MURDER BRIEF (21 page)

"Good. Why didn’t you tell me
earlier?"

"I wanted to. But you were very
busy with your case."

Goodness, he was nice in a
slightly saccharine way. "OK. Thanks. So how did Mrs Muldoon take
the verdict?"

"She’s very angry, as you can
imagine."

"Over $500?"

"Yep, she wants to appeal."

"You’re kidding right?"

"No."

"Nobody will represent her."

A tight smile. "I will."

"You don’t have to do that. You
did the hearing
pro bono
and you certainly won’t get paid
for the appeal. You’ve done enough - more than enough - for Mrs
Muldoon. She can’t expect any more."

"I know. But I’m not happy with
the beak’s decision. I know it sounds crazy, but I really think the
dog is innocent and I don’t like losing, even dog-bite cases."

Until now, he’d seemed like a
mild-mannered tax lawyer. But his hard tone and clenched jaw
suggested a spark of life, though he could have found a worthier
cause. Her eyes widened. "Oh God, she’s driven you mad, hasn’t she?
It's all my fault."

He half-smiled. "No, I’m still
perfectly sane."

"Well, don’t go overboard. It’s
only a dog-bite case. As far as miscarriages of justice are
concerned, it rates pretty low. You don’t have to act like Clarence
Darrow."

"Maybe. But I’ve got no choice.
I took the case, and now I’ve got to finish it."

Robyn shrugged. "Up to you. But
thank you for taking the brief."

He leaned forward and nervously
wrung his hands, as if about to say something important. Christ.
Was he going to ask her out to dinner? Claim his reward for taking
the Muldoon brief?

He was very sweet. No doubt
about that. But even if she wasn't seeing Brian, she wouldn't have
looked at him twice. No pizzazz. Before he could say anything
embarrassing, she spat out: "Well, thank you very much. Thanks a
lot. I owe you one. I really do. We’ll have coffee some time."

She spun around and scuttled
from his room, ignoring the bleating of her conscience.

After the Markham trial, Robyn’s
career surged ahead. Solicitors she'd never met before started
instructing her to appear for armed robbers, serial rapists and
drug traffickers in the Supreme Court. Indeed, to staunch the flow
of briefs, she jacked up her fees. But that had little impact
because solicitors seemed to expect - indeed, almost demanded -
that she charge a huge amount because they found that reassuring.
So, for the first time in her career, she got choosey about which
solicitors she would work with. Indeed, it gave her profound
satisfaction to dump several of the more incompetent non-payers
who'd wasted her time for so long.

She even got a call from Gary
Frost SC, the Senior Public Defender in NSW, who asked her to be
his junior in a High Court appeal. Robyn felt a shot of adrenalin.
The High Court. She’d have walked to Canberra and appeared for
nothing if asked.

Her relationship with Brian also
went from strength to strength. His attitude wasn’t perfect.
Sometimes, he made arrogant or insensitive comments, glanced at
other women or smirked so hard she wanted to slap him. But he was
obviously trying to improve his behaviour and she was confident she
could consolidate those gains.

She spent a few nights at his
apartment. But he preferred sleeping at her place and they soon
settled into a routine where he slept there every second or third
night.

One weekend, he drove her up to
the Hunter Valley to stay in an elegant guesthouse and visit
wineries. The next he took her to his hobby farm and introduced her
to the cattle in the main paddock.

The only wrinkle in the smooth
surface of her new and improved life appeared about four weeks
after the trial, when she got a telephone call from Detective
Inspector Holloway, from the Homicide Squad.

When her receptionist announced
he was on the line, she wondered what the hell he wanted. Was he
about to charge Grimble with murder? Did he want to thank Robyn for
her efforts? If so, he’d taken his time. Still, she would be
gracious.

After they exchanged hellos, she
said: "So, what can I do for you?"

"I thought you’d like an update
on our investigation into the murder of Alice Markham."

"Yes, of course. How’s it
going?"

"Well, after the trial, we
zeroed in on Hugh Grimble."

So she was right: the cops were
about to charge Grimble with murder. "That’s good."

"Yes. In fact, we’ve just
finished that part of our investigation."

"Already?"

"Yes. It didn’t take long to
establish he’s innocent."

Christ. Did the detective say
‘
innocent’
? Impossible. The bowtie-wearing artsy-fartsy
bastard was guilty as hell. She wondered why she ever through this
cop had a brain. He was obviously another shining illustration of
the legendary incompetence of the NSW Police Service. He should be
playing the triangle in the police band. "You’re kidding? He’s not
innocent."

"Yes, he is, completely
innocent," the detective said smugly.

"He can’t be - he just
can’t."

"I’m afraid he is."

Robyn struggled to decipher,
personalise and then digest this new information, with little
success. "How do you know that? Why are you so sure?"

"Because, for a start, we’ve
compared his hair with hairs found on Alice Markham’s clothes. No
match."

"Big deal. That isn’t
conclusive. There are plenty of reasons why his hair mightn’t be
there. Or maybe you missed it."

"True. But other evidence proves
he’s innocent."

"Like what?"

"The clincher is the security
film."

"What security film?"

"The security film we obtained
from the casino. Grimble claims he went to the casino that night.
So we asked the casino for its security film and, thankfully, they
still had it."

"So what?"

"The film shows he arrived at
the casino just after 7pm and didn’t leave until nearly
midnight."

Shit. "You sure? Maybe he snuck
out long enough to murder Alice?"

"Nope. He was never off camera
long enough to do that."

"You sure?"

"Yep. So he’s definitely not the
murderer."

She still couldn't get both arms
around this news. "My God, I’m stunned."

"I bet you are," the policeman
said wryly, enjoying the chance to contradict a smarty-pants
barrister.

"But what about the argument
between Alice and Grimble on the Friday afternoon?"

"So what? People argue all the
time. It was just a co-incidence, nothing more."

"So you’re not going to charge
him with murder?"

"Of course not, though the Fraud
Squad will probably charge him with stealing royalties. He’ll be
ruined anyway."

"Then why’d he agree to give Rex
a false alibi and then recant in the witness box?"

"Probably wanted to cover up his
fraud, and the best way to do that was make sure Rex went to prison
for a very long time. Indeed, if that happened, he could have kept
stealing his money."

Rex Markham told Grimble, a few
months before the murder, that he wanted an accountant to audit the
royalties Grimble was collecting. So the detective’s theory was
convincing. "Mmm, I think you’re right."

"So congratulations," the
detective said acidly.

"For what?"

"It looks like you got a
murderer off the hook. Now he’s free as a bird."

"That’s not true. You can’t
prove Rex killed anyone."

"I’ve got no other
suspects."

"Maybe. But what about his
second alibi: that he was with Danielle?"

"It was obviously just another
concoction."

The detective’s annoyance made
Robyn uncomfortable. ‘Yeah, well, thanks for giving me this
news."

"My pleasure," the detective
said sardonically.

Robyn hung up and was forced to
concede it now looked quite possible that Rex Markham did, in fact,
murder his wife and, through her efforts, he'd escaped just
punishment. Well, if he did, it wasn’t her fault. She did nothing
dishonest. The system failed.

Indeed, in a rather perverse
way, the detective’s revelation enhanced her triumph. Anyone could
get an innocent client acquitted; it took real skill to get a
guilty one off. True, non-lawyers wouldn’t see it quite like that,
but they didn't understand the game.

Of course, it was also possible
that Rex was innocent and a third party killed Alice. Before the
trial, Robyn had suspected both the pseudonymous Richard Olsen and
Tim Nolan. Maybe one of them was the killer, or someone she hadn’t
even considered.

Anyway, it wasn't her job to
look for an answer. She’d leave that to the police. But she was
dying to tell Brian what the detective had said. She caught a lift
down to his floor and strolled past the vacant reception desk to
his room.

Brian wasn’t in his room. But
his suit jacket hung over the back of his chair, suggesting he
hadn’t wandered far. She’d wait a few minutes.

She perched on the corner of his
desk, next to a lever-arch folder containing a brief. The
cover-sheet on the folder identified the matter as "
R v
Stavros
". How odd. Brian often mentioned his cases, but not
that one.

Further down the cover-sheet was
the standard formula:

"You are briefed to appear at
the trial of this matter, for the accused, with Patricia Lenehan as
your junior counsel".

A jolt of anxiety. Patricia
Lenehan. A few weeks before the trial, Robyn saw Patricia leave
Brian’s room after a "conference". Brian said Patricia was
prosecuting one of his clients and they were plea bargaining. He
certainly didn’t mention she was also acting as his junior in a
case.

Why not? Why did Brian try to
put some distance between himself and Patricia? The answer was
obvious: he was shagging her.

Robyn now realized what was
unusual about Patricia’s appearance when she left Brian’s room: she
wasn’t carrying anything. If they were really discussing a plea
deal, she’d have at least had a pen and paper, if not her whole
brief.

Of course, after Brian started
seeing Robyn, he might have stopped bonking Patricia. Robyn felt a
surge of optimism, which evaporated fast. A chronic skirt-chaser
like Brian would hate to give up such a lovely arrangement. No way.
In her heart, she knew he was cheating. Fucking bastard. Turd.

She wanted to dump the arsehole
straight away, but couldn't without solid proof. Certainly, if she
confronted the bastard and accused him of cheating, he’d brush her
accusation aside and make her look paranoid and disloyal.

She needed smoking-gun
evidence.

She surveyed his room and spied
his computer. Brian had probably exchanged e-mails with Patricia,
which might contain incriminating material.

Accessing his computer was bad.
Definitely. But so was cheating, and she just
had
to confirm
that he was.

She shut the door and rushed
over to his computer, which was already on. Hands shaking, she
looked through his e-mail in-box and saw that Patricia had sent
several e-mails during the last week. She opened the most recent
one. In it, Patricia asked when Brian wanted to have another
conference in the
Stavros
matter.

Brian replied that he’d see her
at 6pm on Thursday.

The exchange looked quite
innocuous until Robyn read the final sentence of his reply, which
said: "
P.S. Don’t wear any panties
."

Fucker. Fucking bastard. She’d
trusted him and he’d treated her like dirt. The rotten turd had
promised to stop womanising, but didn't. The grub would pay for
this, in spades.

He obviously wanted to meet
Patricia Lenehan at 6pm tomorrow because, by that hour, most
barristers would have gone home and they wouldn’t be disturbed.

Well, she would turn up and
cause a massive disturbance.

Fearing he might return at any
moment, she dashed out to the lifts and rode up to Fisher Chambers
feeling hurt, humiliated and, most of all, angry - fucking angry.
The bastard. She’d always thought she was incapable of murder. No
longer.

The next morning, Robyn woke
alone and immediately saw an image of Brian on the back of her
eyelids. Bastard. Her blood pressure spiked. She tried to calm
down. But her anger kept returning. What a prick.

She considered dumping him
straight away. But then she’d have to reveal that she looked
through his e-mails. No, she had to catch the bastard
in
flagrante
. But how?

Her feverish mind quickly
engineered a plan - a fiendishly clever one - which required
getting to work early. She glanced at her watch. Six-thirty. Still
plenty of time to put it into effect. She jumped out of bed.

An hour later, she strolled into
the building that housed both of their chambers, got out of the
lift on his floor, which was deserted, and strolled over to his
secretary’s cubicle. In the bottom drawer of the secretary’s desk,
she found a large bunch of keys. She used each key on Brian’s door
until she found the right one, which she slipped into her pocket,
before returning the rest of the bunch to the drawer.

She headed for the lift, feeling
a lot better.

That afternoon, Brian phoned and
asked if she wanted to spend the night at his place. She coughed
and said in a husky voice that she couldn’t because she had a cold.
"But don’t worry Darling, I’ll be fine in a few days."

"OK. And just remember, I miss
you."

"I miss you too."

"Lots of love."

"Yes, lots of love."

She hung up and, after stifling
an urge to vomit, put a hand in her pocket and fingered the
key.