Charlie (70 page)

When he got to Rita’s mutilation, Charlie felt like shouting out abuse at him, only Andrew’s warning look and his firm hand on her arm prevented her.

‘Can we really believe that Miss Dexter, a sensationally beautiful woman in her thirties, who has already proved herself an astute businesswoman, would be concerned about a club girl making eyes at her man?’ he said scornfully. ‘I think it is far more likely the jealousy was all on the side of the younger woman who knew she couldn’t possibly be anything more than just a temporary plaything for a man like Mr Peterson.

‘I suggest that the scars Miss Tutthill bears were executed by one of the many men she must have used in her days as “a good-time girl”. That when she met young Charlie Weish, a grieving, bewildered girl whose deranged mother had so often brought up the name of “DeeDee”, Miss Tutthill found she had the ideal audience to tell a different tale about her tragedy. She slotted fact and fiction together, conveniently using Daphne Dexter and her brothers as the scapegoat and villains. I have nothing but admiration for the determination Miss Weish showed in trying to uncover the mystery of her father’s disappearance, but she was led along the wrong path by people who used her gullibility for their own devious ends.’

All at once Charlie knew that the justice she’d hoped for so long had failed her. Shrugging off Andrew’s hand on her arm, she jumped up, pushed past the row of people on the bench and made for the courtroom door. Once outside in the fresh air, and seeing another pack of reporters, she ran down towards Ludgate Hill and kept on going, sobbing as she went.

‘Where on earth has she gone?’ Rita asked Andrew as they came out of the court and made their way downstairs, looking for Charlie. Soon after her hasty departure the judge had summed up the evidence and now the jury had retired to consider their verdict.

‘I don’t know,’ Andrew replied, looking anxiously around the crowd of people who had been with them in the gallery.

‘I think she was cut to the quick by what that defence geyser said,’ Dave said in a strained voice behind him. ‘I know I was.’

Andrew had almost forgotten Dave in his anxiety to find Charlie. He turned to see Wendy virtually holding her father up; he was ashen-faced, suddenly and dramatically weakened by what he’d heard in the court.

Charlie’s disappearance no longer seemed so important. ‘Come and sit down,’ Andrew said, slipping his arm around Dave and supporting him over to a bench. ‘I’ll go and get you some water.’

Andrew returned a few minutes later to find Dave slumped against his daughter’s shoulder, his face grey, his eyes almost closed. Rita had gone off to find medical help.

‘He’s all in,’ Wendy said, her sunburnt face contorted with anxiety. ‘I must get him home, it’s been too much for him.’

‘Just let me get my wind again,’ Dave croaked. ‘I’ll be fine. Just wait for the verdict.’

Andrew held the plastic cup of water to Dave’s lips, but a sixth sense told him the man was much too ill to be taken home.

‘Just wait for the verdict,’ Dave repeated, but his words were barely audible.

Rita came hurrying back with a middle-aged woman in a nurse’s uniform. She told them that she was one of the Old Bailey’s medical team, and sat beside Dave to take his pulse.

‘He must go to hospital immediately,’ she said, looking at Wendy. ‘We do get quite a few people taken ill in here, but this is more than just shock. Bart’s is very close, they’ll take good care of him.’

An ambulance arrived within minutes of being called. Dave was lifted on to a trolley and wheeled out past the scores of reporters waiting in the street. As Wendy got in beside her father, she called out to Andrew, ‘Find Charlie and bring her to the hospital. I know Dad will want to see her.’ She didn’t have to say ‘one last time’, it was written all over her face.

The ambulance pulled away with the sirens blasting. Andrew looked at Rita questioningly. ‘Where do we look for her?’

Rita was still smarting at what the defence had suggested about her, and she was acutely aware that journalists were not only photographing her but had taken pictures of Dave Kent being carried into the ambulance. She felt incensed by such insensitivity. Charlie’s disappearance was an excuse to let her anger out.

‘I don’t bloody well know,’ she snapped. ‘Just when I think she’d learned to behave like an adult, she reverts to being the spoiled little girl again. Maybe she even believed what that creep said about me.’

‘Of course she didn’t,’ Andrew said alarmed by Rita’s anger. ‘But I’ll have to go and find her.’

He went over to the journalists and asked if anyone had seen Charlie come out. On being directed towards Ludgate Hill, he grabbed Rita’s arm and took her with him. He didn’t think she should be left alone at such a time.

Charlie was close to Blackfriars Bridge, sobbing her heart out as she looked over the Embankment wall at the Thames. Since her father’s funeral back in Dartmouth she had comforted herself that he was back in a place he loved, but now, as she looked into the dirty, green-grey water, she was reminded that this was his real grave – the river had washed over his body for over two years, his flesh disintegrating into it, then flowed with the tide out to sea.

The anger which had made her run out of the court was replaced now by despair. For six months she had placed all her faith in British justice, but all she’d received was humiliation. By tomorrow the whole nation would be hearing her father was a crook, her mother a deranged ex-stripper, Rita, Andrew, Dave and herself all liars. Where could she go from here? All her illusions were shattered, she had no strength left to fight any more battles. The river looked just like her thoughts, muddy, slow and tainted. She might just as well fling herself into it and be done with the struggle.

‘Charlie!’

She involuntarily turned her head at the sound of her name, to see Andrew running across the road, with Rita tottering behind him on her high heels. Charlie was dismayed. Now she was being robbed of the one act which might give her permanent peace.

‘Come with us,’ Andrew called out as he came closer still. ‘Dave’s been taken to hospital. Wendy wants you to see him. I think it’s the end for him.’ He was right in front of her now, panting furiously, his blue eyes wide with concern for a man he’d only met for the first time today.

‘What on earth were you thinking of, coming down here?’ Rita shouted out breathlessly before Charlie could even get her thoughts together.

Charlie glanced over her shoulder at the river. ‘I don’t know,’ she whispered. ‘I just couldn’t,’ she broke off, unable to say the truth, that she couldn’t cope any longer.

‘Are you all right?’ Rita asked. All at once her anger at the girl faded.

Charlie pulled herself together, suddenly remembering that Rita’s character had been more cruelly attacked than anyone’s. ‘I’m fine now,’ she managed to get out. ‘What’s this about Dave?’

Andrew put two fingers in his mouth and whistled down a taxi cruising past. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘To the hospital. I’ll tell you on the way.’

Dave was in a small room just off the main Casualty Department. That he’d been put to bed immediately in a quiet place suggested that the nursing staff knew there was little they could do for him.

Rita stayed outside, but Andrew went in with Charlie. Wendy was on one side of the bed, holding her father’s hand, a nurse was on the other taking his pulse. Dave was conscious and he tried to smile as he saw Charlie.

‘Glad you came,’ he whispered.

‘I’ll leave you for a few moments,’ the nurse said, and indicated the bell. ‘Ring if you need me.’

‘Oh, Dave.’ Charlie moved into the place left vacant by the nurse. ‘I’m sorry I ran off without saying anything, I just got upset.’

‘Me too,’ he said weakly. ‘That defence man was a slime ball. But we ain’t finished yet, we got to wait for the verdict.’

‘Dad made me ring the court and ask them to phone here when the jury comes back in,’ Wendy said, her eyes swimming with tears. ‘I keep trying to tell him it doesn’t matter any more.’

Charlie knew Wendy meant she would rather her father rested and regained his strength than concern himself with what was going on in the jury room, but then she probably didn’t realize that only willpower had kept Dave alive this long, and a ‘Guilty’ verdict would mean he could die a happy man. His dogged single-mindedness shamed her. She had given up even before hearing the verdict.

‘It’s going to be “Guilty”,’ she lied, knowing she intended to tell him that even if it wasn’t true. ‘I spoke to the Clerk of the Court and he said we weren’t to worry.’

Dave looked at her hard. His eyes seemed to tell her he knew that wasn’t true. ‘Let me speak to Andrew,’ he whispered. ‘Just for a minute on our own.’

As Wendy and Charlie left reluctantly, Andrew moved closer to Dave, wondering what the man had to say to him.

‘I wish we’d had time to get acquainted,’ Dave said with some difficulty, his breathing laboured. ‘But I feel as if I know you from what Charlie told me. If they do get acquitted, will you do something for me?’

‘Of course,’ Andrew said, leaning closer so he could hear better.

‘Make Wendy get back to Australia fast, no hanging around clearing up the flat and stuff. Then get yourself and Charlie somewhere safe too. You understand what I mean?’

Andrew felt his legs tremble. Although he was certain the Dexters wouldn’t have the gall to come looking for any of them, it was still a frightening thought. ‘I will, I promise,’ he said.

‘Good lad.’ Dave attempted a weak smile. ‘Your Charlie’s a gem. You look after her and treat her right.’

While Rita and Andrew stayed in the waiting room, Charlie and Wendy sat either side of Dave’s bed. He drifted in and out of consciousness, but the girls talked to each other across the bed so he would know he wasn’t alone. How they had managed to hold a conversation Charlie didn’t know. They were strangers until a few hours ago, the only thing they had in common was the sick man lying between them, and that was a subject which couldn’t be discussed now. So Wendy talked about her life in Australia with Grant and Martin, and Charlie told her about Salcombe and Ivor, steering the subject away from anything to do with her parents. They were both very aware that as each hour passed Dave was gradually growing weaker.

Now and again as Wendy was talking, Charlie found herself slipping back in time to her childhood. Walking down Beacon Road towards the ferry, her father holding one hand, her mother the other, swinging her up in the air and laughing at her squeals of excitement. Sitting by the fire with them both on a cold winter’s day toasting crumpets. Swimming at Slapton Sands with them, and her father diving under the water pretending to be a shark and biting their legs. Unimportant little memories perhaps, yet reminders of happy times together as a family before Daphne Dexter cast her evil spells on their peace and security.

It was only now as this man lay dying, his daughter talking to remind him she was beside him, that she saw the importance of such memories. They were the evidence she needed of her parents’ love for one another, and her. The headstone in the cemetery which marked their graves only marked their deaths, their lives were inside her heart and in her memory. Whatever the outcome of this trial she must remember that, and put aside bitterness. Rising above all the grief, hurt and pain and becoming a happy and successful woman was the only way to compensate her parents for their sacrifices.

At half past three Andrew came rushing in with the news that a message had come to say the jury were going back in. He suggested that he and Rita should go back to the court, and Charlie urged him to hurry back with the verdict.

Dave rallied a little then. ‘How many hours have they been out?’ he asked.

‘About four and a bit,’ Wendy said, stroking his forehead.

‘Not long for something like this,’ he whispered and drifted off again.

The wait was agonizing. Charlie sat rigidly on her chair, watching Dave, offering up silent prayers that if the verdict was ‘Not Guilty’ he’d die before Andrew got back. Yet she knew the man’s will would keep him going; every now and then he would clench his fists as if reminding himself he had unfinished business.

She so much wished too that she could find something to say to Wendy to make this less painful for her. She could feel the girl’s sorrow, see the desolation in her eyes. But while Dave’s heart was still beating, how could she offer words of comfort without drawing even more attention to his approaching death? They each held one of his hands, bonded silently together by their feelings for this man.

‘His hands feel so soft,’ Wendy whispered. ‘When I was a little girl I used to ask him why they were so rough and hard. He laughed and said, “All the better to smack you with.” But he never smacked me.’

‘I did,’ Dave said hoarsely a few seconds later, as if the remark had woken him. ‘I smacked your face when you told me you were pregnant. I’ve always been ashamed of that. Grant was the best present you ever gave me.’

‘I don’t remember the smack,’ Wendy said, bending to kiss him. ‘I only remember knowing you would always look after me, whatever I did.’

Charlie bit back tears, wondering what she would have said to her father if she’d got to him before he died. She didn’t recall any smacks, angry words, only the way he always swung her round in his arms every time he came home.

Over an hour had passed since Andrew and Rita left. It was nearly five now and the rush-hour traffic would be heavy. But an hour seemed far too long to hear a verdict and get back. Could they be afraid to come back with bad news?

A doctor and nurse came in to examine Dave again, and the girls waited outside.

‘Go on back in,’ the doctor said as he came out, folding his stethoscope and putting it in his pocket. His grey eyes were gentle with sympathy and he touched Wendy’s shoulder comfortingly. ‘I’m afraid there’s nothing more we can do but keep him comfortable and free from pain.’

It was quarter to six when Andrew rushed in panting. His wide smile of triumph said it all.

‘Guilty?’ Charlie asked, jumping up.

‘Guilty on all charges,’ Andrew gasped out. ‘Life imprisonment for all three of them.’