The Boudicca Parchments

Chapter 34

Peter Hackett had been hesitating for a long time. As Daniel’s solicitor, he was protected by privilege. Indeed he was duty-bound to keep that privilege and not disclose any privileged information. And the act of passing on the witness statements and post-mortem report was not in anyway a breach of the rules.

Even if his client had been in custody, he could quite lawfully have handed over copies of those documents to him. With the exception of cases involving terrorism or national security — which this case plainly wasn’t — the accused is allowed to see all the prosecution evidence that his lawyer sees. And an accused is entitled to see not only the evidence that the prosecution intends to use, but also any unused evidence that they have considered but deemed to be of no relevance to the prosecution case.

So Hackett had no concerns about passing on that evidence to Daniel’s eMail address and he hoped that Daniel would be prudent about accessing it. Not that he wanted Daniel to remain at liberty. But he knew that it would be better for Daniel to turn himself in of his own accord than to be tracked down and re-arrested, not to mention being charged with the additional charge of unlawful escape and possible supplementary charges involving other murders.

But that in turn led right back to Hackett’s other dilemma: how to handle Daniel’s request for information about the police search of Martin Costa’s home? He had reservations about asking the question. But his client had requested it. And it could provide some useful information for the defence. He had to make the call to DCI Vincent.

“I was basically wondering if the search of Martin Costa’s flat revealed anything.”

“If it had we would have told you. Look don’t worry Mr. Hackett, you’ll get all the material well before the next hearing. But right now we’re still waiting for the records from the phone company. I’m surprised you’re not asking about that.”

“Well that I assumed you would give me as soon as you’ve got it. But the reason I was asking about Costa’s flat was because of what Klein was saying about the image that Costa sent him. He said it looked like a manuscript and so I was wondering about the original.”

“Well presumably it was destroyed in the fire — if it existed at all. I mean Costa was supposedly all set to bring it to the meeting.”

“That may be a probability. But it isn’t a certainty. Klein thought it might still be at Costa’s home.”

“What do you mean thought? When did he tell you that?”

Hackett realized that he had to think quickly.

“At the court… at the remand hearing. It was one of the things we talked about.”

Hackett realized that he was actually contributing to an escalation of Vincent’s suspicions. He wasn’t supposed to be revealing what specifically he and his client had been discussing. The fact that he was — and that he was gabbling — was practically advertising the fact that he had something to hide. By now, Vincent probably knew that Daniel had called him. But it was too late to go back now.

“For the record, Mr. Hackett, we didn’t find any ancient manuscripts at Martin Costa’s flat, nor indeed anything that might be mistaken for an ancient manuscript. We didn’t find any ancient artefacts or antiquities, nor any forgeries. We did find plenty of books about forgery techniques and how to identify forgeries. But given the line of work we know that Costa was in, that’s hardly surprising.”