Two days later, he threw her to the ground in the office car park – the cynical bastard knew exactly where to do it, in the CCTV blind spot – he held her down and he raped her. He had her face down in the dirt, just like he did to you in Cornwall. It wasn’t interrupted this time. She doesn’t know how long it went on for, but it was daylight when he started and full night when it ended. Jamie’s recompense began as soon as he had finished with her. He offered her a pay rise, glowing references, a chance to work on the new estate they’re building down in the Thames Gateway. She was in such shock that she simply said yes. She took the deal.
Do you know how I know? She didn’t tell me; she would never have told me. But she sat on my table at a charity ball, and this girl I’d known vaguely for a year or so, this sparky, brilliant young woman was dead behind the eyes. I wondered if it was boyfriend trouble or debt or an eating disorder or something, and thought, I’ll corner her later; see if she needs help. She was not herself: reminded me of someone, but I couldn’t place who. Then, later, there was dancing; all Jamie had to do was look at her and she ran, in heels, across the dancefloor and into the ladies’. My blood ran cold. I knew who she reminded me of. I’d seen that exact look in you and I’d seen it in my dressing table mirror. I caught her in the ladies’ and she broke down and told me everything.
I tried to persuade her to go to the police. I told her I would support her but she knew my history, the campaigning I’ve done, so why should she have believed me? Instead, she looked at me like I was insane, a liar, or evil. She thought I was part of the conspiracy! That night, when I was taking my make-up off, I saw her disgust reflected in my own features.
The next day, I told Jamie that I was taking my statement off his website. Not that I was leaving him; not that I was going to run a counter-campaign. Just that quiet withdrawal of support was enough. He is presently in Erlestoke Prison for breaking my jaw in response.
I don’t expect or deserve your forgiveness but I would so love one day to meet you and try to make some sense of this. I hope – there’s that word again – that you will take this not as an insult but as a heartfelt apology.
Yours sincerely,
Antonia Balcombe
The last sheet of paper floats to the tiles. He did it. Jamie raped Beth. The doubt that’s been weighing me down for years peels away. Relief wheels in circles above my head like an uncaged bird. Morally, I am off the hook. The tears that come now are for Antonia and the other girl. I could cry all night, but the clock is ticking.
The next page is Beth’s writing again.
Ok, so. I’ve met Antonia a handful of times since she wrote this letter. She’s nice. She’s sincere. She’ll have a metal plate in her jaw for the rest of her life. She’s had it worse than me because she’s had all those years of the bastard. Anyway – we’ve talked it through and this is the best way I can sum up what’s been happening.
When she wrote that letter, Jamie had just gone inside. Since then, he’s got worse, not better. The new girl, this intern – I don’t know her name – is apparently close to telling the police, and he knows this. He now thinks Antonia, her, me and even you are in a conspiracy against him. He’s lost it completely. He’s talking about suing the intern girl, for fuck’s sake. He’s also, and this is where you come in, talking about going ‘back to basics’, which means, as far as we can work out, getting you and me to change our statements about what happened on Lizard Point. I know, I know – he’s well gone. But he believes he’s right, that’s the scary thing.
It’s hard to say how real this threat is – I mean, prison, and the street come to think of it, is full of nutters talking shit. I keep thinking, no, he doesn’t mean it, and anyway, he can’t find them, I should leave them in peace. On one level it’s almost laughable; the idea that we’ll suddenly turn around and go, ‘Actually, Jamie, you’re right! I was gagging for it after all, and Laura never even saw us! Hands up, fair cop, the whole thing was a conspiracy!’ Then I talk to Antonia again, and I look at the way she can’t close her teeth to bite properly any more because her jaw can’t ever be set back to how it was, and how frightened she is, how she’s struggling without the in-laws who’ve been like family to her her whole adult life. She wouldn’t make this up. Then, it doesn’t seem laughable at all. And I remember what he put me through, and I think about where he is, and the people he must be mixing with, and the fact that he’s still a very rich man. This blend of money and connections and his own insane conviction makes me think Jamie’s more dangerous now than he’s ever been. And I think all this and I reason, I can’t not tell Laura and Kit.
Antonia is worried about what Jamie might do, and so am I. With her gone, the reputation he’s been trying to rebuild is in tatters again. All those people who thought he didn’t do it, who thought he was innocent, they believed him because of her. Without her he can’t fool them any more. It’s like he hasn’t got anything left to lose, especially if she persuades this girl to come forward. He wouldn’t have been able to find you in the same way I did – it was only knowing you like I do that led me to you . . .
This last line pulls me away from Jamie and back to Beth. What can she mean, I only found you because I know you so well? It would be so easy, in this onslaught of new information, to lose sight of that. Or is this what she wants? Am I walking right into a ruse? I read on with renewed caution.