Witness (15 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Cheryl

J
oe, and this volunteer Benny, showed Cheryl where she’d give her evidence. It was a little room down in the basement, empty apart from a table and two chairs. There was a monitor on the table and a camera fixed on top of that. That was where Cheryl would sit. Benny would sit in the other chair.

Milo was at the crèche at the Town Hall. ‘Think of it as a rehearsal for you both,’ Joe had said. ‘On the day you’ll know what’s what.’

Cheryl looked round the little room. There were no windows or anything so it felt like you were underground. Everything looked new and clean, like it was for show. With the three of them standing there it felt crowded.

‘What will they ask me?’ Cheryl said. A sickly, cold feeling creeping through her – not long and it would be the real thing.

‘The prosecution barrister will take you through your statement, first,’ Joe said.

‘I’ll see them on the screen?’ Cheryl pointed to the monitor.

‘Yes. And you’ll have a microphone attached to your clothes but your voice will be distorted. The big screens in the courtroom will be switched off and only the judge and jury and the barristers will see you on their screens. Then the defence barristers will question you. You’re likely to get two sorts of questions: those that cast doubt on your evidence – did you really see such and such, can you be certain, can you remember clearly – and other questions which will examine your motives, try and cast doubt on your credibility as a witness.’

Cheryl didn’t like the sound of that. ‘They gonna say I’m a liar?’

‘They will imply you might have other reasons for coming forward because of an existing relationship with the defendants,’ Joe said. ‘A grudge, or an attempt to get the reward money. Don’t let them get to you, stay calm. If you do start getting upset count to five before you answer. There’s only one thing that matters and that is giving your evidence: what you saw, what you heard, telling the court what happened.’

She had butterflies in her belly already.

‘If you get distressed,’ Benny said, ‘I can hold this up.’ He picked up a piece of red card, the size of a cigarette packet. ‘It’s a signal to the judge.’ He was being kind but it made her feel even worse. ‘We’ll have tissues here, water. Before you start you will swear on a holy book, or affirm.’

Cheryl nodded like she was following but her head was buzzing, her mind cloudy.

Up in the offices where all the witnesses came, Joe went over the arrangements with her again. A week on Monday he would collect her and Milo from outside the supermarket at nine. They would take Milo to the crèche and let Cheryl settle him in then Joe would bring her here. When Cheryl had finished giving her evidence, they’d fetch Milo and he’d drop them both back at the supermarket. She would tell friends and family that she was going into town shopping. Any problems, she had his number.

* * *

It didn’t take long for problems to pitch up. Starting with Vinia. She came round at teatime. Nana had made chicken and rice and insisted Vinia fetch a plate and eat some. Milo had eaten most of his and was messing now, dribbling juice into his bowl and making the grains of rice float around. Cheryl took the bowl from him, gave him a biscuit and fussed about clearing up, feeling edgy with Vinia being about.

Nana wiped her mouth, set her cutlery side by side. Cheryl saw she had only picked at her food. ‘Rose tells me the trial for Danny will be starting Monday week. All the family will be going.’

Cheryl struggled for something to say, felt the vibes in the room, strung tight like piano wire. Nana had been triumphant when Carlton and Sam Millins were charged. ‘At last,’ she’d crowed to Cheryl, ‘how the mighty are fallen.’ But she was fair too, and had continued to welcome Vinia into her house unlike some who cut Vinia dead because she was Carlton’s stepsister.

‘Will you go, too, Nana T?’ Vinia asked.

Nana nodded. ‘I think so. Rose would like me there. And the satisfaction of seeing justice done. I know Carlton is family, Vinia, but he took a life and he must pay.’

‘If he’s guilty,’ Vinia said. ‘He says he didn’t do it.’

Nana didn’t reply to that, just sucked her teeth and put the telly on. Nana didn’t know Vinia was visiting Sam Millins. Cheryl hadn’t dared tell her. Vinia couldn’t help having Carlton as her stepbrother but being Sam’s girlfriend – that was different. That was a choice and one that Cheryl herself couldn’t get her head round. Cheryl had tried to talk to Vinia about it.

‘No one would blame you if you walked away. It’s not fair for him to expect any more after a couple of dates. He could be in jail for years, Vinia.’

‘You just don’t like him,’ Vinia complained.

‘No, I don’t. And neither did you, till now.’

‘He’s different on his own, he’s real gentle.’

Cheryl threw her hands up, shook her head. ‘You know what he’s done! You should get out now.’ How could she let him touch her? How could she bear his company?

‘I promised him – that I’d stay true.’

Cheryl stared at her friend. Vinia was supposed to be the wild one, never let a man hold her back, reckless and devil-may-care, and here she was like some wet airhead. ‘It’s your life, Vinia!’ How could she make her see sense? ‘You stick with him, it’s not going to go well.’

‘Least I’ll have a decent life.’

‘With him in prison?’

‘He’s gonna make sure I’m looked after. Cars and clothes, a nice place to live.’

He could do it, Cheryl knew that, the gangs made money, lots of it. Made it hard for the younger kids to say no when they saw the likes of Sam Millins dripping gold and driving top of the range. ‘He’s buying you,’ Cheryl said.

Vinia’s face hardened. ‘You got Milo,’ she said, ‘you got Jeri. You so pretty you can have anyone catches your eye. You don’t know what it’s like.’

‘Back up!’ Cheryl protested. ‘I ain’t had no boyfriend since I got caught with Milo till now, not like I’m married an’ all. Jeri – anything could happen, or not. You’re saying you will stand by Sam because he’s loaded and you’re lonely?’

‘You don’t get it.’

Cheryl lost her temper. ‘You bet I don’t! He killed Danny!’

There was a silence. Vinia’s eyes glittered. ‘You don’t know that.’

‘Everyone knows.’

‘He drove the car, is all.’

Cheryl felt sad then, that Vinia was fooling herself, twisting it all to make Sam seem less guilty. They both knew you didn’t have to fire the gun to face the charge.

After that day Cheryl didn’t expect Vinia to call round any more, thought the friendship was broken, but she kept coming and Cheryl didn’t know why or how to stop her.

Now Cheryl cleared the plates and scraped the chicken bones into the kitchen bin. She washed up and put the kettle on for coffee. She stepped outside for a cigarette and leaned against the wall, blowing the smoke up into the air, making smoke rings one time.

Vinia came out and sat on Milo’s rocker, her knees tucked up to her chin. ‘You want to try these.’ Vinia held up a packet of cigarettes. ‘I can get you some really cheap, two hundred for twenty quid.’

Smuggled they must be, or stolen, thought Cheryl. ‘Ta, can you split them?’

‘Yeah, just a packet if you want. They herbs?’ Vinia nodded at the troughs along the side wall, full of thyme and chives and oregano.

‘Yeah.’ Cheryl waited. No way was Vinia interested in Nana’s garden. So what did she really want to say? Cheryl blew another smoke ring.

‘The trial,’ Vinia said, ‘will you come with me?’

Cheryl’s heart skipped a beat. She couldn’t believe she was hearing this. Vinia, Miss Self-Sufficient, asking Cheryl for help. And doing it knowing how badly Cheryl felt about Danny’s death, how she despised Carlton and Sam, how she thought Vinia was messing up getting involved with Sam. Cheryl couldn’t say yes: she’d be down in that little basement room giving evidence, her voice all gruff, sneaking out afterwards. Was this a trap? A test? Was there some way they’d found out that Cheryl had betrayed them? The possibility made her mouth go dry, sweat prickled under her arms.

Cheryl flicked the ash from her cigarette, tried to ignore her heart bumping in her chest. Suddenly she had the answer. ‘I can’t,’ she said. ‘If Nana’s going, I won’t have anyone to look after Milo. Sorry.’

Vinia shrugged and lit her cigarette. Cheryl took another drag and hoped Vinia wouldn’t notice how badly her hand was shaking.

Cheryl got up with Milo at half past three. His nappy was dirty but once she’d changed him, he settled back okay. She sat by his cot a moment, watching the way his eyelids fluttered and the perfect curve of his cheek in the glow from the nightlight.

She had not been down to Bristol yet. She’d put Jeri off, explaining that Nana wasn’t great, the doctors had mentioned anaemia and her blood pressure was too high so she tired more quickly; two nights would be too much.

Jeri was disappointed but brightened up and promised he’d get up to see her in Manchester soon, could well be last minute as he was doing a lot of travelling: summer festivals and parties. She should come! He could put her on the guest list for the Spanish one, the last weekend in September. ‘Bring the baby. It’s lovely,’ he told her, ‘really chilled. Dancing on the beach till dawn. You’d love it.’ He talked about introducing her to people – they were always looking for new talent for the music videos. With looks like hers she’d walk it. She’d be brilliant.

Cheryl didn’t have a passport. Milo neither. She had never been abroad and passports cost money they didn’t have. She smoothed it over saying she’d have to apply for them, it would be nice to see more of the world.

Cheryl stood up to get back to bed and heard a noise from downstairs. Her belly flipped. She opened her bedroom door and saw, with a rush of relief, that Nana’s door was open, her light on. Nana wasn’t sleeping too good. ‘It comes with age,’ she told Cheryl, ‘I sleep like a baby again.’

‘You’re not that old, Nana,’ Cheryl had said, ‘going on like you ninety or something.’

Cheryl went down to check. Nana was in her chair, eyes closed, a rug over her knees. ‘You okay, Nana?’

She opened her eyes. ‘Queasy, is all.’

‘The chicken?’

‘The chicken was fine, fresh and cook through,’ Nana objected. Then suspicious, ‘Why, you feel sickly yourself?’

‘A bit,’ Cheryl admitted. But she knew most of it was nerves, the whole business with Vinia and the trial, her insides all knotted up with it. Sometimes it felt like she was the one going to be in the dock. ‘Maybe a bug,’ she said.

‘Dry toast and water.’ Nana’s remedy for any bellyache.

‘G’night.’

‘God bless, sweet pea.’

Cheryl dreamt she was at the beach with Jeri. It was warm and the sea was still and aquamarine. She was dancing with him, Jeri’s hands on her hips, his face close to hers. Then she was looking for Milo, she had lost Milo, she was begging people to help her find him but they were just laughing at her like she made no sense. Cheryl was running to find him but the sand was dragging her down, her ankles, her muscles burning with the strain, only able to move in slow motion. Sam Millins had Milo! Sam and Carlton had him! In the distance they were walking away. Milo was bigger, almost grown, and he was in the middle, Carlton on one side doing his rolling walk, Sam with a gun in his hand. Cheryl called for Milo again and again but he never looked back.

Cheryl started awake, still wrapped in the dream. The sheets were damp with sweat and she felt greasy, shivery. She still felt sick. She threw up in the bathroom and had dry toast for breakfast. She just hoped Milo didn’t catch it too.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Fiona

J
oe Kitson came with her to visit the court, at the beginning of September, a couple of weeks before the trial. He met her in Albert Square, near the Town Hall, and they set off to walk down to the Crown Court. She was grateful for his company. She trusted him, she realized. And his calm manner, his steadiness, allayed her own anxieties. Good midwives, good doctors had something of the same quality. She herself had it at work but in this alien context it deserted her.

‘Do you do this for all your witnesses?’

‘Not all,’ he said. There was a warmth in his eyes. Fiona checked: he didn’t wear a ring. With a jolt she understood that she really was attracted to the man. She felt a flush spread across her neck and cheeks. It was years. There had been a few relationships since Jeff but it was awkward with having Owen and though she liked the men she’d never fallen in love with any of them. And so she’d never gone all out to make something long-lasting develop. Shelley reckoned it was a deliberate tactic. Once bitten twice shy. Fiona just argued that she hadn’t met the right person yet.

‘But a case like this,’ he was saying, ‘it’s very hard to get people to testify. I’ll do all I can to get them on board, and keep them there.’

‘There are other witnesses?’

‘There are. But I’m afraid I can’t tell you more than that.’

Fiona thought back to the day: she’d been so focused on Danny that she recalled little else. She remembered the churchgoers streaming across the grass, Danny’s mum and sister among them. But before that? Kids on bikes. A man on his mobile. She couldn’t even remember what he looked like.

They reached the side street and Joe showed her to the entrance which was specially for witnesses; he rang the intercom and a guard opened the door. They had to walk through a metal detector, and the guard searched Fiona’s bag.

Upstairs, they reached a suite of rooms. Joe took her in and they were met by Francine, a volunteer with the witness service, who would explain all the procedures and look after Fiona during the trial.

‘Come through,’ Francine said. ‘It’s a bit of a warren.’

They went along a narrow corridor with rooms off to the sides. Fiona glimpsed people waiting in chairs, some in the corridor itself. Waiting to give evidence. It would be her turn in a couple of weeks.

Francine took them into the kitchen and made tea for them. There was a whiteboard on the wall, columns with names and abbreviations. Francine noticed her reading it and explained: the case, defendants and witnesses, which volunteers were assigned to who, which court it was in.

The place reminded Fiona of a local clinic: the interface of public and professional, the whiteboard, the waiting area with toys and magazines.

‘You can’t discuss your evidence with me,’ Francine explained, ‘but any questions you have about the process I’m here to answer. And if I can’t, I’ll find someone who can.’

‘Are any of the courts free?’ Joe asked.

‘I’ll check,’ Francine said. She turned to Fiona. ‘It helps to see where you’ll be. Sometimes we just use photographs to explain the layout, but I’ll find out if we can go in.’

Fiona sipped her tea. People – volunteers, she assumed – were coming and going, chatting to each other. Occasionally someone altered an entry on the whiteboard.

Francine came back. ‘Yes, we can get a look now,’ she said.

‘Are you all right if I leave you with Francine?’ Joe asked Fiona. ‘I need a word with them in the office.’

‘Fine.’

‘I’ll see you back here.’

The courtroom was more or less as she imagined except for the frosted glass box that surrounded the dock. She remarked on it.

‘That’s to prevent the defendant from communicating with their supporters. They’ll be behind them in the public gallery.’ Francine gestured to the bank of seats at the back of the court. ‘This is the witness stand. You can go in if you like.’

Fiona did. Opposite her was the jury box and to her right the raised dais where the judge would sit. In the well of the court were the lawyers’ benches and then above those to Fiona’s left rose the dock and public gallery.

She felt exposed. ‘They said there’d be screens?’

‘That’s those.’ Francine pointed to maroon curtains bunched at the back of the witness stand. ‘Don’t know why they call them screens – sounds better, I suppose. They pull those round before you come in and just leave them open so the judge and jury and the barristers can see you. You’ll come in from the stairs there.’ Francine showed her a flight of steps that led up to the witness stand from below the court. ‘It means you won’t need to walk through open court otherwise there’d be no point in the screens.’

The air in the room was dead, sound muffled. Fiona felt a chill along her arms as she imagined it full of people. She wondered what other murder trials had unfolded here, what horrors had been spoken about by people standing on this spot.

‘It can be a bit daunting,’ Francine said. ‘Some people get nervous, then often it’s not as bad as they thought. And I’ll be with you all the time. You’ll be given a copy of your statement to read through when you arrive and then when you get called I’ll accompany you. The prosecution barrister will talk you through your evidence then each of the defence barristers will have an opportunity to question you.’

‘Each?’ It hadn’t occurred to her that there’d be more than one, but of course there would.

‘Two defendants – they’ll be running separate defences.’

Fiona came down the steps from the witness stand. ‘How long will it take?’

Francine smiled. ‘Hard to say. You’re here on Tuesday but they might not call you till after lunch.’

‘And the whole trial?’

‘A couple of weeks for a murder.’ It sounded so mundane, so everyday, the way she said it, though Fiona was sure she would not intend it to sound like that. And this was everyday for the court, she supposed.

‘Is there anything else you want to ask?’ Francine led the way to the exit.

Fiona decided to tell her, her throat tightening as she spoke. ‘After it happened, I had a series of panic attacks. I was off work. I haven’t had one in the last few weeks but if it did happen …’

Francine took it in her stride. ‘We can always stop, ask the judge for a break. It’s not unusual for people to get distressed while they’re giving evidence. Any problem, you let me know and I’ll alert the court.’

‘Thank you.’

Joe offered her a lift home. She accepted. It was a high summer’s day, the sky a perfect blue, the city traffic impatient, everyone hot and sticky. Joe’s car smelt of hot plastic. He wound the windows down. Fiona rested her elbow on the window edge.

‘So, you’re back at work,’ he said. ‘How’s that?’

‘Frantic. We’re really short-staffed. They are recruiting more people but the birth rate’s still rising so we can’t meet the demand. It’s a constant frustration, not being able to do the job as well as you can because you’re spread so thinly.’

‘I know the feeling.’

‘I thought the police service had lots of money thrown at it.’ They passed a pavement café, people seated, the aluminium furniture glaring in the sun.

‘Doesn’t always land in the right hands.’

She looked at him, shocked. ‘Corruption?’

He glanced her way, laughed, a rich infectious sound. ‘No, no. Thank God. Just the powers that be deciding on priorities. Terrorism,’ he explained.

‘Ah.’

‘And there’s a lot swallowed up with special events: football matches, party conferences, demonstrations.’

‘How long have you been in the police?’

‘Twenty-four years, near enough. Another six and I can retire on full pension.’

‘Pretty cushy.’

He laughed again. ‘Maybe. I’m on the old scheme. It doesn’t work like that any more.’

‘So, what will you do then?’

He didn’t reply at first, concentrating on crossing the roundabout, finding a gap in among the lorries and vans. ‘I’m not sure,’ he said. ‘I’ve a place in France – I’ve been doing it up. Be nice to spend more time there.’

‘Whereabouts?’

‘The Pyrenees, the east, not far from Narbonne.’

‘Lovely, I was in Provence in July.’ The question of what to do with Owen had dissolved when he accepted an invitation to go with a friend and his family to Cyprus. Fiona and Shelley booked rooms in a small hotel next to a spa. They’d taken trains all the way to Avignon and hired bicycles to get about once they were there. Shelley and she had got on famously, accommodating each other’s different interests by spending a couple of days apart and enjoying some notably giddy evenings drinking the local wine and setting the world to rights. Back home it rained every day but in France the sun shone and Fiona grew tanned and fit. She slept well but whenever her thoughts turned to the trial she felt herself tense, her sense of well-being drain away. It was a lowering obstacle on the horizon growing ever closer.

‘I can’t go out there yet, anyway,’ Joe said as he pulled up outside Fiona’s house. ‘My kids live with me and there’s no way on God’s earth they want to move to France.’

He had kids! ‘How old?’

‘Seventeen and fourteen, girl and a boy. Never a dull moment.’

‘Tell me about it. Owen’s sixteen and I keep wishing we could flash forward a couple of years, people say they improve again.’

‘Hah!’ He laughed. ‘I’m still waiting.’ The sage green eyes shining, lines crinkled at the corners.

She didn’t want to get out of the car, she wanted to keep talking. ‘I guess Manchester has a lot going for it: clubs, bands, uni. Why would they want to give up all that for a backwater in rural France?’

‘Exactly. Tuesday, you’ll be all right if I meet you there – now you know the way?’

‘Yes.’

‘Are you bringing anyone with you?’

She was surprised, it had never occurred to her.

‘You’re allowed: a friend, a supporter, someone to hold your hand.’

‘I want you to do that,’ she said softly.

His face stilled, he blinked, dropped his eyes.

She’d misjudged it. Oh, God. She felt awful, riddled with hot shame and embarrassment. ‘Sorry, that was—’ she stumbled over her words – ‘I shouldn’t, please—’

‘It’s all right,’ he said, looking at her.

‘Unprofessional and—’

‘Fiona, it’s all right.’ He caught her gaze, warmth in his again. ‘I’d love to hold your hand. But that will have to wait till this is all over.’

She felt like squeaking, running. There was a trace of a smile around his mouth. She was giddy and guilty, blood singing in her veins.

‘Thank you,’ was all she said.

She’d actually taken the whole day off and it was only lunchtime. She was restless, itching to do something, work off some of the febrile energy fizzing inside her. A day like this, bold with sunshine, was so rare she wanted to make something of it. Even if September yielded an Indian summer, the sun would be lower in the sky, the air softer, the sting of heat gentler.

She made a sandwich and ate it on the move, gathering things together. She called Ziggy and put him in the back seat. Left a note and sent a text to Owen: there was pizza in the freezer.

She no longer used the car to go to work but was comfortable driving again; she’d done some supermarket trips and driven across town to a training seminar but not any further yet. Now she refused to start worrying about whether she’d cope with a longer journey. She was still taking the pills, she reminded herself, and it was nearly three months since her last attack.

The road out of the city to the south-east was always busy; the traffic sped up along the intermittent stretches of dual carriageway then slowed to a crawl as they were funnelled through the narrower parts. She took the turning for the High Peak, climbing out of the valley and up past the big houses close to Lyme Park, the country estate. Out along the road which zigzagged the side of the hills, she admired the tubs and baskets of flowers that spilt bright colour in front of houses and shops. She had all the windows down and Ziggy stood with his nose out, his eyes closed against the rush of air. Why did dogs do that, Fiona wondered, they all seemed to like it. Was it some race memory of life on windswept plains, did it mimic the thrill of running?

It took her almost an hour to reach the parking spot, in the fold of hills. She changed into her walking boots and rubbed sunscreen on her face and arms. She kept Ziggy on the lead for the first part of the walk. The track led up across farmland and there were sheep in the fields: given half a chance he’d have bounded after them, a game to him but a recipe for heart failure for many a sheep.

Fiona’s calves, the backs of her thighs, ached as the incline grew steeper, the path now climbing between two old dry-stone walls, the slabs of rock encrusted with lichen and here and there tiny violets and thyme growing in the crevices.

She stopped to get her breath, looking back the way she had come. The hillsides were vivid green, the grass as smooth as suede. The few trees that were above the valley stood sentinel, heavy with foliage, alongside the field walls. In one field she could see a tractor at work and the round bales of hay, small as wooden toys. There was a little mere too, the sun glinting on the water in silver stripes.

When they had climbed over the stile into open country, she let Ziggy off the lead. He meandered ahead of her, head down, in an ecstasy of scent trails. Here purple heather and close-cropped turf quilted the peaty soil and cotton grass danced, white feather-heads shivering even though Fiona could feel no wind. Rushes and reeds marked the boggy parts of the moor. A ridge ran from this point for a couple of miles due south. Huge limestone boulders lay tumbled along it, riddled with fissures and holes, the legacy of centuries of wind and water. Fiona heard the spiralling song of skylarks and spotted a pair high above.

She walked along the ridge, following the path as it snaked between the stones and through small streams where hart’s tongue fern lapped at the water’s edge. She let her thoughts roam as free as she was. Ruminating upon Joe. Was he interested in her? In a relationship? He said his children lived with him, was it a permanent set-up? It sounded like it. What had happened to their mother? Had she left? Divorced him, died?