A Time For Justice (30 page)

After drying himself he wandered back into the bedroom, a
large fluffy bath towel wrapped around his middle. He was shaving
with a battery-powered portable which was losing its charge and
seemed to be ripping whiskers out rather than slicing them
off.

The woman was awake. She must have heard him moving about. She
was propped up on one elbow and watched him come into the room with
a smirk on her face. Her hair had been combed and she’d applied
some lipstick rather inaccurately. The top half of her body was
exposed and the sheet was draped across the bulge of her midriff.
It looked to Henry as though she’d spent some time preparing this
position for him. She reminded him of a photo of a ‘reader’s wife’,
rather tacky and desperately unsexy.

He couldn’t bring her name to mind, though he knew she was one
of the cleaners at the police station who’d worked there for years
and had acquired a terrible reputation. Monica, he thought. Rather
than ask her he just nodded slight acknowledgement and walked
across to the wardrobe, still shaving. One thing he did know,
because it sprang to mind, was that she was nearly ten years older
than him.

I’m not sure I believe this, he thought. It wasn’t the first
time he’d thought this in the last few months.

‘
Good morning, Henry,’ she said at length.

He grunted something in reply. His back was towards her and it
must have seemed like an insult, even if he didn’t mean it that
way, when he let the towel drop and bent down to pull on a pair of
Y-fronts.

Then he began to dress in his best suit.

‘
Well?’ she said, beginning to sound irritated. She sighed and
flopped back onto the bed, her large white soft breasts suddenly
losing their shape like two cakes sinking in an oven. She scrabbled
the sheet furiously back and kicked it off. She became still, lying
there, one leg pulled coyly up, the other straight out. Absolutely
naked and unashamed. Then she allowed the leg which had been pulled
up to fall to one side, giving Henry a splendid view of the pubic
area.

He went cold.

‘
Well, did you have a good time last night?’ she asked him
playfully. ‘I certainly did.’

‘
Yeah, sure I did,’ said Henry. The details were hazy, but he
knew they’d had intercourse, after a drunken fashion. He pulled his
jacket on quickly and grabbed a tie before rushing to the door of
the flat. ‘Got to go to work,’ he said apologetically as he crossed
the room. His hand went to the door handle, where he paused and
took a deep breath. He turned to face her with the courage of a
mouse.

‘
Look, it was a lovely night and everything, but-’

‘
Yeah, I know,’ she said with resignation. She pulled back the
covers. Anger coupled with disappointment creased her face. ‘Same
old story. All right, I’ll let myself out. And by the way, I’m
called Maureen, not Monica, wanker!’

He hesitated, his eyes unable to meet hers. A second later he
was through the door and trotting down the stairs.

The only way out of the flat was through the veterinary
surgery which occupied all of the ground floor. A Doberman was on
the operating table and the vet was carrying out an unsavoury
operation on the dog’s bottom. She looked up and nodded at Henry as
he drifted through to the back door which led out into the rear
yard and then the back alley.

Outside he came to a bone-jarring halt and caught his breath.
He felt as if he were about to hyperventilate. What the hell had
possessed him to pick her up, he demanded of himself.

He shook his head in a physical attempt to overcome this early
morning mental haze. His eyes felt like sandpaper as they scratched
over the eyeballs beneath. He rubbed at them with his knuckles and
then looked up at the day.

The rain had stopped. A weak yellow sun was poking its nose
through some broken grey-white cloud. There was some blue sky
beyond. Seagulls circled overhead and the salty smell of the Irish
Sea hung in the air.

It was a nice day for the start of a major criminal
trial.

He unlocked the driver’s door of his recently acquired
twelve-year-old Austin Metro and clambered into the small car. The
engine fired up on the third attempt. He rattled down the cobbled
back alley and pulled into the light traffic on the main road. He
headed out towards the motorway, his eventual destination - if the
car kept going - being Lancaster, almost thirty miles and fifty
minutes away.

Once again he had time alone; time to consider just how
radically his life had been turned upside down.

On the stroke of 8.30 a.m. the gates at Risley remand centre
were flung open to release a convoy of police vehicles.
Lancashire’s force helicopter hovered above.

They were scheduled to arrive, all being well, at Lancaster
Castle approximately one hour later. This would leave ample time
for the prisoner to be given his new cell at Lancaster prison,
confer with his lawyer and prepare himself for his court
appearance.

The hooded figure of a police marksman in a dark green
combat-style anorak patrolled the battlements of the medieval
castle. He was equipped with his personally issued, personally
adjusted sniper’s rifle and a pair of high-powered binoculars. He
paced the ramparts slowly, policeman’s pace, keeping an
ever-vigilant eye on the scene below. Pausing briefly to talk to a
similarly dressed and armed colleague, he pointed to something in
the distance across the rooftops of Lancaster. Both men put their
binoculars to their eyes. It was nothing to worry about. Moments
later they resumed their beats.

Down at street level, all the approaches to the castle were
covered and kept under constant police surveillance. Dozens of
uniformed officers, some with dogs, either patrolled the streets or
maintained strategic static points.

Many of these officers were armed too, handguns hidden as
discreetly as possible in hip-holsters covered by their tunics. So
that the weapons could be drawn quickly if necessary, the tunics
were fastened with Velcro strips rather than buttons. Each officer
was well practised in flipping up his tunic with one hand and
drawing with the other before bouncing down into a firing position,
weapon aimed and ready.

High-ranking officers with tense faces paced nervously around,
checking and re-checking their Constables and Sergeants, keeping
them on their toes, never allowing their watchfulness to
waver.

The Chief Inspector from Lancaster had already had just about
enough of Chief Superintendent Fanshaw-Bayley that morning. Despite
constant reassurances that everything had been covered, FB mithered
and moaned, and was getting on the Chief Inspector’s
nerves.

Fortunately the Superintendent was called back to the station,
giving the other officer some much-needed relief and an opportunity
to have one last slow look around the perimeter of the building and
then check inside the courtroom itself, which had already been
searched several times by specially trained teams.

Near the entrance to the Crown Court, which, paradoxically,
was at the rear of the castle, three Portakabins with eighteen
telephone lines had been installed for press use. TV companies were
setting up transmitting equipment. Press men and women mixed with
TV reporters, comparing notes. Every national British newspaper was
represented, as well as all the radio and TV companies. There were
also many American journalists and TV companies present to cover
the trial, which was expected to last a month and had caused a
storm in the States.

The Chief Inspector walked past the melee of media, many of
whom had arrived several days before and checked into hotel rooms
which had been pre-booked for several months.

There was an expectant, circus-like atmosphere amongst
them.

At the Crown Court entrance, more armed officers were on duty.
The muzzles of their revolvers poked out from beneath the hems of
their tunics.

Public access to the building had been restricted and everyone
entering the court was searched three times: once manually, twice
electronically. Even the Chief Inspector.

The officer submitted to the search with dignity and
patience, scanning the entrance foyer
as
the searches progressed.

Here the presence of
armed officers
was less subtle.

Two officers from the district firearms team lurked at the
back of the room. They were dressed in their dark blue work
overalls, complete with Kevlar body armour and ski caps. Holstered
pistols hung at their sides. One had an MP5 machine pistol slung
casually across his chest; the other had a pump action shotgun held
firmly across hers, loaded with heavy shot capable of
smashing a car engine block to pieces or bringing
down a charging bull elephant.

Both officers looked sinister.

Once the searches were over, the Chief Inspector walked
through the court. Because of
the
showpiece nature of
the trial, it was
being held in the Shire Hall, possibly one of
the most magnificent courtrooms in the country. Built in a
neo-Gothic style with a high vaulted ceiling, its inner walls
decorated with one of
the largest
collections of heraldic shields in the world, it was an ideal
setting, steeped in tradition and legend.

The Chief Inspector looked round the room.

Two PCs patrolled it. They were unarmed. The High Court Judge
who was presiding over the trial had been consulted and had
stipulated that armed police officers would not be allowed into her
courtroom, no matter what the apparent threat was. No amount of
reasoned argument from
the police could
shake her.

The Chief Inspector consulted her watch. 8.45 a.m. Something
should be happening.

Suddenly the personal radio crackled into life.

On
a cue from
the force control room, officers in reflective jackets strode
out into road junctions and stopped all traffic. Lancaster city
centre came to a standstill.

A chauffeur-driven car escorted by police motorcycle outriders
threaded its way through the streets, past the stationary traffic
and up to the castle, parting at the entrance to the Crown
Court.

Already decked out in wig and robes, the High Court Judge
stepped out of the back of
the car,
accompanied by the High Sheriff of Lancashire. Smiling affably,
posing momentarily for the media, she walked into one of
England’s most secure courthouses and
gaols.

The police officers on
guard around
the castle breathed a sigh of
relief. That
was the first hurdle over with. At least the Judge had arrived
alive, safe and well.

The Chief Inspector smiled with a trace of
triumph. Time for breakfast.

She left the court and made her way on foot
towards the police station which was on the other
side of town.

For the first time in six months, Karen Wilde felt reasonably
content with herself and life in general. She was back in the land
of the living, instead of that dazed state of rape trauma which
seemed to dog her every hour, asleep or awake. There was light at
the end of the tunnel at last.

Yet she also felt slightly nervous.

Karl Donaldson was listed as one of the essential prosecution
witnesses and it was very likely that they would meet at some
stage. After all, she was in charge of the security operation at
the castle and she would be in attendance every day the trial was
running.

She wondered if he actually wanted to see her again. She knew
for sure she wanted to see him.

By 9 a.m. the prison escort was already on the M6, travelling
north, passing the Preston exit, the helicopter overhead all the
time, watchful like a kestrel.

On the opposite carriageway was the site where Hinksman’s car
bomb had exploded; now repaired, the road surface bore no sign of
the devastation of that day.

High up on the grass banking though, someone had erected a
stone cross which was surrounded by bunches of flowers of
remembrance to the people who had lost their lives. Motorists often
stopped illegally and dashed from their cars up the grass to drop
off wreaths or bouquets. The motorway police turned a blind eye to
this practice.

The escort was moving at a good pace.

At its centre was the ‘prison bus’ - a Leyland Sherpa
personnel carrier with a 3.5-litre engine, easily capable of
sustaining 90 mph, as it was doing that morning. The inside of the
van, behind the front seats, was an inbuilt cage made of steel.
Inside this sat Hinksman and two police officers. He was
handcuffed. The officers were unarmed. He had not spoken during the
journey so far, but had been compliant.

At the very rear of the van there was a space between the end
of the holding cage and the back doors, in which a bench seat had
been installed. Two armed officers sat there, one having the key to
the door.

There were two people up front, driver and
passenger.