by David Mark
“That kid at the bar earns more money than you.”
“I’m in this for the love of it.”
“Love? You?”
“You’ll hurt my feelings.”
“Feelings?”
“Yeah, they’re new. Bought them off the internet. I’m not sure they fit.”
We both laugh, then fall silent as we replay the morning’s action, looking for the choicest of quotes. Thinking of Ella Butterworth’s boyfriend, and the way Choudhury had eviscerated him, and Roper’s case.
It was clear from the outset that the lad was broken. He had the air of a toy left outside in the rain, rusting to nothingness; never to be played with or enjoyed. He was too young to deal with any of this. Too young to hear the details of his sweetheart’s violation, murder, decapitation. 19-years-old, and done. Done in.
He’d been born to be mediocre, had Jamie. Decently mediocre. Five GCSEs. Flair for music and good at setting the timer on the video. Curious fold of skin at the back his neck which he was teased about at school. Three good shirts and a smart pair of shoes for baptisms and funerals. One suit, and he wore it when they buried his girl. Wore it when police interviewed him, under caution, for the third time. Wore it to job interviews that he hadn’t got. Would never get. Something about him, now. An air of November. Of damp leaves and muddy turn-ups. Fogged breath, and wet eyes.
Jamie’s life had ended when the knife went into Ella Butterworth. We could all see it as he pushed, then pulled, and pushed again at the wrong door to the courtroom, before stumbling into a room full of eyes and pity.
Eight steps up to the witness box.
Same suit, now loose at the shoulders. Burgundy shirt and an earring. Skinny. Smudge of stubble under his lower lip. Leather strap on his right wrist. Aggression, in his walk, his stance.
Had to be reminded to keep his voice up, as the prosecutor walked him gently through his evidence. No tears. No trembling lip. No emotion in his voice. Frequent sighs. Wringing his hands. Sipping water. Not letting himself look at Cadbury. Knowing he would only visualise what the monster had done to the petals of his rose. Probably thought of nothing else since the day she was taken.
Deep breaths through the nose, as though steadying his stomach, as he described their last words, their last moments together. Thinking of the last time he kissed her, held her hand, buried his nose in her belly button, like she liked.
And me, sitting there, feeling for the boy, but competitive. Convinced that my own pain was more real, my own misery more acute than that which racks him, devours him.
Me, wondering as his responses became more weary and his manner became aggressive, whether he’d ever raised a hand to her.
Watching, as steel entered his face, wire entered his jaw, mud entered his head. Questions. Times. Places. Dates. Words. Confirming a story he had told a thousand times.
Then show-time. Cross-examination. Tin-Tin rising to his feet, like a new island bubbling out of the sea. Jamie balling his fists, preparing himself for a fight that he would finish on his face, and with a fat barrister’s cock in his arse.
Jamie didn’t recognise himself in Choudhury’s words. He didn’t know the selfish, ambitious, ruthless and violent young man who had bullied Ella from the moment they met until the night he abandoned her to be filleted and fucked. Nor did he recognise the girl Tin-Tin described; the manipulative slut who’d cheated on him at her college Christmas party, had told her friends she wasn’t sure if he was the man she wanted to grow old with, and whose appetite for al fresco sex and exhibitionism suggested she would have loved the thought of fucking a stranger against a garden fence in her wedding dress.
He spilled his water on the evidence bundle when Tin-Tin showed him the transcripts of Ella’s outbox; the mobile text messages she had sent to her friend Tanya just four hours before she went missing, and which she hadn’t thought to delete saying it all felt false; that she was trying to act excited for her family’s sake but that the wedding was coming around too soon. The message, too, from six months earlier, which Jamie had sent saying he would kill her if she ever looked at that bloke who had chatted her up in The Ship.
Ella’s family stayed quiet. Wrestled with it all. Tongues were pressed hard against teeth. Jaws locked. Fingers gripped. They clung on to the image of the happy young couple that they had known; turned up the volume of their happy memories over the drone of Tin-Tin’s lies. But they didn’t look at Jamie as he left; hoarse, from shouting back at Choudhury around the ball of tears that wedged in his throat, from trying to defend his choices, his mistakes, his entire relationship. His life.
There was no nod from the public gallery as he shuffled by; smaller and greyer than when he walked in. No smile. No “it’s over now” and an arm around the shoulder. They couldn’t. Not yet. Not until they untangled what they knew, from what they had been told.
“Poor kid, though eh?” says Tony H, coming back from the bar with a whisky and dropping it noisily in front of me. “As if he hadn’t been through enough.”
“It’s what Tin-Tin gets paid for. Just muddying the waters. He’s not trying to suggest anything. Just create enough confusion to make any conviction unsafe. Does it well.” Then, as an afterthought. “I’m still going to kill him though.”
Tony H smiles as something funky comes on the CD player.
“How you going to cover the second witness, then?” I ask, turning back to Tony. “I’ve never seen anything like that in my life. Never thought Tin-Tin would meet his match in a Hull chav.”
We share a smile, enjoying the memory. It had been a truly wonderful encounter. Tin-Tin Choudhury with his Oxford education, his 25 years at the bar, his Queens Council stripes and his perfect enunciation, against Lewis, the ultimate little shit.
He came through the door in a fake Burberry baseball cap and a fake Fred Perry jumper, wearing skiing gloves that would be too big for a gorilla, still shouting at the usher who had interrupted his cigarette to shepherd him into Court One.
Five foot eight, but hunched. Kept his head down as he walked, so the peak of his hat always covered his face. CCTV generation.
He made Tony H look elegant. Pinched, sunken face. Hollow cheeks. Spots around his mouth and chin, hiding among the unruly stubble, growing in clumps and patches on his upper lip and pointed chin. Eyes the colour and consistency of French brie. Wiry, too. Skinny, but there’s something under it. A chipolata sausage around a nine-inch nail.
Really, really didn’t want to be there.
Aggressive, from the start. Didn’t seem to realise that Anderson wasn’t the enemy. Didn’t seem to realise he was there as a witness and not a defendant.
Didn’t realise that when the judge told him to stop swearing, he fucking meant it.
Talking us through it in grunts and obscenities. That night. That fucking night.
He’d met Cadbury a couple of years back in a pub on the Orchard Park estate. Hit it off. Common interest in drinking and Playstations, cannabis and wanking. No, he didn’t have a job. No, he’d never had one, unless selling a bit of Ecstasy counted. Yes, they were friends. Best friends? Aye, fuck it, whatever. Hung around. Went to each other’s flats. Watched videos. Sometimes Cadbury’s place, sometimes his. Usually three or four people there. Just watching telly and shit. Eating takeaways. Talking. Bullshitting.
Knew Cadbury had a temper though, he said. He’d seen it. Bit of a weirdo, really, he said. Girls didn’t like him. Why? Ugly fucker, isn’t he? Quiet, too. Just sat there, watching them. Watching until he started breathing deep. Then he’d try it on. Some awful line belched in their faces. Get a knock-back. Lose it. Just fucking lose it. Had seen him screaming in girls’ faces before. Screaming that they were nothing, that they couldn’t treat him like this, that they were just fucking sluts. He’d seen him smash himself in the face with a bottle of Carlsberg when some lass had said she didn’t want a drink one night in The Sailmakers. Just Cadbury, though, wasn’t it? He was a mate.
Then that night. The night
they were all round Lewis’s gaff, and Cadbury wasn’t right. Hadn’t been right for a few days. Quieter. Tenser. White knuckles and grinding teeth. Muttering about bitches, about never getting a fuck. He’d always had a thing about one of the local TV weathergirls, his favourite wank, but now he was telling stories about what he’d like to fuck her with; what he’d like to stick inside her. Wanted to see how much room there was in her arse.
And that night, the night he killed her…
Objection!
Well, he fucking did I’m telling yer…
Objection!
Yeah, whatever, that night, they was all at his place and Cadbury was giving out a harder time than usual. Could be mean when he’d been drinking, and he’s been drinking for days. Big lad with a temper, you put up with it, don’t you? Not worth the fuss. But this night, he’d gone too far. Started taking the piss out of my lass, the fat fuck. Been seeing her a while. Good lass. Nice girl. Cared for her. Figured I could do worse. Told Cadbury and me other mate, Steve Venables, that cunt, told them I was thinking of fucking proposing, like. Steve wasn’t bothered. Cadbury said nowt. Just sat there, drinking Lynx, eating a Chinky. We were watching some film. Cadbury’s just sitting there, saying nowt, staring, eating, drinking, smoking, and then he goes off. Screaming and hollering about how she was a slut, how he’d shagged her, how Steve had shagged her, everybody had fucking shagged her and she was dirty, dirty like they all were, and he’s in my face. Picks up this knife we’d been using to chop the gear ….
Marijuana?
Aye, fucking weed, and he’s got it to my eye, and he’s nuts, just fucking crackers, and then he’s gone. Just drops me and goes to the door.
And he took the knife?
Fucking must have.
And then what happened, Mr Lewis …
“…left it a bit, didn’t I? Had fights before and always best to let him cool down. Just chilled for a bit. Then a few days later I reckon it’s time to end it. Make up. Give him some weed and borrow a film or something, y’know? So I does. I goes round. Use me key, like always. Walk in. He’s sat there in his living room in his boxer shorts. Pleased enough to see me. Watch a bit of telly. Have a crack. He goes to the bog and I remember about that film I wanted to borrow. I gets up to get it from his room, walk in, and there she fucking is. The girl from the telly. The one who’s been missing. I shit myself. She’s there, dead in his bed. Half-naked. Holes in her like she’s a fishing net. So much blood I thought she was wearing a red dress. I’m puking and crying and gasping for breath, and I just run. I’m out of there. Cause he’s killed her, hasn’t he? Finally done what he always wanted, that sick fat fuck in the box over there. I just sprint for home, thinking he’s behind me, and I get in and lock the door, and open a bottle and drink myself fucking sick. Then I wake up and puke and cry and puke some more, and then I phone the police. Then I’m getting fucking arrested, then bailed, and getting arrested again, and getting the shit kicked out of me by that flashy copper off the telly…”
Objection!
Smoke rising from notepads on the press bench. Sniffles and gasps from the gallery behind.
Cadbury, staring straight ahead, sucking his lower lip and rolling the rosary between a fat finger and thumb.
Then all of us, holding our breath, as Choudhury rises.
“You killed Ella Butterworth, Mr Lewis, didn’t you?”
“Yeah. Yeah I did. Oh hang on a sec. No, now I think on, I didn’t. It was that fat fucker behind you. That cunt who’s wrecked my fucking life you Paki bastard.”
And that was the tone of it. Almost endless, the questions. Shot after shot, blow after blow from the fat man, and Lewis just batted them all away with barked obscenities and V-shaped fingers.
“You had a key to Mr Cadbury’s apartment. You stayed there when he was away, sometimes. That is what happened here, is it not? My client will contend that he did not even return to his home that week, that he indeed stayed at your property and you stayed at his. That it was he who returned home and found her dead in his bed, and that it was you who put a knife to his throat and said that if he did not take the blame, you would kill him and his family? You who held a knife to him and made him have sexual intercourse with her dead body.”
“What is wrong with you, mate?”
“You were feeling angry, about your failing relationship, about the fact that the girl you loved was interested in my client, and you took that anger out on the first girl you saw…”
“Can you hear the words that are coming out of your mouth? I’ve never killed owt. I don’t even stand on spiders…”
And it built. Built until something had to give.
“In May of this year, Mr Lewis, you were in prison for a short time for selling drugs. Do you remember that?”
“Aye.”
“And do you remember sharing a cell with a gentleman named Minns? David Minns?”
“Bodybuilder.”
“Mr Minns contends that while you were his cell-mate, you disclosed personal secrets to him. Do you remember that?”
“Told him I’d split up with my lass. Told him that copper had kicked my head in cause of that murder. Told him a mate of mine did it. No fucking secret. Everybody in there fucking knew I’d been questioned. Got my head kicked in twice before the rumours stopped.”
“You see, Mr Minns contends that while you were his cellmate, you told him that it was you who killed Ella Butterworth. That you tried to seduce her, she turned you down, and you plunged your knife repeatedly into her, then brought her body back to Mr Cadbury’s flat, where you made him have sexual intercourse with her body to cover your tracks. That it was you who ……”
“Minns is full of shit!! He’ll say owt for steroids and smack. It weren’t me, it was him – that fat bastard sitting there...”
Wasn’t easy to take down in shorthand.
Tony H and me sitting next to each other. Loving it all. Loving the abuse going Choudhury’s way. The bare, raw indignation of a nasty little Hull shit who couldn’t understand why anybody would think he had anything to with all this; his wounded pride being spat out in swearwords and rage.
A fun morning. Solid gold.
Erased my memory for a time. Blocked it out. All the shit. Jess. The bodies in the woods. Petrovsky. Kerry. Roper. The gun.
The gun in my inside pocket.
Hissing directly into my heart.
“Best file it in a sec,” I say. “Don’t think I’m going back for round two. You?”
“Reckon I’ll see what’s happening with the murder case. Give Roper a call. What do you reckon about what Lewis said? About getting his head kicked in? Bollocks?”
“I think he’s capable of it. You’ve heard the stories about who he was before he got into character. We all are though. Capable of losing it.”
“Well you proved that,” he laughs, finishing his drink. “I’ll catch up with you in a couple of hours. I’m going to work the phones a bit. I know a guy in the same nick as Petrovsky. Be nice to see what he’s up to.”
“Cool. Enjoy.”
Tony pulls on his coat and gives me a slap on the shoulder as he leaves. A draft blows in as he pulls open the old oak door and I shiver into my jacket, my drink, my cigarette, my sudden, all-consuming loneliness.
Opening up my phone. Torturing myself. The image of Jess, asleep on her back, eyes closed, mouth hanging slightly open. Pink knickers and smooth legs. Soft, gentle fingers, always cold.
The phone chirrups into life.
I slam it shut, guiltily. Startled. Flustered.
Open it again, as the song continues.
And with Jess’s body pressed to the side of my face, I say: “Hello”.
A soft, accented voice.
“Mr Lee. I believe you may have killed a friend of mine. We have your sister.”
His voice is lost amid the waves in my head.
And the whisper of the gun becomes a scream.
35
Tony H.
Killing time.
Yellow eyes burning a hole through the tea-break quickie and waiting for the gobby cow to lock up the archives and click-clack her way home.
3 down. “Scum”. 5 letters.
No fucking idea.
He takes a sip of cold machine-tea. Swills it around his mouth and spits it back in the cup. Looks up, past the muddy shoes that are steaming on the desk.
Under his breath: “Leave, you bitch.”
The newsroom’s nicely busy. There’s a pleasant buzz about the place: the early evening hubbub, when the junior reporters are looking at each other to see who’s going to be the first to go home. They all finished their eight-hour shifts ages ago, but they think it will look bad if they leave the building, so they sit at their desks, reading stories on the internet and watching videos on YouTube, fiddling with backgrounders and bashing out fillers from the press releases and fliers that litter their desks.
Tony’s sitting in the news editor’s chair, feet in the boss’s in-tray, stockinged feet dark grey with rain. He has a desk of his own, tucked away between the sports subs and the picture desk, but the cleaners made a stand several months ago and have refused to go near it until he unsticks some of the takeaway boxes and canteen dinner plates from the carpet under his chair, and a stand-off has developed. The keys on his computer are so encrusted with grime that he’s been reduced to a four-letter alphabet, and he feels that even with his own inestimable talents, he’d struggle to craft a front page splash using only two vowels, an apostrophe and the number 9.
He gives up on the crossword. Puts it back on the pile of nationals. Stands up. Wanders around to the far side of the desk and leafs through the diary. Upcoming court dates. Inquests. Local authority meetings. Press calls and photo ops and parish councils by the bucketful. There are initials next to most of the entries: a reporter already tasked with spending their evenings sitting in drafty village halls listening to blue-blood wankers in cravats talk about ways to stop the neighbourhood children from enjoying themselves and pissing up the cricket pavilion. Tony’s name isn’t next to any of them. He does his own thing. The bosses know the score. He’s left alone, and he delivers. The news editor, a panicky chap in his early forties who constantly looks like he’s going to tear his clothes off and make a break for freedom, doesn’t even like to talk to him. He knows this is Tony’s manor. Tony’s paper. The editor, bullet-headed southern cock that he is, has the power of veto on Tony’s exclusives, but he doesn’t use it. Doesn’t want to upset his star man. He’s happy to take the credit and bask in the awards. He has to endure the occasional angry phone call from people who don’t like his methods, but it’s a small price to pay for having a proper old-school hack on the team and valuable filth on the local great and good.
