A Time For Justice

Chapter Twenty-One

At the end of the third week, the trial seemed to have gone fairly smoothly for the Crown. The witnesses had all been good and believable and had kept to their stories, even under severe provocation and pressure from Mr Graham, QC for the defence, who was performing at his peak.

Donaldson had been up to give his evidence. It had been a harrowing experience for him to relive the death of Ken McClure, particularly when Graham questioned everything down to the last detail. Donaldson’s eyes had visibly moistened when he described the scene and last words of his friend. The jury had been right behind him and he sensed he could do no wrong. If nothing else, Hinksman would be convicted of killing McClure.

When Donaldson was asked if the man responsible for his friend’s death was present in court, he’d lifted his hand and pointed his finger straight at Hinksman. ‘That is the man who murdered my friend, Ken McClure.’ It was a satisfying moment.

Hinksman merely stretched and yawned.

Graham immediately objected to the statement, saying that murder had yet to be proved. The Judge ordered him to sit back down, then she warned Hinksman that he wasn’t far from being in contempt of court. He raised his eyebrows and smiled at her.

She made a note.

Donaldson’s evidence was the last to be given on that Friday afternoon.

As the trial was adjourned for the weekend, Hinksman indicated that he wanted a private consultation with Graham.

In the interview room, Hinksman asked, ‘Well, how’s it going?’

‘ In truth, not very well,’ admitted Graham. ‘The prosecution have got sentiment on their side. It does help. Too many innocent people have died.’

‘ How strong do you think their evidence is against me regarding Gaskell, the arms dealer?’

‘ So so,’ said Graham, sitting securely on the fence. ‘Although there’s no direct witness testimony, there are the videos the police recovered from the guest-house which show you turning up at Gaskell’s house. Then the ballistic evidence — the fact that the gun you had with you when Christie arrested you is the one which killed Gaskell. It all looks pretty bleak, to be honest.’

‘ Mmm… When is Christie due to give evidence?’

‘ Middle of next week, I estimate.’

‘ Well, you make damned sure he has a hard time,’ ordered Hinksman. ‘I want his evidence and his character dragged through the mud. Hear me?’

‘ I hear you,’ said Graham dismally. He was unused to being given instructions on how to defend a case by his client. He knew he had to be patient with Hinksman, otherwise he’d probably get a bullet in the brain.

‘ And I want you to tell Dakin to move up a gear on the jury. I want them all shitting themselves this weekend.’

‘ I’ll tell him,’ sighed Graham. He was more concerned with the prospect of Henry Christie’s evidence next week. He knew very little about the detective or his background.

‘ I’m not sure I’ll have much mud to sling at Christie,’ he told Hinksman doubtfully. ‘I may be able to get into his evidence, but as to his character… I don’t know.’ He shrugged.

Hinksman smiled an evil smile. ‘Don’t worry. By Monday morning you’ll have everything you need. Promise.’

By its very nature this murder trial was spectacular and newsworthy. It had all the ingredients of a juicy international story. The massive bomb which killed many innocent people; the violent deaths of police officers; the links with underworld crime in England and America; the death of an American gangster and his ‘moll’; the death of a British arms dealer; the involvement of the FBI and the insinuation — nothing more — that Hinksman was a Mafia hitman, although the words ‘Mafia’ and ‘hitman’ were never to be used throughout the trial.

When it started, the trial made front-page news across the globe; as it proceeded it was always featured somewhere on page two or three. But it lacked a ‘certain something’, a spark.

It got that ‘certain something’ over the weekend, which blasted it right back to the headlines.

Firstly, all the jury members had their houses fire-bombed. No one was injured, but much damage was done and worry caused. Speculation was rife: would the next step be the taking of a juror’s life? Would there have to be a re-trial?

Secondly it got that something that made the whole trial really come to life.

It got a personality.

It got Henry Christie.

He was exposed.

Carried initially by the News of the World it was a tale that caught the public’s imagination.

Henry’s life and times were laid bare for all to see.

His drinking was dredged up. His womanising. His adultery. His violent temper. His marriage collapse. His nervous breakdown. All slit open for the world to see and drool over.

Hero Cop’s Sex and Drink Binge! screamed the headline.

Henry, who had always thought himself to be Mr Very Average, had become newsworthy.

All thanks to the relentless digging of a female American journalist called Lisa Want, on special assignment to the News of the World.

Henry’s Sunday was spent alone with the more highbrow newspapers. He took the Sunday Times and the Sunday Telegraph, which were delivered. He rose at nine, prepared a pot of coffee and warmed up two Sainsbury’s croissants before settling down to three blissful hours of uninterrupted reading.

It was his Sunday ritual.

At 12.30 p.m. he switched on the TV to watch the Grand Prix. The phone rang.

It was FB. His opening words were, ‘What the fuck have you done, Henry? Talking to the fucking gutter press! Have you gone stark staring bonkers?’

‘ Hold on,’ Henry cautioned him. ‘What the hell are you on about?’

FB reduced himself from a boil to a simmer and explained.

Henry put the phone down as FB finished. It rang again immediately. A journalist from a rival newspaper introduced himself. Henry told him where he should get off and slammed the phone down — but not before he heard the man offer him five figures for an exclusive.

The phone rang again.

‘ I have just told you to fuck off,’ bawled Henry.

‘ Henry. It’s me, Kate.’

‘ Oh, Jeez. Sorry.’

‘ Have you seen the newspapers today — in particular the News of the World?’ she asked coldly. ‘Our marriage is splashed all over for everyone to see. Our private life, Henry.’ She was obviously very upset and close to tears. ‘I honestly thought we were near to… to getting back together. But this! This! It changes everything as far as I’m concerned. How could you? Oh Christ, how could you?’

‘ Hang on, Kate. I haven’t done anything. I haven’t spoken to any journalist — not one. And I haven’t seen the paper yet, either… so, look, give me half an hour, will you? Please. I’ll go and get a copy, read it, then phone you back, OK?’

‘ Very well,’ she said quietly in a way that gave Henry a shiver.

Henry closed his eyes as he replaced the receiver. He’d had no idea that Kate was thinking about getting back with him. To hear that and to have the prospect dashed in the same sentence was gut-wrenching. The phone rang again.

He picked it up, shouted, ‘Go fuck yourself,’ slammed it back down, then left it off the hook and dashed out to the newsagents.

He purposely did not open the newspaper until he got back to the fiat. He poured himself a coffee, sat down at the small kitchen table and then opened it.

The story was plastered over pages three and four.

Henry gasped.

The headlines were bad enough in themselves. The story below made him cringe with embarrassment.

There was a still photo which showed him assaulting the TV reporter on the banks of the River Ribble. That illustrated his violent streak.

The remainder of the story was made up from an interview with Natalie which detailed their affair, their sexual exploits — ‘He was insatiable’ she said — and their final acrimonious split. ‘I couldn’t live with a broken man’ she claimed, ‘and anyway, he dumped me. He used me then tossed me aside.’ She talked quite extensively about his nervous breakdown and his terrible dreams. Henry hoped she had been well paid for this, because she’d need the money when she got sacked

… he hoped. There were a couple of photographs from his time with Natalie. They’d been snapped by her friend when he’d been drunk and was drooling pathetically over Natalie. Henry winced when he saw them. They made him look just like he was — a man making an utter fool of himself over a younger girl.

It didn’t stop there.

There was also a piece about Henry and Karl Donaldson taking Natalie and her friend out. Entitled My Night of Sex With FBI Man, it detailed Donaldson’s exploits that night too, including the mystery lady banging on his hotel door in the early hours, demanding to see Donaldson and interrupting their lovemaking. The woman wasn’t identified, but was described as a ‘high-ranking officer in the Lancashire Constabulary who was, at the time, running a major investigation’. It went on to describe Donaldson, naked, chasing her down the hotel corridor. Henry knew it was a night Donaldson would rather forget, especially now that he’d made his peace with Karen.

Then there was the photo of Henry’s two distraught-looking daughters taken a few weeks before, following the shooting incident in the Lake District.

‘ Bitch,’ uttered Henry, shaking his head, reading on.

It got worse.

The scorned cleaner Maureen had her say, too. Her story made an ideally tacky footnote to the whole thing. Another ‘used and abused after a night of sexual ecstasy, a night when I did things for him I’d done for no other man’. For no other man that night, snorted Henry. There was a picture of her in her overalls with a mop and bucket, looking as ugly as sin. God knows how I ever fucked her, he thought bitterly.

The worst of it was that he hadn’t told Kate.

Miss Lisa ‘Shit-Face’ Want had been very busy indeed. Some of her facts weren’t exactly spot on and there was a great deal of literary exaggeration, but all in all it turned out to be a much better profile than she’d promised.

Henry rushed to the toilet and vomited.

He hung over the pan, spitting and slobbering, almost crying. This, once more, was where his life had gone.

Dave August spent a very subdued weekend, returning to work at eight on Monday morning. Everyone’s eyes seemed to be on him, as though they knew. He tried to shrug the feeling off: he was the Chief Constable, after all. It was only natural that he should be the centre of attention.

Jean was at her desk, sorting correspondence. He bade her a jovial good morning and she was glad to see that her boss had rediscovered some of his lost friendliness. His mood over the last week had started to put a crisp edge on her nerves.

‘ Shall I make tea?’ she suggested before he reached his office door.

‘ Most certainly, Jean. Best drink of the day,’ he replied.

She got up, smiling, and left. He paused with one hand on the door handle. Taking stock of himself, he turned it and confidently shoved the door open.

Everything was as it should have been. There was nothing untoward in the post or on his desk.

August sighed with relief.

He got the phone call at 9.05 a.m.

Henry Christie and Karl Donaldson arrived at Lancaster Castle together. Donaldson was driving, even though Henry had had his plaster removed first thing that morning and his wrist felt OK, if a little weak.

They were greeted by a crowd of eager journalists and photographers who’d been herded behind barriers by the police. Questions and flashes assaulted the ears and eyes of the two detectives. They held up their hands to shield their faces and said ‘No comment’ to all the enquiries.

Once inside the building, Donaldson turned to Henry and said, ‘Fame at last, pal,’ with a grin.

Henry couldn’t help but laugh.

They both submitted themselves to the search procedures and entered the court.

Then they went to hunt for Lisa Want — but she was noticeable by absence.

Henry entered the witness-box at 10.30 a.m. on Wednesday. He took the Bible in his right hand and said, ‘I swear by Almighty God that the evidence I shall give shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing the truth.

My name is Henry James Christie. I am a Detective Sergeant with Lancashire Constabulary, currently on the CID at Blackpool. Previously I was seconded to the Regional Crime Squad, also based in Blackpool. ‘

The QC for the prosecution stood slowly up. He shuffled his papers.

The court was hushed and expectant.

Henry had a quick look round.

He saw that Lisa Want had suddenly appeared in the press-box. He looked at the jury. They seemed to be good, decent people.

Then his eyes locked with Hinksman’s.

Hinksman was fondling his chin thoughtfully with the fingers of his gilt hand, gazing at Henry. As Henry looked at him, Hinksman almost imperceptibly drew his first finger across his throat in an unmistakable gesture.

Henry allowed himself a slight sneer.

The Judge had seen the exchange. She made no comment on it, but noted it down.

The QC coughed and began to take Henry through his evidence.

Henry felt he had done well. The jury were obviously on his side, sitting there open-mouthed with anticipation and sympathy.

As he drew to a close the prosecuting counsel thanked Henry and said, ‘Would you please wait there, Sergeant. I’m sure my learned friend will wish to ask you some questions.’

He sat down and handed over to Graham.

Graham, with his half-glasses perched precariously on the tip of his nose, stood up slowly, adjusting his robes as he did so.

Henry knew of his reputation — well paid, defender of rich villains and celebrities, ruthless — and was on guard immediately.

Graham pushed his spectacles up his nose to the bridge, then allowed them to slide back down again to the tip. He pursed his lips into a pucker. He nodded at Henry and said, ‘Sergeant,’ by way of a greeting.

Henry nodded back apprehensively. This is not going to be easy, he thought. Why don’t you just get on with it instead of fannying around, you bastard.

Graham’s lips then went tight across his teeth, like a dead man’s smile.

‘ I’m very pleased to see, as is the court, that you have recovered from your injuries.’

‘ Thank you,’ said Henry. He realised that this would probably be about as humane as Graham got.

‘ You certainly have been in the wars,’ he commented. ‘It’s a wonder you made it here.’ A titter went round the court. ‘You have been through a very traumatic time, physically and mentally.’ Though this was a statement it was phrased as a question — but Henry chose not to answer it. If you want to ask me questions, he thought, then ask and I’ll answer.

When nothing was forthcoming, Graham added, ‘Isn’t that so?’

‘ Yes,’ said Henry simply.

‘ Right, Sergeant, if I may, I’d like to take you back to the night in question — the night, in fact, when you shot my client.’

Suddenly it was as though Henry was on trial.

Henry stood stock still. He avoided eye-contact with Graham; he knew that would be disastrous. Eye-contact led to verbal battles; once these battles were joined, the officer giving evidence had usually lost the war, unless he was very experienced and clever. Henry had given evidence many times, but was aware he was no match for a devious, slimy barrister when it came to word-games.

He desperately wanted to say, ‘And the night when your client killed a whole bunch of people,’ but he didn’t.

He decided to stick to his usual courtroom strategy: keep it simple, don’t stray from the written statement, don’t lose your cool, don’t answer back. Tell the truth — but if a lie has to be told, remember what you said.

‘ You were on a surveillance operation that night, you say, tailing a man who was eventually shot in front of you.’

Henry said nothing.

Graham then knew he would have to ask direct questions.

‘ Is that correct, officer?’ he asked stonily.

‘ It is,’ nodded Henry.

‘ And you followed this man into a public house in Blackpool, the — ’ and here Graham read out the name of the establishment from his brief. ‘Did you drink any alcohol when you were in this bar?’

‘ Er… I can’t remember,’ said Henry.

‘ Wouldn’t you have stood out like a sore thumb if you’d been in there without a drink in your hand? You were, after all, undercover. ‘

‘ I may have had a soft drink,’ Henry admitted. ‘I was on duty and I don’t drink on duty.’

‘ So, no alcohol?’

‘ No,’ said Henry. He actually remembered buying a bottle of Bud but wasn’t going to reveal that.

Graham nodded, not impressed.

‘ When you followed this man and his associates out of the public house, you stated that you lost sight of them and then were dragged down an alley. Is that correct?’

‘ Yes.’

‘ Can you describe the alley?’

Henry thought a moment. ‘It was about twenty feet wide and a hundred and fifty feet long, coming to a dead end. The exact measurements are on a plan, which I believe you have a copy of.’

‘ It is your recollections the court is interested in, not a map,’ said Graham haughtily. ‘Where exactly was this alley?’

‘ Between the pub and the next building along, which is a guest house, I think.’

Graham’s mouth pursed as he composed his next set of questions. ‘What time of night was it?’

‘ About nine forty-five.’

‘ Remind the court, officer — what month was it?’

‘ October.’

‘ October,’ said Graham ruminatively, drawing out the word, as though chewing the cud. ‘Quite late on in the year, wouldn’t you say?’

‘ It is a fact,’ said Henry, deadpan, ‘that the twentieth of October is quite late in the year.’

A couple of the jury giggled. There was a slight release in tension. Graham shot them a hard, warning glance. He did not like it. But he took control of himself and smiled good-naturedly, accepting the joke at his expense. He turned back to Henry, his features assuming the look of a hunter poised to kill.

‘ So, getting on towards winter. Nights drawing in…’

Impulsively, Henry cut in: ‘If you’d like me to say that it was dark — yes, it was dark.’ He regretted his words immediately, not only because he’d spoken otherwise than in answer to a question, but because courts are very formal, traditional, patient places and by his impatience he had just managed to rub everyone up the wrong way, including Judge and jury. Not a good move.

Graham allowed himself the flicker of a smile, just the corners of his mouth twitching. Only Henry saw it.

Graham was back in charge of the interaction.

He said, ‘I would be obliged if you could refrain from jumping the gun, Sergeant.’ He raised his eyebrows and cocked his head at Henry, as if to say, ‘Do you understand, pal?’

Henry nodded. ‘My apologies,’ he mumbled.

Graham paused and perused his papers, allowing time for everyone in the court to settle and for Henry to become agitated. A pause can be a good weapon, if used correctly.

‘ So, it was a dark night,’ confirmed Graham. ‘What was the weather like?’

‘ Clear and fine.’

‘ Could you see down the alley?’

‘ It was fairly poorly lit and there were a lot of shadows.’

‘ Was there any actual lighting in the alley at all?’

‘ No.’ At that point Henry began to see where this was leading and his stomach lurched. He might just conceivably lose this.

‘ So, you were dragged into the alley and a vicious fight ensued between yourself and several men. You have graphically relayed details of this struggle whilst giving evidence earlier, and we are all very impressed by your bravery…’

Just fuck off, Henry thought.

‘… so I don’t intend to pursue that. But at the conclusion of this fight, could you remind us what position you were in?’

‘ Face up on the ground, surrounded by people who didn’t like me very much.’

‘ You also mentioned that you’d received a blow on the head prior to this and that you thought you’d passed out momentarily. Is that correct?’

‘ Yes.’

‘ How did you feel?’

‘ Frightened. ‘

‘ No doubt,’ said Graham. ‘Were you pretty dazed too, from the blow on the head?’

‘ Actually my head was very clear,’ he said. ‘My body was in a mess physically — but I was thinking very clearly.’

Graham nodded. Then pounced.

‘ You’d been beaten up, bashed about the head and body, quite badly injured, knocked unconscious — and you say you were thinking very clearly?’ Graham barely suppressed a laugh. ‘Do you expect the court to believe that, officer?’

‘ I’m a very cool customer in stressful situations,’ said Henry glibly and rather rashly. A complete and utter lie, one which was seized upon ruthlessly by Graham.

‘ A cool customer in stressful situations,’ the QC repeated dubiously. ‘Now that is not altogether true, is it… Sergeant?’

‘ Yes, it is,’ said Henry without conviction.

‘ Well then, perhaps I could remind you of another incident when you showed yourself to be completely uncool in a stressful situation. Such as at the scene of the M6 bombing, of which my client is accused. You actually assaulted and threw a TV reporter down the banks of the River Ribble. Isn’t that so? Not the actions of a man who is, quote “A very cool customer in stressful situations”, are they?’

‘ That was completely different,’ protested Henry eventually.

‘ Are those the actions of a man who is a cool customer?’ Graham was insistent.

‘ Completely and totally different…’

‘ Did you or did you not assault a TV reporter?’

‘ Yes, but-’

‘ Thank you, officer,’ said Graham victoriously.

Henry found himself to be shaking and grinding his teeth. He gripped the edge of the witness-box to stop himself falling over. His breathing was shallow. His nostrils flared. Suddenly this big courtroom was beginning to swallow him up. He wanted to flee. Leap over the side of the box and run. Run for his life. He was, again, showing exactly how uncool he was in stressful situations. His eyes roved round the room madly. To the Judge. Across the faces of the jurors. To Hinksman, who smirked. Back to Graham, a man he hated more than anyone else at that moment in time.

Get a fucking grip on yourself, Henry, he told himself. Get a fucking grip. Pull yourself together. Don’t let this little shit win.

‘ I need to tell you about that particular situation,’ he pleaded. He looked at the Crown prosecutor for support.

The man, who had been squirming until that moment, got the message and stood up reluctantly. He addressed the Judge. ‘Your Honour, I feel that Sergeant Christie should be allowed to tell the court about this if he so wishes… After all, he did not bring the subject up. It was my learned friend here.’

Graham said quickly, ‘Your Honour, the situation itself is not actually relevant, merely the witness’s reaction to it.’ The last thing he wanted was Henry going for the sympathy bid.

‘ No,’ said the Judge with finality, ‘the Crown is quite correct, Mr Graham. The officer should be allowed to expand a little if he so wishes.’

She nodded towards Henry who said, ‘Thank you, Your Honour.’ The prosecutor sat down, hoping Henry wasn’t going to make a mess of this, like he had done so far.

Joe Kovaks rubbed his eyes. He had been up all night, patrolling the streets of Miami, searching, but not finding. It was almost 7 a.m., five hours behind British time.

He was parked in a plain FBI sedan in the Lemon City district, north of Miami, killing the last few minutes of his tour of duty.

His temporary partner, Tommo, dozed next to him in the passenger seat, snoring gently. Sue had been reassigned unwillingly to other duties — some massive white-collar fraud enquiry where she could use her accountancy skills to their best advantage — and Tommo had been teamed up with Kovaks pending the return of Donaldson from England.

The sun was climbing up through the sky. It was going to be another hot day. Soon Kovaks would be going home — how he had almost come to hate going home! — and he would take Chrissy to hospital where she would undergo treatment for most of the day, some medical, mostly psychiatric. He would go back to the apartment and sleep while she was there, collecting her later in the day.

Kovaks yawned and reviewed the night’s work.

Another fucking total waste of time. He’d combed the city for what seemed the millionth time, but he couldn’t find her, the woman who was going to bring Corelli to justice…

He and Tommo had hassled countless prostitutes, pimps and drug dealers, because he was sure that it was amongst these people she would be found: selling her body, what was left of it, and that once gorgeous mouth so that she could get pumped-up with enough drugs to see her through the next day.

But he couldn’t fucking find her.

Kovaks was teetering towards the edge now.

Tommo opened his eyes and squinted sideways at Kovaks. ‘You gonna answer that fuckin’ radio or not?’ he croaked.

‘ Eh?’ Kovaks had been so deep in his thoughts that he did not hear the radio operator shouting his call sign. He fumbled the handset. ‘Yeah, receivin’. Go ahead.’

‘ Yeah, Joe,’ began the weary operator. ‘Can you be making your way to the Jackson Memorial Hospital, Emergency Room?’

Puzzled, Kovaks said, ‘Sure, but I’m off-duty at seven.’

‘ Well,’ she drawled, ‘it’s up to you, Joe, but that little lady you been seeking for the past few days has just turned up there in the back of an ambulance — drugs OD.’

‘ On my way,’ shouted Kovaks, throwing the handset down, the wheels of the car spinning almost before he’d finished speaking.

They were back on Henry’s side following his graphic and emotional account of the M6 bombing and its aftermath in the river and on its banks. It was the first time Henry had related the whole story in full to anyone. He found it to be a cathartic, cleansing experience. Suddenly he felt as though a great burden had been lifted from his soul. He’d tried his best, but the situation had been against him. And now he could accept that. Stood in that courtroom, the eyes of the world on him, he had bared his soul — and it felt great.

He looked at the jury. Two women were actually crying.

Then he looked at Hinksman.

Again their eyes locked. But this time Henry felt in no way intimidated by him. I am a brave man, he told Hinksman silently. You are a violent man, but at heart you must be a coward. I am better than you.

Graham coughed. He desperately wanted to get the whole thing back on course.

‘ Now if I may bring you back to the night in question,’ he said, not wasting time, not allowing the jury to reflect. He went straight for the jugular. ‘We’ve established that you were in a dark alley, being assaulted by a number of people. You were on your back, having passed out briefly. What happened next?’

Henry’s ordeal was by no means over.

‘ One of them had a gun to my face — my own gun, actually — and he was weighing up whether or not he should "pop" me.’

‘ “ Pop” you, officer?’

‘ Pull the trigger, kill me,’ explained Henry. ‘Before he could make a decision he himself was dead with his brains blown out, mostly all over me.’

‘ Who shot him?’

‘ A man who came down the alley.’

‘ Do you see that man in court today?’

‘ Yes,’ said Henry. He pointed. ‘Him. Your client.’

‘ Now, come come,’ tutted Graham disapprovingly. ‘How can you possibly make that assumption? A dark alley. No lighting. A beating. You cannot say for sure that it was my client in the alley, can you? You cannot say for sure that he killed those people, can you?’

Henry hesitated. Then he said, ‘I am sure it was.’ No way was he going to be swayed.

‘ Did you see his face?’

‘ To a degree,’ said Henry. ‘Enough to identify him.’

‘ What happened after “this man” shot those people in the alley?’ ‘He turned and walked away.’

‘ Did he speak to you?’

‘ No, but he spoke to one of the men before he shot him. He said a few words in an American accent.’

Graham chose to ignore that. ‘Did he turn back at all?’

‘ Briefly, at the end of the alley. He glanced back and I saw his face again — this time under street lighting. It was definitely your client.’

‘ And how long did you see his face for? One second? Two? Three?’

‘ About a second,’ admitted Henry.

‘ About a second… and that gave you enough time to make a positive identification of Mr Hinksman?’

‘ Yes.’

‘ How far away was he from you?’

‘ About fifty feet.’

‘ And you were still laid on your back, is that correct?’

‘ Yes,’ said Henry.

Graham shook his head. ‘What happened next?’

‘ Hinksman turned and walked away towards the Tower. I decided to go after him.’

‘ So you lost sight of him.’

‘ Yes.’

‘ For how long?’

‘ Until I caught up with him on the promenade.’

‘ Which was how long?’

‘ A minute, ninety seconds.’

‘ Is it not just possible that the man you caught up with was not the same man who killed all those people in the alley?’

‘ It was the same man — Hinksman,’ said Henry firmly.

‘ But you lost sight of that man. How could you possibly say it was the same man?’

‘ I recognised him, and apart from anything else, he was wearing the same clothing.’

Graham did not pursue Henry’s encounter on the promenade with Hinksman. Too many people could back him up. Instead he concentrated on discrediting the identification of Hinksman in the alley. He knew that much of the evidence against Hinksman was good and that he would probably get convicted of most of the murders of which he was accused. Graham saw it as his job to do two things; get some of them reduced to manslaughter and get him off some of the charges. He had a strong case against Henry’s testimony, as the sergeant well knew. There was no one to back up Henry’s story because Ralphie’s girlfriend had disappeared without trace (probably dressed in concrete, Henry believed), and therefore everything rested on Henry’s eyewitness account, backed up by forensic and ballistic evidence which proved that the gun in Hinksman’s possession at the time of his arrest was the one which killed Ralphie and his pals. The difficulty for the prosecution was in proving that Hinksman had actually pulled the trigger. If Henry couldn’t convince the jury, then Hinksman would be cleared of four murder charges. Henry did not want this to happen.

Henry spent a further thirty minutes in the witness-box under cross-examination by Graham.

In the end Graham said huffily, ‘It is obvious, officer, that you have decided to stick to your story no matter what, so I have no further questions for you.’ Angrily he sat down, unhappy that he could not get Henry to budge — and not terribly pleased that he had been unable to carry out Hinksman’s instructions and drag Henry’s character through the mud.

Three hours after stepping into the box, Henry stepped out, feeling weak and hungry. The court had adjourned for lunch.

‘ Well done, pal,’ said Donaldson. He’d been watching from the rear of the court.

‘ I feel completely drained,’ said Henry. ‘Lunch?’

‘ Afraid not. Karen and I have an appointment in Manchester at three. We’ll be leaving now.’

‘ What’s that for?’

‘ Can’t tell you,’ said Donaldson, tapping his nose.

‘ A mega-concoction of pills, anything she could lay her hands on, I’d say,’ the nurse told Joe Kovaks. ‘You name it, they were in there. Pill cocktail, could’ve been lethal if she’d’ve had ‘em in her any longer. Got here just in time. We pumped her stomach out real good. Doc says no harm done.’

‘ So she’ll be OK?’

‘ Yep. She’s tired now and she’ll need a few days in here, but she’ll be fine, or at least as fine as a junkie can get.’

They turned into the ward. ‘Third bed on the left.’

‘ Thanks, nurse,’ Kovaks said.

He walked quietly down the ward. Curtains were drawn around the third bed along. He found the gap and stepped into the enclosed world. Kovaks gasped when he saw her. She looked very ill, all skin and bone and she seemed to be barely breathing. In fact he thought she was dead at first, but a twitch in one of her fingers told him otherwise. A drip ran into one of her skinny arms, the tube of which was not much less in circumference than the arm itself.

Kovaks sat next to the bed. His chair scraped on the floor.

She looked ninety years old. Kovaks knew she was nineteen. He shook his head sadly, remembering the feisty girl who used to give him as good as she got whenever he visited her to try and arrest Whisper when he’d been wanted on warrant. She hadn’t taken any shit from anyone back then. Now she didn’t even look capable of taking a shit.

Yes, Corelli had a whole lot to answer for, he thought grimly.

‘ Laura,’ Kovaks whispered.

Her eyelids flickered, but stayed closed.

‘ Laura,’ he said more forcefully. He touched her arm. It felt cold and clammy.

This time her eyes opened. Kovaks noted they were dead eyes, without depth or hope. She squinted sideways at him, not instantly recognising him, but when she did she sneered.

Kovaks looked at her mouth. Once thick-lipped and sensuous, even he had imagined the pleasure of a blow job with her. Now her lips formed a thin, hard line.

‘ What do you want?’ she whispered tiredly.

‘ I heard you were in. I wanted to see how you were.’

‘ Well, now you’ve seen,’ she said, ‘so fuck off and leave me.’ Her eyes closed wearily. She breathed out and her whole being seemed to deflate as though she’d breathed out her soul.

‘ There’s only one reason you’re here,’ Kovaks said, ‘and that’s because of Corelli. He hasn’t only fucked up your life, you know? He’s fucked up hundreds, thousands. We need to talk, Laura, maybe not just at this minute, but soon when you’re feeling better. We have to stitch that bastard up… please, Laura.’

She opened her eyes again. ‘I’ve lost my baby because of him. She’s been taken away from me, did you know?’

‘ No, I didn’t,’ he lied.

‘ She was all I had left after they killed Whisper. Yeah, sure, I’ll talk…’ A tear rolled down her face and dripped onto the pillow. ‘He can’t do anything to me now. If he killed me he’d be doing me a favour… so what do I have to lose? But not now, not now. I feel so sleepy. I need to sleep…’