[Lambert and Hook 21] - A Good Walk Spoiled

by J M Gregson

  Dr Haslam gave her a thin smile and made no comment. ‘Would you say that your capacity for decision-making was affected?’

  ‘No. If it had been, I wouldn’t be accusing the bastard of rape, would I?’

  ‘Please just answer as honestly and fully as you can. It’s a question which would certainly be raised in court, and we need the fullest possible picture if we are to prepare a case. Were there any recreational drugs involved?’

  ‘No, of course not.’

  ‘We have to ask. Cannabis and cocaine in particular are now involved in a high percentage of rape cases. It’s one of the things we need to know about from the outset. Now, please tell us as fully and as calmly as you can what happened at the end of the evening.’

  ‘It was a pleasant evening, until we left the pub. Until the moment when we came in here, in fact.’

  ‘Did you invite him in?’ This was Sergeant Fox taking over again, looking as if she wanted to put an arm round the victim even as she asked the most searching questions.

  ‘Yes. I asked him if he wanted a coffee. I think he said, “Just try to stop me!”’

  ‘A lot of men take that invitation to mean more than a coffee. Sometimes the women who make the offer do, too. Did you?’

  ‘No. I suppose I wouldn’t have rejected a goodnight kiss as he left, but I swear I never intended more than that.’

  ‘You may need to swear to it, in court, if this goes the full distance. What happened when you got in here?’

  ‘Everything happened very quickly. He asked for the loo and I set about making coffee whilst he was in there. He - he must have put a condom on whilst he was in there, according to what he said later.’

  ‘Did you drink the coffee?’

  ‘No. I never even made it. He grabbed me from behind whilst I was waiting for the kettle to boil. I told him to lay off, but he twisted me round and kissed me very hard. Then he slid his hands under my bottom and carried me in here.’ She glanced automatically towards the rug and the brooch with the broken clasp which still lay beside it.

  ‘Did he at any time ask for your consent to what he was doing?’

  ‘No. He told me that I was quite safe because he had a condom on. He - he said that I was a hot bitch under my cool exterior and that I knew it. That I was going to enjoy it.’

  ‘You’re sure he used these phrases?’

  ‘Yes. I can still hear him shouting them into my ear when he was lying on top of me on that rug!’ Her whole body shook with a sudden, cathartic shudder, and Sergeant Fox reached out and put a large hand on top of hers, the first and only time she touched her during the whole exchange.

  ‘Did you try to stop him?’

  ‘Yes. I know that the advice is to go along with it if you can’t stop it, to be passive and complain afterwards, but I didn’t even think of that at the time. I screamed at him to stop and tried to throw him off.’

  ‘And he took no notice?’

  ‘No. If anything, it seemed to make him more excited. He said I was a horny little hussy who wanted it as much as he did. That I was going to shout as loud as anyone when I came.’ She was surprised how accurately she could remember the phrases, how she wanted to repeat them now and then never again.

  ‘He was on top of you?’

  ‘Yes. I struggled as hard and as long as I could, but he was too strong for me. It was on that rug there.’ She waved at it, as if its rumpled state would testify to her struggle.

  Perhaps she looked worse than she felt, because Sergeant Fox said gently, ‘The worst is over now, Priscilla. Tell us how it ended.’

  ‘He lay on top of me when he’d finished. It seemed a long time to me before he moved and let me out, but it may not have been. I told him to get out. He started trying to talk to me, using words and phrases which I don’t remember - I don’t think I heard them, even at the time.’

  Dr Haslam produced a small digital camera. ‘It’s a good thing that you struggled, from the point of view of evidence. I now need to examine you and to record the details of any injuries sustained.’

  She was a slight, intense figure, far less attractive and acceptable to Priscilla Godwin at this moment than the more motherly Sergeant Fox. Perhaps she sensed this, because she said unexpectedly, ‘It’s got to be done, I’m afraid. It may help you to know that I was raped myself. It’s a long time ago, but I remember what it feels like as if it were yesterday. Shall we go into the bathroom?’

  There was a lot of bruising on the insides of her thighs, a small cut on her hip where he had wrenched at her clothing, a long scratch she had never felt just below her breasts where the brooch had been torn from her blouse. All good stuff for a jury, Dr Haslam assured her: they were colleagues now against this attacker she had never seen. ‘There’ll be no semen,’ said Priscilla as she stood patiently with her legs apart. ‘He wore a condom, and I told you, I washed myself hours ago.’ The condom had been a tiny relief to her as she cleaned herself; even now, she was glad that he had worn it.

  ‘He’ll have left enough of himself behind to be identified,’ Haslam consoled her. ‘In any case, I expect he won’t deny that you had sex. He’ll probably try to make out that it wasn’t rape. That’s what most of them do.’

  When they went back into the lounge, Sergeant Fox had parcelled up the rug into a big plastic bag. ‘He’ll have left enough of himself on this for a DNA sample, I’m pretty sure,’ she said by way of explanation. ‘I’ve bagged your brooch, too. We may get his fingerprints from it. We’ll need a sample of yours, too, for elimination purposes.’

  Priscilla watched them recording their findings. She was surprised that it was only at this stage that they asked for Richard Cullis ’s name and added details of his background to what she had already given them. ‘People are always devastated by this crime, usually much less in control of themselves than you’ve been,’ Sergeant Fox explained, with a smile of congratulation. ‘We let people talk. We fill in anything else we need later.’

  ‘What are the chances if it comes to court?’

  ‘Difficult to say, love.’ She glanced sideways at Haslam, who nodded and smiled. ‘You’ve convinced the pair of us, but we don’t have to be objective, you see. We’ve got the evidence. Now we’ve got to persuade the Crown Prosecution Service that they have a case worth talking to court.’ Her big lips wrinkled in distaste at the pusillanimity of lawyers.

  ‘Drink always complicates things,’ sighed Haslam. ‘He’ll probably argue you consented, and then some clever young male defence lawyer will try to show that because you were “pleasantly pissed”, you went along with it at the time, maybe even that your resistance was all part of the sexual game.’

  Sergeant Fox smiled her big, compassionate smile and said in a voice as dark and sympathetic as evening cocoa, ‘We should ask you at this stage if you’re sure that you want to proceed with a possible court case against Mr Cullis.’

  ‘Unless he admits what he did to me last night, I do.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear that. But it won’t be easy. Because you knew your assailant, because before this action he was a friend of yours and of the people who work with you, things might be difficult. You know the truth, but, human nature being what it is, some mutual friends might even suggest that you’ve invented the whole thing, or suggest that you permitted it at the time and are only doing this because you now regret it. You’ll need to ignore all the gossip and stick to your guns, but don’t imagine it’s going to be easy.’

  ‘I don’t. But I won’t let this go.’

  Dr Haslam fastened up her big leather bag with the evidence within it. ‘Good. If you feel you need any counselling or care in the next few days, you should contact the Rape Counselling Centre.’ She wrote down a phone number and an Internet address and said wryly, ‘You may find there’s a waiting period.’

  ‘I don’t think I shall need them, but why would that be?’

  ‘Because they see nine times as many people as we do. Four out of five rape victims never report the fact
that they’ve been raped to the police. You’ve done the right thing and we’ll now set things in motion.’

  As they stood up and turned towards the door, Priscilla said with sudden urgency, ‘Don’t wrap things up to be kind to me. I’m a scientist, used to handling facts. What are the chances of success?’

  Sergeant Fox turned back to her, gave her that wide, motherly smile, and then was suddenly serious. ‘You said don’t wrap it up. I won’t. In 1977, a third of people charged with rape were convicted. Today it’s one in twenty. And half of those are because the accused admits the crime. Our first hurdle is to get past the Crown Prosecution Service and persuade them to go to trial with this. We’ve got supporting evidence, so we have a chance. Cullis will be interviewed and I can’t deny that the impression he makes there will influence CPS decisions. It’s another fact of life, I’m afraid. We’ll be in touch as soon as we have any news. You’ve been commendably frank, but if you remember anything else you think might be useful don’t hesitate to get in touch with me at this number.’

  Priscilla held the card in her hand for a long time after they had gone. She didn’t feel that she would ever be able to resume her life, the life which she had been so content with before the horror of last night.

  Eight

  It was early afternoon when the Chief Constable rang Chief Superintendent Lambert, the Head of Oldford CID section.

  ‘John, we’ve got a tricky one. There’s been an allegation of rape against Richard Cullis.’

  ‘Yes?’ It wasn’t the crime but the name which was puzzling John Lambert. It was vaguely familiar, but he couldn’t pin it down for a moment. He’d remembered names for months, even years, when he’d been a young CID sergeant, but in your fifties it took you longer. ‘That’s the man at Gloucester Chemicals that the All God’s Creatures people threatened.’ He tried to keep the relief out of his voice.

  ‘That’s the one. He’s a director of the company, responsible for the research and development laboratories: that’s why he was threatened by the animal rights lot. It’s a sensitive one, this. I don’t want a whiff of it in the press, unless it’s taken forward and he’s formally charged. All hell will break out if he is, but there’s nothing we can do about that.’

  ‘Or would want to do, if he’s guilty.’

  ‘Of course. But you know as well as I do what the chances are of this even getting to court.

  He’ll have to be interviewed, of course, but I want it kept as quiet as possible until we have the full picture.’

  And swept under the carpet if at all possible, in the interests of PR, Lambert thought. He said, ‘I understand, sir. I’ll do the interview myself.’

  There was a pause at the other end of the phone. The CC didn’t really want that, but he didn’t know how to turn the offer down. ‘Are you sure you’ve got the time, John?’

  John Lambert smiled grimly, understanding perfectly the dilemma he had given the chief; Lambert would be as discreet as a reclusive owl, but he would also be thorough. The CC wasn’t certain he wanted thoroughness: that might lead to a charge. High-profile rape cases rarely bring kudos to the police service. Worse than that, they can be a public-relations disaster, if evidence is not gathered fully and clever lawyers make fun of leaden police officers in court. ‘I’ll make the time, sir, if this is as important as you say.’

  He remembered after he had volunteered himself for the job that Bert Hook had taken the day off. He would have preferred to have the down-to-earth, unthreatening, but deceptively perceptive Hook at his side. Instead, he collected Detective Inspector Rushton from the CID room.

  ‘Be good for you to get away from that computer for an hour,’ he said, with a sour glance at that innocent machine. He knew that Chris Rushton thought he was a dinosaur and he rather enjoyed playing up to the image. He outlined the delicacy of this mission as Rushton drove him out to the industrial estate, knowing his DI would be rather flattered to be entrusted with this delicate commission from the CC.

  Chris was happy to tell him that he already knew about the case. ‘I’ve just opened a file on it on the computer, as a matter of fact, sir. I’ve printed out a copy of the woman’s statement for you to look at now. You’ll find it in my document case.’ Let the old bugger know that the technology he so despised was more on the ball than he was. ‘I’ve been entering the full information from the Sapphire Unit’s interview with the victim. Quite full and very interesting. The photographic evidence of the injuries will be available later today.’

  Richard Cullis had been in and out of the labs for most of the day. He’d decided now that Priscilla Godwin was not coming in, but he was listening for any scraps of conversation or puzzled looks in his direction, which might tell him that she had spoken to one of her colleagues. He feigned complete surprise when the CID men arrived. ‘A chief superintendent and a detective inspector. We’re honoured indeed, today.’

  ‘Is there somewhere private where we can speak, sir?’

  ‘You’d better come through to my office. We won’t be disturbed there. Is it about those animal rights ruffians? You haven’t turned up their undercover man after all, have you?’

  ‘Not so far. We’re keeping an open mind on that issue. This is something else entirely.’

  They told him what he was fearing to hear, whilst he feigned again the astonishment he had rehearsed all day in his mind. ‘I can’t believe this. It’s quite preposterous.’

  Rushton who had his notebook at the ready, said, ‘You deny the allegation, sir?’

  ‘Indeed I do. Most emphatically!’

  Rushton nodded, professionally impassive, conscious of Lambert’s eyes upon him as well as those of this suave, good-looking man whose facility with words he secretly envied. But Chris knew enough about rape to know that this man in his forties, with his tan and his expensive haircut and his lofty position in the firm, was as likely a candidate for the crime as those shadowy men from doss-houses who were desperate for sex and careless of the consequences.

  Chris Rushton was a handsome man who did not see himself as such, a thirty-two-year old whose confidence with women had been severely dented by divorce, a trauma even more common in the police than in other callings. But he could no more have committed a rape than leap over the moon. He said, ‘A very serious allegation has been levelled against you, Mr Cullis. You will understand that it has to be investigated , just as the notion that a saboteur had infiltrated your laboratories had to be investigated.’

  ‘I understand that. I know you have a job to do. I hope you will do it discreetly, so that when you accept that I am totally innocent there will be no damaging rumours left behind here.’

  ‘The lady in question is a Ms Priscilla Godwin.

  ‘I can’t say that I’m surprised at her identity.

  What appals me is that she could even think of accusing me of something like this.’

  ‘You were out with her last night, I believe.’ Richard gave them the urbane smile which he hoped completely covered the turmoil within him. ‘That much we can agree upon. Look, let’s get this out of the way as quickly as possible. I’ve known Pris for years as a colleague: she’s been a reliable member of my workforce here for quite some time now. A few days ago I invited her out for a drink and a meal. She was only too happy to accept. Quite eager, I’d have said, if we leave modesty aside.’

  ‘Let’s do that, sir, if it enables us to get to the truth. You’re sure you invited Ms Godwin out for a meal, are you, rather than just for a drink?’

  Cullis shrugged elaborately. ‘Pretty sure. I told you that she was eager. I may have suggested a drink and divined that she would welcome something a little more extravagant - as she did quite emphatically when it was offered to her. It’s hardly important, is it?’

  Rushton was happy to spend some time recording the gist of this; silence could be a very effective weapon, if you had a nervous subject. Then he said, ‘It could be crucial, sir, if you translated something casual and brief into an evening out togeth
er. We don’t know what is important yet, sir, and neither do you. If we decide that we agree with you that this is an unfounded allegation, none of this will be important and it will be expunged from our records.’

  He stopped for a moment to savour his verb.

  Richard said a little too quickly, ‘That will undoubtedly be the outcome, after the expenditure of a lot of expensive police time.’ He glanced significantly at Chief Superintendent Lambert, who had said not a word since they had entered his office, but had studied him throughout with an intensity which was becoming unnerving.

  Rushton said, ‘We have the lady’s account of the evening, as you would expect. Would you please now give us yours?’

  Richard had been over this many times in his mind during the day, had even spent an apprehensive half-hour in the privacy of this office at lunchtime rehearsing it. Now he said, ‘This is really rather unnerving, you know. I haven’t even thought about it until this moment, and now I’m frightened of making mistakes of detail and being picked up on them. I’m beginning to wish I’d never seen this ridiculous woman. I’m certainly wishing I’d never been foolish enough to ask her out for the evening. But she so patently wanted my attention that I suppose I took pity on her. I’ve always been a bit of a sucker for a pretty face, but I never thought it would land me in anything like this.’

  ‘Indeed, sir. I still need your account of what went on last night. From the beginning, please.’

  ‘Well, I picked her up and took her out into flerefordshire, to the pub where I’d ordered the rneal. We had a drink when we got there. I was being careful because of driving, but Pris had a gin and tonic. A double, if I remember right.’

  ‘Ms Godwin ordered a double, did she?’ Richard realized that he was going to have to be very careful indeed. ‘I think so, but I really couldn’t be certain. We went into the dining room and ordered food. Pris selected the wine: rather a nice claret, actually. I remember thinking that she must be quite a drinker, which I hadn’t expected. She had quite a lot more of the wine than I had, too. She was coming on strong to me during the meal, making it quite clear that she had the hots for me. I admit that I found that quite flattering. Of course, it may have been the wine which was removing her inhibitions!’ He smiled in self-deprecation, but received no answering mirth from the men on the other side of his desk.