Read Unsafe Convictions Online
Authors: Alison Taylor
‘
If she did, no one ever told us.’
‘
She was a notorious prostitute,’ McKenna reminded him, ‘and her child was therefore at risk. You did nothing to protect that child, and even when she was so horribly injured, you
still
did nothing.’
‘
I’ve already told you the Church looked after
her
.’ An unpleasant smile began to play about Ryman’s mouth. ‘And d’you know, none of this is any of your damned business! You’re just muck-raking about things that have nothing to do with Smith or Dugdale, and you’re overstepping the mark. Dangerously so, in fact. Maybe people should be told.’
‘
Then feel free to tell them.’ McKenna rose, and picked up his briefcase. ‘But don’t forget that Trisha Smith may have died because she fell into a heap of other people’s muck.’
The
heat from Bunty’s fire was making Jack very sleepy. Stifling another yawn, he asked: ‘Why is your son telling such exaggerated untruths about his childhood?’
‘
Because he was born with lies on his tongue,’ Ida replied.
‘
I suppose it puts him in a better light,’ Bunty ventured, ignoring her friend. ‘And he always had ideas above himself. He was never content with me, or what I could give him. He wanted more, and he thought he had a right to it, but heaven knows why.’
‘
And what he couldn’t get honestly,’ Ida added, ‘he’d get another way.’
‘
How long have you two known each other?’ asked Janet.
‘
Donkey’s years!’ Ida said. ‘Since we both got jobs in one of the knife and fork factories after we left school. That was where Bunty met her husband.’
‘
You were married to your son’s father?’ Ellen’s eyebrows shot up.
‘
Of course she was!’ Ida snapped.
‘
What happened to him?’
‘
Well, he didn’t run away from the army and get his legs cut off!’ Ida barked.
‘
He took to the drink,’ Bunty said.
‘
Why?’
The
old women looked at each other, then shrugged.
‘
Because men do,’ Bunty suggested. ‘Women do, as well, these days.’
‘
Bunty threw him out. He was drinking the money she needed for rent, and baby food and suchlike.’ Ida pursed her mouth. ‘She should’ve thrown his offspring after him, and saved herself a lot of grief.’
‘
He wasn’t a bad man,’ Bunty said, defending her absent spouse. ‘He was never nasty to me, and he was a good husband before the drink took him.’
‘
He must’ve had bad blood,’ Ida countered, ‘and it came out in his son.’
‘
Where’s your husband now?’ asked Jack.
‘
I don’t know. He took to the hills thirty-three years ago, and that’s the last I saw of him.’
‘
When did you last see your son?’
‘
When the nasty little thug was sixteen.’ Once again, Ida responded. ‘He disappeared one day, without a word, and it was just as well, if you ask me, ’cos Bunty was near the end of her tether with his evil goings-on.’ She leaned forward, and tapped Jack’s knee. ‘You see, that’s why I never said when the coppers came asking before. Bunty’s never got on the wrong side of the law, so I reckoned it must be something to do with husband or son, and both of them’d done enough harm already.’ She shook her head angrily. ‘And now he’s saying he was put in a children’s home because Bunty was in prison, and that’s another wicked lie. She had to go into hospital.’
‘
And when the police came calling,’ Bunty added, ‘it was months before then, maybe even a year.’
‘
What did they want?’
‘
There’d been an accident outside the old YMCA place on Division Street,’ Ida said. ‘A man got knocked down and killed by a car, and Bunty saw it all, so she had to be a witness in court.’
‘
It’s not unusual for young children to confuse time, and connect unconnected events,’ Ellen offered. ‘Perhaps your son should have the benefit of the doubt over that.’
‘
Benefit of the doubt nothing!’ Ida turned on her. ‘He knows damn well Bunty was in hospital, because I used to get him from the home every Wednesday evening and every Sunday afternoon, and take him to see her.’
‘
What was the operation for?’ Janet asked.
Ida
looked at her friend, who simply nodded. ‘She gets tired easily, and she’s not had a decent night’s sleep since that son of hers was let out of prison, because she’s scared he’ll find out where she is, and come causing her more grief, so that’s why I’m doing most of the talking, in case you’re wondering.’ She folded her arms across her ample stomach, and took a deep breath. ‘Bunty’s mam and dad,
their
parents, cousins, aunties, uncles, and her big sister and little brother were wiped out by a German bomb in the war. They were all together having a party for Bunty’s third birthday, and
he
knows all about it, so you can forget the fairy stories in the paper. Anyhow, Bunty was dragged out of the rubble by an air raid warden. She had her picture in the papers as far away as Newcastle and London, and the warden got a medal for saving her. Nobody expected her to pull through because she was broken up like a doll that’d been stamped on, but she did.’
‘
But I’ve always had a lot of trouble with my bones,’ Bunty said.
‘
That’s why she never grew very big,’ Ida went on. ‘She managed all right for years, but having a baby made things go wrong, because of the weight. She struggled on for a few years, then the doctors made her go to hospital to be screwed back together again.’
Bunty
levered herself from her chair, went to the sideboard, and pulled a bulging, tattered envelope from the top drawer. ‘Have a look in here,’ she said, handing the envelope to Jack. Her fingers, he thought, were like broken claws. ‘There’s old newspaper stories about the air raid,’ she added, ‘and other bits and pieces, and letters from the doctors at the hospital.’
‘
It was like she started falling apart after
he
was born,’ Ida added, embellishing the awfulness, while Jack moved to the table, spilled out the contents of the envelope, and began to read.
Ellen
frowned. ‘How d’you mean?’
‘
Oh, Ida, you don’t half lay it on!’ Bunty chided. She offered Ellen a surprisingly sweet smile. ‘My pelvis got broken in the raid, and it was fastened together with screws and things. It all got pulled around when I was expecting, so it had to be repaired. That’s all there was to it.’
‘
And how’s your health now?’
‘
I manage,’ Bunty replied. ‘I could be worse, considering my age, and everything.’
‘
Do you remember the air raid?’ Janet asked.
‘
I can’t remember a thing, which I’ve always thought was a blessing. A friend of my mam’s in the next street had a photo of her, so I know what
she
looked like, but there’s nothing left to remind me about my dad, or the others, or my sister Betty, or little Eric. He was barely a year old.’ Again she smiled, warming Janet. ‘Sometimes, when I’m dozing by the fire, or even wandering round the shops, I’ll get little pictures flashing through my mind, right out of the blue, and I have the loveliest dreams some nights, and I know they must be about my family, because they make me feel everything will be all right.’
‘
Some hopes!’ Ida commented. ‘And
I
don’t know what went wrong, either,’ she added, seeing the expression on Janet’s face. ‘How somebody like Bunty gave birth to him is beyond me.’ She chewed her lips thoughtfully. ‘Maybe they swapped him at the hospital.’
‘
Don’t be silly,’ Bunty said. ‘I’d’ve known.’
‘
You did your best for him,’ Ida insisted. ‘You worked hard, you looked after him much better than a lot of mothers, and you wouldn’t hear a word against him even after that teacher died.’
‘
Maybe I didn’t love him enough,’ Bunty said. ‘Folk say you can’t do for your children what wasn’t done for you, and I can’t remember having a real mam, so perhaps I never knew how to be one.’
‘I’ve often thought,’ Jack observed, fighting to steady the car against the onslaught of the wind, ‘that we should listen to what ordinary people have to say instead of the claptrap psychologists put about, because in the end,’ he added, swerving towards the verge as the wind suddenly voided itself, ‘psychology amounts to nothing more than basic common sense. Bunty was spot on in my opinion with what she said about not knowing
how
to be a mother.’ As the first flakes of snow spattered the windscreen, he switched on the wipers. ‘Some experts believe Mary Bell’s early influences were really to blame for the fact that she killed two little boys when she was only eleven herself.’
‘
Mary Bell’s mother was a prostitute who offered sado-masochism as part of the service,’ Ellen said. ‘And she traded from home, so Mary would have seen a lot, and heard the rest of it. She might even have been forced to play her own part. That child was the product of ordinary human nastiness in bed with grim circumstance, so the comparison doesn’t hold water.’
‘
It’s the early influences that determine which aspects of a child’s personality will flourish,’ Jack insisted. ‘And which won’t. Mary Bell only learned about violence and depravity. On the other hand, from what we’ve seen of Bunty, the foster parents who reared her must have been decent people.’
‘
I expect they were,’ Ellen conceded, ‘but they probably couldn’t offer the emotional warmth she’d have had with her birth family, so
she
couldn’t show her own child the emotional empathy any child needs to be healthy and whole. And don’t forget we’ve only heard her side of the story. It’s bound to be subjective, if not as biased in its own way as what Smith says. We should really be looking for some middle ground.’
‘
Why?’ Janet asked, watching the snow spiralling, and even flying upwards, as the wind drove into it. ‘Maybe people like Smith just evolve through the genetics of evil. Even if they don’t, he’s had enough counselling to know exactly what his problems are and where they stem from, so he hasn’t a single excuse for the way he behaves.’
*
The moors above Haughton were dusted with white by the time they reached Church Street. Snow splattered the railings, and drifted against walls and tree trunks and gravestones. The rooks still clung to the threshing trees and, as he was locking the car, Jack saw a nest wrenched from a crook in the branches. It fell to earth with a clatter and a splintering thud, and a bevy of birds erupted about the steeple, cawing anxiously.
McKenna
was in the kitchen with Rene, gossiping while she prepared their lunch. Jack poured tea for himself from the pot warming on the cooker hob, and sat down. ‘It’s snowing hard up on the moors,’ he said.
‘
There’s a surprise!’ Rene smiled, reaching for a carving knife to cut the haunch of roast ham on the counter. ‘You’ll have your wings clipped if you can’t get any chains for the cars, and I hear there’s not a set to be had for miles around.’
‘
Couldn’t we borrow some?’ he asked. ‘There must be spares at the police station.’
‘
I thought you and them weren’t on speaking terms,’ she commented. ‘Especially after last night.’
‘
Yes, but you must know someone there who doesn’t think we’re poisoning the town’s life-blood.’
Her
mouth twitched. ‘I’m allowed to play now, am I?’ The carving knife was held still, its tip glinting.
‘
I’ve an idea you’ve been directing the traffic from when we set foot here,’ Jack told her.
Smiling
to herself, she sliced through the smoky brown flesh. ‘I expect I could find somebody to help out, as long as Mr McKenna doesn’t mind me using the telephone.’
Returning from her enforced absence to the hotel, Gaynor expected a reception frostier than the outside day, and a discreet invitation to step into the manager’s office, but she was admitted as if last night’s extraordinary events had never happened. Thinking that was probably because of the platinum sheen on her credit card, the size of her car, and the matching suite of Louis Vuitton luggage lodged in an alcove in her bedroom exactly as she had left it, she went down to lunch. Afterwards she was still hungry, for she had literally turned up her nose at the breakfast offered in the cells, so she ordered sandwiches and coffee from room service, then set about catching up on missed telephone calls and disappearing opportunities.
She
called Davidson first, and he obviously expected her to be enraged by his attempted appeasement of Linda Newton.
‘
I had no choice, I’m afraid,’ he told her, launching into self-justification.
She
let him finish, then calmly said: ‘It was always on the cards we’d drop ourselves in
something
and, from what I’ve heard since, Smith really led us up the garden path there.’
‘
Oh.’ Davidson was surprised. ‘I see.’
‘
And he probably did the same over his mother,’ she added, ‘so maybe you should write to her in a similar vein, but only offer five thousand. She wasn’t quite misrepresented in the same way, and we could always argue that she should have made her existence known long ago.’
‘
This is getting very expensive, Gaynor, aside from your hotel bills.’
‘
I’m sure the paper’s still well in profit.’ She munched a sandwich filled with a delicious concoction of meats and relishes.
‘
At the moment, but that’s no guarantee it’ll last. This is a dog-eat-dog world, as you well know. By the way, your articles provoked several very venomous letters, mainly about the police. What have they done with you?’
‘
Charged me with wasting their time, and bailed me.’ Fingers hovering over the plate, she selected another triangle of thin brown bread, oozing with cheeses. ‘Trust me, it won’t go any further.’
‘
Trusting you is getting a bit risky.’
‘
Nothing ventured, nothing gained!’ Her voice sharpened. ‘You’ve done better than you dared hope for up to now.’
‘
Maybe things really
have
run their course,’ he suggested, harking back to yesterday’s argument.
‘
They won’t do that until McKenna and his geeks sod off back to Troglodyte-land.’
‘
What’s he like?’ Davidson asked.
‘
He’s a copper, and all coppers are bastards.’
*
The hotel was two miles down a winding track off the road that trailed over the top of Dark Moor and, with snow chains in the boot, Gaynor set off towards Haughton, to visit Beryl and her husband. Before she left, she had sent one of her scouts to trawl the local estate agents, to find out who owned the house where Trisha Smith had burned to death. She was amazed that the police had never bothered, for while the information might not be of any significance, no one was in a position to judge unless it was brought to light. Mentally ticking off the many aspects of the murder investigation where it was now clear that Dugdale had been negligent, she turned on to the High Street and cruised towards the town centre traffic lights.
Snow
flurries gusted down from Bleak Moor, sticking to the windscreen and gathering in small drifts here and there. She flicked the wipers, then as the lights changed, surged up the road towards Beryl’s house beneath the long, undulating edge of the moor. Absent-mindedly asking herself why she regarded the house, its contents, the servants and the money as
only
Beryl’s, she realised how little investment Smith made in his environment. He took from it to the point of draining its life-blood, and returned nothing.
The
tall gates stood wide open and, parking outside the front door, she glimpsed Beryl’s car, with its self-conscious number-plate and brand-new tyres, in the huge garage. The gardener-handyman, whom Smith insisted on calling a ‘groundsman’, was nowhere to be seen, but a wheelbarrow filled with various tools had been left in the middle of the drive.
She
closed the car door quietly, and tiptoed over the gravel, her journalist’s nose twitching like an animal’s. The place was too quiet, overhung with an atmosphere darker than the sombre snow clouds above Bleak Moor and, as she stepped on to the wide semicircular doorstep, she held her breath. Unable to distinguish a word of the altercation inside, she put her finger to the bell.
At
the third summons, the housekeeper opened the door, looked her over from head to foot, then said: ‘I don’t know how you dare show your face, after all the mischief you caused.’
‘
Excuse me?’ Gaynor raised her eyebrows.
‘
Oh, don’t come the innocent! You know what I’m on about.’
‘
You’re forgetting your place, and I don’t talk to servants. I want to see your mistress.’
‘
And aren’t you a hoity-toity bitch?’ The housekeeper stalked away, leaving the door open. As Gaynor shut it quietly behind her, Beryl emerged from the drawing-room.
‘
Oh, it’s you.’ Her face was puffy and her eyes red, and she held a balled-up handkerchief in her hand.
‘
We need to talk,’ Gaynor said, advancing towards her.
Beryl
retreated, almost stumbling into the door frame. ‘It’s really not a good time. Piers is quite upset.’
Determined
that he would shortly be even more upset, Gaynor almost pushed her out of the way. Smith was lounging in a fireside chair, a cigarette dangling from his fingers. He stared at her unblinkingly, and she chilled from head to foot.
‘
I wish I’d never set eyes on you!’ His mouth was a thin, vicious line. ‘Peddling your false fucking sympathy! D’you know what you’ve done?’ He sprang to his feet, and began to jig around the room. ‘People spat at me in the shops, and slashed the tyres on the car. I’m afraid to go out, and it’s all your
fault
!’ A shrill, ranting note came into his voice. ‘You’re like a fucking vulture!’
‘P
iers!’ Beryl’s voice was a horrified whisper.
Ignoring
his wife, he jabbed his finger in Gaynor’s face. ‘When I’ve finished with you, you’ll wish you’d never been born!’ His breath was foul.
‘
I wrote what you told me.’ Gaynor tried to hold her voice steady, but her heart was pounding. ‘Too bad you couldn’t tell me the truth! You lied about your mother, you lied about Linda Newton, and you lied about Trisha. You’ve already cost me a night in the cells, not to mention my paper getting stung with a libel action.’ Enraged, she stood up to him, trying to ignore the cruel mouth and dangerous eyes. ‘You made a fool out of
me
!’ She jabbed her own finger. ‘And don’t you
dare
threaten me! You caused all the trouble.’
‘
You bitch!’ he shrieked, dancing like a dervish. ‘You
whore
!’
‘
Piers, please!’ Beryl sobbed. ‘Please, oh,
please
, don’t!’
‘
Shut
up
!’
Beryl
snatched at his arm, but he wrenched away so violently she stumbled against a chair. Then she too turned on Gaynor. ‘Go away! Please. Just go
away
!’ Her eyes were wild, her breath came in little panting sobs as if her airway were obstructed.
‘
I don’t think I ought to do that,’ Gaynor said. ‘Left alone with him, you’ll probably end up like your predecessor.’
Smith
stopped his jigging as if turned to stone, and Gaynor braced herself for the attack. She dodged when he moved, but he simply brushed past, mouthing more obscenities. Flouncing from the room, he pounded up the stairs, slammed drawers and doors, pounded down again, and ran out through the front door, leaving it wide open.