by M. R. Hall
‘Could you please leave the building, madam.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Now.’ He gestured towards the door.
‘Sir, I’m a coroner, and I’m here to enforce a court order.’
The man looked at her with dead eyes. ‘Please comply with my instruction or I will have to use reasonable force to remove you.’
Jenny reached for her phone. ‘I’m calling the police. I’d advise you not to make things any worse for yourself.’
He shot out a hand and grabbed her arm above the elbow.
‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’
With his other hand he snatched her briefcase.
Pushing her towards the door, the security guard hissed, ‘What are you, brain dead? Get out.’ He tossed her case down the steps and shoved her after it.
He slammed the heavy door, leaving her standing outside nursing an arm that felt as if it had been crushed between boulders. A woman passing on the pavement stopped to gawp, then hurried on.
Still in pain, Jenny picked up her case with her good hand and started to plan her counter-attack. If the lawyers wanted to play rough, she would send in officers from Bristol to batter their way in. Meanwhile, Alison could take another team into Reed Falkirk. She pulled out her phone to start making arrangements. The numbers swam in front of her eyes.
She needed somewhere to sit and calm down. She remembered a cafe on a busy road nearby, but couldn’t remember from which direction she had entered the square. Disorientated, she looked left and right, searching for a point of reference.
‘Jenny.’
She turned at the sound of a familiar voice and saw Simon Moreton climbing out of a cab on the far side of the road. Holding the door open, he called out, ‘Over here. For God’s sake, come on.’
The feeling of unreality intensified as she dumbly did as she was told. Simon buckled into the seat next to her and instructed the driver to take them to the Royal Lancaster Hotel.
‘Why are we going to a hotel?’ she asked.
‘It has a good bar. And it’s near the station.’
‘Soften me up and send me home?’
‘Believe it or not I’m on your side, Jenny.’
‘How did you know I was here? Don’t tell me Annabelle Stern’s pulling your strings, too.’
‘There was a certain flurry of excitement when news of your coup with poor old Mr Justice Laithwaite hit the wires. It didn’t take a genius to work out what your next move would be.’
‘They threw me out. Their security guard nearly broke my arm. Did you know that was going to happen, too?’
‘More or less.’
‘What the hell does that mean?’
His ambiguous sideways glance said he couldn’t decide whether to give her the full or the sanitized version.
‘Unless you tell me, Simon, I’m going to have that place turned over, news cameras, the lot.’
‘You could, Jenny, of course, and on one level I wouldn’t blame you, but the fact is . . . the fact is you’ll be out of a job before you embarrass Lord Turnbull in public, at least until his bill has passed.’ He turned his gaze out of the window, as if trying to detach himself from his words. ‘You have to learn to accept the way things work. Things get sorted out in the end. What you mustn’t do is cause a cataclysm where it needn’t happen. One thing at a time.’
‘And if an innocent man strings himself up in his prison cell while he’s waiting?’
‘You’re proving my point, Jenny. You’ve let yourself become partial. That’s precisely what our measured approach is designed to prevent.’
‘I have an order for disclosure of documents that Turnbull had suppressed. Laithwaite told me the story: Eva was a hostess at one of Turnbull’s pre-salvation parties, screwing his high-rolling friends, probably him, too. She’d been asking him for more money since last November. She was on the skids, Simon, falling apart. Turnbull thought she was going to expose him.’
Moreton stared out of the window, smiling vaguely as they passed Charing Cross station and headed out into Trafalgar Square, a billowing curtain of pigeons rising into a clear sky.
Jenny said, ‘Are you going to say something, or just sit there admiring the view?’
‘I was wondering how far I would be prepared to go for you,’ Moreton said. ‘And if it backfired, how I’d explain it to my colleagues . . . or my wife. They’d all assume I’d had my head turned, lost my judgement.’
He shot her a look she couldn’t read, but she could feel his charge in the brush of his shoulder against hers as the cab swung through Admiralty Arch into St James’s Park. It would be so easy to say yes, Jenny thought, and to use him as her champion and protector. It could even prove to be his salvation from all the years of dissembling and compromise. She thought he might want that more than anything, even more than he wanted her.
Jenny said, ‘Turnbull’s lawyers haven’t got enough to prove I’m unfit. It’s my father the police are interested in, not me.’
‘Judges are very sensitive creatures, these days, Jenny. You’d be removed for your own good, out of compassion, or at least until the storm had passed. We can’t have a coroner working under such a burden of mental stress – it’s not in anybody’s interests.’
‘What would happen if I didn’t have any bodies buried in my garden?’
‘One would be found. No one has nothing to hide, least of all the most outwardly blameless.’
‘I’m not going to sleep with you, Simon, so you might as well tell me what you’ve got in mind now.’
‘Jenny—’
‘I don’t think it would be in anybody’s interests either, do you?’
He met her gaze, his eyes sparking briefly with hope, then slowly fading into resignation. ‘No, I suppose not,’ he said, as if it was his decision alone to make.
‘Well?’
‘You leave the disclosure issue alone and I’ll guarantee the police will take a thorough look at all that evidence relating to Miss Donaldson and Turnbull later. In the meantime, you can lodge a statement with them setting out what you already know. But like I said – one thing at a time.’
‘Do Turnbull or his lawyers get put on notice of the police investigation?’
‘Absolutely not.’
‘What do they hear?’
‘That you’ve been “spoken to”.’
Jenny thought about it. It wasn’t attractive, but nor was the alternative. At least Moreton’s deal still held out the prospect of justice being arrived at in the end. ‘I still have three witnesses to hear from again. I can’t be seen to have been completely rolled over.’
‘I’ve showed you the line, Jenny. It’s up to you how close you walk to it.’ His face cracked into a smile.
‘What?’ Jenny said.
‘You . . .’ His hand brushed against hers. ‘You’ll never give up, will you?’
TWENTY-THREE
IT WOULD HAVE BEEN BETTER to have slept with Simon Moreton. Waking up on the sofa next to two empty bottles with a splitting head had been far lower than that. It took Jenny back to the very bottom. She had betrayed her promises to Dr Allen and to herself. It had happened the first time when she had lunched with Simon at the Hotel du Vin. Clinking her delicate glass against his had seemed the most natural and civilized gesture in the world. Even afterwards she hadn’t given it a thought. But that’s how the devil got you: before you even knew it had happened.
She prayed that she wouldn’t get pulled over. The way she was driving she deserved to be, hitting the rumble strip as she squinted into the bright sun that hurt her eyes. The metallic taste of the cheap wine still lingered in her mouth. All she had managed for breakfast was black coffee, two paracetamol and a Xanax. And in less than an hour she’d have to face Decency’s lawyers and pretend that yesterday hadn’t happened.
At least she hadn’t got as far as telling Father Starr about the injunction. In the end, when it was all over, she could tell him a white lie: that she’d persu
aded the police to have a second look and that, lo and behold, they’d found a whole history between Eva and Turnbull. Where that would lead, she had no idea. There was every chance it would result in yet another whitewash, but what could Starr expect? She was a coroner, not a miracle worker.
The very thought of the priest made her angry. He was the reason she was hung-over, about to be humiliated at her own inquest and so racked with guilt she could barely look at herself in the mirror. His selfish demands were tearing her apart. There had been messages from both Ross and Steve on her machine when she arrived home, but there was nothing she could have said to either of them apart from: Leave me alone. Coughlin had also called, saying that he had spoken to some regulars in a gay bar who claimed to have seen Jacobs come in and pick up once or twice. He was hoping to track one of these partners down. His call, too, had gone unanswered.
There was only one news van, as well as Alison’s car, outside the clubhouse. Jenny parked close to the door, pointing outwards so she could make a quick getaway after the verdict. She planned to deal with the witnesses in the first half of the morning and sum up to the jury immediately afterwards. By early afternoon it would all be over.
Alison greeted her warmly and apologized for handing her a thick sheaf of urgent emails. Jenny sensed that she knew, and guessed that Simon Moreton had issued her with strict instructions to keep things running smoothly. She flicked through her messages and decided they could wait.
‘And there was a call from Dr Kerr,’ Alison said, as if preparing her for disappointing news. ‘Apparently it wasn’t Freddy Reardon’s DNA in Jacobs’s body. He’s expecting the last batch of test results this morning but he said not to hold your breath.’
Jenny nodded. In a strange way it was a relief. The pressure to make a connection with Eva had dissolved. Three separate deaths. Three separate causes. Trust Simon. One thing at a time.
Her headache had softened to a low persistent throb as she took her seat at the head of the courtroom. All eyes were on her, from Father Starr and Kenneth Donaldson at the back, through the ranks of journalists, to the jury at her side and the black wall of lawyers opposite. This was what it must have felt like for Eva going to work some mornings, Jenny thought to herself, except she had to perform naked.
If the lawyers felt any measure of shame at their part in the suppression of evidence, they weren’t allowing it to show. Annabelle Stern was smiling. Ed Prince felt confident enough not even to have bothered turning up, sending an assistant in his place. No doubt there was far more money to be made back at the office.
‘Members of the jury,’ Jenny began, ‘thank you for your patience. Before you consider your verdict, I have asked three key witnesses back to see if they can help us understand why Miss Donaldson made a complaint to the police.’ She should have gone on to address the article that had been written about her in the Post, but when she tried to find the words, they escaped her. It was easier to behave like the lawyers, to brazen it out and pretend nothing had happened. She drew back her shoulders. ‘Mrs Christine Turnbull, please.’
The witness was dressed in a navy summer suit with a light silk blouse. She managed both to be both alluringly beautiful and to radiate wholesomeness. It was impossible not to admire her.
Jenny reminded her that she remained under oath and asked her to cast her mind back nearly four months to the early part of March. Had she noticed anything out of the ordinary in Miss Donaldson’s behaviour?
‘She was happy. We had just commissioned polling which showed over seventy per cent of voters back our campaign. It was a real shot in the arm for us all.’
‘You have been made aware, I am sure, of the evidence that she telephoned the police on the evening of 15 March in an apparent state of intoxication, complaining of harassment.’
‘Yes,’ Christine said, with a note of sadness. ‘And I can think of only one explanation. The poll had been published the previous week. There was a flurry of articles predicting the end of the pornography business in Britain as we know it. If ever there was a time Eva was likely to have been deliberately intimidated, that was it.’
‘Wouldn’t she have told you?’
‘Not necessarily. Our opponents are nothing if not cunning. They know everything about how to prey on human weakness. One can only imagine what they might have threatened her with. I’m sure they weren’t short of material from her past.’
‘But what about the fact Eva was incoherent, possibly drunk? How does that fit with the woman you knew?’
‘We all have our breaking points,’ Christine said. ‘Even Eva.’
‘That’s certainly true,’ Jenny responded drily, ‘but we also know that Eva was pursuing a former employer, GlamourX, for unpaid royalties. If what you say about your opponents is true, wasn’t that an act of recklessness bordering on the utterly irresponsible?’
The lawyers bristled. Annabelle Stern’s stony face told her she was sailing dangerously close to the wind.
Unfazed, Christine said, ‘Eva was entitled to what was rightfully hers; I have no doubt she would have put the money to good use.’
Then why had such draconian measures been taken to keep these matters secret? Jenny wanted to know. And how could Christine Turnbull remain so composed when she was part of a machine that had put such pressure to bear on the dead woman? Then it occurred to her that beneath the mask Christine might be churning as much as she was, that all that was sustaining her through this ordeal was the imminent prospect of her campaign reaching its end.
‘The night Eva was killed, you were at the Mission Church with your husband, is that correct?’
‘Yes.’
‘From what time?’
‘Shortly after six, as far as I recall.’
‘And when did you receive the message that Miss Donaldson wasn’t coming?’
‘A little while before the service. At about six-thirty.’
‘Were you with your husband at the time?’
‘We were in the boardroom at the church offices planning our meetings for the coming week.’
‘Didn’t it occur to either of you to try to persuade her to come?’
Christine said, ‘No. I think we both felt that if she were exhausted we had better leave her to recover. She had a busy time ahead. We all did.’
‘Might there have been another reason why Eva didn’t come to the church that night?’
Christine said, ‘If there was, I think we would all know about it by now.’
A pair of junior lawyers escorted Christine Turnbull to the door, where she was met by a driver who would whisk her away to her final frantic round of lobbying meetings. As Joel Nelson took her place in the box, Alison leaned over to Jenny to let her know she had received a text from Andy Kerr saying his test results had come back with something that might be of interest. Could she call him?
‘You call him,’ Jenny said. ‘If it’s important, get him to court.’
Alison crept out to the side office as Jenny turned her attention to Nelson. His face radiated confidence.
‘Tell me, Mr Nelson,’ Jenny said, ‘did you and Eva often pray together?’
‘Not often, but we certainly did.’
‘Can you tell us what about?’
Nelson said, ‘I can put my hand on my heart and say there is nothing Eva ever told me in confidence that could have any bearing on this inquest. She was looking forwards, not back. She was seeking strength and inspiration, and on the whole that’s what we prayed for.’
‘What else?’
‘Normal day-to-day things, the minor incidents of life.’
‘Money?’
Nelson shook his head. ‘No. That was never a subject that was mentioned.’
‘Relationships?’
Nelson gave a patient smile. ‘Ma’am, to tell you the truth, whenever I sat down with Eva she usually wanted to pray for others.’
‘Others in the church?’
‘For the most part.’
‘Did a lot of people bri
ng her their troubles?’
‘Of course.’
‘Such as?’
‘You name it. But that’s what we ask people to do – to offer up their problems in prayer.’
Jenny heard the door to the office open and close. Alison tiptoed across the creaky, uneven boards towards her. She leaned down and spoke to her in a whisper.
‘Something about carbon fibre particles on both Freddy Reardon and Alan Jacobs’s bodies. There might be some connection with Eva. He’ll be here in fifteen minutes, but we can’t keep him – he’s dealing with a cot death.’
Jenny thanked her and turned back to Nelson. ‘Did she ever mention Freddy Reardon or Alan Jacobs in these sessions?’
‘You make it sound like a formal ritual – it really wasn’t. And no, I don’t believe she did.’
‘How can you be sure? It sounds as if she mentioned so many.’
‘I chose my words very precisely, ma’am,’ Nelson said. ‘I don’t believe she did, but it’s also possible I don’t remember.’
Jenny glanced at Annabelle Stern and saw her features harden. The assistant next to her was punching a message into his phone. She sensed that she had strayed into uncomfortable territory. Mentioning Freddy and Jacobs was a breach of her deal with Moreton; grudgingly, she took a sideways step.
‘Did the problems you prayed for ever include suicidal thoughts?’
‘That came up occasionally and it still does. It’s a far more common phenomenon than you might think.’
‘Do you have protocols, a system to refer such people to professionals who can treat them?’
‘The church doesn’t hold itself out as being a substitute for medicine, if that’s what you’re implying.’
‘But you are a church that believes in miracles.’
‘That’s the basis of Christian faith,’ Nelson said. ‘Jesus was God made flesh. He can, and does, heal all the time.’
Sullivan scraped back his chair. ‘Ma’am, I fail to see the relevance of this line of questioning.’
‘I’ll put it directly. Mr Nelson, is it possible that someone who was relying on Eva for support had become an unbearable burden? Threatening, even?’
