No Further Questions

by Gillian McAllister

  Wind.

  Food.

  Cold.

  Hot.

  Tired.

  The internet no longer offers up answers. The search results are all purple, not blue, already clicked on. I haven’t asked Martha. Not while she’s in Kos. I could kill bloody Scott for leaving her with me for a second night, though I sent him a breezy text back.

  Why am I like this? I wish I was one of those people who could say, coolly, ‘No, that doesn’t work for me.’ No explanation. No second-guessing. No self-flagellation. But I’m not. I’m just not.

  My phone beeps. It’s Marc.

  Samuel, his text begins. How you getting on?

  I smile at that. He has called me Samuel for years. Martha and Scott find it bizarre, always exchange glances when Marc uses that special name that has its roots in the time when we used to love each other.

  It originated when we were watching University Challenge. We liked to smirk at the nerdy team members. ‘Their mothers didn’t love them,’ Marc would say. We would hoot with laughter at their geeky sweaters and milk-bottle glasses.

  Anyway, at the precise moment Paxman asked, ‘Which Beckett served as a member of parliament for Whitby from 1906?’ Marc said, ‘Drink?’ and I said, ‘Samuel.’

  How we laughed. ‘Sorry, drink, Samuel?’ Marc said, and we chuckled some more. The answer wasn’t even Samuel Beckett; it was Gervase Beckett – Samuel Beckett was a ridiculous guess. He was an Irish writer who lived in Paris, not a Whitby MP! That just made us laugh even more.

  I don’t think Marc has ever called me anything else since. Not even when it all unravelled, when we forgot to kiss each other properly – dry kisses, perfunctory kisses before work – and forgot to be Marc and Becky, not Xander’s parents. I was still Samuel, then, to him. Even the day he left, he said, ‘’Bye, Samuel,’ in this sad, mournful way that I’ve never forgotten.

  Alright, I reply to him now, but nothing more.

  There’s no time. Besides, he’s just checking in with me, I think. I hover on his name, wanting to call him. To say, ‘I love it when you call me Samuel.’ To say, ‘I miss you, thanks for checking up on me.’ But I can’t. No matter how nice he is now, he won’t want to hear it. The romance is over. Those laughs, that life, snuffed out. By me. Because of me. I’m lucky we can even remain friends. That he remains nice at all after what I did.

  I glance up at the darkened bedroom window where I know Layla is still crying, still bright red, still writhing around.

  I have to go back in, soon. I didn’t ask for this, didn’t know what it would involve, but here we are. There’s no point being furious about it, I tell myself. But nevertheless, fury burns through my veins.

  I’m angry at myself. But I’m also angry with her.

  With Layla. For crying.

  It’s irrational, but it’s true.

  Forty-eight, forty-nine, fifty.

  41

  Martha

  There is a paediatric neurosurgeon up next. She is wearing a blazer which is the exact colour Layla’s cheeks used to be: the pale blush of an apricot.

  ‘Please state your name for the court,’ Ellen says.

  ‘Helena Armstrong.’

  ‘And what is your job?’

  ‘I’m a consultant paediatric neurosurgeon.’

  ‘And how many years’ experience do you have?’

  ‘Twenty,’ Helena says.

  She folds her arms and tilts her head to the side. She doesn’t look forty-five to fifty. She barely looks thirty-five.

  ‘Seven as a consultant.’ She reaches and takes a sip from the plastic cup of water on the edge of the witness box.

  Her hands are steady. She is utterly used to this, I can tell.

  Ellen is staring down at her papers. This is her moment, after all. This medical evidence is what the case turns on. This is her proof.

  ‘Let’s take it injury by injury,’ Ellen says to her witness.

  I feel my mouth filling with saliva.

  ‘Okay,’ Helena says.

  A paediatric neurosurgeon. I can hardly imagine what her life is like.

  ‘The pathologist told us that Layla had haemorrhages around her nose and mouth. Blood in her lungs, together with fibres. And bruised gums.’

  ‘Yes, she did have those, according to the scans and reports I have seen.’

  ‘And why is that so unusual, Ms Armstrong?’

  ‘If there is blood around the nose and mouth, it indicates that the baby was struggling for breath, or perhaps even struggling hard against somebody who was inflicting harm. When strained, veins and arteries burst. The same happens in the lungs, with forced attempts to breathe before death. The bruised gums indicate force.’

  ‘Force?’

  ‘Yes. The bruised gums are indicative of Layla perhaps having had something applied quite tightly across her nose and mouth.’

  ‘I see. So, in your expert opinion, Layla died from asphyxiation. But do you have a view as to whether this was accidental or deliberate?’

  ‘It looks deliberate to me. The bruising is suspicious. The haemorrhages could be down to the body struggling for breath, or down to violence being inflicted on Layla. It’s impossible to tell.’ She indicates the folder again. ‘I have replicated the scans.’

  ‘Please turn to pages thirteen and fourteen, jury,’ Ellen says.

  ‘Here are Layla’s MRI scans, performed after she died,’ Helena says. ‘You can see the blood in her lungs very clearly: the white spots on the scans. Likewise the white lines on the retinas, which indicate retinal haemorrhages.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Ellen says. ‘How sure are you that these injuries are attributed to deliberate and not accidental smothering?’

  ‘With the bruised gums, as sure as I can be.’

  I swallow the saliva.

  What was I doing in Kos, the moment it happened?

  At 8.30 p.m., 9.00 p.m., 9.30 p.m. The experts are all sure. It was between 8.00 p.m. and 9.30 p.m.

  Asleep, perhaps. Perhaps I was removing my make-up in methodical swipes. A mother, becoming an ex-mother, in one unknowing motion.

  ‘So it is not possible that, for example, the baby rolled and became trapped somehow in the Moses basket?’

  ‘Layla was only eight weeks old. She hadn’t rolled over yet. So I would be surprised by that.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘And now to the bruising on her ear lobe.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why is that unusual?’

  ‘It’s very difficult to bruise a baby’s ear lobe. It is not bony, and so it is not likely to be bumped. It therefore raises red flags to medics.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s consistent with signs of abuse. Deliberate trauma. Pinching.’

  Pinching.

  ‘Thank you. And finally. The pathologist has timed the death as occurring at around eight or nine at night. Is that consistent with what you have read?’

  ‘I have no reason to dispute that. Yes.’

  ‘And would Layla have died instantly, following the suffocation?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Nothing further,’ Ellen says.

  Harriet stands up, looking contemplative. Her eyes are narrowed and she upends her pen and taps the end of it on the desk until it clicks off, and then on again. The noise seems to echo in the courtroom.

  ‘Would retinal haemorrhages be present in an accidental smothering?’

  ‘Yes, probably. But not always.’

  ‘Would bleeding in the lungs?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Bleeding in the skin surrounding the mouth and lips?’

  ‘Yes, sometimes.’

  ‘Bruised gums?’

  ‘Not always.’

  ‘Sometimes?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Thank you. Is it not, also, possible that some of these injuries – the retinal haemorrhages, for example – are incidental findings, left over from, say, if not accidental smothering, then a traumatic birth?’

&
nbsp; ‘Possible, but unlikely.’

  ‘So with that possibility, we cannot be certain that this baby was smothered at all, either accidentally or on purpose. There are plenty of explanations.’

  Helena huffs. ‘I can’t answer that.’

  ‘I think you have to,’ Harriet says, raising her eyebrows to the judge.

  He makes a motion with his hand. ‘Ms Armstrong, an answer to this is both helpful and necessary,’ he says.

  She pauses, then says slowly, ‘I would like to think I am as certain as I can be.’

  ‘Nothing further.’

  Ellen stands back up. ‘If you had to say, in terms of likelihood, whether these injuries were more consistent with accidental or homicidal smothering, which would you say?’

  ‘Homicidal.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘We’ll take a break there,’ the judge says.

  I thought he might intend this for Becky’s benefit, even though she’s been sitting there impassively, her chest rising and falling, but he’s looking across at me and Scott.

  ‘We only have one more witness,’ Ellen says. ‘Then the prosecution can close.’

  The judge looks across at us, over his glasses, and raises his eyebrows. He reaches a hand up to scratch underneath his wig. It must be itchy in the heat.

  I look at Scott. His eyes are wide, panicked, even though he has always suspected Layla’s death was not accidental. He looks at me, raising his eyebrows, wondering if we can go on. I lift a hand, which is supposed to mean go ahead, but the judge remains looking at me, forcing me to speak.

  ‘Please, go on,’ I say, my voice sounding loud and confident.

  I must look calm on the outside, but I’m not. Marc’s name has been running through my mind repeatedly as I sit in the public gallery.

  I know what I’m going to do. I have decided. I am going to speak to Ellen about him. I’m going to tell her that he has no alibi. Perhaps I can speak to her after this next witness. Tell her about Marc. Maybe there’ll be an opportunity.

  ‘The prosecution calls Jane Ghale.’

  After a few moments, a small, bent-over woman arrives in the court, brought in by the usher.

  ‘Please state your name for the record,’ Ellen says.

  ‘Jane Ghale.’

  She is sworn in and confirms she is a radiologist and has been for ten years.

  ‘Have you reviewed the MRI scans of Layla Blackwater?’

  ‘I have.’

  ‘Please talk us through them. Jury, please turn to pages thirteen and fourteen again for the scans.’

  Jane reaches forward and holds two slides up, showing my baby’s chest. ‘The white area indicates bleeding.’

  It looks like a cloud over Layla’s lungs.

  ‘Is there any doubt about what that represents?’

  ‘No. It represents blood.’

  ‘Thank you, nothing further,’ Ellen says.

  ‘Nothing from me,’ Harriet says.

  Ellen rises again, tugging at her robes which keep slipping down over her shoulders. ‘The prosecution rests,’ she says.

  And just like that, the onslaught of the State is over. There is no more. It didn’t end with a revelation or a bang. Just a radiologist confirming in a small voice what we all already knew.

  I look up at the ceiling behind the dock where Becky sits and think about it all.

  The trip to Londis, leaving my baby alone in that house.

  The Google search.

  The neighbours overhearing the shouting, right before the exact time of death.

  Alison, Forrest and Ralph’s mother, seeing Becky grey and shaking, the house eerily silent behind her, when we all knew that Layla cried so much, all the time.

  And the medics, of course. Convinced that it couldn’t have been an accident, not feasibly.

  Layla could only have died during that evening. That evening when Becky was alone with her.

  It is a compelling case.

  I glance at the jury. They’re shuffling in their seats, at the halfway point, as they wait for direction from the judge. Would I convict, if I were seated there, and not here? If the victim wasn’t my baby, and if the defendant wasn’t my sister? It is only halfway through the case – the prosecution is at its strongest, like the winter solstice, night at its longest – but I cannot ignore the voice inside me that says: Of course I would. It’s like Scott said: there is no other explanation. The only way she is innocent is if we shrug our shoulders and pin our hopes on spontaneous, unexplained bleeding, on coincidence, conjecture.

  Becky’s defence is that she has no defence at all. She doesn’t know, can’t explain. That isn’t a defence. They have no explanation, only the holes in the prosecution’s explanation. And as for the rest, the non-medical evidence, they’ll say: But she’s a good person. What defence is this? It is nothing. There is no defence case. It is only: Not that. A finger pointed at the prosecution. It was an accident, but not one Becky caused: she admitted that in her police interview. If it wasn’t a tragic, co-sleeping accident, then what was it?

  Murder.

  Scott is right. He is always right; the most reasonable person in my life. My sounding board, my voice of reason.

  I look across at my sister in the dock, her head bowed as the lawyers shuffle their papers, as the judge takes stock, as the players prepare to metaphorically switch sides. I look at her and agree with Scott. Here was a smothered baby. And here was the person looking after her. She must know. She must know what happened. She must know more than me, anyway.

  ‘I think we should leave it there for today,’ the judge says. He looks at the digital clock on the table down below him, its giant numbers glowing red. ‘We’ve made very good time thanks to the meticulous preparation, prompt witnesses and the jury’s flawless attendance. We’ll be looking to conclude early next week. We can commence the defence case in the morning. Everybody fresh.’ He directs a kindly smile my way.

  I linger and see the security guard releasing Becky from the dock. He hands her over to an usher. She waits obediently at the door, clearly schooled in what to do, and only moves when the usher motions her out. She’s bailed. Not in custody. She’s not dangerous, surely. But then I think of Xander, moved into Marc’s house, her contact with him supervised by our own parents, and I wonder. Social Services must think she is dangerous. The State does, too. Is it only me who doesn’t?

  I look at her slim wrists, at her ribcage visible at the top of her thin, open-necked shirt. If she is convicted, what will I think then? Will she transform, in the dock, as she is sentenced? Into my sister, the murderer? I can’t imagine it. I just can’t. Perhaps I will always believe her.

  ‘Shall we go?’ Scott murmurs to me.

  I’m watching the barristers. Ellen leaves first. My eyes track her across the courtroom and out the door. Through the little glass window in the wood, I see her disappear into a meeting room opposite the courtroom.

  ‘Yeah,’ I say.

  The room is clearing out around us. The jury is looking pleased with their early finish, off to enjoy the sun and put loads of washing on and collect their children from school, probably. Becky’s team has closed around her and escorts her out. She’s got a tan line around her neck that I spot as she reaches to pull open the door. She must have been outside a lot. It’s only sun, I tell myself. You can sit in the sun but still be miserable.

  It’s just the two of us, now, in here together, looking at it all. The dock. The royal coat of arms. The places where the jury sit.

  All of it.

  Layla’s life.

  Her little fat fists that gripped my hand during night feeds, her dark, soulful eyes that looked into mine as she suckled, her golden hair that smelt so good, like cooking biscuits and lavender and summer days. Those are all gone. Instead, we have juries and witnesses and experts’ reports about haemorrhages.

  The detritus of a life.

  I tell Scott to go home without me. He looks surprised, for a second, then obliges. He doe
sn’t question it any more. He doesn’t try to maintain a sense of togetherness. Neither of us does.

  I wait in the foyer, listening for the sweep of Ellen’s robes.

  She arrives out of the meeting room after ten minutes and I hover nearby, looking vague, as though I might be waiting for somebody, or looking for the vending machines.

  She catches my eye, briefly, and I think I see something sympathetic behind her professional, neutral expression.

  ‘Ellen, I …’ I say softly to her.

  She stops fussing with her briefcase and looks at me.

  ‘I was thinking – listen. About … about Becky’s husband.’

  ‘Marc,’ Ellen says.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Look, I’m just wondering … has anyone ever looked into his alibi, for that night? Really looked?’ I swallow, not saying I’ve asked him, not admitting that. Trying to forget it, but not able to, either. Those words he used. Came over.

  ‘Marc’s alibi?’ she says. The expression on her face is suspicious, irritated. She looks as though she is about to tell me to stop, to let her do her job. That I am inappropriate. But, at the last moment, she seems to take in my skinny form, my thinning hair, and she looks at me kindly, instead. ‘I’ll look into that,’ she says to me. ‘Tonight.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I whisper. ‘Thank you.’

  42

  Martha

  When I walk through the door of the flat, Scott doesn’t look at me.

  He sits on one of the armchairs covered in fabric from India and I sit on the sofa and wonder why the flat feels so cold as summer starts to wane. We watch the sea in the distance, still lit up by the sun. Even though it’s just there, it’s four storeys down, and behind a glass wall. It may as well just be a big flat-screen television tuned permanently to the seascape. People are swimming in it, some paddling at the edge, some in wetsuits, their strokes confident and strong.

  ‘I’m going out,’ Scott says.

  Most evenings from late spring to early autumn, he would go to his patch of land and harvest it. This time of year we would be looking forward to blackberries and apricots. Boxes of them, every evening. They were always fresh and sweet. Scott would fold his lips in on each other as he brought them in, otherwise his proud smile would show. He’s been going more, lately, but not bringing any fruit back with him. He’s maintaining the status quo, I guess. Going through the motions.