Faith (8 page)

She called out as she got to the front door, but walked in when she received no reply, thinking her friend was probably upstairs. As always when she came to Jackie’s home, she felt a surge of admiration at her sense of style. She raked through junk shops and auction rooms and bought furniture anyone else would consider rubbish. But she stripped or painted it, made cushions or added old tiles, and somehow it always turned out looking marvellous.

The hall of the farmhouse was typical of Jackie’s taste: black and white tiles on the floor, an old-fashioned hall stand painted lime green, with a selection of colourful hats hanging on it. Even the flower arrangement was just right, a rustic basket filled with late primroses and moss.

She called again, looking up the narrow staircase straight ahead of her, and when there was still no reply, she decided Jackie must have popped out for a moment, so she went into the kitchen on her left to wait.

But as she pushed the half-closed door open, she saw Jackie on the floor. She was wearing jeans, her white shirt was red with blood and there was a knife embedded in her chest.

Much of what happened later that day had become a blur of indistinct images. She couldn’t recall the faces or names of the policemen, or even the correct sequence of events. But that first sight of her friend on the floor, the way the sunshine slanted in through the window on to her vivid red hair, the pool of blood beside her, even the grotesque way her legs were splayed out, was still as clear in her mind now as if it had been just yesterday.

She heard herself scream, and threw herself down beside Jackie, grasping the big knife to pull it out. In her naivety she thought her friend was still alive because her skin and blood felt so warm, and she caught hold of her shoulders in an attempt to rouse her.

‘Laura?’

She started at Stuart’s voice, and was brought back to the present and the question he’d asked her.

‘That’s right, it was Michael Fenton who phoned the police,’ she sighed. She quickly told him how she’d found Jackie. ‘I was covered in her blood and kneeling beside her when he came in. I’m absolutely certain he arrived just a few minutes after me, but I expect you know that at the trial, Angus McFee, a neighbour, gave evidence that he’d seen my car go past his place well over half an hour before he saw Fenton’s car.’

Stuart nodded. ‘That seemed to me to be the most damning piece of evidence against you. Could you have blacked out for a while or something?’

‘It was suggested, as I’m sure you know, that I might have blacked out all memory of killing Jackie,’ Laura said tartly. ‘But I can assure you I remember everything which led up to me going in that door and seeing her. Every detail, even the record that was playing on the radio! And I could hardly have fainted if I was still on my knees when Fenton came in. I think that McFee was either mistaken about the time gap, or he saw the real murderer, who may well have had a white car like mine too, but didn’t see me pass at all.’

‘He said he was painting an upstairs window.’ Stuart consulted his notebook again. ‘And that he had a clear view of the lane from his ladder. I drove out there to have a look round, and it’s a pretty remote spot. I only saw one car pass while I was there.’

‘It was different when Jackie was alive,’ Laura said defensively. ‘She had people turning up all the time. Why do you think that old codger watched so eagerly?’

‘Point taken.’ Stuart gave a knowing grin. ‘So how soon after the police arrived did they arrest you?’

‘A lot of that is blurry now,’ Laura said thoughtfully. ‘I remember I was in a state, hysterical really, and the first two policemen who came only asked me why I’d gone out there, who Jackie was to me and what she had said when she phoned me. I can remember sitting on a bench in the yard, and suddenly being aware there were dozens of police there, yet I can’t remember all the cars driving in.

‘It must have been late in the afternoon before they asked me to go with them to the police station. I was shivering by then; I was only wearing a thin jacket and the heat had gone out of the sun. I asked if I could go home to change first because I had blood all over me, and it was only when they said they’d need to take my clothes for forensic tests that I suddenly realized they thought I’d killed her. Then they cautioned me.’

‘How did you respond to that?’

‘I was livid. I couldn’t believe they could think such a thing. When they told me I’d need an advocate – you probably know that’s what they call solicitors up here? – I went mad, I said I didn’t need one as I hadn’t done anything.’

‘You flew into one of your rages?’ he inquired gently, his tone reminding her that he’d witnessed many of these in the past.

‘Yes, I’m afraid I did,’ she said glumly. ‘Well, wouldn’t you? She was my best friend, I’d known her since I was sixteen. I would never touch a hair on her head. I was in shock at what I’d seen. No one ever expects to walk in on something like that.’

Stuart nodded. ‘You said at the trial you had forgiven her for Barney’s death. Was that true?’

Laura closed her eyes in exasperation. ‘Of course I had. It was an accident. And eleven years had passed since his death, for goodness’ sake.’

‘Some things you don’t ever get over. The death of your child is probably the main one,’ he said and reached out to take her hands in his.

It was his big, hard, brown hands holding hers that cracked the shell she had built around herself since being in this place. Stuart had loved Barney as if he were his own flesh and blood. She had watched those same practical hands washing him, dressing him and caressing him, and she owed it to him to tell him the truth about how she felt.

‘I still grieve for him, Stuart,’ she said brokenly. ‘I also feel a huge burden of guilt that I wasn’t a better mother to him. But I
had come
to terms with his death. As God is my witness, I didn’t hold a grudge against Jackie for it. She loved him too, I could see that it tore her apart thinking she was responsible because she hadn’t made him put his seat belt on. Yes, I had really forgiven her. What made me sad was that she couldn’t forgive herself.’

‘I sensed that too in a couple of letters she sent two or three years afterwards,’ he agreed. ‘I also thought that was maybe why her letters to me tapered off in the past few years. Perhaps putting pen to paper to someone so closely connected to Barney was too difficult? But did you think that last phone call was about that?’

‘In as much that I think Barney’s death was often behind her low moments, and there were plenty of those, just as there still are for me,’ Laura said sadly. ‘But she said nothing that morning that would suggest she was brooding on that. She just sounded crazy, like she’d hit some crisis but couldn’t explain it.’

‘What did she actually say to you on the phone?’

‘She just asked if I could come over right away. I asked what was wrong and she said “Everything”. She was crying, Stuart. She said there was so much she’d kept from me, and that she needed to talk about it. But that was about all that made any sense. I told her it would take me more than an hour to get there, and she began sobbing as if that was too long.’

‘Did you feel it was an emergency as in that she was being threatened, frightened or menaced?’

‘No, not at all.’ Laura shook her head. ‘If I’d got that idea I would have phoned the police. I thought her problem was a man. For some time I’d suspected there was someone special to her, but she wouldn’t admit it or tell me anything about him. I assumed her problem was that he’d dumped her, or if he was married his wife had found out. She didn’t give me even the vaguest idea that she was in danger.’

‘You said at the trial that there were several men; that she was drinking too much and letting her business in London fall apart.’

‘That’s right. So she was.’

‘But no one else seemed to agree with that.’

Well, they wouldn’t, would they?’ Laura retorted. ‘Married men aren’t going to come forward and admit they’d been shagging her, nor would Belle want to own up that her big sister was becoming a lush. As for the business in London – well, you know what Roger is like! Their marriage might have ended, but Roger was still involved in her business. He wouldn’t want to admit publicly that it wasn’t in great shape.’

Stuart just sat and looked at her for a moment or two, his eyes scanning her face as if looking for evidence she was lying.

‘Who do you think killed her then?’ he asked eventually.

‘Almost everyone she knew could have had some kind of motive,’ Laura sighed. ‘Gain, jealousy, spite, you name it, someone probably felt it, but I can’t pin it on any one of them, because I didn’t know what was troubling Jackie. She’d been less open with me in the last few years, she no longer told me every last thing she’d done or said, like she used to.’

‘Why do you think that was?’

Laura made a ‘don’t know’ gesture with her hands. ‘That we’d grown up enough not to need to divulge everything to each other perhaps? Or maybe she had done something, or had someone in her life she couldn’t tell me about? We were still the very closest of friends, but I was pretty much engrossed in my shop, I wasn’t exactly on her case every five minutes.’

‘Right. Let’s get back to suspects,’ Stuart said.

‘Well, some of the people in her life can be ruled out because they were too far away,’ Laura went on. ‘But you know what a sucker she was for lame dogs, Stuart! She met all kinds of way-out people and invited them home; any one of them could have been a weirdo who wanted more than she was prepared to give. I said that in my evidence, but Belle denied it was true. Anyway, Jackie might have rung someone other than me and Belle that morning, or they could just have dropped by. All I know is that I was a gift to whoever really did it. Stupid bloody Laura who didn’t have the sense to back out that door and phone the police immediately!’

Stuart said nothing more for a few moments, just looked at Laura thoughtfully.

‘It’s exactly that which makes me believe in you,’ he said eventually. ‘I know how devious you can be. If you were going to do anything dodgy, you’d plan it properly. You certainly wouldn’t tell people you were going to Fife if you had murder on your mind, nor cover yourself with blood and wait to be caught.’

She laughed mirthlessly. ‘That’s a back-handed compliment, if ever I heard one!’

‘I know you, Laura,’ he said, half smiling. ‘Really know you, warts and all. I also know the time you received that call from Jackie, and I’ve driven the distance between your shop and Brodie Farm several times to check how long it takes. With no hold-ups on the Forth Bridge, no traffic jams in Edinburgh, it can be done in an hour, which would have got you there at the time the neighbour claimed he saw your car.’

‘You checked that out?’ She frowned.

‘Yes.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I can’t believe you killed her, despite all the compelling evidence to the contrary. Of course it does seem as if I’m the only person of this opinion, but I hope to change that. For one thing it would be practically a miracle if there wasn’t some sort of delay anywhere. I only managed it in an hour once, and that was late in the evening. All the other times it ranged from an hour and fifteen minutes to worst case, an hour and three-quarters.’

Laura looked into his eyes and felt that strange tugging feeling in her belly that he’d so often given her in the past. She used to say it was his voice, the deepness of it, the soft Edinburgh accent, and the self-belief. She could recall times when she’d hungered for that voice so much that she’d play an old tape recording of him speaking, then laugh at herself for being so soft. But it wasn’t his voice alone, not now, it was the determination in his face, the touch of his hands on hers. And his belief in her.

‘I went to see Barney’s grave too, and took some flowers,’ he said, his voice soft with sadness. ‘Someone has been looking after it – there were masses of pansies planted on it and it looked very pretty. As Belle is still there I expect it was her.’

‘Really!’ Laura exclaimed, for she had expected to hear it was totally overgrown with weeds. ‘That’s very nice of her. She and Charles were very fond of him, but under the circumstances I didn’t expect them to concern themselves with his grave.’

‘A child’s death touches everyone who knew them,’ he said simply. ‘I know how devastated I felt, even though I hadn’t seen him for years. I wished I’d been in the country when it happened. I would have come to his funeral.’

‘I’m glad you didn’t, I don’t think I could have borne that,’ she said. ‘Yet I did appreciate your card. I still have it amongst my things. But visiting time is nearly up and I’m sick of talking about me,’ she went on, afraid of what she was feeling. ‘Tell me what you’ve been doing. What on earth were you doing in South America?’

‘Overseeing a building project,’ he said with a smile. ‘But I can write and tell you all that. Before I get chucked out I want you to promise me you’ll give me written authority to speak to your lawyer and anyone else connected with you. I’ve got to try and find a way to get you out of here.’

Laura’s heart leapt. No one else had expressed real belief in her, much less stated that they intended to try to help her. ‘There’s no way you can do it. Short of finding the real murderer and sticking lighted matches under their nails until they confess.’ She smiled glumly.

‘Then that’s what I’ll do.’ He grinned, showing perfect teeth.

Strangely she felt a little sadness at his teeth, for they had been far from perfect when they’d first met. But he wasn’t suave and sophisticated then either. She guessed that another woman had taken him in hand, and she wondered, but couldn’t ask, if he was still with her.

‘It isn’t even possible to appeal unless we can bring on some completely new evidence,’ she said wearily.

‘I’ll find some,’ he said.

‘How are you going to do that? The police dug into every aspect of Jackie’s life, and interviewed dozens of people. Not all of that evidence was used in the trial, but for an appeal you have to have brand-new material, not the unused stuff.’

‘You once said you had every faith in me!’

‘I did, didn’t I?’ she agreed, remembering how he’d promised to find a home for her and Barney, and came up with it. ‘You always were the kind of man who instilled faith in anyone.’