The following morning both Beth and Steven got into the office early so they could talk before their first clients arrived. The police had contacted Steven just before he left work the previous evening to tell him the two bodies in Wales had been found, and also the one at Luddington. Steven had rung Beth during the evening to tell her, knowing that it would be on the nine o’clock news and that by this morning it would be splashed across the front page of every newspaper.
‘You couldn’t blame anyone for thinking Susan is another Fred West,’ Steven said, pointing to the front page of the Mirror, one of several papers he’d brought in with him. The headline read, ‘The death count mounts’.
Beth read the page quickly. ‘They’ve reported it as if more are expected,’ she sighed.
‘My old grandmother used to say, “There’s nothing like a good murder to sell papers.” ’ Steven half smiled. ‘She was practically a world expert on murder trials, she used to read up about them all the time. Loved the psychology profile stuff. Maybe that’s what influenced me to become a lawyer.’
Beth sighed dejectedly. ‘I wonder what she would have made of our Susan?’
‘I don’t even know what to make of her myself,’ Steven said. ‘One moment I feel angry with her, the next sorry for her. I understand, yet I don’t. I still keep thinking that there’s something she hasn’t told us. One thing that would make a huge difference.’
‘Perhaps that’s because we can’t feel what she was going through as she did it?’ Beth suggested. ‘Maybe you should ask her to tell you that, Steven?’
‘I’m not sure I want to know that.’ He sighed. ‘She’s given me enough nightmares already.’
Beth got out of her chair and went over to him, putting one hand on his shoulder. ‘I bet you wish I’d never handed her over to you,’ she said. ‘It’s turned out to be a poisoned chalice, hasn’t it?’
He smiled weakly. ‘When I was at law school I used to imagine being a defence lawyer was mainly about saving the innocent from being sent down for crimes they didn’t commit.’
Beth could see he was deeply troubled, and judging by the bags under his eyes he hadn’t been sleeping any better than she had.
‘I was the same,’ she said. ‘I thought I was going to be the champion of the oppressed. But do try to winkle out that one thing she hasn’t told you. It probably won’t change anything at all. But it might give us both a clearer understanding of her.’
‘I’m going to see her tomorrow,’ he said gloomily. ‘I’ll do my best, but don’t be surprised if I get nothing.’
All the way to the prison the next day, Steven told himself he must be dispassionate about Susan. He couldn’t afford to spend so much time thinking and worrying about her, he had other clients who needed him more. It was down to the psychiatrist to dig into her mental state, his role was only to see she got a fair trial.
He began well enough. ‘You’ll have been told the police found the bodies in Wales?’ he said crisply. ‘I got word this morning they’ve found the one in Luddington too. Is there anything more you want to tell me? Or anything you want to know?’
‘You look tired,’ she said, looking hard at him. ‘Is that because of me?’
He was thrown again, for it was so like her to show concern for others despite being in such deep trouble herself.
‘No, of course not,’ he said quickly. ‘I’ve just been working hard lately and not getting to bed early enough.’
‘Don’t tell me lies,’ she said quietly. ‘I do understand what all this must have done to you.’
Steven looked into her greenish-blue eyes and saw real concern. It touched him, for he didn’t get that concern at home. ‘It’s all part of my job.’ He shrugged.
‘Not any more it isn’t,’ she said. ‘I’m going to dismiss you. I’d like a new solicitor.’
That was the last thing Steven expected. ‘But why, Susan?’ he asked. ‘It’s your right of course. But I’d like to be given a good reason after all we’ve been through together.’
She looked at him sadly, her lower lip trembling. ‘Let’s just say you are too involved now,’ she said in a small voice. ‘I want someone to defend me who doesn’t care.’
‘That’s an absolutely ridiculous thing to say,’ he retorted indignantly.
‘Is it?’ she asked, raising one eyebrow. ‘You can’t win now, Mr Smythe, I’m going to get life, whatever you try to do for me. I can accept that. But I don’t believe you’ll be able to. That’s why I want someone else.’
Steven sighed. He was touched by her obvious sincerity and he also felt a sense of relief, even though he’d come to see her today believing he wanted to defend her to the end. ‘If that’s what you really want, then that’s what you shall have,’ he said.
She smiled. ‘It will be better for both of us,’ she said, and her voice was lighter. ‘You are a bit like me, Mr Smythe, you feel too much. If you are going to continue in criminal law, you’ll have to grow a harder shell.’
‘I’m not usually so affected by my clients,’ Steven said defensively. ‘You are a special case.’
‘You want to understand, don’t you?’ she said, and smiled faintly. ‘I wish I could help you, but I don’t really understand it myself.’
‘Could you try? For me?’ he said.
She sighed. ‘Liam’s death is quite easy to explain, for it was just an accident. I’d been through so much, I was scared of losing him, and I struck out in desperation. I can only suppose that once you’ve seen a body lying dead on the floor, buried it, cleared up and got away with it, the taboo of killing is broken. And you can do it again.’
She paused, looking thoughtful.
‘None of us ever know what we are really capable of, not until a moment of intense fear or anger. It’s like there’s another person inside of you that comes out at times like that. If I hadn’t killed Liam, I would never have killed Reuben and Zoë. But then, if I hadn’t killed Liam I wouldn’t ever have fallen prey to Reuben in the first place.’
‘What makes you think that?’ Steven asked.
‘I wouldn’t have been so needy, all those guilt feelings about Annabel’s death being punishment for Liam.’
She got to her feet suddenly, showing that her explanation and the visit were over. ‘Thank you for everything you’ve done for me, Mr Smythe,’ she said, holding out her hand. ‘And you have done a great deal, even if you can’t see it.’
Steven shook her hand. He thought in that moment that she was as regal as a duchess thanking her servants for taking care of her.
‘Don’t lose any more sleep over me,’ she said. ‘You’ve got a wife and family to think of.’
Steven didn’t know what to say in the face of such dignity. ‘I wish you luck’ was all he could think of.
‘I’ve written a letter to Beth,’ she said, pulling an envelope out of her trouser pocket. ‘Will you give it to her for me?’
Steven nodded. ‘Look after yourself, Susan. I will be thinking about you, I can’t help that.’
‘I don’t want another solicitor from your firm,’ she said as she went to the door and signalled to the officer outside she wanted to be let out. ‘I want someone completely unconnected.’
Beth hadn’t been home more than five minutes when her door-bell rang.
She picked up the intercom phone and heard Steven’s voice. ‘I’m just putting a letter from Susan through the letter-box,’ he said. ‘Can’t stop, I’m running late, but I thought you’d like it right away.’
Beth ran down the stairs two at a time, hoping to catch him, but she was too late. He was gone, and the letter was lying on the mat. She opened it as she walked up the stairs.
Dear Beth, she read. I don’t know if you’ll get to read this before Mr Smythe tells you I’ve dismissed him, but it doesn’t really matter because I think you’ll understand why, even if he doesn’t.
I don’t want to see you again. Not ever. Please don’t come to the trial, or try and visit me, or even write to me. I
t won’t do either of us any good.
Beth paused in the reading of it as she got back upstairs. She shut her front door, went into her living room, sat down and continued.
What we had together as girls will always be precious to me. I want to keep those good memories intact for ever. Can you understand that? It was a cruel twist of fate that we should meet up again the way we did. You so successful, and me right down there in the gutter. But I believe there is always a good reason for everything, and perhaps in our case it was not just to make me ashamed of what I’d become, but so you too could face up to your past.
I told your policeman you’d been raped. Maybe you even know that by now. I told him purely to hurt him, and bring him down, I took pleasure in it.
I know you will be puzzled by that, just as you will have been by me confessing to the other murders. You wouldn’t have believed I was capable of such cruelty and vindictiveness. But I am.
I can’t pinpoint exactly when I began to change from the girl you knew, it was probably a gradual process over the years. I can remember getting very resentful towards both my father and brother in the last few years of my mother’s life. I was being wound up like a spring tighter each day. I told you about the moral blackmail, but it was more than that. I was frightened of them, especially Martin. He had intimidated me almost from birth, and as I grew older it got worse. So when my father left everything to him, I guess that was a bridge too far. If it hadn’t been for Liam coming back into the picture, I know without any doubt it would have been Martin I killed, for the spring was at breaking-point at that time.
If only it had been Martin. I would have felt justified in ridding the world of someone so cruel and mean. I could have gone to the police right then and owned up, taken my punishment and felt justice had finally been done.
But I killed the man I loved. And then later I lost my Annabel and I was broken completely. Then along came Reuben, and I thought I was being offered a chance to redeem myself
Sitting here writing this in my cell, I can’t adequately explain why I felt I had to kill him and Zoë. But I do know that all the rage I felt towards Martin, and my father, the loss of Annabel, what I’d done to Liam was mingled with the humiliation and hurt Reuben and Zoë put me through. I had to show them they couldn’t do that to me and get away with it.
Killing them haunted me, yet not in a guilty way as you’d expect. I felt a kind of jubilation that I’d done it. I felt powerful and in control for the first time in my life.
I thought that new power would stay with me back in Bristol. I had visions of finding a good job, and a nice home again. But my clothes were shabby. I had no money and I was back with all the memories of Annabel.
I was stuck in a hole. Without tidy clothes I couldn’t get a decent job, without a job I didn’t have any money to buy them. All the cleaning job brought in was the bare minimum to pay the rent and eat, no way out.
Maybe if I hadn’t seen Dr Wetherall and that blonde bitch together up on the Downs, I might have found a ladder eventually. But seeing them together brought it all back that they were responsible for her death. All at once I was focused. It gave me a buzz stalking them, a whole new reason for living. I learned so much about them, and their daily routine. They used to walk up to the Adam and Eve pub in Hotwells for a drink after work. I would sit in the corner behind a newspaper and watch them, and marvel that they were so wrapped up in one another that they were unaware of me. I thought of so many different ways to hurt them, as varied as informing his wife and her husband what was going on, painting Adulterers’ on the door of the medical centre, I even considered killing one of their children. People may have thought I was an alcoholic, but the only thing I was addicted to was revenge.
There was a small part of me however that was frightened of the feelings inside me. I knew I was out of control but I had no way of communicating with anyone, I didn’t even pass the time of day with anyone at the house in Belle Vue. I let myself into the offices to do the cleaning. They left my money on a desk every Friday. I didn’t even see anyone there, ever. It was almost like being a small nocturnal animal, living a life that was invisible to everyone. I was so lonely. When I took a bottle of drink with me to sit in the square at Hotwells, I suppose I was always hoping someone would eventually confront me, that I’d be arrested, or taken to a mental hospital. But no one cared enough to even speak to me.
A few days before I eventually shot them, I was ill. I lay shivering up in my bed in that horrible room, knowing that if I was to die it would be weeks before anyone even found my body, much less care that I was all alone. Prison suddenly seemed very much better than what I had, and so I gave up all ideas of a covert killing. Shooting them openly was simpler and more dramatic. Everyone would know who did it, and why. I didn’t care what happened to me afterwards.
Had I been given any other solicitor I doubt if I’d have had one moment of remorse. But you turned up and all those memories, feelings, hopes and dreams I once had came flooding back. Enough to make me think what I had become. Because of you, Mr Smythe cared about me, and Detective Inspector Longhurst. All those years I’d wanted someone to care just a little, but when it came, too late for me to change anything, I found I couldn’t cope with it.
Despite what I know you think, I am dangerous. I need to be locked away from other people. So forget me, Beth. Get on with your life, find happiness. I could be happy if I thought that in all my wickedness I was at least the catalyst that gave you the power to set yourself free from the pain in your past.
Remember how we used to joke about being wallflowers? We didn’t really believe we would be, did we? I used to imagine that on my sixteenth birthday I’d be miraculously transformed into a slender, dainty beauty, that there’d be a queue of boys waiting to take me out. I used to picture a white wedding, with you as my chief bridesmaid, and then I’d project the dream even further to seeing myself with several children and you coming to visit as their favourite aunt.
I don’t know which was the sadder of us two, me too weak to insist on a life of my own, then one day turning killer.
Or you, with all your brains and beauty, allowing three brutes to prevent you from finding love and happiness.
It isn’t too late for you to get down from that wall you’ve stayed on for so long. Get down from it now, join in, be part of it all. Do it for me, Beth.
My love and fondest memories
Susan
Beth was crying long before she got to the end of the letter, and as she finished it she went into her bedroom, flung herself down on the bed and cried the way she had as a teenager.
Maybe Susan’s explanation wouldn’t be enough for most people, but it was for her. Their lives might have been poles apart, yet at their core they were the same. Beth knew what it was to feel so alone that her mind turned in on itself, preventing anyone from breaking through. She knew how hurt and humiliation could wind someone up to breaking-point.
She had her hatred for her father. Susan had hers for her brother. There were incidents in both their lives which had never been resolved. Beth knew she was luckier in that her career had given her the ability to be entirely independent. But she was as tied to the past as Susan was with her sick mother.
Still crying an hour later, Beth heard the door-bell ring, and thinking it might be Steven, she got up to answer it.
But it wasn’t Steven, it was Roy.
She couldn’t refuse to let him in. For all she knew he might have some urgent message.
By the time he’d come up the stairs she’d attempted to bathe her face, but she hadn’t managed to get rid of the mascara streaks or the redness of her eyes.
He took one look at her, put his arms round her tightly and just held her there in the tiny hall.
‘I had to come,’ he murmured against her hair. ‘I couldn’t stand another day without seeing you.’
‘I told you to stay away from me until all this was over,’ she sobbed out, trying to push him away.
&
nbsp; ‘I know you did,’ he said, restraining her arms. ‘But it looks to me as if you need a friend right now just as much as I do.’
Beth gave in, she had no strength left to fight with him, and handed him Susan’s letter to read, so at least he would know why she was upset.
She watched his face as he read it. She told herself that if there was just a trace of cynicism on it, or if he sneered or made a sharp remark, she’d show him the door. But to her astonishment she saw a tear trickling down his cheek.
Her heart melted, for she knew that rugged face wasn’t accustomed to feeling the wetness of tears.
He looked up at her, dark eyes swimming. ‘She’s very noble,’ he said in a croaky voice. ‘No self-pity, no wanting to cling to you like a life raft.’
‘Nothing cynical to add?’ Beth said, still struggling to hold back her own tears.
Roy reached out for her, took her hand and drew her down on to the settee beside him. ‘How can I be cynical? She’s written that straight from the heart. She was even honest enough to admit what she’d told me, and why.’
‘But you arrested her. You’ve been there at the searches for the bodies. You’ve met Zoë’s mother. I couldn’t blame you if you were totally against her.’
‘I don’t like what she did, but that doesn’t stop me from seeing what she is,’ he said. ‘Or what she might have been if fate hadn’t conspired against her.’
‘How long ago did she tell you about me?’ Beth asked.
‘It was last Friday morning. It broke up the interview. Then when we started again in the afternoon she said she wanted to confess.’
Till We Meet Again Page 38
