The Redeemed

CHAPTER 22




The train slowed to a painful crawl through the dismal London suburbs and arrived in Paddington late, leaving Jenny just fifteen minutes for the cab ride across the centre of town to the Royal Courts in the Strand. And then there was the time it would take to clear the security check and find her way through the labyrinth of corridors to Mr Justice Laithwaite's chambers. She called Alison and pleaded with her to contact his clerk to beg for ten minutes' grace. She promised to try, but called back almost immediately to say that her request had been refused: the judge had a car waiting and would be leaving if she wasn't in his office at two on the dot. The taxi came to a dead halt on the Euston Road. It was the roadworks at King's Cross, the cabbie said, decorating his speech with expletives, you'd spend half an hour in a jam and find the lazy sods having a smoke and scratching themselves. If she was in a hurry, she'd do better by tube.

Damn. Jenny shoved a twenty-pound note through the slide window and jumped out between the three static lanes of traffic. Dodging the motorcycle couriers, she made it to the pavement and ran through the slow-moving tourists to

Baker Street underground station.





It was nearing three o'clock when she arrived, perspiring and out of breath, in the welcome cool of the Cromwell Hospital's reception area. Jenny approached the long, blond- wood reception desk and spoke to a receptionist.

'Could you tell me if Mr Justice Laithwaite has booked in? I need to see him immediately.'

The young woman tapped on her computer.

'Your name, please.'

'Jenny Cooper. Severn Vale District Coroner. It's a professional matter.'

Unimpressed, the girl ran her eyes over a list of patients. 'I'm afraid he's not checked in yet. You're welcome to wait in the lounge.'

Jenny stepped away from the desk and pondered the etiquette of buttonholing a sick judge on his way into hospital. She wasn't even sure what points of law she would argue; in the rush for the train there had been no time to consult textbooks.

'Are you quite sure? My surgeon assured me ten days. Well, could you please make enquiries? I'll need to speak to my insurers.'

Jenny noticed the small, round man in the beige linen suit for the first time. He was getting testy with a receptionist at the far end of the desk.

'Mr Justice Laithwaite?'

He snapped round with a startled expression.

'Jenny Cooper. Severn Vale District Coroner.'

'Good God.'

'I'm sorry to disturb you — '

'Really, this is hardly the time — '

'I know, Judge, but my inquest into the death of Eva Donaldson has reached a critical stage. I only learned this morning that you granted an injunction forbidding any disclosure of her private documents or affairs. I need to know what's in that material.'

'The moment to discuss this was at two o'clock.'

'I had to come from Bristol.'

'I'm no longer available, Mrs Cooper.'

'Judge, I need an order lifting the injunction for the purposes of my inquest. It's a formality—'

'It's out of the question.' He turned back to the desk and rapped on the counter. 'What's going on?'

'I'm trying to get through to your surgeon's secretary, sir.'

Jenny refused to give in. 'I can impose reporting restrictions. Judge, it's vital I know what was happening in her private life - the inquest is meaningless without that knowledge.'

'Mrs Cooper, don't you think the public interest might best be served by not raking over these coals until the Decency Bill has at least had its first reading? We both know how the media work. What you propose risks derailing the bill completely.'

'With respect, Judge, I can't see how the public interest can be served by anything less than the truth.'

He grunted dismissively.

'Judge, it's not Eva's Donaldson's murder that is at issue here. What you won't have read in the newspaper is that two of her close associates in the church have committed suicide in the last two weeks. One of them was a sixteen- year-old boy. I can't prove a connection with whatever was going on with Eva, but I can't disprove one either. All I know is that it smells bad, and this injunction makes it smell even worse.'

There was a pause as Laithwaite tried to absorb this information. She had stirred his conscience.

Taking advantage of the lull in conversation, the receptionist offered him the phone. 'Are you able to speak to her, sir? You might be able to explain it better than I can.'

'In a minute.' Laithwaite moved away from the counter, gesturing Jenny to follow him around the corner into an alcove that afforded a small degree of privacy. 'What sort of connection are we talking about?'

'Both of them were in Eva Donaldson's study group at the church Michael Turnbull helped to establish. The boy hanged himself the night before he was due to give evidence at my inquest. They were close.'

'And the other?'

'A married father of one who'd had sex with a man hours before he took his own life. It gets more complicated - he was senior mental health nurse at a unit the church tried to get involved with. A month before he died he persuaded a patient, a teenage girl, to give up her medication. She hanged herself too.'

'It all sounds rather circumstantial.'

Jenny said, 'The little evidence I have suggests Eva was falling out with the church in the weeks before she died. She was drinking; on one occasion she called the police and claimed she was being harassed. There - now you know more than I do.'

Laithwaite pressed a hand to his midriff and grimaced. He looked for a moment as if the pain in his stomach might overwhelm him.

Jenny reached out to steady him. 'I'm so sorry. Do you need to sit down?'

'No. Please—' He pushed out a hand to hold her at bay and waited for the spasm to pass. 'You've caught me in a weak moment, Mrs Cooper. But I can see why you considered it so urgent.' He took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. 'Given what you've told me, I'm prepared to accept there's a public interest in you being able to view any restricted material held by solicitors for the respective parties, but on strict condition that you only make public that which has a direct bearing on the case.'

'I'm not even sure who the respective parties are,' Jenny said.

'Ah, of course.' Laithwaite lowered his voice, as if fearing they might be overheard: 'They were Eva Donaldson and Lord Turnbull. I'll telephone my clerk and have him draft the order. I suppose you'll want it immediately.'

'If you could, Judge. Thank you.'

With a nod, he started back to the desk.

Chancing her luck, Jenny said, 'You wouldn't happen to recall what it was Turnbull wanted to suppress?'

Laithwaite stopped and looked her up and down, as if only now weighing the full consequences of his hasty decision. Jenny feared he was having second thoughts, but the doubt seemed to pass, giving way to an air of resignation.

'Sex,' he said, 'and a large measure of hypocrisy. A few years ago, while he was still in business, Turnbull liked to play the magnanimous host. Apparently on one occasion Miss Donaldson was part of the cabaret, a fact she chose to remind him of earlier this year.'

'They had a history.'

'More of a chance encounter.'

'And she was trying to blackmail him with it?'

'I'm afraid I can't recall every detail.'

'But the injunction must have covered more than that. She had other contractual disputes her solicitor wouldn't discuss with me.'

Laithwaite looked suddenly tired. Answering her was becoming an effort. 'It covers anything that might bring Lord Turnbull, the Decency campaign or his church into disrepute.' He gave a pained smile. 'Do try not to be late next time, Mrs Cooper.'

He moved off to the desk, where the receptionist was waiting for him with an explanation for his query. Jenny watched him give a tired, indifferent shrug as if all the fight had drained out of him; and something told her that it probably had.





Jenny made her way to a sprawling internet cafe in High Street Kensington and hired a terminal at which she set up a temporary office among the students and travellers. It was too risky to use her phone with so many people in earshot, so she communicated with Alison via email, instructing her to request Mr Justice Laithwaite's clerk to fax copies of his order waiving the injunction to both sets of solicitors and to her office. She wanted old-fashioned hard copies to arrive in the lawyers' hands: email was too easily erased.

It was a long anxious wait for a response. Staring at the screen, waiting for a message to appear, she thought about what Laithwaite had said. It sounded as if Eva had been a hostess at one of Turnbull's parties, and more than just a pretty girl serving drinks. The judge had given the impression that Eva had been one of many girls Turnbull would have encountered while living the life of a high-rolling businessman. It was possible he wouldn't have remembered her, but she would have remembered him.

Nearly twenty minutes passed before Alison's reply arrived. Jenny clicked open the attachment long enough only for the time it took to press 'print', collected the hard copy from the desk and hurried out to hail a taxi.

The text was far briefer than she had anticipated.



IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION

CLAIM No. TD280110

BETWEEN:

A

and

B

ex parte The Coroner for the Severn Vale District

ORDER



Upon application by the Coroner for the Severn Vale District, the terms of the order in this matter dated 28 January are varied as follows:

1) The Coroner for the Severn Vale District, namely Mrs Jenny Cooper, shall have the right to inspect all documents and materials which are subject to the terms of the said order, and to make whatever use of them as she sees fit in the conduct of her inquiry into the death of Miss Eva Donaldson.



Signed on behalf of Mr Justice Laithwaite by his clerk, it bore the court office seal. It was the genuine article, but less than Jenny had hoped for. There was no mention of the contents of the previous order, and no schedule of the documents covered. It meant that even if the lawyers opened their files to her, she had no means of checking if they were complete.





The cab was crossing Hyde Park Corner en route for Lincoln's Inn Fields when her phone rang. It was the office number. She pulled the glass screen separating her from the driver tight shut and answered.

'You got the order, Mrs Cooper?' Alison asked.

'It's pretty flimsy but I guess it'll do. Have all the parties received it?

'I just called both offices to confirm. It's there, or at least a PA's taken it off the machine . . .' Alison paused. 'You won't have seen the Post, of course.'

Jenny felt a rising sensation of dread. 'Why? What have they written?'

'Are you sure —?’

'Tell me.'

'There's a photo of you coming out of Weston police station. The article says you're helping police with their inquiry into the death of your cousin in 1972 . . . It's not so much what it says as the way they say it.'

'Say what?' Jenny snapped.

'It says the case has been reopened following a complaint by the dead girl's younger brother.'

'What other lies have they printed?'

'They quote someone—'

'Just read it to me.'

'A former colleague described Mrs Cooper, 43, as a somewhat driven but fragile character, who gave up a successful career in family law due to ongoing emotional problems exacerbated by an acrimonious divorce. She has one child of her own who lives with his father.'

'That's nice. No name?'

'No.'

Jenny's first thought was of Ross reading the article, or, more likely, one of his college friends taunting him with it. And then there was David and his prissy pregnant girlfriend.

None of them knew about Katy. Should she phone them? What would she say?

'So, is any of it true, Mrs Cooper?' Alison asked warily.

Avoiding the question, Jenny said, 'Make sure you speak to my three witnesses. Offer them a ride to court in a police car if they've got a problem with it.'

She ended the call and thrust Katy out of her mind.





The firm of Kennedy and Parr occupied a smart Victorian building in Lincoln's Inn Fields, a quiet, green oasis set behind the roaring thoroughfare of High Holborn. Like all the pleasant central London squares, it had been built to keep the rich insulated from the poor and it had succeeded. It was now home to expensive law firms and upmarket finance houses. Quiet, discreet and reassuringly solid, it was a place in which time seemed to have stood still, and where the wealthy came for succour and sanctuary.

Jenny stopped by the railings of the next-door building and searched her handbag for the Temazepam tablet she knew was in there somewhere. She found it wedged in the folds of her wallet and swallowed it dry. It was a drug for serious insomniacs which these days barely touched her. Another thing she'd have to deal with when this was all over. They were stacking up.

She approached the front door and was buzzed through without demur. She stepped over the threshold into a reception that resembled the set of a fashion shoot.

The receptionist had been chosen to complement her surroundings. Jenny approached her with a disarming smile.

'Jenny Cooper.' She handed a business card over the counter. 'I need to speak to either Ed Prince or Annabelle Stern. I'm sure they're expecting me.'

'Take a seat.' The girl motioned her to a sofa.

Jenny flicked through a pristine copy of Tatler as the girl phoned around the building, evidently being passed from one PA to another. It was a full five minutes before she had any joy. 'If you'd like to pick up the phone, Mr Prince will speak to you.'

Jenny reached for the sleek handset sitting in the middle of the table. It felt unnaturally smooth to the touch, like alabaster.

'Mrs Cooper?' Prince barked, making sure to have the first word.

'I've trust you've seen the order made by Mr Justice Laithwaite,' Jenny said, dispensing with the niceties. 'I'd be grateful if you would comply. I'd like to take copy documents back to Bristol this afternoon.'

'There's nothing to copy. They were all destroyed months ago.'

'If that's true, I have to call you as a witness of fact, Mr Prince, and Ms Stern also. Are you in the building? If so, you could at least have the decency to conduct this discussion in person.'

'It doesn't matter where I am, there's nothing to discuss. Number one, there is no evidence for you to see; number two, the order doesn't say anything about lawyers giving evidence; and number three, I'd go to jail before I broke a client's confidence.'

'You may well have the opportunity to put those principles to the test.'

'I doubt that, Mrs Cooper. I doubt that very much.'

Prince hung up.

Jenny marched over to the reception desk. 'Please get me Ms Stern.'

'She's not available.'

Jenny said, 'I'm here to enforce a High Court order. She has a choice: speak to me now or I'll have her office door broken down by police officers.'

'Just a moment.' The girl dialled a number while Jenny drummed her fingers impatiently on the counter. 'Is she in the building?' Jenny asked.

'Excuse me,' the girl said and stood up from her chair. She opened a door behind her desk and went through.

'Hey-'

The girl shut the door after her. At the same moment, a large man in a buttoned-up blazer which barely met across his pumped-up chest stepped out of a doorway next to the elevator. His plastic lapel badge read, 'Kennedy and Parr, Security'. He walked towards her with no expression on his dull face.

'Could you please leave the building, madam.'

'I beg your pardon?'

'Now.' He gestured towards the door.

'Sir, I'm a coroner, and I'm here to enforce a court order.'

The man looked at her with dead eyes. 'Please comply with my instruction or I will have to use reasonable force to remove you.'

Jenny reached for her phone. 'I'm calling the police. I'd advise you not to make things any worse for yourself.'

He shot out a hand and grabbed her arm above the elbow.

'What the hell do you think you're doing?'

With his other hand he snatched her briefcase.

Pushing her towards the door, the security guard hissed, 'What are you, brain dead? Get out.' He tossed her case down the steps and shoved her after it.

He slammed the heavy door, leaving her standing outside nursing an arm that felt as if it had been crushed between boulders. A woman passing on the pavement stopped to gawp, then hurried on.

Still in pain, Jenny picked up her case with her good hand and started to plan her counter-attack. If the lawyers wanted to play rough, she would send in officers from Bristol to batter their way in. Meanwhile, Alison could take another team into Reed Falkirk. She pulled out her phone to start making arrangements. The numbers swam in front of her eyes.

She needed somewhere to sit and calm down. She remembered a cafe on a busy road nearby, but couldn't remember from which direction she had entered the square. Disorientated, she looked left and right, searching for a point of reference.

'Jenny.'

She turned at the sound of a familiar voice and saw Simon Moreton climbing out of a cab on the far side of the road. Holding the door open, he called out, 'Over here. For God's sake, come on.'

The feeling of unreality intensified as she dumbly did as she was told. Simon buckled into the seat next to her and instructed the driver to take them to the Royal Lancaster Hotel.

'Why are we going to a hotel?' she asked.

'It has a good bar. And it's near the station.'

'Soften me up and send me home?'

'Believe it or not I'm on your side, Jenny.'

'How did you know I was here? Don't tell me Annabelle Stern's pulling your strings, too.'

'There was a certain flurry of excitement when news of your coup with poor old Mr Justice Laithwaite hit the wires. It didn't take a genius to work out what your next move would be.'

'They threw me out. Their security guard nearly broke my arm. Did you know that was going to happen, too?'

'More or less.'

'What the hell does that mean?'

His ambiguous sideways glance said he couldn't decide whether to give her the full or the sanitized version.

'Unless you tell me, Simon, I'm going to have that place turned over, news cameras, the lot.'

'You could, Jenny, of course, and on one level I wouldn't blame you, but the fact is . . . the fact is you'll be out of a job before you embarrass Lord Turnbull in public, at least until his bill has passed.' He turned his gaze out of the window, as if trying to detach himself from his words. 'You have to learn to accept the way things work. Things get sorted out in the end. What you mustn't do is cause a cataclysm where it needn't happen. One thing at a time.'

'And if an innocent man strings himself up in his prison cell while he's waiting?'

'You're proving my point, Jenny. You've let yourself become partial. That's precisely what our measured approach is designed to prevent.'

'I have an order for disclosure of documents that Turnbull had suppressed. Laithwaite told me the story: Eva was a hostess at one of Turnbull's pre-salvation parties, screwing his high-rolling friends, probably him, too. She'd been asking him for more money since last November. She was on the skids, Simon, falling apart. Turnbull thought she was going to expose him.'

Moreton stared out of the window, smiling vaguely as they passed Charing Cross station and headed out into Trafalgar Square, a billowing curtain of pigeons rising into a clear sky.

Jenny said, 'Are you going to say something, or just sit there admiring the view?'

'I was wondering how far I would be prepared to go for you,' Moreton said. 'And if it backfired, how I'd explain it to my colleagues ... or my wife. They'd all assume I'd had my head turned, lost my judgement.'

He shot her a look she couldn't read, but she could feel his charge in the brush of his shoulder against hers as the cab swung through Admiralty Arch into St James's Park. It would be so easy to say yes, Jenny thought, and to use him as her champion and protector. It could even prove to be his salvation from all the years of dissembling and compromise. She thought he might want that more than anything, even more than he wanted her.

Jenny said, 'Turnbull's lawyers haven't got enough to prove I'm unfit. It's my father the police are interested in, not me.'

'Judges are very sensitive creatures, these days, Jenny. You'd be removed for your own good, out of compassion, or at least until the storm had passed. We can't have a coroner working under such a burden of mental stress - it's not in anybody's interests.'

'What would happen if I didn't have any bodies buried in my garden?'

'One would be found. No one has nothing to hide, least of all the most outwardly blameless.'

'I'm not going to sleep with you, Simon, so you might as well tell me what you've got in mind now.'

'Jenny-'

'I don't think it would be in anybody's interests either, do you?'

He met her gaze, his eyes sparking briefly with hope, then slowly fading into resignation. 'No, I suppose not,' he said, as if it was his decision alone to make. 'Well?'

'You leave the disclosure issue alone and I'll guarantee the police will take a thorough look at all that evidence relating to Miss Donaldson and Turnbull later. In the meantime, you can lodge a statement with them setting out what you already know. But like I said - one thing at a time.'

'Do Turnbull or his lawyers get put on notice of the police investigation?'

'Absolutely not.'

'What do they hear?'

'That you've been "spoken to".'

Jenny thought about it. It wasn't attractive, but nor was the alternative. At least Moreton's deal still held out the prospect of justice being arrived at in the end. 'I still have three witnesses to hear from again. I can't be seen to have been completely rolled over.'

'I've showed you the line, Jenny. It's up to you how close you walk to it.' His face cracked into a smile.

'What?' Jenny said.

'You . . .' His hand brushed against hers. 'You'll never give up, will you?'