B006U13W The Flight (Jenny Cooper 4) nodrm

by M. R. Hall

  ‘Mr Corton, you are an experienced mariner yourself, aren’t you?’

  ‘I am.’

  ‘You spent twenty-five years in the merchant navy and latterly skippered cargo vessels.’

  ‘That’s correct.’

  ‘Tell us, if you can, why so few yachts are to be seen in the upper reaches of the Bristol Channel – the area to which we also refer as the Severn estuary.’

  ‘It has one of the highest tidal ranges in the world – as much as fifty feet in places.’

  ‘Meaning that it’s an exceptionally treacherous stretch of water?’

  ‘For the inexperienced, most certainly.’

  ‘The area of water in which the Irish Mist went down is only navigable at high tide – is that correct?’

  ‘You would have to sail in on the rising tide, if that’s what you mean.’

  ‘Thank you for correcting me, Mr Corton. But my point is that Mr Brogan would have to have been navigating according to a carefully prepared plan.’

  ‘Either that or he was fortunate with his timing.’

  She paused briefly to take a sip of water. Behind her, Mrs Patterson was waiting, her eyes fixed on Corton.

  ‘Let’s assume it wasn’t luck – there was nothing wrong with his rudder, after all. High tide occurs roughly once every twelve hours – is that correct?’

  ‘More or less.’

  ‘And it was some sixty minutes before high tide when the accident happened.’

  ‘Fifty-seven.’

  ‘Mr Brogan knew he was going to be in that spot at the time, didn’t he?’

  ‘I have no idea.’

  ‘Doesn’t it strike you as more than mere coincidence that a man with his history was the only person at the scene of an aircraft disaster?’

  Corton frowned. ‘I couldn’t possibly speculate.’

  Jenny cut in just as Rufus Bannerman QC was squaring himself to object. ‘Miss Hemmings, please restrict your questions to the physical evidence.’

  She continued regardless. ‘Contrary to every rule of good seamanship, Mr Brogan was wearing no lifejacket. That can only be because he intended to fire a gun.’

  ‘Don’t answer, Mr Corton,’ Jenny said. ‘Miss Hemmings, I have warned you—’

  ‘Mr Corton,’ Hemmings persisted, ‘have you been told to tell only partial truth to this inquest?’

  ‘No, ma’am, I have not.’

  ‘You’re lying, aren’t you, Mr Corton? What was in that boat? What aren’t you telling us?’

  ‘Miss Hemmings, that’s enough. You may stand down, Mr Corton.’

  Corton gratefully stepped away from the chair.

  Hemmings was in full flow. ‘Ma’am, you expressly stated that this inquest exists to uncover the truth. I am doing no more or less than that requires.’

  ‘That does not include making unfounded allegations.’

  ‘I am entitled to ask the witness if he is withholding information.’

  ‘And you got your answer. Please sit down.’

  ‘With respect, ma’am, I did not get an answer. You discharged him before he could reply.’

  Jenny was pulled up short. Hemmings was right. In her haste, no, her fear of trespassing across the boundaries she had been set, she had denied Mrs Patterson her chance to have her questions put. It was a new and disconcerting experience: she was usually the one sniffing out unlikely conspiracies. She needed time out to reconsider, and decide how far she could let Hemmings go before the Ministry of Justice pulled the lever and let her swing.

  ‘We’ll adjourn there until two o’clock,’ Jenny said, and stood up from her desk.

  Mrs Patterson’s voice cut through the sound of scraping chairs as she turned on her lawyers. ‘What was wrong with the question? The man had a gun. He was a known terrorist . . .’

  Greg Patterson tried to calm her, but her voice rose in indignation. ‘Why can’t we ask about that? What’s she hiding, Greg?’

  Jenny walked quickly to the office and closed the door, Mrs Patterson’s words ringing in her ears like an accusation. It was at moments like this that she envied her tough-skinned colleagues who remained immune to the emotions of grieving familes; she felt Mrs Patterson’s grief like a physical force.

  ‘Mr Bannerman would like to see you,’ Alison announced, as she appeared a short while later with coffee. ‘I think he’s got a message from the Ministry.’

  Jenny would normally have refused to see counsel in private during an inquest, but on this occasion she decided to make an exception. It wasn’t cowardice, she told herself, it was merely the sensible thing to do. Just as Dr Allen had instructed, she was no longer acting on whims and hunches, but reasoning her way to answers. It was as if Mrs Patterson had held a mirror up to her: the sight of a formerly rational woman collapsing so spectacularly under the weight of emotion was no more or less than had happened to her. But while Michelle Patterson had only just begun her descent into madness, Jenny was on the last leg of the journey home and had no intention of retracing her steps.

  ‘How can I help you, Mr Bannerman?’ Jenny asked, as he sat in the plastic chair opposite hers.

  ‘It’s not so much a case of helping me, perhaps, as helping yourself, Mrs Cooper.’ Bannerman spoke with a kindly smile that must have disarmed many opponents in a long and successful career at the Bar. Up close, he looked even softer and more benign than he had across the hall. ‘You will be aware that the Ministry of Justice is understandably most anxious that your inquest doesn’t intrude on Sir James’s territory, so to speak. It’s no reflection on your abilities, of course; the concern is merely that were you inadvertently to make any premature findings of fact, it would play havoc with the eventual inquest into the plane crash. You can imagine what fun we lawyers would have if his findings threatened to contradict yours. He could find himself snagged up in judicial reviews for years. That surely wouldn’t be in anybody’s interests, least of all those of the families of the dead.’

  ‘What do you suggest?’ Jenny said, trying hard to reveal nothing in her expression.

  ‘As you might expect, I have briefed both Sir Oliver Prentice at the Ministry and Sir James Kendall on this morning’s proceedings, and Sir Oliver is very much of the view that you have already called sufficient evidence to return a verdict. On the narrow issue of what caused Mr Brogan’s death, I can’t imagine there is any more to be said.’ Bannerman took a measured sip of coffee. ‘And as regards Mr Ransome, I have to inform you that he will not be attending, and that Mr Hartley and his team are poised to go to the High Court should you attempt to force the issue.’

  Up until recently Jenny would have told Bannerman exactly what she thought of a man such as him, who was prepared to sacrifice the principles of his profession to suppress the process of justice and to hell with the consequences. But something had changed; her newly manifesting survival instinct told her to hold fire.

  ‘Won’t his absence merely add to the speculation, Mr Bannerman? Isn’t that what you’re seeking to dampen?’

  ‘How shall I put this, Mrs Cooper?’ He pushed his small, round spectacles up his short beak of a nose. ‘It has come to my notice – I have to admit through conversations I have overheard, rather than been party to – that Mrs Patterson is under the impression that she has struck some sort of bargain with you. “She promised us we’d get to ask about the plane,” to quote her directly. “She told us there would be no cover-up on her watch.” ’ He smiled at her over the rim of his cup. ‘I can’t for a moment imagine that that is true, but she does rather seem to have got hold of the idea that you assumed the mantle of her personal champion.’

  Jenny didn’t permit the uncomfortable irony of the moment to show on her face. She realized now that she had truly done Mrs Patterson a disservice in promising her an inquiry she knew in all but the most irrational parts of her would not be permitted to happen. She had allowed herself to be swayed by a mother’s grief and by her own selfish need to atone for ancient sins. Far from being noble, she had be
en weak.

  ‘Sudden tragedy can unbalance the sanest of people,’ Jenny said.

  Bannerman nodded, assuming that they had reached an understanding. ‘I can tell Sir Oliver that proceedings will be concluded swiftly?’

  Jenny thought she had made up her mind, but felt a sudden and powerful tug in the opposite direction; as if the dead were imploring her. She resisted it.

  ‘I intend a verdict to be delivered this afternoon.’

  Bannerman smiled. ‘A very wise decision, Mrs Cooper.’

  Jenny had written her lines on her legal pad and carefully prepared her response to Rachel Hemmings’s protests and the inevitable outburst from Mrs Patterson. Her justification would be firmly rooted in the law: her decision to limit the evidence framed as being in the overall interests of justice. By the time she had mentally rehearsed her speech several times over, she was almost convinced by it.

  She remained calm even as she heard the lawyers reassembling and Mrs Patterson issuing instructions to Rachel Hemmings to stiffen her spine and remember she was being paid to get answers. Jenny felt strangely powerful, as if in one short lunch hour she had finally become absorbed into the great legal machine against which she had so often imagined herself to be opposed.

  Alison’s unmistakable tap-tap-tap sounded on the door. ‘We’re ready for you, Mrs Cooper.’

  As Jenny made to leave, she felt the silent buzz of her phone in her pocket. She reached for it by reflex. The name on her screen was that of Owen Williams, the Chepstow detective with a hatred for the English. They hadn’t spoken in months.

  Jenny called through the door. ‘Won’t be a moment.’ She answered his call. ‘Sergeant Williams?’

  ‘Inspector Williams now, if you please. Even I still don’t believe it.’ He sounded more sing-song Welsh than ever, his voice rising and falling between baritone and soprano. ‘You’re conducting the inquest into the death of that sailor, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, straining to hide her impatience. ‘Right now, in fact.’

  ‘Oh,’ he said. ‘Only I think we’ve found his lifejacket. I thought you might want to pop down and claim it.’

  TEN

  HARTLEY AND BANNERMAN HAD LOOKED appalled when Jenny announced that the hearing would be adjourned while further evidence was obtained. They had demanded full particulars of precisely what had been discovered, Rachel Hemmings adding her voice to the clamour, but Jenny had told them only that a lifejacket had been discovered, not by whom or where. All parties insisted they be granted the right to have their experts inspect it simultaneously. Jenny refused, asserting her right to have evidence tested first and as she saw fit.

  Leaving the building, she saw Greg Patterson and Nick Galbraith steering Mrs Patterson away from predatory news cameras. No wonder Bannerman was nervous: a forceful woman with a fearsome intellect – there could be no one harder to contain.

  Jenny headed north across the Severn Bridge into Wales with her conscience clear. She had come close to being compromised, but had found the courage to resist at the last minute. Her search was still on.

  She followed Williams along the corridor of the quaint, stone-built police station in the main street of the little market town of Chepstow, and into a locked evidence room. The few rows of aluminium shelving were decidedly bare. Business was slack at the moment, he was pleased to report. And as far as Williams was concerned, trouble usually came in the form of foreign – invariably English – interlopers who had dared to venture onto the wrong side of the border.

  He handed Jenny the orange lifejacket in the clear plastic evidence sack in which it had been stowed. It was deflated and smeared with mud.

  ‘It was one of the boys from the sailing club who found it. It was washed up on the shore opposite the castle. Must have come right up the mouth of the Wye on the tide. You can see it’s been tampered with.’

  Jenny peered through the plastic. One lifejacket looked much the same to her as any other.

  ‘Look here—’ He took the bag from her. ‘You see this?’ He pointed to one of the two inflatable pouches at the front of the jacket. ‘It’s been punctured. It’s a clean cut, about two inches long. Looks like it was done with a knife.’

  ‘Is that how it was found?’

  ‘Hasn’t been touched. I took a statement from the fellow myself. And here.’ He fumbled through the plastic for one of the nylon webbing straps. ‘This is the bit that’s meant to go down your back and between your legs. Clips together at the front. It’s been cut up there, by the shoulder.’

  ‘I can see,’ Jenny said. ‘It was like that when he found it too?’

  Williams nodded gravely, enjoying a rare moment of drama in his steady line of work ‘It was, Mrs Cooper. The man only brought it in because it didn’t look right to him. I’ll expect you’ll want someone to have a look at it.’

  ‘Yes—’ Her mind was already racing with possibilities.

  As Williams handed her the bag she saw that the words ‘Hennessy’s, Dublin Bay’, and beneath them the company phone number, were written in faded black marker pen on the rear side of the jacket. There was no doubting it was Brogan’s.

  ‘Can I take a copy of the finder’s statement?’

  ‘Certainly,’ Williams said, sensing that he might have become involved in something portentous. ‘Is there anything else I can do to help, Mrs Cooper?’

  Jenny pulled herself back from her distracted thoughts. ‘There is one thing. There’s a witness on the Somerset side of the estuary who heard a helicopter flying back in this direction from the scene of the air crash very soon after it happened. I tried to get hold of the CCTV footage from the bridge, but I was beaten to it by Kendall and he’s keeping it to himself.’

  ‘I know. Some of my boys were drafted in to the D-Mort, said he was a right uppity English bastard.’

  Jenny gave a patient smile. ‘You do know I’m half-English, Inspector.’

  ‘We’ve all got a touch of the mongrels, Mrs Cooper, but always remember – the beautiful bits are Welsh.’

  Jenny took a circuitous route back to the office, stopping off at the depot of a courier company, where she arranged for the immediate dispatch of the lifejacket to a private forensic laboratory in Oxford. Her phone didn’t stop ringing for the entire hour, and like one of the people she used to smile at pityingly in traffic jams, she conversed with her callers as animatedly as if they were sitting in the seat next to her. There were calls from the lawyers anxious for information she wouldn’t give, and another from an official in the Ministry of Justice demanding to know when her inquest would be concluded. As soon as possible, she replied, refusing to be pinned down.

  Simon Moreton joined the procession and informed her that he had postponed an important meeting with the Justice Minister, no less, to find out what the devil she was playing at.

  ‘It’s hardly sinister, Simon. New evidence has turned up.’

  ‘What evidence?’

  ‘A lifejacket.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘I don’t know yet. It’ll take the lab a few days to run some tests.’

  ‘What kind of tests?’

  ‘Why don’t you trust me for once?’

  ‘I’ve tried that before, Jenny. It’s not done either of us any favours.’

  ‘Would you believe me if I told you I intend to do this strictly by the book?’

  ‘Jenny, it’s not betraying any official secrets to tell you that this disaster is being treated as an issue of national security. The PM has already chaired three meetings of a specially convened disaster management committee. There are military and intelligence people crawling all over this. You don’t honestly believe you can improve on their efforts?’

  ‘If they were behaving properly they’d pass their evidence on to me.’

  ‘Always the constitutionalist when it suits you.’

  ‘You don’t have to deal with grieving mothers.’

  Moreton let out a weary sigh. ‘I can’t shield you any more, Jenny.
I won’t say it again – the world’s safest airliner falling from British skies is out of your league. Dangerously out of your league.’

  ‘Noted. Haven’t you got a minister to suck up to?’

  ‘Goodbye, Jenny. You’re on your own now.’

  ‘Goodbye, Simon.’ She hit the overhead button that ended the call.

  She was fumbling for her phone, intending to switch it off in order to gain a few moments’ peace, when it rang again. It was Michael Sherman.

  ‘Michael?’

  ‘Hi. Look, sorry to bother you—’

  ‘What can I do for you?’

  ‘Can we meet for a few minutes? I’d rather not talk on the phone.’

  ‘Any particular reason?’

  He chose not to answer. ‘I’m not far from your office.’

  ‘I’ll be there in ten minutes.’

  ‘How about the Mexican place on the corner? I could do with a drink.’

  There were student bars on Whiteladies Road, and those that were strictly for the after-work crowd. Montezuma’s was squarely in the former category. Jenny had never been tempted to step inside, and now knew why. The floor was tacky with spilt beer and everything, including the paper napkins, smelt of last night’s tacos. But Michael appeared neither to notice nor to mind. As he sat down in the corner booth, his mind seemed to be elsewhere. Sliding into the bench seat opposite, Jenny noticed that his eyes were heavy with tiredness.

  She waved her hand in front of his face. ‘Is this a social visit, only I’m rather busy?’

  ‘Sorry—’ He shook his head as if to wake himself. ‘Long weekend. Race meetings from Plymouth to Carlisle. Some of the jockeys seem to spend more time in a plane than they do on a horse.’

  ‘There was something you didn’t want to say on the phone—’

  His eyes instinctively swept the largely empty room. It was a habit she guessed he had picked up in the Air Force – always alert to who might be listening. ‘I spoke with Nuala’s brother last night. Called him up in Auckland. He’s feeling bad that he hasn’t come over, but he’s a young guy, twenty-five – he’s trying to get the money together for the fare.’