Gagged & Bound (26 page)

Trish pulled fruitlessly at the thick staples in the envelope and resorted to a presentation paper knife with a sharply pointed end. That levered them out eventually, even though two were flicked straight out of the open window. Trish hoped they hadn’t hit some magnificently important judge in the face. That wouldn’t do much for her reputation.

The impulse to giggle shocked her back into something like sobriety. But it was reading Gillian Crayley’s letter that finished the job.

Trish sat with the letter in her hands, staring at the signature, while her mind settled.

There was no triumph here to sing about or announce with banging drums and trumpets. But there was vindication. If she could hand this letter and the tape to someone official, who would be prepared to use it, then all the risks she’d taken,
even the ones with David’s security, had been worth taking.

Breathing became easier as she let the knowledge ease out all the doubts and miseries from her mind. Now, at last, she could see a time in the future when David might be safe again.

She had always kept a personal stereo in her desk for listening to taped interviews with clients. She took it out, hoping the batteries still had some juice, and slipped the tape into the machine, plugging in the earpieces.

When Nessa returned with the coffee, Trish was still listening. As she sipped bitingly strong espresso, she heard Jack Slabb taunting his sister and keeping his responses so ambiguous that they wouldn’t have counted for evidence even if they had not been recorded illegally.

At the end, for the first time in her life, she had some sympathy with the view that her profession did the devil’s work in keeping known criminals at large to offend again and again.

Trish’s phone rang when she was halfway across Blackfriars Bridge, sober now, but determined to have an early night so she could get her mind firing on full throttle for the weekend’s work. She was due to collect David from Beaconsfield on Monday morning and take him straight on to Center Parcs from there. That meant the last two opinions had to be completed by the end of Sunday evening, and she would have to talk to Bee, as well as find a way to sort things out with George.

The jingle of her phone was getting louder every minute. She pulled it out of her pocket, noticing how the last of the sunset had drawn salmon-coloured streaks in the indigo sky behind the London Eye. When she looked down, she saw Caro’s name on the screen of her phone and put it to her ear.

‘Trish? Me. I haven’t got anywhere with our techies. Without a registration for David’s phone, there’s nothing they can do. I’m really sorry. And I don’t think I’m going to be able to persuade my colleagues to do anything about David’s bike. The theory is it’s almost certainly schoolboy malice. If there’s any more trouble, which God forbid, I’ll go back to them.’

Trish stopped walking and turned to look behind her. There was no one there. Leaning against the flat metal of the balustrade, she said, ‘He texted me again today to say there’d be more news soon. I thought … I thought something …’ She
took a huge breath, blew it out again, then said, ‘I had all kinds of melodramatic fantasies, but my mother swears David is fine. I’ve just got to wait.’

‘I’m sorry,’ Caro said again. She sounded defeated, more so, Trish thought, than even the news warranted.

‘You haven’t heard about the job, have you?’

There was a pause. Then Caro said, ‘This afternoon. I didn’t get it. I thought of going straight back to them with everything Stephanie had told me, but how can I? They’d be even more ready to believe it was spite now.’

‘I’m sorry, Caro. Did John Crayley get it?’ One day Trish would tell Caro about Gillian’s information but not yet, and never over an insecure mobile phone.

‘Presumably They haven’t told me. But I can’t believe he’s been behind what’s happened to David. He wouldn’t use a child like that. Not John.’

‘Are you sure? There wasn’t actually much physical damage, and compared with what happened to Stephanie Taft and Sam Lock, bribing someone to cut a bike’s brake cable was nothing.’

‘Even if John is linked to the people who killed Sam Lock or Stephanie, I can’t believe he knew what was going to happen to either of them. He’s just not the sort who—’

‘Isn’t that what everyone says about the jolly little man at the end of the street who turns out to have bodies buried under his patio?’ Trish said, hating Crayley for his lies and shams, and for what he’d done to his adoptive mother. ‘I’m sorry about the job, Caro. I could see how much it meant to you.’

‘At this stage, with everything that’s happened, I’m not sure I mind that much. It seems trivial somehow.’

‘What else has happened?’ Horrible pictures raced through Trish’s imagination. Had Gillian Crayley’s tall body been found on some waste ground with her head in a plastic bag? ‘I’ve been so busy I’ve hardly even read a paper. Has there been another death?’

‘No. But there have been developments in the Sam Lock enquiry. Apparently there may be a connection with Stephanie’s death, and with the Slabbs. It sounds as though that idea of yours could be right after all. Someone brought in a note he claimed would link them once the scientific tests had been done. I haven’t got the details because I’m not on the case, but I should hear something soon. I’ll fill you in as soon as I do.’

So Brian Walker did his stuff, Trish thought, speeding up. And if John Crayley’s DNA or fingerprints are on the note – if it is a note – they’ll be kept on the files. If I can get Gillian’s tape to the right person and they believe what they hear, they can test Crayley’s prints and DNA and make a match. Then it’ll all unravel for him, and without damaging Caro.

‘Trish, there’s someone shouting for me. I must go.’

‘Before you do,’ Trish said, ‘could you run a check to see if a man called Derrick Flick has ever had any connection with the Slabbs or John Crayley?’

‘Who? Why?’

‘He’s David’s school caretaker, and the only person I can think of who had access to his rugby boots, his phone and his bike, as well as the opportunity to damage the bike.’

‘I’ll do what I can.’ Caro sounded as though she was getting back some of her usual energy. ‘Must go now. Night.’

With the phone returned to her pocket, Trish walked on, deliberately slowing down her thoughts so she could put them in order, making a sequential narrative rather than a mass of sparking possibilities. She wanted to test them in an imaginary cross-examination to be sure she wasn’t about to make a crashing fool of herself.

 

As soon as she was back in the flat, she picked up the landline to call Antony. All her analysis and agitation had confirmed her view that she had to do what Caro had never been able to face. She had to go direct to someone within MI5 and pass on
everything she knew or guessed. Any other course of action would be irresponsible and could only cause more trouble. More people might die.

The problem was she had no contacts within MI5. Antony was her best hope of a way in.

‘I hope you’re not still in chambers,’ he said with his mouth full, ‘after all the energy I put into making you see life more sensibly today.’

‘I’ve dragged you away from dinner,’ she said in a tacit apology. Her need to find the truth was too urgent to worry much about Antony’s digestion.

‘That’s OK, but make it quick. What d’you want?’

‘The name of the silk who prosecuted that MI5 whistle-blower two or three years ago. I can’t remember who it was, but I’m sure you can.’

‘Wasn’t it Roland Benting?’

‘Could be. You don’t happen to know him, do you?’

‘Of course I do. D’you want to meet him?’

‘Yes. But not formally.’ He would be her best chance to reach the people who might be able to make the world safe for David again.

‘Is this to do with Simon Tick and Bee Bowman?’ Antony asked.

‘In a way,’ Trish said, salving her conscience with the knowledge that she could ask questions about Tick too, once she’d got an introduction to someone in MI5.

‘All right. I’ll see if he’s in London this weekend and ask him to drop in for a drink tomorrow. I’ll let you know. Night.’

‘Thank you, Antony. Tell Liz I’m sorry I disturbed her dinner. Bye.’

That done, she made a cup of tea and sat down to phone Bee and press the idea of offering Lord Tick the chance to go to mediation as a way of settling his claim.

‘Motcomb and Winter don’t want to do that yet,’ Bee said.
‘They’re so impressed with the way you’ve established that the two Baiborns
could
be the same they think you’d be able to make him withdraw the claim altogether, which would suit them better than mediation. They’ve asked me to fix up a meeting with you and someone from the insurance company to discuss the possibility.’

Trish fought the impulse to say that all Motcomb and Winter or Bee should be discussing now was which of the three defamation specialists she’d recommended they were going to brief.

‘They’ve given me three times next week,’ Bee went on, oblivious to everything Trish was thinking, ‘so you can chose which would be most convenient for you.’

‘I can’t do next week,’ Trish said. ‘I have to take David to Center Parcs. It’s important that I have some time with him. And if I’m to start providing legal services to your publishers and their insurers, it really would have to go through a solicitor and my clerk.’

‘Trish, I …’ Bee paused, then started again. ‘I know how much I owe you and that you have no reason to do anything for me, but is there any way you could leave David in someone else’s care, just for a day, so we could get this settled?’

Trish forced herself to remember some of what must be churning around in Bee’s mind, and the mental precipice over which she lived.

‘I will go on doing everything I can,’ Trish said, as a compromise, ‘but it has to wait until Monday week. My clerk can fix a meeting at the first possible opportunity after that, but I owe next week to David.’

‘I understand.’ Bee’s voice was tightly controlled. ‘I don’t know what I’d do without you, Trish.’

A little heartened, she embarked on the next call she had to make. There was no answer from the number of George’s house in Fulham. She tried his mobile. It rang and rang. She was about
to cancel the call, not wanting to leave another message on his voicemail, when she heard him, sounding breathless.

‘Trish? Where are you?’

‘Southwark. Why?’

‘Great. I was hoping I could come round.’

‘That would be fine, George. Look,’ she said, hastily trying to remember what there was in the fridge, ‘I’ll rustle up something to eat. David’s at my mother’s still, so we’ll have space and time.’

‘I’m on my way. With you in ten minutes.’

He doesn’t sound angry any more, she thought. Thank God. But what can I cook?
He
won’t eat a tin of cold sardines with a teaspoon.

The kitchen seemed unwelcoming in its emptiness, and somehow stale, even though it was only a day since the cleaner had been. But there were onions, rice, dried mushrooms, garlic and Parmesan, so there could be a mushroom risotto: the ultimate comfort food.

Trish took three onions from the bowl and started to peel them. Sharper than any she’d touched for weeks, they made her eyes burn as soon as she started to chop. Tears were still streaming down her face when George let himself in.

‘You should have waited for me to do that,’ he said stiffly, but he kissed the back of her neck. ‘D’you want me to take over?’

‘No. It’s fine. I can manage. There’s a half-open bottle of wine somewhere I could use for this. I don’t want to waste it, and it’s probably not drinkable any longer.’

‘I’ll search,’ he said, sounding more natural. ‘Any idea where you left it?’

‘None, I’m afraid. Oh, yes, I took it upstairs.’ Luckily she’d brought the empty sardine tin down and chucked it in the bin on her way out of the flat yesterday morning.

He was back with the bottle just as her phone started to ring.

‘You answer. I’ll deal with the rice,’ he said.

It was Antony, telling her that his old friend Roland Benting was in the country for the weekend, but would be more than happy to talk to her over the phone. He dictated the number, then wished her a good holiday.

‘I won’t be a minute,’ she called to George and went upstairs to make her next call in private. They would have to talk about the row at some stage, but not now. She was only beginning to heal; she couldn’t risk the scars ripping apart again.

‘Ah, Trish Maguire,’ said Roland Benting. ‘Antony told me to expect your call. What can I do for you? He was most mysterious.’

‘It’s just that some information has come my way that I need to get into the hands of someone in MI5 who deals with organised crime, and I don’t know how to go about it. Remembering that you’d been involved with them when you prosecuted a whistle-blower a while back, I thought you might still have contacts there. I hoped you could put me in touch with one.’

‘Ah, I see. And I take it that this information is too … sensitive to be handled by any more conventional means?’

‘That’s right.’

‘What form does it take?’

‘An audio cassette.’

‘Fine. I’ll make a couple of calls and get back to you. Where will you be over the next, say, couple of days?’

Trish explained her plans and heard him promise that he would get in touch with her as soon as possible.

Back in the kitchen she was given the job of grating the Parmesan. As she watched George cooking, she felt a reassuring sense of familiarity. They’d often stood like this in the pre-David days, when nothing had mattered nearly as much as it did now.

‘How are the opinions going?’ George’s voice was much too polite for the stage they’d reached in each other’s life.

Trish scraped some skin off her knuckle with the grater and had to suck the blood off it.

‘Well enough, but I’ve been behaving badly.’

‘That’s not like you.’

‘Antony rescued me and fed me at lunch time,’ she said and set about entertaining George with an account of the way the great man had wrestled with the lobster claws. George smiled in all the right places, and offered her some stories of his own when hers dried up.

This is how grown-ups do it, she told herself, as the evening progressed slowly towards normality. We both know we need to look after this thing, this bond, between us. We may disagree with each other, disapprove of all the things the other isn’t saying, but we’re looking after the thing. Maybe it’s the best way. Maybe we’ll never know exactly what we thought and felt during the row. Maybe it doesn’t matter. There are no points to score, after all. Not for us.

Listening to his account of the past week and asking what she hoped were the right questions, she longed for the moment when they could both forget to test each word before they spoke it in case it launched them back into the rage. It was going to be difficult to share a bed tonight, she thought. But with the effort they were both making, she couldn’t possibly tell him to go home.

‘And so I’ve decided that I
am
going to stand down as senior partner,’ he said, making her sit up and listen. ‘Will you mind, Trish?’

‘Me?’ she said, surprised into an unguarded word. ‘No, of course not. Unless you kill yourself with overwork. I’d mind that. A lot.’

His careful friendliness broke into a proper smile. He didn’t move, but she felt almost as if he’d hugged her.

‘That’s pretty rich, coming from a woman who’s been in chambers until the small hours every day for a week,’ he said.
‘And one who’s planning to spend the entire weekend working before buggering off for another five days without me.’