Innocent Graves (25 page)

It was all relative, of course. For a starving child in an Ethiopian village, for example, prison food would be a luxury and freedom might simply be defined as the hour or two’s relief from the agony of hunger. When people are starving, they have no true freedom. But for someone like Owen—middle-class, reasonably well-off, well-educated, living in England—freedom was made up of myriad things, some more abstract than others, but it all came down to
having a choice
.

Locked in his small, lonely cell once again, Owen actually felt relieved to be left alone at last, to be shut away from the bureaucrats, the reporters and the women who stared at him with such naked hatred in their eyes. He was protected here from the crowds outside eager for his blood, and from the policemen so anxious to
rip off the surface of his life and dig their hands deep into the slimy darkness below.

His cell was the only place he felt safe now; its routine and isolation sheltered him from the malevolent absurdity of the world outside.

III

Jenny Fuller dashed into the Queen’s Arms ten minutes late, shucked off her black overcoat and folded it carefully over the back of the adjacent chair. She gave her head a shake to toss back her mass of flame-coloured hair, then sat down and patted her chest. “Out of breath. Sorry I’m late. Are we on expenses?”

Dr Jennifer Fuller was a lecturer in psychology at the University of York, and over the years her focus had shifted towards criminal and deviant psychology. Now, she had even started publishing in the field and was quickly making a name for herself. Hence the summer in America. Banks had worked with her on several cases before, and an initial attraction had transformed into an enduring friendship that delighted and surprised both of them.

Banks laughed. “Afraid not.”

“Pity. I was getting sort of used to that in America. Everyone’s on expenses there.”

“Let me buy the first one, at least.”

“How kind. I’ll have a small brandy please, to take the chill off.”

“And to eat?”

“Chicken in a basket.”

On his way to the bar, Banks recognized one or two of the local shop-owners and the manager of the NatWest Bank on his lunch-break. Cyril had also got the coal fire going nicely. The closest table to it was already taken by a group of ramblers in hiking boots and waterproof gear, so Banks and Jenny sat off to one side, near the window. Rain spattered the red and amber diamonds and blurred the clear panes. Along with the drinks, Banks ordered Jenny’s chicken and scampi and chips for himself.

Jenny rubbed her hands together and gave a mock shiver when Banks came back with the drinks, then she picked up her small glass and said, “Cheers.” They clinked glasses. “Have a good Christmas?”

“The usual. My parents for Christmas Eve, Sandra’s for Christmas Day and Boxing Day.”

“And how is Sandra?”

“She’s fine.”

Jenny took another sip of brandy. “So,” she said, “I see you’ve got your man under lock and key. Another notch in your truncheon.”

Banks nodded. “It looks that way.”

“I take it that’s what you
do
want to pick my brains about, and this isn’t just a ruse to secure the pleasure of my company?”

Banks smiled. “Yes to the first. Not that I’d be averse to the latter.”

“Stop it, you sweet man. You’ll make the lady blush. How can I help?”

Banks lit a cigarette. “I don’t know if you can. Or if you will, rather. Just listen, first of all, and tell me if I’m going way off the tracks.”

Jenny nodded. “Okay.”

Banks told her what they knew about Owen Pierce and Michelle Chappel, stressing Owen’s reluctance to admit to knowing Michelle, her resemblance to Deborah Harrison, and what she said Owen had done to her.

When he had finished, Jenny sat quietly for a moment, sucking her lower lip and thinking. Banks sipped some beer and said, “I’ve been trying to work up some sort of psychological scenario for this crime. Owen Pierce had means and opportunity, and the DNA evidence is pretty damning. I suppose I’m looking for a
motive
.”

“You should know by now that you don’t always get one with crimes like this, Alan. Motiveless, stranger killings. At least not what you or I would regard as a logical or even a reasonable motive, like anger or revenge.”

“True. But bear with me, Jenny. Say he’s upset about the girl, Michelle, angry at her. He goes for a walk and there, out of the fog,
this vision appears. Michelle. Well, maybe not exactly Michelle, but an approximation. A younger model, more innocent, perhaps more vulnerable, less threatening. So he follows her into the graveyard, approaches her, she says something and sparks his anger. He’s already been violent towards Michelle, remember, so there’s a precedent. Does it make sense?”

Jenny frowned. “It could do,” she said. “Sometimes, we act out, we behave towards people as if they were someone else. It’s called ‘displacement,’ an unconscious defence mechanism where emotions or ideas are transferred from one object or person to another that seems less threatening. I think Freud defined it as one of the neuroses, but my Freud’s a bit rusty at the moment. What you’re asking is whether I think Owen Pierce could have displaced his feelings for Michelle to Deborah because of some vague superficial resemblance—”

“And because of his mental state at the time.”

“All right, that too. And that this led him to kill her. Really he was killing Michelle.”

“Yes. What do you think?”

“I think you’ve got a point, or the beginnings of one.”

“You don’t think I’m way off beam?”

“Not at all.” Their food came. “How about another drink to wash this down?”

“Please. I never argue when a woman wants to buy me a drink.”

Banks watched Jenny walk to the bar. She moved well and had a superb figure: long legs, narrow waist and a bum like two plums in a wet paper bag. She had a new energy and confidence in her stride, too, and it looked as if the summer in California had done her good.

She was wearing tight black jeans and a jade-green jacket, made of raw silk, over a white shirt. Judging by the cut and the material of the jacket, the way it narrowed at her waist and flared slightly over the swell of her hips, it had probably cost her a small fortune on Rodeo Drive or some such place. But Jenny always had liked nice clothes.

Banks noticed her exchange a few words with a young man who looked like a trainee bank manager while she waited for Cyril to
pour the pint. Poor fellow, Banks thought; he didn’t stand a chance. But Jenny was smiling. Why did he feel a pang of jealousy when he saw her flirt with another man, even to this day?

She came back with a pint of bitter for Banks and a Campari and soda for herself. He thanked her. “Making a date?” he said, nodding towards the man.

Jenny laughed. “What do you think I am, a cradle-snatcher? Besides, he’s not my type.” Jenny was thirty-five in December; the young man about twenty-four. As yet, Banks knew, Jenny hadn’t quite figured out what her “type” was.

When Jenny smiled, her green eyes lit up and the lines around them crinkled into a map of her humour. Her tan brought out the freckles across her nose and cheeks.

“How was California?” he asked.

“All sun and surf. Just like ‘Baywatch.’”

“Really?”

She wrinkled her nose. “No, not really. You’d hate it,” she said. “Can’t smoke anywhere.”

“And they call it the Garden of Eden. Is that where you developed a taste for fried chicken?”

“Not at all. I’ve always had a weakness for lean, relatively fat-free meat deep-fried in batter and cholesterol. It appeases both conflicting sides of my nature.” She sliced off a chunk of deep-fried chicken breast and popped it in her mouth.

Banks laughed. They finished their meals in silence, then Banks lit a cigarette and said, “Back to Pierce. Look, I know I’m putting you on the spot, Jenny, but I’d like you to work something up for the CPS.”

“Like what?”

“The kind of thing we were talking about. Displacement, for example. Tell me more.”

Jenny sipped her Campari and soda. Banks still had half a pint left, and he wasn’t allowing himself another drink this lunch-time.

“Okay,” Jenny said, “let’s say that he has poor control over his anger. It’s pretty much a commonplace that people often respond to frustration by getting angry, and if their anger is really intense and their inner controls are weakened even further—say by alcohol or
tiredness—then it can result in physical assault, even murder. That seems to be what happened with Michelle, but what about Deborah? Had he been drinking?”

“He’d had two pints and a whisky.”

“Okay. Let’s say, then, that we
are
dealing with displacement, which is a coping pattern. A defence mechanism, if you like.”

“Defence against what?”

“Stress, basically. If a situation really threatens your sense of adequacy, your ego, your self-esteem, then your reactions become defence-oriented, you defend your
self
from devaluation.”

“How?”

“Any number of ways. Denial. Rationalization. Fantasy. Repression. Things we all do. What it basically comes down to is ridding yourself of the anxiety and the tensions that are causing the pain.”

“Sexual tension?”

“Could be. But that’s just one kind.”

“And displacement is one of these defence mechanisms?”

“Yes. You shift the strong feelings you have from the person or object towards which they were originally intended to another person or object. Often very difficult emotions are involved, like hostility and anxiety. It’s an unconscious process.”

“Are you suggesting he wasn’t responsible?”

“Interesting point. But I don’t think so. I don’t know exactly what the law is, but I’m not saying a person suffering displacement isn’t responsible for his actions, especially violent ones. Just that he might not know the inner processes that are leading him to want to do what he does.”

“Which you can probably say for most of us most of the time?”

“Yes. In less extreme ways.”

“Okay. Go on.”

“Displacement is often combined with projection, where you put the blame for your own problems on someone else, or some group.”

“Women?”

“Could be. In extreme cases it leads to a form of paranoia. People become convinced that forces or groups are working against
them. He
could
have formed such a projection of his anxieties and hostilities against women in general. Plenty of men do. That French-Canadian who shot all those women at the college in Montreal, for example.”

“And could he also have displaced his hostile feelings for Michelle onto Deborah, given the stress of the anniversary, the effect of alcohol and the resemblance between the two women?”

“Possibly. Yes. There’s a study by a psychologist called Masserman, done in 1961, where he manages to show that under sustained frustration people become more willing to accept substitute goals.”

“Deborah for Michelle?”

“Yes. Look, I’m a bit rusty on this. I’ll need a few days to come up with something.”

“How about next week?”

Jenny smiled. “I’ll see what I can do.”

“If there’s anything else you want to know, give me a call.”

“Can you get copies of the statements to me?”

“No problem.”

“Okay. Now I really must go.” She stood up and reached for her raincoat. Then she leaned forward and gave Banks a quick peck on the cheek.

When she had gone, he lit another cigarette, vowing it would be his last for the day, and contemplated the remains of his pint. Another half wouldn’t do any harm, he decided, so he went and got one, pouring it into the pint glass because he didn’t like drinking beer from small glasses.

IV

One afternoon about three or four weeks after his committal—he was losing track of time—Owen was taken from his cell to a prison interview room, where he met for the first time the barrister Gordon Wharton had engaged to lead his defence.

In her early forties, Owen guessed, Shirley Castle, QC, was an attractive woman by any standards. She was also the first woman he
had seen since his trip to the Magistrates’ Court. She had glossy dark hair that fell over her shoulders and framed a pale, oval face. Her almond-shaped eyes were a peculiar shade of violet, so unusual that Owen wondered if she were wearing tinted contact lenses. She had on a grey pleated skirt and a pale pink blouse buttoned up to her chin. Her perfume smelled subtle and expensive.

Wharton sat beside her with a smug, proprietorial air about him, basking in the glory of her presence, as if to say, “Just look who I’ve got for you, my boy. What a treat!”

Shirley Castle took the cap off her Montblanc fountain-pen, shuffled some papers in front of her and began.

“It doesn’t look very good, Owen,” she said. “I don’t want to give you any false hopes or illusions. We’ll have an uphill struggle on our hands with this one.”

“But all they’ve got is circumstantial evidence.”

She looked at him. “The point is, that they can build a very good case on that. Look at it this way.” She started to count off the points on her long fingers. “One, you had the opportunity. Two, motive in such crimes is so obscure, to say the least, that they don’t really need to establish one. And, three, there’s the DNA, hairs and blood.”

“But I can explain it all. I have done. I never denied being in the area from the start, and I told them the girl bumped into me. Maybe that’s how the hair and blood were exchanged.”

“Maybe. But the police don’t believe you,” she said. “And quite frankly, I don’t blame them, especially given that you only came up with that explanation at the eleventh hour. No, Owen, I’m afraid we’re going to have to fight tooth and nail for this one.”

“Are they still looking for the real murderer?”

“Why should they? They think they’ve already got him.”

“So there’s nobody out there trying to prove my innocence?”

“I’m afraid not.”

“Can’t you employ a private detective or someone?”

Shirley Castle laughed. It was a lighter, frothier, more vivacious sound than he would have imagined, given her overall gravity. But it was a nervous laugh, no doubt about that. “To do what?” she asked.