actually. Seems you’re going for police incompetence instead of acquittal.’

She took a gulp of her drink, smiling that annoying smile. ‘That, diminished responsibility due to blackout – I’ll try what I can.’

‘But I thought your case was that he didn’t do it.’

She scraped back her wet hair. ‘You believe in the truth, Officer?’

‘Dunno what you mean.’

‘I mean, I see one thing, you see another. You know that story about the elephant in the dark? One person says it’s a wall, one says it’s a snake. Our Charlie, she thinks he didn’t do it. Why? ’Cos he’s her man. I believe her, or I wouldn’t be here. But you and me and the judge and jury, we’ll never know for sure, will we? So, I have to go down every road that might be the right one. That’s my job. It’s the jury who have to decide, not us, yeah?’

He remembered what his dad had said: You just bring ’em in, lad. Not his job to decide on what really happened. He sighed. Wished for a moment he’d never had to meet this annoying Australian, never stepped into that office full of blood, never set eyes on Charlotte Miller.

‘Hegarty – come on! Did you do anything wrong? If you did, now’s the time to admit it – before it’s too late.’

Hegarty took another mouthful of whisky and pushed it away; he wasn’t going to finish it. ‘It’s my career, you know.’

‘I know. I know it is, but . . .’

He thought of Charlotte in his flat, stepping up to him, the smell of her hair. His mouth on the warmth of her throat. He said, ‘There was a back door.’

‘Hmm?’ He’d spoken so quietly, she hadn’t heard.

He said it louder. ‘There’s a back door to the club. It’s in an alley behind the place. We never checked if it was locked that night.’

‘So you’re saying someone could have got in that way?’

‘I dunno. If it was open, maybe.’

Kylie seized her bag, grabbing tissues and mints and lip balm as they fell out. ‘You’re a life-saver, you know that?’ She saw his face and paused. ‘I’m sorry. But it’s the right thing. You know it is.’

She went, and Hegarty was left alone with his whisky, and his own eyes in the bar mirror that he couldn’t quite meet.