The Death Collector (35 page)

‘I think Reader Parker sounds better,’ she said, some mischief returning as a glint in her eye.

‘We’ll talk about it over coffee,’ Joe said.

‘I thought you wanted out?’

‘Well, yeah maybe. But what else can I do? Push trolleys around a supermarket car park?’

‘First things first. Aidan Molloy. I’ve got someone you might want to meet.’

‘Have you got me down here to tell me to stop wasting my time?’

‘Just follow me.’

She stood and went towards the nearest courtroom.

The door was heavy, solid wood, and despite the concrete look of the building’s exterior the courtrooms were styled on the courts of old, with wooden panelling and brass rails. There were three rows for the lawyers. The QCs’ slot at the front, the everyday barristers behind and the clerks and caseworkers at the back. Behind the last row was the wooden dock, the brass rail along the top usually marked by the moisture of thousands of sweaty palms, gripped tightly as verdicts or sentences were announced.

Along the middle row was a barrister, sitting on the desk, his trouser leg riding up as he raised one foot onto the cushion of the chair, his socks held up by garters. Joe recognised him. Martin Barlow. He wasn’t from the chambers he usually used, but sometimes the work gets swapped around as people become double-booked.

‘Mr Barlow?’ Joe said, curious. ‘This is all a bit clandestine.’

‘Martin, please,’ he said, and smiled, small grey eyes under short grey hair. ‘I haven’t seen you in a while, Joe.’

Joe held out his hand and shook. ‘I’m still around,’ he said.

‘Young Kim here said you’re looking at resurrecting the Aidan Molloy case,’ Martin said.

‘Just thinking about it at the moment,’ he said, although he knew he had already gone further than just thinking.

‘I defended him,’ Martin said. ‘I was the junior on it.’

Joe was surprised. ‘So this is about telling me that I’m wasting my time?’

‘No,’ Martin said, surprised. ‘Just the opposite, in fact. Aidan was one of the few I believed.’

‘I’m pleased to hear it.’

‘Hear him out, Joe,’ Kim said, irritation in her voice. ‘I’m doing this for you. We can all go home and forget about Aidan if you prefer.’

Joe leaned against the desk. ‘Okay, I’m sorry. Go on.’

‘I’ve heard you’re working with Hugh Bramwell again,’ Martin said.

‘Yes. Like you, he thinks Aidan is the innocent one and wants to try and get right what he didn’t last time.’

‘That might take some time.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well, Hugh did very little right last time. To the point where I wondered if he was trying to lose the case on purpose.’

‘What do you mean?’

Martin started to undo his collar to remove his tabs, fastened with a brass stud at the back. ‘This is going to be kept between you and me for now, but it might help you decide where to look. Hugh had a reputation for not fighting very hard. In the Molloy case, he was asked to look more into the witnesses, to find something we could use against them, like attention-seeking or false reports. We wanted them to be interviewed, and we asked Hugh to get the permission from the police, but he didn’t do it. He said it wasn’t ethical. It was Hugh who got Aidan to insist on his mother giving evidence, almost as if he was determined to lose the case.’

‘But you were in charge of the case in court, not Hugh.’

‘No,’ Martin said. ‘Aidan was in charge. He’s the client, you know how it works. We advise, we don’t instruct, and the advice he listened to was that drummed into him by Hugh. The thing is, he should have looked into the witnesses more.’

‘Why?’

‘I came across one of them again. One of the three girls who said she’d heard him threaten to kill Rebecca outside a pub.’

‘I was going to visit them before, but Hugh talked me out of it.’

‘Lucky for you that I met one of them. She got in trouble for looking after drugs her boyfriend was selling, when she stored them in her loft. I defended her and she was angry because she said she’d been promised she would be protected.’

Joe frowned. ‘Protected? I don’t follow.’

‘She told me that she would be tipped off if the police were ever going to visit her with a drugs warrant, as if it was her reward for giving evidence in Aidan’s case. She was running around with some pretty dodgy people, but she was one of the ones you wouldn’t think of. From a nice home, she looked the part, clean and wholesome, but she had a taste for the bad boys. She felt she had been betrayed, especially when she got three years.’

‘So she told you she had lied and you didn’t say anything?’

Martin shook his head. ‘You can’t lay that on me. What she told me was confidential and she didn’t say she had lied. She just hinted at inducements, and wanted her reward for locking up the killer.’

‘I read the file notes,’ Joe said. ‘Aidan had argued with Rebecca the night before, but said he was just being emotional because she was ending their relationship. No threats to kill were made. He made a fool of himself, that’s all, crying and pleading.’

‘And that is probably what happened,’ Martin said.

Joe let out a long sigh. ‘The woman who saw the car drive away is convinced it was a different car to how she described it in her statement. She said Hunter put them under pressure to remember it differently, and her boyfriend went along with it because he trusted Hunter’s judgment more than her ability to recognise cars. Even the partial registration was down to Hunter.’

‘And it will be the same with those three silly little teenagers,’ Martin said. ‘The truth is embellished to make it fit. They might even believe it themselves now, and this is the thing, that no one was doing it to lock up an innocent man. Even Hunter. They all thought they were patching up holes that would let a murderer walk free. If Hugh had done his job properly, perhaps those holes would have been seen.’

‘So he’s trying to make amends,’ Joe said.

Kim shook her head. ‘It’s more than that,’ she said. ‘I asked around after we spoke earlier. We haven’t got many of the old guard left, but the ones we have remember Hugh of old. His reputation wasn’t good.’

Joe was surprised.

‘Don’t get me wrong,’ she said, raising her hand. ‘Everyone liked him. He didn’t cause us problems and was always charming. Sometimes you just want to get through the day as smoothly as possible, without someone taking every useless point just to wear you down. But we talk about defence lawyers, ask ourselves the question of who we would go to if we were in trouble.’

‘And?’

‘If we were guilty, the same names cropped up, those who were good at the tear-jerking speeches, who could be the difference between Christmas at home or a prison breakfast. Hugh could do that. He had that old-school charm. If he said his client wouldn’t do it again, the magistrates would go all doe-eyed and believe him.’

‘But?’

‘No one would go to him if they wanted a not guilty verdict. We know who fights well and clean. Hugh wasn’t one of them. Not one of us would have used Hugh if we were in trouble.’ Kim grimaced. ‘And there were rumours.’

Joe was becoming uncomfortable. ‘What kind of rumours?’

Kim looked at Martin, who nodded.

‘That he was too close to the police,’ she said. ‘He entertained them, bought them presents.’

‘Everyone did back then.’

‘No, it was more than that.’ Kim sighed. ‘Don’t be angry, but I called Gina before. I asked her to look into Hugh, to use her old police contacts, and she didn’t sound surprised.’

‘So is Aidan innocent or not? What does it matter about Hugh?’

‘Because Hugh might not be involved for the reason you think,’ Kim said. ‘If Aidan Molloy is innocent, I hope you prove it. I’ve never wanted to lock up an innocent man just to say I could. Don’t let Hugh derail that.’

Martin got to his feet and put his wig on top of some papers in an old leather holdall. He didn’t want to keep his wig clean. A mark of experience was a tatty wig. He was keen on making it look more tatty. ‘He was negligent, in my view, but that isn’t how Aidan or his mother saw it. As far as they were concerned, Hugh made sure their voices were heard.’ He gave a wry smile. ‘You know how it is. Sometimes it’s better to say nothing, but it’s a tough call. Aidan had his case heard, but it was very weak because Hugh didn’t do enough for him.’

Kim reached out and put her hand on Joe’s. ‘If Aidan is innocent, get him out. Just keep an eye on Hugh.’

Joe nodded and let go of her hand.

When he left the courtroom, he wasn’t sure what anything meant any more.

Sam rushed into the restaurant, looking for Alice. She waved when she saw him, although her smile seemed slow in coming.

It was one of those themed restaurants, American chrome, mock-diner style, with guitars and neon signs on the walls. It was all burgers, shakes and chicken wings, although the servers didn’t quite provide the
have a good day
cheeriness that the style tried to project.

It was easy for Alice, though; she could let the girls play on the climbing frames and slides in the large room at the back so that they blew off some of their energy before she had to get them into bed.

Alice was at a table by the play area and she was eating chicken wings. Sam leaned in to kiss her and ended up with a blob of barbecue sauce on his cheek.

She tilted her head and smiled, and her eyes got that dreamy look that had first attracted him when they were still teenagers – soft and wistful, it had made him fall for her quickly. Too quickly, his father had said, but his mother liked Alice. She said she was good for him, that all that mattered was that she put a smile on his face.

‘Sorry I’m late,’ he said.

‘You look tired, Sam.’

‘I’ll be fine,’ he said, reaching across for a chip. ‘How are the girls?’

‘They’ve been manic today. When I told them we were coming here, they wouldn’t calm down.’

‘It’ll tire them out,’ he said.

Her smile wavered and was replaced by a look of concern. She put her food down and said, ‘Come home earlier tonight. You can’t keep doing these long shifts.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You know what I mean,’ she said. ‘We had the conversation last night. It seems like every time someone is murdered you drop everything, even us, to try and sort it out. You get blinkers on and stop seeing what is around you, as if we no longer matter.’

‘I’m on the Murder Squad,’ he said. ‘It’s what I do. And this morning I dug up a corpse, so I feel a little invested in this one.’

‘So how long are you working today?’

‘Until I can’t work any more,’ he said. ‘Joe thinks he has got something useful. I need to follow up on what he came up with.’

Alice frowned and glanced towards the play area. ‘Go and say goodnight to your children, then.’

‘Don’t be like that,’ he said, irritation in his voice. ‘This is important.’

‘So are they.’

Sam took a deep breath. He could feel his anger building, but he knew it was partly tiredness, and also because he knew Alice was right. She was always right, but that didn’t stop him from going back to work.

‘Okay, I won’t be late, I promise,’ he said.

Alice didn’t respond.

‘I’ve just got a couple of things to look at, then I’ll come home.’ He reached across and took hold of her hand. ‘I promise.’

She looked at him, tried to maintain her frosty look, but then a smile flickered at the corners of her mouth. ‘Okay, Sam Parker. If you promise.’

He grinned and kissed her hand, before standing and going into the play area. Erin and Amy ran towards him and wrapped themselves around his legs. He kissed them each on the heads, the scent of their hair mixed in with fast food and drinks, the grubby smells of happiness. They went back to their play and he watched them for a few minutes, showing off as they climbed and played and jumped into ball-pits, enjoying his attention.

The desire to stay with them was strong as he left the restaurant, but so was the urge to carry on with the case.

He kissed Alice goodbye and went back to his car, his mind returning to the case. Just a few hours more and he would let his life go back to normal for a while.

Joe was preoccupied as he walked quickly up the office steps and rushed through reception. Marion tried to pass him some telephone messages but he waved them away and carried on towards his office. He paused when he got to the top. Gina was standing there, her arms folded.

‘What have you found out?’ Joe asked, his tone accusatory.

‘So you’ve spoken to Kim?’ When Joe nodded, she said, ‘So where is he, your little helper?’

‘He’s gone on an errand.’

‘Did he say where?’

‘A birthday card for his niece.’ Joe frowned. ‘What’s going on, Gina?’

Gina put her hands on her hips and stared at the floor for a few seconds. When she looked up again, she spoke more softly. ‘Let’s go to your room. We need to talk.’

Joe followed her along the corridor. When he closed the door to his room, Gina sat down. She swivelled towards the window and stared at the view for a few seconds before saying, ‘I’m surprised that you let Hugh back into the case.’