The Aladdin Trial

by Abi Silver

  ‘Could be worse,’ she replied.

  ‘So, what’ve you found, then? What’s so pressing I have to miss the cricket highlights?’

  ‘I’ll let Constance tell you. We’re hoping to ask Dr Wolf what it means, in court.’

  Constance scrolled through a couple of screens on her laptop.

  ‘These are the hospital forms for Mrs Hennessy,’ she said.

  ‘OK.’ Dawson sat down and unbuttoned his coat. Judith rose and came to stand behind him.

  ‘If you scroll through the admissions forms, they are all numbered, but page 7 is missing. It’s been removed.’

  ‘Yes, I can see that.’

  ‘I asked Dr Wolf’s secretary when I noticed it, last week, but she said she couldn’t remember what the form was. She thought it must have been something routine, but she hadn’t removed it.’

  ‘OK. So, what’s the importance of this missing page?’ Dawson asked casually.

  ‘These are the forms for another patient, Mr Wilson, also private, seventy-five years old, discharged the day before Mrs Hennessy died.’

  ‘How did you get these?’

  ‘Dr Wolf’s secretary gave them to me.’

  Dawson raised his eyebrows but remained silent. Constance scrolled forwards then reached the screen she wanted. With finger and thumb she enlarged it so it could be read more easily.

  ‘Page 7 for Mr Wilson is a form giving consent to a particular treatment, signed by Dr Wolf and Mr Wilson.’

  ‘What’s the treatment?’

  ‘It’s not very clear. If you see at the bottom, it says “Aladdin Trial”. And also, “I, the undersigned, confirm that I give my doctors permission to use the Aladdin process currently being trialled, in addition to or in place of conventional processes, at their absolute discretion”.’

  ‘And what the hell is that?’

  ‘I don’t know. But it’s clearly important enough that it’s been removed for Mrs Hennessy who is now dead.’

  ‘Any idea who removed it?’ Dawson was interested now but wishing he wasn’t.

  ‘The metadata shows the last person to work on the document.’ She pointed Dawson towards the name on the screen.

  ‘Ah, surprise, surprise, Charlie, it’s our friend Dr David Wolf,’ Judith chimed in.

  ‘And there’s something else, too, which I have only just discovered,’ Constance added. ‘It may mean nothing, but just in case.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘The anaesthetist, Dr Jane Bridges, is Dr Wolf’s wife. She practises in her maiden name.’

  ‘Lots of doctors marry each other. So do lots of lawyers I’m told. Not many coppers though.’

  ‘He didn’t tell us when we asked him. He just talks about “Dr Bridges” as if they are not connected to each other. I think he and his wife are involved in something they are trying to hide and that may give us the answer to Mrs Hennessy’s death.’

  Dawson sat and mused over Constance’s words. Judith began to pace, arms folded.

  ‘Clearly, we must recall Dr Wolf tomorrow and ask him about this, but only after forensics, I think,’ she said.

  Dawson looked from Constance to Judith and back again.

  ‘Can you send me these documents?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes of course. Share and share alike,’ Judith replied sarcastically.

  ‘What will you ask Wolf about all this in court?’

  ‘I suppose I just have to ask him what it all means. I haven’t quite decided yet. It will need careful thought – and at least one more cup of coffee.’

  * * *

  Judith slipped into bed late but couldn’t break the habits of a lifetime; at least two files accompanied her and she propped herself up with a glass of Chardonnay, her blue notebook on her lap. Often she had her best thoughts at night, lying quietly surrounded by the darkness.

  Greg moaned and turned over noisily to make space for her.

  ‘What time is it?’ he asked.

  Judith patted his arm lightly. She had neglected him the last few days with all the preparation for the trial, she mused. Then she paused in abject horror. The thought which had just entered her head was so alien to her that she feared she had lapsed into unconsciousness without noticing. Martin, her late husband, had always given her so much space; either he wasn’t around or, if he was, he had so much of his own to divert him, she would never have contemplated how much attention she was paying Martin, because it would never have concerned him.

  Judith and Martin had spent time together – restaurants, opera, theatre – most of it divine and decadent, but had they really been together? When she thought back to those joint experiences, she wondered if they had truly been shared? They had so infrequently talked about them afterwards or mentioned them to anyone else. True, Martin had often called her when he was travelling, for a download, especially if she was working on a big case, but they hardly ever really chatted when they were together.

  Greg expected so much more. If they were out somewhere, he wanted to laugh and joke and hold her hand and drag her over to read things or view the world from a particular angle. And if they were at home, he wanted to talk about his day and hear about hers. When he took a phone call, always accompanied by an apology if it was ‘after hours’, he wanted to lament it, or imitate the person on the phone or swear, each time anticipating a reaction from her. This need to be responsive, to participate in his life, to allow him entry into hers, was unfamiliar. So she had taken things very slowly with Greg; it was a month before they kissed and now, almost a year into their time together, they were trying out a period of him staying over. Neither of them had articulated how long it was intended to last.

  Judith thought about Ahmad and the kind of husband he was; which of the men she knew he most closely resembled, if any. Constance said his wife didn’t speak at all. And Constance was getting involved again with the family and she mustn’t. It wasn’t that Judith was uncaring. She had to remain aloof in order to make sensible judgements about the case. She didn’t have the luxury of forming attachments with clients. She hoped Constance understood that and didn’t think her cold and totally unfeeling.

  Judith focused back on the present. When the trial was over she would do some rearranging. Having Greg living in, even temporarily, required a re-think of how to use her limited living space. The gap between the dressing table and the curtains, on the opposite wall, for starters, bothered her.

  For a moment she couldn’t remember why there was a gap there at all; then she recalled that Martin’s trouser press had sat there until recently. It was the only personal item of his she had retained from their former life. She hadn’t burned his possessions on the lawn, as Greg had admitted he had done with those of his adulterous wife. She had, instead, found a nice ‘clearance’ lady and asked her to find suitable homes for everything which had been Martin’s – shirts, shoes, briefcases and stationery. And had agreed to leave most of the furniture behind.

  But the trouser press had come with her. It wasn’t sentiment; quite the opposite. In the immediate aftermath of his death and her discovery of his serial infidelity, she had wanted to inflict pain on Martin, even if it was posthumously. Martin had always timed the pressing of his trousers to the last second to have the creases perfect, so she had taken his suits from the wardrobe and pressed the trousers over and over until they started to singe and wrinkle; this had been her revenge.

  But when Greg expressed a desire to spend more time with Judith and they agreed this trial arrangement, she no longer felt any need for this last remnant of their cohabitation. The trouser press had been driven to the dump and unceremoniously tossed into a large skip. And now only the space where it had stood remained.

  She allowed her eyes to travel around the room, taking in the chair, dressing table with mirror, wardrobe, bedside cabinet and wastepaper basket, and thought about Mrs Hennessy’s room
at the hospital. Then she extracted the envelope of photographs Constance had taken and leafed through them again. Eventually, she stopped. Now she knew what had bothered her about the furniture in Mrs Hennessy’s room.

  Barbara Hennessy’s bed clothes were thrown back on the side facing the door, as if she had climbed out of that side of the bed. But her crutches were over by the bathroom door, propped against the chair for visitors. If she was to use the crutches to help steady herself and walk, Judith would have expected them to be next to the bed. Had someone other than Mrs Hennessy moved the crutches out of her reach, and if so, why? That lent support to a third person being involved in her death after all.

  ‘What time is it?’ Greg muttered again. ‘Why don’t you turn off the light and go to sleep?’

  Martin would have slept through her scribblings and would never have dared to tell her to stop working. But Martin wasn’t here any more, and although she was still sad he was gone, she was pleased not to be alone.

  She exited her bed slowly and entered the bathroom, ran some cold water into the basin and soaked her left hand for some minutes. Then, with the aid of a bar of soap, she eased her wedding and engagement rings off her finger and lay them on the edge next to the tap. She thought of the dressing-down she had given Ahmad when he had dared to explain that Mrs Hennessy had placed her rings in a similar place.

  She stretched her left hand out and examined closely the space where the rings had sat. It felt strangely naked; she tried dropping it to her side and glancing at it casually. That was better. Then she dried the rings and her hand and slipped them back on. ‘Not yet,’ she whispered to herself. ‘Not yet.’

  Scrambling into bed, she switched off the bedside light, turned on her side, wrapped one arm around Greg and went to sleep.

  * * *

  Constance returned to her empty flat. There was no point even trying the fridge for food. She knew there wasn’t any. Judith had a strong constitution, she thought. After a whole day in court she was still full of vigour at 11pm, but Constance was desperate to sleep.

  She could hear Judith’s endorsement ringing in her ears after she had discovered the missing hospital form. ‘Well done, Connie. You did it again.’ But she wasn’t entirely sure what she had done or where it would lead. She hadn’t particularly warmed to Dr Wolf but she had been the one who tried to rein Judith in from her early suspicions that he was hiding something. Now she wished she had supported Judith more at the time.

  She knew she should shower, undress, prepare her bag for the following morning, but somehow all those activities seemed like things which could be done just a little later. Before long she was fast asleep, fully-clothed on top of her bed.

  The musical chime of her mobile woke her and a shaft of light, squeezing through a chink in the curtains, struck her temple as she reached for her phone. As Constance muttered ‘hello’ she noticed the time on her clock by the bed. It was already 7:10 –much later than she had expected to rise.

  ‘Is this Miss Constance Lamb?’

  ‘Yes. Who’s calling please?’

  ‘My name is Dr Al-azma. I am calling you from Damascus. In Syria. You have been trying to speak to me.’

  47

  ‘I miss Baba.

  ‘I know. Suzy said he would be home soon but I’m not sure. They think I don’t know what’s happening.

  ‘I went to Mrs Crane and I asked her just before break. I asked “what’s a murderer?” and she said it’s someone who kills other people and asked who had been talking to me about things like that. And her face got this red mark, well, on her neck, really.

  ‘No, she is nice but she has this red thing when people ask her things she doesn’t want to answer or, like the time when Mr Ingles sat at the back of the class to watch her. He said “just ignore me, children; pretend I’m not here” but then he kept coughing and writing notes on a piece of paper, and poor Mrs Crane had these red spots everywhere by the time he left.

  ‘So then I told her. I said “Mikey Ingram says my dad’s a murderer”.

  ‘She went all funny. She crouched down and put her arm around me and said “it’ll be all right” and then her eyes went all blurry. Then she said “you shouldn’t always listen to Mikey”.

  ‘No. I asked Suzy this afternoon on the way home. She said that Daddy had been taken away by the police to Hampstead. So I said “I know that. I saw the car. And the police messed up my room.” But that was months ago. I asked her if he had a new job with the police. Was that why he couldn’t come home? She said “no”. So I asked if he still had his old job and she said “I think so”. Then she said that if I didn’t tell Mum she would show me Daddy on the television.

  ‘Yes. It’s like he’s really famous. He’s in this great big room with lots of important people. He was on the news, just for a second. Baba always liked watching the news. I know because he liked to talk about it. He must be excited now that he’s on it. He didn’t do any talking though. There was a man sitting at the front with funny white curly hair. Suzy says he’s the judge. Says he will decide if Baba can come home or not.

  ‘Baba looked really sad though. I went up and touched the television screen. He couldn’t see me of course. No, silly.

  ‘She said if he’s on the news tomorrow, I can see him again but I mustn’t tell Mum.

  ‘No. I don’t know. I just wish he could come home.’

  48

  The prosecution called Dr Jason Lewis, consultant pathologist, to opine on Mrs Hennessy’s death. He confirmed the cause of death was catastrophic head injuries sustained on impact with the ground, although Mrs Hennessy had also sustained a broken neck and three broken ribs. The nature of the injuries and the position of the body were also consistent with a fall from the eleventh-floor fire escape. And, tellingly, her fingerprints had been found on the railing on the eleventh floor too.

  He mentioned the wound to Mrs Hennessy’s foot from the operation, which had been neatly closed, he commented that she was light, around seven-and-a-half stone, and that there were very few reported cases of people surviving a drop of such magnitude. He would expect most people to die from such a fall.

  Dr Lewis accepted he had originally given the police a window for time of death of between 7pm and midnight on Thursday the 11th of May, but he was adamant that this was very much ‘finger in the air’; the conventional wisdom of measuring changes in body temperature had been largely discredited recently. It was much better to find other corroborating evidence to assist with time of death.

  Andy Chambers began with the fingerprint evidence and continued with the small but crucial matter of Ahmad’s hair on Mrs Hennessy’s nightdress.

  ‘As I’ve set out in my report, a single hair from the head of Mr Qabbani was found attached to the second button of Mrs Hennessy’s nightgown,’ Dr Lewis confirmed.

  ‘When you say second button, can you indicate where that was on her person?’

  Dr Lewis pointed to an area just below his neck. ‘Her buttons began at the neck so around here.’

  ‘And how was it attached?’

  ‘It was wound around the button twice.’

  ‘If Mr Qabbani had simply been cleaning in Mrs Hennessy’s room and had not approached her, is there any way the hair could have attached itself to her nightgown?’

  ‘No. He would have had to interact with her, touch her, come very close to her at least.’

  ‘Were there any other hairs attached to any of the other buttons?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Any DNA of any other person found on Mrs Hennessy’s nightgown?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Thank you. That’s very clear. Let’s move on to the part of your expert report which comments on Mrs Hennessy’s body as it was found, outside the hospital. Tell us what you determined from the position of Mrs Hennessy’s body on the ground?’

  ‘Mrs Hennessy was ly
ing on her stomach. Although she had landed on soft ground on top of leaves which had cushioned her fall to a significant degree, her head had struck a large and jagged tree-stump, resulting in a very serious head and brain injury.’

  ‘She would have died instantly.’

  ‘Yes. And in terms of her position, she was lying traverse to the building at a distance of 8.5 metres from the base.’

  ‘And can you glean anything useful from her position?’

  ‘It’s extremely unlikely that she jumped.’

  ‘Why do you say that?’

  ‘If she had jumped she would almost certainly have been twelve or thirteen metres from the building.’

  ‘I see. And can you say anything about how she fell?’

  ‘In my view, it’s more likely than not that she was pushed from behind or from the side, rather than falling backwards, say, overbalancing, over the railing.’

  ‘Can you explain that please, doctor?’

  ‘Yes. When a person falls backwards, the body is bent in an unnatural way, and it resists and, even in mid-air, tries to correct it by leaning forwards. That tends to mean the body landing far closer to the building. I would have expected around six to seven metres away from the building only. I should add that if a person were flung off a building of that height – I mean picked up by their wrists and ankles and swung off – then we would be back at the twelve or thirteen metre mark.’

  ‘So, to summarise, Ahmad Qabbani’s fingerprints were on the door leading out onto the fire escape, Mrs Hennessy’s prints were on the railing, which is the place from which she almost certainly fell, there must have been some kind of physical interaction, most likely, contact, between Mrs Hennessy and Mr Qabbani for his hair to have attached to her nightgown, Mrs Hennessy most likely fell forwards or sideways over the railing (that is, was pushed from behind or from the side) and it is unlikely she jumped?’