A Mind to Kill

Chapter Twenty-four

Jennifer cleaned herself up but had to discard her already ruined underwear. Without which she felt naked, defenceless – revulsed by herself – and as she tried to restore her hair and repair her make-up the voice said, ‘ That’s what you are, Jennifer, bare-assed, defenceless and revolting. You smell like a pig. And there’s really no end to what I can make you do.’

People are believing me now, she thought.

‘ So what, you’re still a freak.’

But not a murderer.

‘ The show ain’t over till the fat lady sings.’

People know it’s you singing, not me.

‘ Still a freak. ’

Jennifer made a positive effort to stop the mental conversation. She’d hit her leg, opening the wound, during the convulsion and when he’d re-dressed it the doctor had said it needed to be stitched but that it couldn’t be done there. To the wardress Jennifer said, ‘I hope I didn’t hurt you.’

‘We’ve had worse,’ said Ann, speaking for both of them.

‘ No you haven’t, not yet.’

Go away! thought Jennifer.

‘ Not until I’ve finished. And I’ve got a lot to do before I’ve finished.’

‘It’s pretty unusual up there? What’s happening, I mean?’ said Ann.

For the first time Jennifer was conscious of a change of attitude from the motherly woman who had befriended her and couldn’t understand it. There was a caution, a distancing that hadn’t been obvious before.

‘ Freak! ’

‘I didn’t do it,’ said Jennifer, replying to the wardress. ‘We’re proving I didn’t do it.’

‘Eerie!’ said the second wardress, smiling uncertainly.

‘ Better get used to it! ’

‘I’ve been doing this for eighteen years,’ said Ann. ‘I’ve never seen anything like it.’

‘It’, isolated Jennifer. She was becoming an ‘it’, not a human being.

‘ That’s what you are, honey: an “it ”.’

‘Would you do something for me?’ asked the second woman, tentatively.

‘What?’ asked Jennifer.

The woman offered a sheet from a notebook she took from the top pocket of her uniform. ‘Sign an autograph? My name’s Kathleen.’ The accent was Irish.

‘ Hah! ’

Jennifer flushed and Ann said to the other wardress: ‘Don’t be so bloody daft!’

‘Of course,’ said Jennifer, self-consciously taking the paper.

‘ There’s a place for you in a carnival, along with the bearded lady and the fattest man in the world.’

‘If you don’t mind then…?’ smiled Ann, taking out her own pocket book.

Jennifer signed for the second time. Both women held the paper towards her at arm’s length. ‘Please stay close to me in court. In case anything happens.’

‘ They think you’re contagious! ’

‘Sure,’ said Kathleen, doubtfully.

‘Do you know when it’s going to happen: when you’re going to be thrown about?’ asked Ann.

‘I know when she’s with me.’

‘Is she with you now?’

‘Yes.’

Both women stared at her open-mouthed, dumb-struck.

‘ This is going to be the story of their lives! The only story of their lives ’

‘How?’ asked Kathleen, breathlessly.

‘I don’t want her to know.’ Jennifer’s face was burning and not from Jane’s presence. She did feel a freak. What the hell was she doing, going along with this inane conversation, responding to their inane, stupid questions?

‘ You’re the woman with two heads! That’s the billing! Roll up, roll up, see the woman with two heads, one inside the other! ’

Jennifer saw the two wardresses exchange awed looks. ‘And I don’t want to talk about it any more.’

‘No, of course not,’ accepted Ann, immediately deferential. ‘It’s time we were moving anyway.’

Jeremy Hall and Humphrey Perry were beside the dock when Jennifer re-entered, putting themselves between her and the press, who were noisier than ever before. Four journalists were outside the gallery, waiting for her to appear. When she did they surged forward, to be intercepted by police and a black-gowned court official. Perry moved to meet them. Each thrust pieces of paper at the solicitor, who accepted them.

‘More autographs?’ demanded Jennifer.

‘What?’ frowned Hall.

‘What’s all that about?’ she demanded.

‘Nothing for you to worry about. Is everything all right?’

‘How do I know?’ Jennifer was at once aware of the self-pity. ‘Yes. I’m OK.’

‘You’re going to be fine.’

‘Am I?’ Hall wasn’t standing as close to the dock edge as he could have done.

‘ Not if I can prevent it. ’

From the bench there were demands for silence from the clerk. Hall hurried towards his place as Jarvis strutted into court, glowering towards the media. He remained looking in their direction when he sat. ‘Your editors are already aware of my feelings about press intrusion. If your behaviour in this court offends me, then I shall conduct the remainder of this trial in camera, excluding you all. I want what I have said reported, verbatim, by whichever of you represent news agencies, so that all editors are aware of my feelings. I want that done now. I will not reconvene this court until it is done.’

Two men and a woman rose sheepishly from their places and hurried out. There were four court artists now, all sketching. Jennifer was conscious of every single person in the court staring at her. And that despite their undertaking, neither Ann nor Kathleen had their seats as close to her any longer.

‘ Freak. ’

Not going to get me convicted of murder, thought Jennifer.

‘ Never intended to, remember? ’

Jarvis had so subdued the court that the return of the news agency reporters was audible before they came into Jennifer’s vision to regain their seats.

‘Mr Hall?’ invited the judge, with the briefest grimaced smile.

There was no swagger this time when Superintendent Bentley approached the witness-box. The suit, blue, was as immaculate as before but there was no buttonhole carnation.

‘You headed the investigation into the murder of Gerald Lomax?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Sir’, noted Hall. ‘There are certain standard procedures in such investigations, are there not?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Is one of those standard procedures taking fingerprints from an accused, once that accused has been charged?’

‘Yes, sir.’ Bentley wasn’t addressing the assembled journalists, nor smiling in their direction.

‘Did you or one of your junior officers do that, in this case?’

‘No, sir.’

‘Why not?’

‘Mrs Lomax declined to make a statement after I charged her,’ tried the detective. ‘That refusal was confirmed by her solicitor and by you.’

Hall stretched the pause as long as he felt able. Then, ‘Superintendent, we are not discussing statements here, are we? We are talking of standard, operating procedures in murder investigations.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘You ignored the standard, operating procedures you should have followed in the case of Mrs Lomax, didn’t you?’

‘She was too ill to be fingerprinted on the day of the murder,’ Bentley fought, desperately. ‘After that our enquiries were obstructed.’

‘Obstructed?’ seized Hall. ‘Obstructed by whom?’

‘My officers and I were denied the opportunity of interviewing or taking a statement from Mrs Lomax by yourself and by her solicitor.’

Hall wasn’t perturbed the cross-examination was temporarily going sideways: the detective was damning himself with virtually every answer. ‘Did you. at any time, approach myself or Mr Perry, my instructing solicitor, with a request to fingerprint Mrs Lomax?’

‘No, sir,’ admitted Hall, miserably, all the bombast gone.

‘ Perry Mason shit. Who’s impressed? ’

‘I am: you should be, thought Jennifer.

‘ Guy’s an amateur. Dumped on you.’

‘Did you instruct any of your junior officers to make such a request?’

‘No, sir.’

‘So no official police fingerprints were obtained of a person whom you had charged with murder?’

‘No, sir.’

‘That was a grave mistake, wasn’t it, Superintendent? A clear failure to follow standard operating procedures?’

‘Yes, sir,’ conceded Bentley. His face was blazing.

‘I didn’t hear that,’ protested Jarvis, glaring down.

‘Yes, sir,’ repeated Bentley.

‘Yes, sir, to what?’

‘It was a grave mistake for us not to have taken fingerprints.’ Bentley practically choked on the words.

‘In your evidence-in-chief you were obviously proud of your conviction record. Twelve, was it not?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Do you consider yourself an expert in murder investigations, Superintendent?’

Bentley did not immediately reply, fervently seeking an answer that couldn’t be turned against him. In the end, hoping formality would save him, he said, ‘I have brought to a successful conclusion twelve murder investigations.’

‘An enviable record,’ agreed Hall. ‘So murders are a crime you have wide and long experience of investigating?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘After the conclusion of yesterday’s hearing, you were present with myself and others when the fingerprints of the accused – fingerprints you had failed to obtain – were finally taken?’

Bentley squirmed. ‘Yes.’

He could be forgiven for finally omitting the ‘sir’ but for nothing else, Hall decided. ‘Were you given the opportunity last night to compare Mrs Lomax’s fingerprints with those lifted from the glass wall of Gerald Lomax’s office?’

‘I was.’

‘And were you in court this morning to hear the evidence of the prosecution’s forensic scientist, Doctor Billington?’

‘I was.’

‘They don’t match, do they?’

‘No.’

‘You also heard Doctor Billington’s evidence about blood type and grouping?’

‘Yes.’

‘Mrs Lomax’s blood does not match any of that found in Gerald Lomax’s office, does it?’

‘No, sir.’

‘Superintendent,’ said Hall, allowing the patronizing tone. ‘As an expert in murder investigations – a man who has successfully brought twelve murderers to rightful justice – would you have charged Mrs Lomax with murder if you’d properly carried out the investigation you should have done, from which you would have realized the fingerprints upon the bloodstained murder weapon were not those of Mrs Lomax?’

‘Sixteen people witnessed her do it!’ protested Bentley, writhing.

‘Her fingerprints are not on the knife, are they?’ persisted Hall.

‘No.’

‘Her blood isn’t at the scene, is it?’

‘No.’

‘So answer my question. Would you have charged her with murder?’

‘I would have referred it to higher authority,’ said the detective.

‘Superintendent, who, in your expert opinion and now with the benefit of the forensic evidence you did not earlier have, do you believe murdered Gerald Lomax?’

Bentley looked desperately around the court, as if seeking inspiration. As with Billington, earlier, Keflin-Brown steadfastly refused any rescue because no rescue was possible.

‘Answer the question, Superintendent!’ demanded Jarvis, a bully with a new target.

‘I don’t know, sir,’ Bentley finally capitulated.

‘You do not know who killed Gerald Lomax?’ echoed Hall, triumphantly.

‘No.’

‘I am grateful, finally, for your honesty,’ said Hall to Keflin-Brown’s headshake against the offer to re-examine. As Malcolm Rodgers was summoned, the older barrister leaned sideways and said quietly, ‘You’re not taking prisoners, are you?’

‘Not as readily as everyone else was prepared to do,’ said Hall. He’d made his decision upon that morning’s idea. Perry would probably argue against it. So, most definitely, would the heavy breathing, unctuous Feltham along with Sir Richard Proudfoot. So they wouldn’t get the opportunity: they’d be presented with a fait accompli.

Inspector Malcolm Rodgers was an ambitious career policeman who’d hitched his wagon to Superintendent Bentley’s unstoppable express but who now detected the vibrations of an impending fatal crash. And who had decided, the previous night and then again listening in court so far that day, that it was time to disconnect the coupling. He studiously avoided the staccato and truculent answers that Bentley had given, repeating again and again that he’d gone through every stage of the investigation under the command of a superior officer. He regretted that superior officer had not insisted upon Mrs Lomax’s fingerprints being taken. And would obviously have himself ordered it done by a junior officer – or done it himself – had he not automatically assumed the order for such basic routine had been given while he was otherwise engaged. He could offer no explanation or suggestion for the disparity between the fingerprints and the blood. Certainly, from none of the sixteen eyewitnesses was there evidence of anyone other than Gerald and Jennifer Lomax being in the totally visible room at the time of Gerald Lomax’s death.

‘Who then, in your opinion, killed the man?’ demanded Hall.

‘I do not know, sir,’ dutifully replied the responsibility-avoiding detective.

Which brought Jeremy Hall to Ross Hamilton Forest II, senior partner in the Washington DC law firm of Forest, Pilton and Camperstone, a white-haired, cultivated man with practised, courtly manners and a clipped, New England accent. Forest had reached the court fifteen minutes before the afternoon resumption, giving Hall ample time to read and discuss the documentation the man carried. It was, in fact, that documentation that finally decided Hall upon the application he intended making. But which now – while Forest was being formally sworn and thanked by Sir Ivan Jarvis for his Atlantic dash (‘an act of unprecedented legal cooperation between our two countries and our two legal systems,’) to Forest’s repeated assurance that it was nothing, nothing at all, sir – Jeremy Hall had stomach-hollowing second thoughts.

He had sufficient to create reasonable doubt, the corner-stone of defence. To seek more – which he could – would turn what the following day’s newspapers and television would build into a legal and public phenomenon, for which there wasn’t an adjective extravagant enough to describe. And for whom would he be doing it, by going further? For Jennifer, whose categoric instructions had been to prove her not guilty of murder? Or for his impatient, ambitious self, cynically grabbing the opportunity to pole-vault ten, maybe fifteen mundane, ladder-climbing years with one mighty leap to the Sir Richard Proudfoot ice-capped echelon? Yet more questions for which he couldn’t find an answer. Maybe never would.

After the pleasantries from on high, Hall went through the ritual at his level, tempering the sycophancy by coupling it with the establishment of Ross Hamilton Forest’s legal qualifications.

That done, Hall said, ‘At the request of my instructing solicitor, Mr Perry, did you some time ago establish in the United States of America the marriage of Gerald James Lomax to Jane Mary Herbetson?’

In Jennifer’s head there was again the sound of sharply indrawn breath. ‘ I don’t want to hear this.’

You don’t have a choice: isn’t that what you’re always telling me? thought Jennifer.

‘ Shut up! ’

Tables turned!

‘I did, sir,’ beamed Forest. He had the tanned face of a man who conducted a lot of business on a golf course or from a yacht on the Potomac.

‘Jane Mary Herbetson was Gerald Lomax’s first wife?’

‘She was indeed, sir.’

‘The daughter of one of the most respected families in Virginia?’

‘Proud history going back over two hundred years, according to my enquiries: one of the founding fathers of our great and good country,’ said the American lawyer, proudly. ‘Her father was the Episcopalian bishop: there’s a bust in his cathedral, commemorating the work and the impact he made within his diocese. Mrs Herbetson was an extremely rich woman and throughout their lives together – and after her unfortunate death – the bishop was an extremely generous benefactor. He personally paid for two schools and a clinic for the disadvantaged. In his will he left a substantial bequest in trust to benefit the poor.’

‘What do you mean by Mrs Herbetson’s “unfortunate” death?’

‘The poor lady drowned, in a boating accident when Jane was just fifteen years old.’

‘ Pompous legal prick. Probably first generation descent from some Irish shit-kicker! ’

‘As I understand it, Mr Forest, there is a certain statutory health requirement in your country – certainly in the State of Virginia – prior to marriage?’

‘There most certainly is, sir.’

‘ Bastard! Bastard! Bastard! ’

‘Of particular importance in view of a condition from which Jane Mary Herbetson suffered from birth?’

‘The poor child was a diabetic’

‘ Poor child, my ass! ’

‘Quite so, as this court has already heard. What is the requirement we’re talking about?’

‘Blood tests, sir. To ensure compatibility: a protection for offspring. And for any hereditary disease.’

‘Such tests were conducted upon Gerald Lomax and Jane Mary Herbetson?’

Despite the judge’s earlier warning there was a growing murmur of anticipation from the media coral. Jarvis looked sharply towards it: the noise lessened only very slightly.

‘They were, sir.’

‘And are retained, on file?’

‘For a statutory period.’

‘You were able to gain access to those records and have an affidavit from the doctor who compiled them sworn before a judge in Washington DC yesterday? And which you produce to my Lord and to this court today?’

On cue the American took an impressively bound folder from his briefcase and handed it to the waiting usher.

‘Would you tell the court the blood group registered as that of Gerald James Lomax?’

‘AB Rhesus Positive.’

Here we go, thought Hall, the moment of no-turning-back commitment: saving Jennifer from one fate without any idea of what other she might be thrust into by what he was going to say and do. ‘And would you tell the court the blood group registered as that of Jane Mary Herbetson?’

‘O Rhesus Negative.’

The court exploded, beyond any control. The predominant reaction was, predictably, from the media in a virtual mass exodus from the room. But there was a lot of noise, discernible gasps, from the jury. An aviary of sound descended from above from the public gallery.

The time it took to restore order gave Jeremy Hall the opportunity finally to make up his mind. His primary duty, always, was to Jennifer. And the only course open to Sir Ivan Jarvis was now a positive direction that to proceed upon the newly available evidence would be unsafe, in law. Which fell short of a verdict of not guilty. So, Hall convinced himself, he had to press on. He turned, to smile at the strained-faced Jennifer, aware as he did so of several of the returning journalists bunched around Humphrey Perry, who was making rapid, dismissive hand gestures.

There was still some noise when Jarvis hurried Hall on, but it ended abruptly when Hall turned back to the American, no-one wanting to miss a single word of the exchange.

‘Those findings are written ones, the result of pathological examination carried out prior to the marriage?’ Hall resumed. ‘The actual samples themselves no longer exist.’

‘No, sir. Storage would be an impossible task.’

‘Mr Forest, you have travelled an extremely long way for what may seem a very short period of time to give evidence in this court. But, in thanking you, I assure you your help and your evidence has been invaluable.’

Once again Keflin-Brown declined to examine and there was a hiatus of several minutes while Jarvis effusively thanked the American lawyer, who, equally effusive, insisted it had been a pleasure.

‘Mr Keflin-Brown?’ invited the judge, after Forest stood down.

‘As I made clear to you in chambers this morning, my Lord, I am subject to your direction.’

‘I am minded, Mr Hall, to make a certain recommendation to the jury. Is there anything further upon which you feel it necessary to address me, before I do that?’

‘There is, my Lord. But with the greatest respect, anticipating your Lordship’s possible feelings, I wonder if my submission might be made in the absence of the jury…?’

‘ What’s the sneaky little bastard up to now? ’

Something else to screw you.

‘ He’s just building up penalty points against you. You’ll be sorry. ’

Hall was aware of Keflin-Brown’s sharp look and of Jarvis’s face closing against him. The judge said, ‘I trust you can infer the way my mind is directed. And I have allowed you considerable leniency, Mr Hall.’

‘Which I must assure your Lordship I have not – nor will – abuse.’

‘You are insisting?’

‘I am humbly requesting.’

‘Members of the jury,’ said Jarvis, turning towards them. ‘You will be taken to a room assigned for your deliberations while I hear a submission from learned counsel. You are not being excluded. Indeed, if I so decide, I will fully acquaint you upon your return with what Mr Hall has said. The purpose of asking you temporarily to leave is to prevent anything wrongly said during legal exchanges adversely to affect your final deliberations. I hope it possible to recall you very shortly.’

As the jury filed away Hall felt a tug at his gown and leaned back towards Humphrey Perry. ‘What are you going to do?’ demanded the solicitor. ‘It was obvious he was going to rule the prosecution unsafe. We’ve won.’

‘I’m going to prove her totally innocent…’ said Hall. He hesitated, guessing from how close and attentive Keflin-Brown was holding himself that the man could probably hear. ‘… and identify the real murderer.’

Jarvis held up his hand against Hall speaking, going again to the media. ‘You should all of you be aware of the restrictions when a jury is out of court. But I will once again remind you. Not one single word of what is said in their absence can be reported. I will have my clerk and other court officers read every newspaper, listen to every radio transmission and watch every television broadcast. If I recognize one word from what is about to be discussed, the provider of that report and his or her editor will be jailed for contempt…’ He turned back to the barristers. ‘Mr Hall?’

‘It is my submission, my Lord, that upon the evidence I have brought before you today, it would be legally unsafe to continue the prosecution for murder against my client-’

‘Which it was unnecessary to send the jury out to make,’ broke in the judge. ‘And precisely the guidance I intend to make to the jury.’

‘I’m obliged for that advice, my Lord. But it will not constitute a verdict of not guilty for my client.’

‘Of course it will in everything but pronouncement, Mr Hall. You’re nitpicking.’

‘With respect, my Lord, there is something more that could be done publicly and totally to exonerate my client of any guilt for the crime upon which she has been arraigned.’

Jarvis’s face was furrowed into a frown that made him appear more wizened than ever.

‘ What the fuck now! ’

‘What is that, Mr Hall?’

‘As your Lordship has already heard, the shank of hair recovered from Gerald Lomax’s office is a different colour from that of Mrs Lomax. Last night, with Mrs Lomax’s agreement, samples were taken of her hair. Both are at this moment being subjected to DNA analysis and comparison, not just by Doctor Billington but by a separate forensic expert engaged by the defence. I am hopeful of a result within the next twenty-four hours. Some of the O Rhesus Negative blood is also being subjected to DNA matching…’

‘… Your submission, Mr Hall, your submission!’

‘The grave of Mrs Jane Lomax is in Mortlake cemetery. I am applying to you, my Lord, for an exhumation order for that grave to be opened for DNA tests upon the hair and bone that the coffin will still contain. And for the findings of those tests to be compared with the DNA found in the blood and hair currently being examined by defence and prosecution forensic specialists-’

‘ NO! ’ Jennifer stopped herself echoing the deafening scream but couldn’t prevent being hurled bodily across the dock so violently that she crashed into its side. Her breath was knocked completely from her and the duty doctor who examined her in the dock guessed at two cracked ribs. When the doctor insisted upon X-rays – which later confirmed three – Hall immediately applied for bail, with a condition of residency in hospital. Within an hour she was back in the same private ward at St Thomas’s to which she’d been admitted after the murder. Completing the coincidence, she was put under the care of Dr Peter Lloyd, who travelled from the court with her in the ambulance.

With difficulty, wincing against the pain, Jennifer said, ‘I’m glad it’s you. There’s something I need to know.’ She wasn’t going back to prison to be used as a sex toy, she realized.

Jarvis continued in Jennifer’s absence. The fully co-operative Keflin-Brown hurriedly supported Hall’s application – totally aware of the incredible events and inevitable publicity in the wake of which he was being borne along – and the judge issued the exhumation order with a further injunction against press intrusion, warning that he was extending the precincts of the court for a radius of five hundred yards around the grave of the first Mrs Lomax.

When he arrived at St Thomas’s, Hall realized he’d made an error in not anticipating what would be happening there and by failing to ask the judge for an additional precincts order. The hospital authorities had already complained and adding to the irony of Jennifer’s return Superintendent Hopkins was again in charge of the police unit confronting the press siege. There was none of the officious belligerence he’d shown towards Hall for Emily’s disastrous visit. They were doing their best to prevent any media person entering the premises, he reported formally, and there were uniformed officers in the corridor outside Jennifer’s ward, intercepting anyone who approached. Four journalists and two photographers had already been arrested and charged with behaviour likely to cause a breach of the peace: one, an Italian, had been wearing a white coat and insisted he was a doctor.

‘Is it a fact that she’s genuinely possessed by the first wife?’ demanded the policeman, incredulous.

‘I think so.’

‘What’s going to happen to her?’

‘I don’t know.’ He wished he did, thought Hall, moving through the hospital. His responsibility towards Jennifer Lomax ended with the conclusion of the trial, extending beyond that only to any outstanding legal formalities. But the end of the trial was hardly going to be the end of her problems. But they weren’t legal, he warned himself. They were personal: medically – or perhaps more accurately psychiatrically – personal. Not his consideration then.

He was challenged twice at the level of Jennifer’s ward, once directly outside the elevator and again at the police barrier outside the individual room. There it needed Dr Lloyd’s intervention to persuade the suspicious policeman he really was Jennifer’s lawyer.

She smiled wanly up at him as he entered the room. ‘Here we are again.’ She plucked at the hospital-issue nightdress. ‘And the fashion hasn’t changed.’

‘ And I’m still here, too.’

‘How are you?’ asked Hall.

‘It hurts, when I breathe.’ He’d moved the chair away from the bed, not closer, when he sat.

‘ Frightened of you. Frightened of me. Cowardy, cowardy custard, his balls are made of mustard.’

‘The judge granted the order.’

Jennifer was ready, gripping the side of the bed. The movement vibrated though her and the voice screamed, ‘ Mother-fucker. I’d get you too, if I could.’

‘She called you a mother-fucker.’

‘She’s got a dirty mouth,’ taunted Hall.

‘Will I have to go back to the prison hospital?’

Hall shook his head. ‘I got Jarvis to agree to bail, on condition you resided here.’

‘ Well aren’t you the smarty pants! ’

‘Never?’ demanded Jennifer, intensely.

‘Whatever the result of the exhumation, Jarvis is going to direct the jury that it’s unsafe to convict.’

Jennifer closed her eyes. ‘Thank God for that!’

‘ Doesn’t matter a damn.’

‘She says it doesn’t matter a damn.’

‘Why’s she so hysterical then?’

‘ Kiss my ass, cocksucker.’

‘You believed me from the beginning, didn’t you?’ said Jennifer. ‘No-one else believed me but you.’

‘Yes,’ lied Hall. He did now, he accepted, finally confronting the phenomenon. He was talking to a woman inside of whose head there was another woman, a woman he knew all about, a murderer. Believed it so much he was talking to Jane as if she existed: was a real person, in the same room. He shivered, visibly.

‘What’s the matter?’ frowned Jennifer.

‘ Scared shitless, that’s what’s the matter.’

‘Someone walked over my grave,’ Hall said, inadequately.

‘ Leave mine alone! ’

Jennifer held his eyes for several moments. Then, nodding to the corridor outside, she said, ‘There’s more police than before.’

Hall shifted, further discomfited. ‘The hospital is virtually under media siege. The police outside are to keep them away from you. There’s a lot more downstairs.’

‘ Freak. ’

‘I hadn’t thought of that.’

‘Neither had I, not until now. Everything’s happened very quickly.’

There was another wan smile. ‘You did what I asked you. Proved me not guilty. Thank you.’ She reached out her hand, towards him.

Hall hesitated, then took it.

‘ Where’s the fucking violins and pink doves? ’

‘I was testing you,’ confessed Jennifer.

‘Testing me?’

‘To see if you’d take my hand. To see if you were frightened of me. She says you are.’

Hall retained her hand. ‘Then she’s wrong about that, too, isn’t she?’ It wasn’t a lie. He wasn’t scared. He was… He didn’t know what he was but it wasn’t fear. Disbelief, perhaps? No, it couldn’t be that. He’d already decided he did believe. It was, he supposed, how someone would feel confronting a creature from outer space, although the analogy offended him, because Jennifer Lomax wasn’t an alien creature. Despite what she’d gone through – was still going through – she was a very beautiful and physically attractive woman. He released her hand. Not that he felt any physical attraction. To have allowed that would have been unprofessional: he had to behave like a doctor in that respect.

‘ I’m not wrong! He’s scared. Everyone’s going to be scared. You’re going to be a pariah for the rest of your life. We’ll get you a drum. That’s what it means, you know. A drummer because that’s what Hindu pariahs do, beat a drum as a warning for people to get out of the way when they’re coming.’

‘I’ve got to think of Emily, haven’t I?’

‘You haven’t ever stopped.’

‘I mean about getting back with her. Properly.’

‘I’ve told you, Annabelle says she’s virtually forgotten what happened here.’

‘She’ll remember, when I go home.’

‘You don’t know that.’

‘I’m frightened that’s how it will be.’

‘You’ll have to take it a step at a time,’ said Hall, hating the cliche.

‘How long, before it’s all finished with the court?’

‘Depends how long the DNA takes. Just days.’

‘It’s been a lifetime.’

‘ And it’s only just beginning! ’

‘Now it’s over.’

‘I won’t have to go back to prison to get my things?’

Hall shook his head again. ‘I’ll have them collected and taken back to Hampshire. Or to the flat here, if you’d prefer.’

Now Jennifer shook her head, but much more positively. That’s where he went with Rebecca. In our bed. My bed. I don’t want to go there again. Not ever. I’ll sell it. In fact…’ She paused. ‘I’ll certainly be here all day tomorrow?’

‘Yes.’

‘Ask Geoffrey Johnson to come. He can make arrangements to put it on the market immediately.’

‘I’ll fix it,’ undertook the barrister. It all sounded very normal, so very ordinary. Would it ever be possible for Jennifer Lomax to know normality – to be normal – again.

Jennifer looked abruptly to the bedside cabinet and what was on top of it. ‘And I can use the telephone, whenever I like, can’t I?’

‘Yes,’ agreed Hall, guessing the point of the question.

‘So I could telephone Emily?’

‘If you want to.’

‘I want to,’I said Jennifer, hesitantly. There was a pause. Then she said, ‘But I don’t know what to say to her.’ There was a further silence before she added, ‘And there’s something else…’

Hall waited for Jennifer to finish but she didn’t.

Jeremy Hall wasn’t conscious of being followed from the hospital until he parked along the Embankment and was immediately surrounded by people who leapt from three separate cars which screeched to a haphazard halt behind him. There were seven reporters, three women among them. They all began talking and shouting at once, drowning each other out, and for several moments Hall was totally bewildered.

‘Who are you? What…?’

The names of the newspapers were the first thing that positively registered. He didn’t bother to match the identification with the representatives.

‘Is she all right?’

‘What’s she say?’

‘What’s Jane telling her?’

‘Can Jane make her do whatever she wants?’

‘She’s a Frankenstein, isn’t she?’

‘Will she always have to be locked up, as a danger?’

Hall used his bulk to shoulder his way through, shaking his head but saying nothing. Envelopes were thrust at him and instinctively he took them.

‘That’s not final.’

‘We’ll negotiate.’

‘Call us first, before anyone else.’

‘We’ll be sympathetic, put Jennifer’s side of the story.’

The cordon was much bigger around his chambers. When the crowd saw him approaching there was the blinding whiteness of cameras and television lights and Hall actually stumbled into people he could not see. It was impossible to distinguish anything from the shouted, screaming questions. More envelopes were thrust towards him, which he let fall to the ground. It wasn’t until after he bulldozed his way through and was admitted through the briefly unbolted door by the uniformed porter that Hall realized he was still clutching those that had first been forced upon him.

Everyone was already assembled in Proudfoot’s room. The QC and Bert Feltham were in shirt-sleeves: Mickey Mouse figures were propelled up and down Feltham’s braces by the heaviness of his breathing. Humphrey Perry looked mournful.

Proudfoot said, ‘What the hell have we opened up here?’

‘Pandora’s Box?’ suggested Hall. After the previous night entirely without sleep he was suddenly extremely tired.

‘I’ve never known anything like it. It’s incredible. We’ve called the police, to clear them,’ said Proudfoot.

Choosing partly to misunderstand, Hall said, ‘There’s never been anything like this. That’s why they’re here. It’s as bad at the hospital. I was followed back.’ He looked uncertainly at the envelopes in his hand and thrust them towards Perry.

‘It’ll be more offers,’ predicted the solicitor, holding up a sheaf of already opened letters. ‘ The Sunday Times heads the list at the moment. Quarter of a million. They all say they’re prepared to negotiate. And that they’ll be sympathetic, whatever that means.’

Proudfoot indicated the open cocktail cabinet and said to the younger barrister, ‘Help yourself.’

Hall wasn’t a drinker but he poured whisky, deciding that night he not only needed but deserved it. He wondered if there would be any congratulations for representing a client as he had. He said, ‘I hadn’t thought this far ahead. Anticipated the reaction.’

‘I don’t want it to continue,’ declared Proudfoot, accusingly. ‘I’m wondering what the Bar Council attitude will be.’

‘Disappointment among its members that they’re not involved,’ guessed Hall, cynically. ‘And I don’t see how I could have avoided it.’

‘Applying for exhumation was unnecessary,’ insisted Proudfoot.

‘If the DNA is the same as that at the scene, Jennifer Lomax will be officially and fully declared not guilty instead of the trial closing because the evidence is unsafe.’

‘Which means Gerald Lomax was murdered by a ghost,’ said Proudfoot, contemptuously.

‘Yes,’ said Hall, with flat simplicity. ‘The court has already accepted evidence that proves that.’

A heavy silence encompassed the room. It was broken by the wheezing Bert Feltham. ‘I’ve gone through the transcript of today’s evidence. That’s exactly what it proves.’

‘Precisely a Pandora’s Box,’ said Perry, distantly.

Hall helped himself to more whisky, uninvited. ‘We can only go on a day at a time,’ he said, remembering it was the cliche he’d used at the hospital because he couldn’t think of anything.

Proudfoot smiled, in sudden affability. ‘Thought I might sit in, at the resumption.’

Wigged, gowned and ready for recognition inside and out of the court, guessed Hall, bitterly. ‘I’m sure Mr Justice Jarvis would welcome someone rumoured to be his successor.’ He was tired and fed up and didn’t care.

‘It might not be a good idea, for that and other reasons,’ cautioned Feltham.

‘Reasons that might affect my case?’ demanded Hall, considering the impertinence justified if it did, although he couldn’t imagine how. He slightly stressed ‘my’.

Proudfoot looked sharply at his Chief Clerk, who flushed in unaccustomed and rare embarrassment, dragging an inhaler from his pocket. Proudfoot said, ‘It’s of no consequence. I don’t think I will attend.’

‘It is of consequence if it is in any way connected with my client,’ insisted Hall, curious at the obvious feeling between the two men.

Proudfoot sighed, heightening Feltham’s colour with another look. The older barrister said, ‘We have accepted the brief to represent Enco-Corps in a civil matter. Some derivatives dealing in copper, predominantly on the Far East market.’

‘And?’ persisted Hall, dissatisfied.

Now Proudfoot looked at Humphrey Perry. ‘We understood at the outset there was no question of culpability on the part of Enco-Corps: that they were acting in genuine good faith for Asian dealers. It would seem, however, that there might be some doubt…’

Hall waited.

‘Gerald Lomax was inflating prices on offer to Hong Kong and Singapore,’ finally admitted Proudfoot. ‘Manipulating the buy-in prices. It created a snowball effect, artificially heating both exchanges. Dealers panicked, continuing to buy high to cover their losses.’

‘Will it become public?’ demanded Hall. The deal, he recognized at once. His uncle had allowed the Jennifer Lomax murder to be dumped on to the chambers – and personally on to him, whose career was still too new to be of any importance – to gain a civil brief that would take months to prepare and months to litigate, all at a fee of?1,000 a day.

‘In my opinion any British prosecution will have died with Gerald Lomax himself,’ said Proudfoot. ‘Rebecca Nicholls’ name is on some of the sell orders but she says she was acting on Lomax’s instructions: there’s nothing criminally to link her.’

And with Gerald Lomax’s death went the hope of all that money, thought Hall, satisfaction warming through him. ‘Thank you, for advising me.’

‘I would have done so, had I considered it had any relevance,’ insisted Proudfoot. Now it was he who coloured.

‘I have no doubt whatsoever that you would have done,’ said Hall, maintaining the sarcasm.

‘What shall we do with all these offers,’ Perry hurried in to the rescue, waving the letters in his hand like a flag.

‘We’re Mrs Lomax’s agent,’ reminded Hall. ‘We’re required to pass on any correspondence.’ He paused. ‘I doubt she’ll be interested. Money’s the one thing she isn’t in need of.’

At the hospital Peter Lloyd said, ‘There was something you needed to know?’

‘I was lesbian raped in prison. They used something: an artificial penis. If it had been used on someone else, someone with AIDs, could I have been infected?’

Lloyd swallowed, swamped with pity. ‘I doubt it.’

‘But you’re not one hundred per cent sure?’

‘Would you like to be HIV tested?’

‘Yes.’

‘ Now here’s a whole new ball game! ’

‘Are there really ghosts?’

‘Of course not,’ said Annabelle.

‘Margaret Roberts says there are.’

‘Well there aren’t.’

‘Margaret Roberts say’s Mummy is a ghost.’

‘How can your mummy be a ghost? She’s your mummy.’

‘She’s not here though, is she?’

‘She will be, soon.’