Faith

by Lesley Pearse

  ‘You checked that out?’ She frowned.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I can’t believe you killed her, despite all the compelling evidence to the contrary. Of course it does seem as if I’m the only person of this opinion, but I hope to change that. For one thing it would be practically a miracle if there wasn’t some sort of delay anywhere. I only managed it in an hour once, and that was late in the evening. All the other times it ranged from an hour and fifteen minutes to worst case, an hour and three-quarters.’

  Laura looked into his eyes and felt that strange tugging feeling in her belly that he’d so often given her in the past. She used to say it was his voice, the deepness of it, the soft Edinburgh accent, and the self-belief. She could recall times when she’d hungered for that voice so much that she’d play an old tape recording of him speaking, then laugh at herself for being so soft. But it wasn’t his voice alone, not now, it was the determination in his face, the touch of his hands on hers. And his belief in her.

  ‘I went to see Barney’s grave too, and took some flowers,’ he said, his voice soft with sadness. ‘Someone has been looking after it – there were masses of pansies planted on it and it looked very pretty. As Belle is still there I expect it was her.’

  ‘Really!’ Laura exclaimed, for she had expected to hear it was totally overgrown with weeds. ‘That’s very nice of her. She and Charles were very fond of him, but under the circumstances I didn’t expect them to concern themselves with his grave.’

  ‘A child’s death touches everyone who knew them,’ he said simply. ‘I know how devastated I felt, even though I hadn’t seen him for years. I wished I’d been in the country when it happened. I would have come to his funeral.’

  ‘I’m glad you didn’t, I don’t think I could have borne that,’ she said. ‘Yet I did appreciate your card. I still have it amongst my things. But visiting time is nearly up and I’m sick of talking about me,’ she went on, afraid of what she was feeling. ‘Tell me what you’ve been doing. What on earth were you doing in South America?’

  ‘Overseeing a building project,’ he said with a smile. ‘But I can write and tell you all that. Before I get chucked out I want you to promise me you’ll give me written authority to speak to your lawyer and anyone else connected with you. I’ve got to try and find a way to get you out of here.’

  Laura’s heart leapt. No one else had expressed real belief in her, much less stated that they intended to try to help her. ‘There’s no way you can do it. Short of finding the real murderer and sticking lighted matches under their nails until they confess.’ She smiled glumly.

  ‘Then that’s what I’ll do.’ He grinned, showing perfect teeth.

  Strangely she felt a little sadness at his teeth, for they had been far from perfect when they’d first met. But he wasn’t suave and sophisticated then either. She guessed that another woman had taken him in hand, and she wondered, but couldn’t ask, if he was still with her.

  ‘It isn’t even possible to appeal unless we can bring on some completely new evidence,’ she said wearily.

  ‘I’ll find some,’ he said.

  ‘How are you going to do that? The police dug into every aspect of Jackie’s life, and interviewed dozens of people. Not all of that evidence was used in the trial, but for an appeal you have to have brand-new material, not the unused stuff.’

  ‘You once said you had every faith in me!’

  ‘I did, didn’t I?’ she agreed, remembering how he’d promised to find a home for her and Barney, and came up with it. ‘You always were the kind of man who instilled faith in anyone.’

  ‘Well, try it again now. I work better when someone really does have that faith.’

  ‘How can you believe in me when you must have discovered all those lies I told you about my background?’ she asked, hanging her head. She had to bring it up; she wouldn’t be able to sleep tonight wondering if he knew or not.

  She felt his finger on her chin and he lifted it gently so she was forced to look into his eyes. She saw he did know it all.

  ‘I was hurt you didn’t feel able to tell me the truth,’ he said. ‘But it wasn’t a total surprise as I always suspected there was something you had hidden. I once broached the subject with Jackie, and she agreed with me. She said there was a sadness in you, a lack of the silly little tales we all dig out about our childhoods. But we haven’t got time to talk about that now. Why don’t you write it all down for me? I’ve often found it’s the easiest way to deal with hurtful things, and I know it must have been very painful for you to hide it so well.’

  Laura gulped to get rid of the lump in her throat. ‘I don’t deserve you being so understanding. And I’d like you to know the whole truth. The way the papers reported on it made it sound like I was a confidence trickster. I wasn’t ever that. I will write it all out and send it to you.’

  He took her hand and squeezed it, his way of showing his understanding. ‘While you are dredging up the past, think hard about all you know of Jackie’s life and the people who came into it too. The bond between you was so strong I’ve no doubt it was forged though some kind of adversity when you were both very young. Jackie often mentioned your flat-sharing days; I got the idea there were quite a few men in both your lives then. I want to know about them.’

  ‘Do you think that her killer was from way back then?’

  ‘Perhaps. It wouldn’t hurt to explore the possibility.’

  The bell rang and people started to move.

  ‘Just tell me, Stuart, why are you doing this?’ she asked.

  He stood up and smiled, moving towards her to embrace her. His arms went round her in a bear hug, and he smelled of something akin to cinnamon. ‘For first love,’ he murmured against her neck. ‘For Barney. For inadvertently pushing me on to the road to success. Take your pick.’

  ∗

  Back in her cell, the many questions she’d had fired at her from the other women about her visitor still ringing in her ears, Laura felt very strange. It was almost as if she’d been slipped a mild hallucinogenic drug. The light seemed brighter, the normal prison noises louder, and she was even more aware of the smell of the place: that strange mixture of cleaning fluids, cigarettes, cheap scent and stale food.

  When she first arrived at Cornton Vale it was the terrible smell of body odours in the reception area that she noticed above all else. She wasn’t all that fresh herself, for she’d been in police custody for some thirty-six hours, including the brief court appearance that day, with no opportunity to wash and no clean clothes to change into. But some of the women brought in that day had been sleeping rough for weeks; there were drug addicts and those who had no idea of personal hygiene anyway. She found it appalling, after all she’d been through already, that she was treated the same as these women and was forced to strip off in a tiny cubicle before being driven into a shower as if she too was lousy.

  It made her feel like ‘Stinky Wilmslow’ again, alone, unloved and bullied.

  Yet if she had retained everything she had been and known at the age of twelve, the months she spent on Romeo, the remand block, might not have been such a shock to her system. The women there were very much like those she’d grown up with in Shepherds Bush – rough, uneducated, loud and often violent. They called her Lady Muck or The Duchess, and claimed she was a snob. Hardly a day passed without someone trying to pick a fight with her.

  When the police came to question her, or Patrick Goldsmith, her lawyer, visited, all she managed to convey to them was her rage and indignation that she’d been charged with murder. She couldn’t find the right words to explain her grief.

  Yet it was the all-consuming grief which was the very worst thing. Jackie was her dearest and closest friend, the only entirely true friend she had in the world. Even if she had been miles away when Jackie died, with no connection to her death, she would still have felt the same. She had loved Jackie for her entire adult life and they were closer than most sisters, real soulmate
s – even marriages and Barney’s death had never managed to shake their friendship. To have her snatched away in such a brutal manner, and then to find she was accused of the crime, was just too much to bear.

  Yet somehow she managed to keep her sanity. She told herself that any day the police would find the real killer and she’d be released. There were also the distractions of weekly visits from Goldsmith, Angie, her assistant in the shop, who was being a rock in keeping the place going, and a few other friends. She really believed that even it she did end up in court, once she’d told her side of the story she would be acquitted.

  She remembered during the last couple of weeks before the trial how she used to plan what she’d do when she got home to her flat in Morningside Road. It was on the second floor, above an electrical shop, and only some hundred yards from her own shop.

  For the first two years at Imelda’s she lived in a scruffy bedsitter some distance from genteel Morningside because that was all she could afford. She spent her days encouraging rich women to bring in their obsolete beautiful clothes, and then had to persuade less comfortably off women that it was better to have a gorgeous second-hand dress or jacket than a less stylish, inferior-quality new one. But the hard ground-breaking work paid off eventually, and once she had built up a large customer base, with new clothes arriving each day, and often being sold on immediately, she felt able to find herself a decent place to live.

  Of all the places she’d ever lived in, that flat at number 42 was the one which gave her the most joy. It was spacious and bright, warm and comfortable, and she’d kept the decor to simple pale blue and cream, and trawled all the second-hand shops until she found the right kind of shabby-chic furniture which had what Jackie called ‘A nod to French Farmhouse’.

  In her little prison daydream she imagined arriving home with an armful of scented lilies, pulling up the blinds and opening the windows wide to hear the bustle of the busy street below. Then she would run a bath, pouring in a huge quantity of scented bath oil, and lie there soaking until the smell of prison was finally gone. Later, wearing her favourite cream linen dress she’d bought in Rome, with her hair and makeup perfect, she’d go out to Marks and Spencer and buy salad, tiger prawns and a bottle of the best Italian wine. She would spend her first evening alone, looking at her clothes, paintings and ornaments while listening to music, revelling in the delight of being home again, with the freedom to do what she liked, when she liked.

  She knew of course that even if she were acquitted she would probably have to sell the shop and give up the flat, for gossip about her was bound to continue. Angie had already hinted that she’d like to buy her out, and Laura thought that would probably be the best plan.

  Going south again seemed a good idea, maybe to start up the same kind of shop again in Bath, Cheltenham or Cardiff. She even thought at that time that it would be good to have a complete change. She would of course want to visit Barney’s grave in Crail churchyard, so she’d need to come back once or twice a year.

  ∗

  Almost from the outset of the trial Laura sensed that there was going to be no new start for her. The prosecution had dug deeply and widely into her past, and as the more unsavoury aspects of it stacked up against her, she knew she was doomed.

  Even the tragedy of her son’s death did not gain her any sympathy with the jury, for there were several witnesses called who testified she had been a neglectful mother. Questions were asked as to why Barney was in Jackie’s car when he died, and that brought forth answers that Jackie had shown him more care and attention than his own mother did.

  Laura’s instability after Barney’s death was laboured over. There was even a police report of her being picked up wandering the streets at night wearing only a nightdress.

  Roger Davies, Jackie’s estranged husband, claimed Laura had always been jealous of Jackie because she was so successful. He stated that after Barney’s death she blackmailed Jackie into lending her money to start up the shop, and he inferred that Laura killed her in a fit of rage when she called the debt in.

  It seemed with every witness called that the jury was hearing more evidence that she was volatile, manipulative, greedy or jealous. Laura winced herself many times as some incident she was ashamed of, but had thought was buried in the past, was resurrected and painted even blacker than it really was.

  Even loyal Angie, a witness for the defence, who knew nothing of Laura’s wildness when she was younger, or even about her losing her son, had her words twisted. She had worked for Laura for the past eight years, during which time Laura had led a completely blameless life, yet the skilful way the prosecution lawyer questioned Angie created quite the opposite image. By the time he had finished with her, he’d succeeded in painting a picture of an ambitious, erratic hothead, who on the morning in question had left the shop seething with anger at Jackie because she had to miss her lunch appointment.

  Yet it was Belle’s testimony which really sealed Laura’s fate. Being the younger sister of the victim, with angelic long blonde hair and wide blue eyes which kept filling with tears, was almost enough alone to make her a compelling witness. Yet it was her obvious affection and long-held loyalty for Laura, which made her stumble over her words when forced to admit to her shortcomings, that really sold her to the jury.

  Belle told the court that she had been only eight when Jackie first met Laura, who had become almost a member of their family. She stated that she had preferred Laura to her own sister because she was fun and had so much time for her. Belle’s lack of spite, even though her sister was now dead, and the way she kept turning from the judge to look at Laura in the dock, as if silently apologizing for her being there, was enough for anyone to trust every word she said.

  When asked if she’d ever witnessed Laura fly into a violent rage, she stalled, not wishing to admit to it. But the prosecution pointed out that it was on public record that she had been present at a party in London when Laura pushed a broken glass into another girl’s face, and she had in fact been a police witness. Belle protested, quickly stating that this case had been dropped before coming to court.

  Just that it had been disclosed was enough. To the jury, whether Laura was prosecuted or not, it was confirmation of her violent disposition. That the younger sister of the victim in this case was attempting to defend her only went to show that Laura was a practised manipulator.

  Belle said that she believed it would have been better for her sister if she had distanced herself from Laura after Barney died. But her voice quavered as she added, ‘How could she? Laura had no one else, and Jackie felt responsible for her loss.’

  When the prosecution asked Belle what her sister had said to her on the telephone that last morning, Belle began to sob.

  ‘ “I’ve got important things to say to Laura which she isn’t going to like,” she blurted out. “And I’m afraid of what she might do.”’

  When asked what she thought these important things might be, Belle replied that she thought Jackie was tired of being an emotional and financial crutch to her old friend.

  By then Laura was completely bewildered, for if Jackie had had anything unpleasant to say to her, she would have come over to Edinburgh to say it to her face. She certainly wouldn’t have put on a show of being upset to get her over to her place. But while it could be said that Jackie had been an emotional crutch for her, she had never used her as a financial one.

  The defence did their best to fight back, but their cross-examination of the witnesses couldn’t disprove anything they had said. They went to town on Roger, insisting that he had a long-standing grudge against Laura because she had encouraged Jackie to move to Scotland, and that he had always been jealous because his wife was so fond of Barney. Roger reluctantly admitted he did have a grudge against Laura, not for the reasons stated, but because she had always been a bad influence on his wife, and because she used her.

  Even under oath, not one witness would admit that Jackie had been drinking heavily for some months before her
death or that she had several lovers.

  As these witnesses appeared to be honest, upright people, it was hardly surprising that the jury chose to believe Laura was as malicious as they suggested.

  It was a unanimous ‘guilty’ verdict. The judge proclaimed Laura ‘An affront to womenkind, for she had not only viciously taken another’s life, but had then sort to malign her character, distressing her victim’s family still further’.

  When Laura was brought back to Cornton Vale to begin her life sentence she was beside herself with rage. This was so apparent that she was put on suicide watch, and both prison officers and the other prisoners gave her a wide berth for fear of what she might do to them. She paced the floor of her cell like a caged animal, cursing a legal system that had failed her.

  Perhaps because that level of anger was impossible to sustain, she had eventually sunk into complete apathy. She stopped raging at anyone who came near her, barely spoke, and spent hours lying on her bunk staring mindlessly at the ceiling. It was only when it was put to her that she might very well find herself placed in the psychiatric ward if she continued this way that she began to do the work she was given, ate her meals, read books in her spare time and occasionally held brief conversations with other women on her block. But if the officers thought this was a sign she was at last accepting her sentence, they were wrong. She just didn’t care about anything any more.

  The letter from Stuart had partially woken her from that apathy, making her notice her bedraggled hair, her ragged nails and the texture of her skin, but not enough to feel hope, excitement or even fear.

  Yet she felt all those things now, and she wasn’t sure she liked it, for if all her senses and emotions were completely awakened, how would she be able to stand being in here?