The Coroner (34 page)

    Jenny
said, 'I wouldn't have dragged you here if you'd said.'

    'Glad
to get out of the house. I've been on paid leave since I was charged.'

    'So
much for innocent until proved guilty.'

    'Who
invented that myth? My credit cards got frozen, too. Police must have tipped
them off. Bastards.' Her eyes scanned the car park, instinctively checked the
mirrors, on her guard since being clubbed down. 'What couldn't you say on the
phone?'

    'I
wanted to ask you about the girl you mentioned, Hayley Johnson. The police
haven't got to her so far as I know and I'd like to speak to her first.'

    'I've
only met her once. She was working the street in Broadlands.'

    'What
else do we know about her?'

    'Eighteen.
Mixed race, comes from Plymouth, I think she said.'

    'She
knew Katy?'

    'Said
she'd seen her turn a few tricks, get in and out of cars. They'd spoken,
nothing significant.'

    'When
did you find her?'

    'About
ten days ago, but she claimed not to have seen Katy since before she went to
Portshead.'

    'Did
you believe her?'

    'I
don't know. She was kind of shifty, couldn't accept I wasn't a cop.'

    'How
did you track her down?'

    'Just
driving around. I've got to know the area.'

    'I'd
like to talk to her, see what she can tell me about the punters, cars they
drive, whether Katy had any regulars.'

    'You've
got a particular car in mind?'

    'Maybe.'

    Tara
looked at her, then out of the window, giving Jenny the impression she'd broken
her trust by withholding information.

    Jenny
said, 'As far as I know, the police are looking for a blue Vectra. That's all
we've got.'

    Tara
waited a moment before replying. This was Jenny coming to her and Tara needed
her to know it. 'Like I said, Hayley was hard to pin down. I was trying to win
her trust.'

    'Do
you think you can get her for me?'

    'That
depends.' She gave Jenny a look, challenging her. 'What are you doing about
Danny Wills?'

    Jenny
said, 'How can I trust a woman who threatened to publish my medical records?'

    Tara
tilted her head, conceding the point. 'We hadn't met.'

    Jenny
held her gaze, choosing to ignore what might have been the subtext of what
she'd just said. 'I'm back on the case. And if it works out, next week I'll be
opening another inquest.'

    Tara
looked surprised. 'I really was wrong about you.'

    The
list office excelled itself. Not only was she granted a swift hearing, it was
listed in the Bristol District Registry of the High Court at nine-thirty a.m.
on Friday morning, half an hour before court business normally commenced. Jenny
arrived expecting to find an army of lawyers representing the Crown and UKAM,
but UKAM were unrepresented and the Crown sent only the most junior and
inexpensive counsel. Jenny's team consisted of a teenage clerk sent to hold the
file by the modest firm of solicitors she had instructed, and an earnest young
female barrister who looked as if she had sat up the entire night mastering the
principles of coronial law. A solitary reporter sat in the gallery.

    Mr
Justice Aden Chilton, a ferocious intellectual snob with whom she had clashed
many times in bad-tempered wrangles over the custody of various unfortunate
children, barely acknowledged her when he swept into court in his full red
robes and regalia. He said he had read the coroner's affidavit and was minded
to grant the application if there were no objection. The grateful young counsel
for the Crown shook his head, muttered, 'No, My Lord,' and the case was over.

    Jenny
glanced at the reporter and saw him yawn for the umpteenth time, showing no
interest in taking a note.

    She
walked out of the courtroom and said goodbye to her bemused lawyers with a
mounting sense of mistrust. A system which frequently conspired to keep
troubled and desperate families in limbo for months had miraculously granted
her wish in less than seventy-two hours. It seemed too good to be true, which
meant it probably was.

    It
was only decent to have Alison phone ahead to give the staff at Portshead Farm
half an hour's notice of her arrival, and for good measure she faxed a copy of
the court order to the director's office. Her visit was irregular - coroners
did not often visit the scene of a death and even less frequently presented
themselves anywhere without an appointment - but she was within her legal
rights. The wide-ranging common law powers of the coroner to investigate the
cause of death entitled her to insist, with police back-up if necessary, on
full cooperation from all potential witnesses and unlimited access to all
relevant evidence. She had spent the previous night stooped over her textbooks
until she was sure of her ground: Portshead Farm had no option but to open its
doors to her.

    She
arrived in a cold, steady drizzle, weather which had hardly lifted for the
entire month, and found there was no human being at the entrance to the secure
training centre. She walked from the fenced car park along a paved walkway to
solid steel gates watched over by a cluster of CCTV cameras perched on high
poles. The outer concrete wall of the facility was high enough that only the
roofs of the buildings inside the perimeter were visible. A little piece of
urban hell in the English countryside.

    She
pressed the buzzer and got no reply. Only on her fourth attempt did a voice
come over the speaker asking her to state her name and business.

    'Jenny
Cooper, Severn Vale District Coroner. I'm here to see the director.'

    Silence.
The voice came back several moments later, saying, 'There's no appointment on
the system. You'll have to call the other party and have it logged.'

    Jenny
said, 'I'm a judicial officer on official business. The director has been
notified of my arrival.'

    'No
appointment, no entry.' A click. Communication ceased.

    She
pressed on the buzzer for a full five seconds.

    The
voice returned, officious this time. 'Madam, you've been told the procedure.'

    Staying
calm, she said, 'Listen to me, whoever you are. Call the director's office and
tell her Mrs Cooper, the coroner, is here. Either I'm on the other side of this
gate in two minutes or you'll be having lunch in a police cell.'

    Jenny
waited, agitated, at the gate, feeling the effect of the pill she had taken
earlier wearing off fast. There was no way she'd take another here under the
cameras.

    Several
frustrating minutes passed before the gate opened. A woman of about her own
age, dressed in a black, well-cut suit, stood on the other side of the
threshold. Her immaculately styled hair and conspicuous make-up were explained
by the mid-Atlantic accent in which she greeted her with a clipped, 'Good morning,
Mrs Cooper. Elaine Lewis. What can I do for you?' She made no attempt to invite
her in.

    'I
trust you received a call from my officer and a copy of the court order made
this morning?'

    'They
were just handed to me. I've been in a meeting.'

    'I've
come to inspect the scene of death.' She stepped inside the gate. 'If you'd be
good enough to have someone show me round.'

    'All
my staff are fully occupied. This is an extremely busy facility.'

    'Then
maybe you could show me yourself? As part of my investigation I'll need a
detailed understanding of the procedures Danny Wills went through here.'

    'That
information has already been supplied.'

    'I am
conducting an entirely fresh inquest, Mrs Lewis. It's starting here, right
now.'

    Elaine
Lewis appeared startled. 'I'm not sure I appreciate your tone.'

    'You
don't have to. You're under a duty to comply with all requests for evidence,
including a full inspection of these premises.'

    'This
is news to me. I'll need to speak to our lawyers.'

    'I'd
rather look around without the need for a police escort, but if you want to
push it that way it's up to you.' Jenny gave her a benign smile.

    Icy,
Elaine Lewis said, 'I'll see if my assistant is free.'

    She
turned and walked away at speed, signalling to one of the security cameras.
Jenny followed at her own pace as the gate clunked shut behind her.

    Elaine
swiped her security tag across the reader and they entered through the main
door of the reception centre, a brick- built two-storey building. To the left
was an area signed 'Trainee Reception', the entrance to which was a solid steel
door with a small observation window. Jenny caught a glimpse of a teenage boy
on the other side, from the look of him no more than thirteen or fourteen.

    Elaine
Lewis said, 'You can wait here. Someone will be with you in a minute,' and
swiped herself through a door leading to a corridor to the right, alongside
which were signs that read 'Administration', 'Security' and 'Director'. Jenny
was left a prisoner in an empty hallway. Ahead of her was a door that led on to
a quadrangle around which were ranged the other buildings on the site, but it,
too, opened only with a tag.

    She
hated being locked in anywhere and felt the familiar stirrings of claustrophobia.
She glanced at the walls and ceilings, looking for cameras, and spotted only
one, above the door to the quadrangle. She turned her back to it, dipped into
her handbag and found a temazepam among several loose in a zip pocket. She
coughed, brought her hand up to her mouth and slipped it in.

    Her
anxiety eased just from the feeling of the pill on her tongue. She swallowed
and her heart started to slow. She stepped over towards the steel door and
glanced in from a distance, hoping she wouldn't be noticed. Three boys were
being seen by two nurses, one male, one female, both dressed in prison medical
style: tight buttoned waist-length jackets that couldn't easily be grabbed. Two
Asian boys of fourteen or fifteen were sitting on plastic seats fooling around,
while the younger white boy was being processed. The male nurse was peering
into his ears as the female asked him questions she read from a clipboard. She
seemed impatient with his answers, as if he wasn't following. Not liking having
his ear poked, the boy jerked his head away and the male nurse grabbed it with
one meaty hand, forcing him to hold it steady.

    The
door to the administration corridor opened and a large, unenthusiastic young
woman came through who said her name was Sue and that Mrs Lewis had told her to
show Jenny round.

    Thinking,
who the hell do these people think they are? Jenny said, 'I'm a coroner
conducting a formal inspection. I need full access to every area of this
facility. We'll start with the male house unit.'

    Sue,
a stone wall, gave her a flat look and moved, heavy- hipped, to the door
opening on to the quadrangle.

    The
house unit was a long, single-storey building with forty matchbox-sized
bedrooms, twenty on each side of the single corridor. At one end of the unit
was a fusty-smelling staff room and trainees' common room with a TV set, at the
other the communal latrines and showers. Each room contained a bed, a steel
wardrobe, a steel toilet bowl, a plastic chair and a writing table. All
furniture apart from the chair was bolted down. Cell windows were permanently
sealed and barred. Some cells contained personal effects - posters, a radio -
but most didn't. Sue, who found communication of any sort an effort, said it
was to do with the system of privileges. Only trainees who made it to gold got
a radio.

    The
trainees were in class, so the unit was empty save for two young women
cleaning. Jenny looked up at the ceiling and noticed the semicircular black
domes which contained surveillance cameras. Sue said the monitors were all
contained in a suite in the admin corridor near the director's office. She
couldn't say how many staff would have been on duty the night Danny died.

    Jenny
looked through the toughened glass pane into the room where Danny had been found
hanging. It was approximately ten feet long, six wide. The wardrobe stood at
the end of the bed on the wall to her left, leaving a gap of less than a foot
between it and the window. The toilet bowl was opposite, in the far right-hand
corner; sitting on it, you'd be looking at the door. Hanging from the far left
of the bars, jammed in tight to the wardrobe, Danny's body might have been
partially obscured, but you'd have to have been blind not to have seen it from
where she was standing.