The Death Collector (19 page)

‘So you’ve come to me, an elderly sage, so that I can scatter wisdom down onto you and make you love the law again?’

Joe laughed, despite himself. ‘Not quite,’ he said. ‘Perhaps I like your company?’

Hugh leaned forward and put his hand on Joe’s forearm. ‘What is it, Joe?’ he said, his voice low. ‘You can talk to me.’

Joe moved his arm away and took another drink of his beer. ‘I’m here about a case, an old one of yours. Aidan Molloy.’

Hugh’s eyes widened. He took a long pull at his beer until he emptied it. He held up his glass. ‘I’ll need another one for this. And fill yours too. I don’t like to watch people playing catch-up.’

Joe shook his head, smiling, as he went back into the pub. As he glanced back, he saw Hugh looking down, as if the solitude weighed heavily on him the moment it arrived. It wouldn’t harm anyone if Joe kept him company for a while.

When Joe returned with two more creamy beers, Hugh looked up, and Joe saw that some of the joy had faded from his eyes.

‘Aidan Molloy,’ Hugh said solemnly. ‘The one that got away.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘They don’t come along very often, but now and again you get a client accused of something serious when you think they’re innocent. And I don’t mean
not guilty
; that’s a whole different thing. No, I mean innocent, as in he didn’t do it.’

Joe settled back into his seat. ‘What makes you think that?’

‘It was just the way he was. All the way through the case, he was different from the rest. You know how most are, that they feign some outrage and anger, but only because they want to make someone else believe them. With Aidan, it was different.’

‘How so?’

‘It was disbelief, not anger. I remember the way he looked at his mother when he was convicted. She couldn’t watch the trial until after she had given her evidence, but she was there for the verdict, and when it all came crashing down around him Aidan looked across at her and just shook his head and cried, as if he couldn’t believe what was happening. That’s when I believed him.’

‘And before?’

‘He was a client. It didn’t matter whether I believed him or not.’

‘So did you try to do anything about it?’

Hugh took a drink of his beer and, once he had wiped away the foam from his mouth, said, ‘There was nothing to do. I took advice from counsel as to whether there were any appeal points, but there weren’t. The judge summed it up just right, so it was all down to how the jury saw the evidence, and Aidan. The verdict was a reasonable one.’

‘But a wrong one?’

‘I think so, but you can’t appeal it just because you don’t like it, not without any other evidence. Once we gave Aidan the news, he sacked us. His mother took up the campaign on Aidan’s behalf. She started out by slandering the firm, but we threatened her with legal proceedings, so all of her attention was directed towards persuading people by the strength of her will. The one thing she couldn’t see, however, was that she was one of the problems.’

‘I met her today. She’s suspicious of everyone and angry at everything.’

‘That’s what I mean,’ Hugh said. ‘She was the same back then, and it was easy to take a dislike to her. The jury did.’ Before Joe could say anything, Hugh raised his hand. ‘I know, I know, it’s not a talent contest, but sometimes all the witness has is the hope that the twelve people on the jury like and believe them. If they don’t like someone, it makes it easier for them to think they’re lying.’

‘Lying? Is that what you think?’

‘No, I don’t, for what it’s worth, but it didn’t take much for the jury to think she was.’ Hugh sighed. ‘We tried to talk her out of giving evidence, told her she would only make it worse for Aidan, but she was insistent, which made Aidan insistent. In their eyes, we were part of the conspiracy, lawyers who all pal around together, so her opinion always won over mine.’

‘Why was she such a problem?’

‘Two reasons: the alibi and her character, and both reasons were intertwined.’ Hugh jabbed his finger at the table. ‘If she’d have listened to us, perhaps Aidan would have just swung enough reasonable doubt his way, but I was there when she was in the witness box, and you could see the faces of the jury harden. It was where the doubt slipped away and became a certainty of Aidan’s guilt.’

‘What was wrong with the alibi?’

‘She changed it,’ Hugh said. ‘When they first pulled Aidan in, he told the police that he had got home at twelve thirty. That could still have made him the killer but would have ruled him out as the person dumping the body. Once Aidan had given them a time, the police spoke to her, before Aidan could get her to change her mind. She told the police two thirty, which meant that he could have been the person dumping the body. But she was insistent that she had got it wrong, that she had been tired when she heard him come in through the front door and had quickly glanced at the clock, not spotted the one before the two.’

‘And when did she discover her mistake?’

‘Once she had spoken to Aidan, who convinced her that she must be wrong. She wanted to tell the jury that.’

Joe shook his head. ‘I can guess what happened,’ he said.

‘The prosecution waved her statement at her, the one she had given to the police, with the declaration of truth at the top, where she said it was two thirty, the first time she had been asked to recall it, and accused her of changing the truth just to help out her son. It was an easy point to make.’

‘A very easy one.’

‘And it wasn’t the first time,’ Hugh said.

‘I don’t understand.’

‘Three or four years before the trial, Mary Molloy went to prison for perverting the course of justice. Six months. Her boyfriend was caught on a speed camera and he persuaded her to say that she was driving, except that they didn’t think to ask to see the photograph before they embarked on their lie. Her beau had a lush dark beard and the camera captured it just beautifully. It split them up, because she resented him so much for it. When the police asked him about it, he said he had no idea about it, that Mary must have done it as an act of love. She went to prison. He didn’t even get as far as a courtroom.’

‘So she had told a lie before to try to get someone off,’ Joe said, nodding to himself. ‘If she would do that for a speed camera offence, how far would she go for a murder case?’

‘Exactly,’ Hugh said. ‘The jury thought she was covering up for her son, and if they thought that, they thought he was guilty.’

‘Why couldn’t you stop her? You didn’t have to call her.’

‘The client was insistent, and you know how it is. We might be the lawyers, but sometimes we have to look after ourselves.’

Joe sat back and took a drink. Hugh didn’t need to spell it out. Joe had had many cases like it, where the last thing the case needs is for the client to get into the witness box, as all the hard work of creating doubt in the prosecution case can be wiped out by a defendant’s lame excuses. But most defendants want to explain themselves, to have their say. Some will listen to good advice to quit while they are ahead, but others are so insistent that all you can do is give them their hour or more in the spotlight; if you don’t let them and the verdict comes down as guilty, the lawyer gets the blame. It must have been the same in Aidan’s case, where eventually Hugh had let Aidan dictate his defence, where the desire for Hugh to avoid a complaint was stronger than the need to do the right thing by Aidan, even if Aidan couldn’t see it.

‘What did you think of the witnesses?’ Joe said.

‘The couple who saw the car seemed decent enough, although they wouldn’t budge on the type of car, or the partial plate. And the three young women who reckoned Aidan had threatened the victim?’ Hugh shrugged. ‘Why would they lie? Aidan’s mother had a reason to lie. They didn’t.’

‘To say you believed him, you’re putting up a good case for the prosecution.’

‘No, I’m just saying why the conviction wasn’t a surprise. It doesn’t mean it wasn’t wrong.’

They sat there in silence for a few minutes, enjoying the beer. Joe began to feel his muscles relaxing, his worries about his future slipping away.

It was Hugh who broke the silence. ‘So what are you going to do?’

Joe looked at him. ‘I’m going to look into it.’

‘Why?’

Joe thought about that, and said, ‘I want to love my job again, to do something good, to right a wrong.’

‘Your idealism is always the first victim to the job.’

‘It doesn’t mean it has to be gone for ever.’

‘Promise me one thing,’ Hugh said.

‘What’s that?’

‘If I got something wrong, if I overlooked something that I should have spotted, know that I’m sorry. Truly sorry. If you can get him out of prison without ruining my reputation, I would be grateful, but if you can’t…⁠’ And Hugh just sighed. ‘Just get that man out of jail.’

Joe raised his glass in agreement. He planned to do that.

The cellar door opened and the sound of footsteps on the stairs filled the dark space. Carl stood away from the wall, fear pushing back the threat of sleep. If he slumped, the noose would tighten around his throat. He grimaced and closed his eyes as he waited for the lamp to switch on, opening them slowly when his eyelids turned bright red. He turned his face away until he got used to the glare.

The man moved in front of the lamp and stepped close to him again, so that his silhouette blocked out the light. He was breathing heavily through his nose, as if his jaw was clenched in anger.

‘What’s going to happen?’ Carl said, blinking.

There was a pause before the man said, ‘You could attack me. Bite me or headbutt me. Don’t. No one knows you’re here. No one will hear you outside. You’ll die from lack of water within three days if you annoy me. I will leave you down here for a week if you even try, so be very careful. That’s if you can stay awake. You could weaken and then it would all be over. One slip, one sag of your knees, and you’ll end your days spinning on the spot in here.’

‘Why are you doing this?’ Carl said, a sob choking his voice.

‘Because you lied to me.’

‘Don’t hit me again,’ Carl said. ‘Please. I’m scared.’

‘Why? You can leave whenever you want.’

Carl was confused. ‘I don’t understand.’

He laughed, his breath warm on Carl’s cheeks. ‘But you’ll be dead when you do. It’s a simple choice: either you stay here or you die. There is no middle way. All you’ve got to do is relax those knees and feel that noose go tight. It will feel like a release.’

Carl put his head back against the wall and closed his eyes.

‘Why?’ he said, his voice breaking.

‘I’m a collector,’ the man said. ‘I choose, usually, but it looks like something has just washed up for me this time. So let’s talk some more. We could try the truth for a change. I want to know why you’ve chosen me. Why did you come into my house?’

Carl didn’t respond.

‘You know you’re going to die here, don’t you?’ the man said.

Carl nodded slowly.

‘So talk, and make it easy on yourself.’

Carl felt a small burst of hope. The man wanted to find out what he knew, and whether anyone else knew. He put his head back and wondered what he could say. He guessed that his survival was still only as good for as long as he held onto his secrets.

‘Like I said, I’m just a kid who wanted a look round your house.’

There was the swish of movement before Carl gasped at the sharp prick of metal under his chin. He tried to move his head away but he couldn’t.

‘Don’t tell me lies,’ the man said. ‘One more and this blade will go so deep you’ll be grateful for the noose, just to stop the pain.’

‘Okay, okay, I’m sorry,’ Carl said, a stammer in his voice. ‘I’m looking for my dad, and I think he came looking for you, and now he’s gone missing.’

‘Why would he come looking for me?’

‘I don’t know. He’s a policeman and he was looking into one of his old cases. He had a list of addresses, and your house was on it. So I was looking at you when the police caught me.’

‘So what do you know about me?’

‘Nothing, I swear. Nothing at all.’

‘What about my name?’

‘I don’t know anything about you. It’s just an address. Let me go and I won’t say anything.’

There was no response for a few minutes. Carl waited for another blow or a deeper push with the knife, but the man said, ‘Tell me everything.’

‘I’ve told you. It was just a list my father was looking at. I’ve looked at other houses too.’

‘But you came back for me.’

‘You seemed different from the people in the other houses I looked at, that’s all.’

The knife left Carl’s neck and the man stepped away. His hand went to his forehead, and he seemed to be grimacing.

The man turned back. ‘Do you want to know about me?’

Carl swallowed and then shook his head. ‘Not any more. I just want to go home.’

‘Why? You might learn something.’

‘Why would it matter, if I’m going to die?’

A pause. ‘I can see your point.’ A few more minutes passed before the man said, ‘Like I said, I’m a collector.’

‘Of what?’

‘Beautiful things. You’re too young to understand.’