by John Fairfax
‘I let you into Congreve’s because you were good to our Archie. And because he told me you were innocent. And what did I read in the paper last week? That you were guilty. That you’d admitted it after your trial. In writing.’
‘That was my fault, Dad,’ said Archie. ‘I should have—’
‘Belt up, son. Come here, young man. Give me your hands.’
Totally bewildered, Benson came to the table, offering both his hands. CJ leaned forward and grabbed them with a weak but sure grip.
‘People are talking. About you and about the Congreves. Now, they can say what they like if they’ve got it wrong, but if they’ve got it right, you aren’t staying in Artillery Passage. Do you understand?’
‘Yes.’
‘So, tell me, if you’re innocent, why say you’re guilty?’
Benson croaked from lack of spit. ‘If I didn’t accept the verdict, I wouldn’t have got parole. And I could never have worked as a barrister. The authorities would say I’d refused to accept what I’d done. So I’m trapped.’
CJ tried to squeeze harder, putting on the pressure, but he’d no strength left.
‘I have to admit that I killed a man,’ Benson went on. ‘It’s crazy, I know, but if I said I was innocent, they’d say I lied to the parole board, the Inns of Court and the Bar Council. I’d be out on my ear.’
‘Meaning?’
‘The Bar Standards Board wouldn’t let me practise.’
CJ leaned forward from his wheelchair and yanked Benson closer till their faces were inches apart.
‘Did you kill that poor man?’
‘No, I did not.’
CJ examined Benson’s complexion as though he wanted to know if he’d been freshly caught. If he’d had gills, Benson was sure that CJ would have pulled them open to see if they were nice and red. He began to panic. Those watery eyes, unable to focus properly, were looking beyond appearances. For a long time he seemed to waver, but that could have been the trembling of old age; and then, at last, he leaned back.
‘You can call me CJ,’ he said.
‘That means you can stay at Congreve’s, Mr Benson,’ said Eileen, standing up. ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’
5
Benson began the short walk back home to Seymour Basin. The day was fading, and with the encroaching darkness, he felt the onset of a depression. Not the beginnings of an emotional collapse – where he’d be stranded, unable to move because of the shapeless weight blotting out his mind – but rather a dimming of the lights, giving rise to a general sadness he wouldn’t be able to shift; a sadness he’d have to put up with until something bright came along. He tried to think of the coming trial – he’d only read the brief once and there was a lot of material to master – but he couldn’t focus his thoughts. He couldn’t shake off his conversation with the Congreves.
Archie had only done a year inside – and that was a Cat D. An open prison. Home from home. Benson was the real thing. He’d done time in those high-walled Victorian dungeons. Dot Congreve, who’d said nothing during the appeal hearing, had been full of embarrassment and questions afterwards. Like a voyeur, she wanted to know what prison was really like . . . did he have a TV? Were the screws on the take? Had he been gang-raped in the showers? Benson didn’t know what to say. Even as she spoke, he found himself wanting to scream out the scream he’d learned to suppress, a scream that was still buried deep in his subconscious. What could he talk about? Yes, there were friendships, robbed of depth by constant transfers to another prison. There was solidarity. But these were hardly redeeming features. HMP Anywhere was a hothouse of deeply human problems without adequate resources to treat them; a self-enclosed universe of boredom, shattered self-esteem, remorse, depression, drug addiction, illiteracy, mental illness, abandonment, sorrow, self-harming and suicide. At least, that had been Benson’s experience. When his parents came to visit this faraway cosmos, they left the visiting hall in pieces, overwhelmed by the ear-splitting kids and crying mothers, choked by the conversation that hadn’t happened, because Benson had vanished inside his head in order to survive. He was still in there somewhere. He’d never made it back to the normal world. What was he to say to Dot, pouring the tea, and Betsy, all excited, who’d opened a packet of ginger biscuits? Ordinarily, he’d have sidestepped the conversation, but he owed the Congreves. They’d given him a break, for a peppercorn. He had to give them something of himself in return, and at cost.
‘Have you ever been stuck in a lift?’ said Benson.
‘Yes,’ said Eileen, turning to her sisters. ‘Do you remember that time in Clacton? The ghastly hotel? That tiny box for three people? We overloaded the bloomin’ thing and it got jammed between floors.’
CJ had fallen asleep, but his daughters were very much awake. They forgot Benson was there, recalling how they’d been cramped, breathing over each other, sweating in the dark, crying out for help with no one responding. Betsy had started banging on the wall, and Joyce had thought she might go mad or die, and Dot had started moaning, sucking at the slit between the lift doors. As Eileen observed, none of the Congreve girls could have auditioned for Pan’s People. They were too ample. ‘It’s the steamed puddings and the pies, Mr Benson,’ admitted Eileen. ‘We were jammed in like four lumps of melting lard.’
‘And then that bloke came along,’ said Betsy, blinking erratically. ‘Said we were lucky he’d heard us because normally he’d have gone home half an hour ago. We could have been stuck there all night.’
‘Well, I was in that lift for up to twenty-two hours at a time,’ said Benson. ‘On average, it was sixteen. For ten years. Then I went Cat D. I thought I’d die, too. That I’d suffocate . . .’
In a way he had done; the twenty-one-year-old philosophy student had died gasping for air. He’d come to life again, obscurely, with the law, the rules and penalties that had put him behind a locked door; the self-enclosed universe that governed freedom and responsibility in the world he’d left behind. Or, rather, the world that had moved on, leaving him behind, because in HMP Anywhere, there was no such thing as ordinary time. Time was only something you did.
‘I tend to leave doors open these days,’ said Benson. ‘Otherwise I get jumpy. And I can never find my keys.’ He wondered if he should tell the four sisters what really happened when he found himself in a small room with a closed door; and that he’d been in therapy for years, and couldn’t imagine it ever ending . . . but he changed his mind. ‘Can we stop there? I’ve got to get back to work; back to Congreve’s . . . and I don’t usually talk about prison for long.’
‘In case it all comes back?’ said Betsy.
‘Sort of, yes.’
The four sisters looked at each other while CJ snored quietly.
‘And to think,’ said Dot, appalled, ‘you’d done nothing wrong.’
Benson rounded the corner into Seymour Road. And sure enough, he couldn’t find his damned keys.
6
Something wasn’t quite right.
Tess let her eyes drift along the fence, past the adjoining buildings, up to the end of the road and then back again to the fence and the gate.
And it clicked.
Someone else was waiting. About a hundred yards away, at the junction with Wenlock Street, stood the bearded man wearing a leather bomber jacket. He’d turned around on seeing Tess approach Benson’s gate, but he hadn’t gone anywhere; he wasn’t doing anything. He was just lingering, looking down Seymour Road, rubbing his hands.
Waiting.
But for what?
Darkness was falling fast. Misty orange light spread from the streetlamps. Tess shivered. There was no point in hanging around. Benson wasn’t at home and there was no guarantee that he’d be coming home. She slotted the key into the ignition, and just as she was about to give it a turn, there was activity.
A car door had opened on Tess’s side of the road, much further up. A man got out and crossed over, striding quickly, thick arms held wide from his body. He was heading down the street
, now, so Tess turned, and there was Benson, smartly dressed in a dark suit, coming from the opposite direction, tapping his pockets. He was shaking his head and talking to himself, not looking where he was going. She sensed something was going to happen . . . and it did: when the man reached Benson, he coughed, gathered in his mouth, and spat straight into Benson’s suddenly upturned face.
Benson recoiled in shock. But he didn’t retaliate. He just looked up to the dark sky and then began tapping his pockets again – presumably trying to find a tissue – as the man backed away down Seymour Road, his hands inviting Benson to bring it on. Tess threw open the car door and reached Benson in seconds, offering a handkerchief.
‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘That’s very kind.’
‘Are you okay?’
‘Yes, fine. It’s nothing.’
‘It’s something.’
Despite what had happened, Benson looked extraordinarily calm. ‘Something best ignored,’ he said, as if in fact, he’d won some kind of point. ‘He’ll be bragging in the pub tonight; but he’s lost something of himself.’
A car growled into life. It pulled away, roaring towards the end of the road, where it picked up Benson’s aggressor. When Tess turned back, Benson was examining her features.
‘I think I know you,’ he said, slowly.
‘The Old Bailey, Court One. Nineteen ninety-nine.’
After that, Tess was tongue-tied. She gestured for the handkerchief and then threw it into a waste bin. When they were back eyeing each other, Benson began to sing:
‘“And I would walk five hundred miles . . .” It’s you, isn’t it?’
‘It is.’
‘I can’t remember your name, I’m sorry.’
‘Tess de Vere.’
‘That’s right . . . I knew it was a de – something. You did a placement with George Braithwaite.’
‘That’s right.’
‘Oxford?’
‘Yes.’
‘Shipping law, wasn’t it?’
‘Yes. But no.’
They shuffled in the cold, their talk coming through bursts of fog, Tess distracted, because Benson’s appearance was very different from how she remembered him; and very different from the photograph in the Guardian. The youthful fear had been replaced by that distinctive melancholy; and, in the flesh, it was strangely appealing. He was a strong man who needed something.
‘I took your advice,’ he said.
‘So I hear. I’m impressed. Very.’
‘I told the feckers where to get off.’
‘In style.’
‘Yes. Would you believe it, I practise from an old fishmonger’s?’
‘I know. It’s brilliant.’
They stalled. And Tess wished she could reach for that Corpse Reviver. All she could do was take in Benson’s dark-brown eyes – they wouldn’t rest on her for long – his short, jet-black hair, and that sadness which was calling out for something. He spoke:
‘Don’t get me wrong, but what brings you here?’
Tess held up her hands. ‘I’ll be honest: I didn’t think you’d actually make it. If I’d known you’d start the long walk I’d have helped.’
‘I don’t think George Braithwaite would have approved.’
‘No, he wouldn’t. But that was then and this is now. You’re here. And I’m here. And from what I’ve read, I think you could do with a helping hand.’
Benson scratched the back of his head. ‘Do you want a drink?’
‘I need a drink.’
He finally found his keys in the side pocket of a rucksack. Unlocking the gate, he turned to Tess and nodded at her car:
‘Is that yours?’
‘Yes.’
‘It’s beautiful. Really stands out. There’s nothing else like it.’
‘She’s a classic.’
‘What’s the make?’
‘Austin Cooper S. Nineteen sixty-four. Cherry red.’
‘Hard to come by, I suppose?’
‘Very.’
‘Do you want to keep it?’
‘Sorry, I’m afraid I do.’
‘Well, you’d better shut the door and lock it up, then.’
Tess had been so engrossed in Benson’s humiliation that she’d left it wide open. Crossing over, she looked up towards Wenlock Street. The darkness had become sharp. The clouds of orange mist had turned to pools of stage light. But the bearded man in the bomber jacket had vanished.
7
Benson was surprised. Tess had taken one look in his drinks cupboard, then, unimpressed, she’d gone to the local off-licence, returning with a bottle of cognac, a bottle of calvados and a bottle of sweet vermouth.
‘Have you got a cocktail shaker?’
‘No.’
‘An egg cup and a jug?’
‘Yep.’
She got busy, hardly looking at Benson.
‘You made it into shipping?’ he said, arms folded.
‘No. I got knocked off course.’
She’d spent seven years at Hollingtons doing general crime but had drifted into technical waters – Human Rights Act stuff – which eventually took her to Strasbourg. After five years – four months ago – she’d come back to London and a one-year consultancy at Coker & Dale. She had a roving brief to develop human rights law across the firm. ‘I can do what I want,’ she said. ‘Which is great.’ But what she really wanted was ice cubes, so Benson showed her the freezer. His mind, however, was on the stern door. When Tess had returned, she’d closed it and flipped the lock.
‘Have you got a sieve?’
Benson hadn’t so he gave her a tea strainer.
‘Stemmed glasses?’
‘Sorry.’
She settled for porcelain teacups and began filtering the mixture.
‘This, Mr Benson, is a Corpse Reviver. It changes your outlook on everything.’
Tess was shorter than he remembered; and slender. Her movements were slow and naturally elegant. The burst of freckles had faded somewhat. The sandy hair had darkened to the colour of a beach in late afternoon rather than morning. Her eyes were remote, with flashes of green and blue. Benson had seen the loneliness of the sea. He wanted to trail his hand in the water, to feel the breakers around his ankles.
‘The Ministry of Justice may be able to shut you down,’ said Tess, walking to some crowded bookshelves that ran the length of the boat. She put her cup down and began examining the titles, one finger stroking the spines.
‘I’m not so sure,’ said Benson.
‘Neither am I; but I’d be worried if I was you.’
‘I’m always worried.’
Benson looked at his hands. He was beginning to fidget.
‘Richard Merrington is a populist,’ said Tess, taking down a volume. She opened and flicked through the pages. ‘He’s tough on crime and the causes of crime and so on, but you represent a unique chance: his chance to be tough on a criminal. You represent his chance to dominate the media. He’s the Lord High Chancellor now but he wants to go a lot further. You’re a rung on the ladder. So is Mrs Harbeton.’
‘I’m not backing down.’
One of Benson’s legs was bobbing on its toes. He glanced at the door, imagining the lock mechanism in operation. Tess had given it a turn. But why?
‘If Merrington brings forward legislation to ban a certain class of ex-offender from holding positions in the legal system, you’ll be up to your neck in injunctions, judicial reviews and appeals – every kind of legal spitting. He’ll do whatever he can to keep you out of court. And by the time you get your case to Strasbourg – if you have a case – it’ll be too late. It takes years and years, you know that.’
‘So what do you suggest I do? Give up now? Because I won’t.’
‘No. The opposite.’
‘What do you mean?’
Tess closed the book, slid it back on the shelf and turned on Benson as if she was ready for an argument:
‘If this is Merrington’s opportunity, it’s also yours. The spotlight is on y
ou like no other barrister in England. It’s your chance to make a strong impression. Stun your critics and it will be a lot harder to pass “Paul’s Law”.’
Benson’s mouth was caked with panic. The symptoms had come on fast: his stomach was gaping. His skin was itching. Sweat had gathered on his back.
‘Do you mind if I open the door?’ he blurted out.
‘No, sure.’
‘Can I smoke? I know it’s disgusting and causes cancer but—’
‘Don’t worry. It’s not a problem.’
Benson quickly opened the door and sucked in the cold air. It came fresh off the canal like the kiss of life. Trembling violently, he knocked a Gauloise from a crumpled packet and lit up. Slowly the shake in his limbs subsided. Papillon slinked in and Tess spoke quietly:
‘Have you ever conducted a Crown Court trial?’
‘Unfortunately not.’
‘I understand you’ve landed the Hopton Yard killing.’
‘I have.’
‘Sarah Collingstone?’
‘Yep.’
‘It’s listed for Wednesday morning. The day after tomorrow. Court One, the Old Bailey? Where you were tried and sentenced?’
Benson didn’t answer but the receding panic rose like an angry wave. Tess said:
‘Have you met her?’
‘Last Friday. We had a brief talk, nothing more.’
‘What are her chances?’
‘Slim to non-existent. Her defence hasn’t been investigated. The prosecution have an open field.’
Benson breathed in more chilled air. The itch had gone. The hole in his stomach had closed over. The sweating had stopped. Only an anxious catch remained in his lungs. ‘I’m okay, now. Thanks. I’m really sorry . . . but can I leave the stern door open? Just a smidgen?’
Tess was seated at the dining table. Benson joined her and their eyes met, like they’d done sixteen years earlier, when the jury had been deliberating for four hours. His Honour Judge Rigby had said he’d take a majority verdict if they couldn’t reach a unanimous decision. The tension had been unbearable.
