Grace
I stared at the laptop screen in front of me. It had been a week since Charles’ funeral and already life was continuing as before.
‘We all think we’re indispensable and the world will stop turning when we die, but of course it doesn’t,’ he had once said.
As I stared at the screen absent-mindedly, thinking about Charles, I began to focus on four little words on the menu at the left-hand side: time capsule shared device. It wasn’t the first time I had noticed them, but suddenly something clicked in my mind and they took on a whole new significance.
I remembered my visit to Lorraine all those weeks ago and how she told me she had hacked into Daniel’s iPhone and Apple time capsule, the backup device for his computer. She also told me she was sure there was a second-time capsule somewhere, possibly up at our house, which may have more information on it. At the time, I had no idea what she was talking about and had never heard of a ‘time capsule’, other than in the context of a box containing memorabilia, that people bury in the ground to be dug up many years and possibly many centuries down the line. I promptly forgot all about it after I met her, but as I sat there daydreaming in the kitchen, something stirred in the back of my memory and another piece of the jigsaw suddenly slotted into place.
My Macbook Air laptop had been Daniel’s in a previous life before he upgraded to a more powerful version and donated the old one to me. The machine, obviously, still remembered the backup device he had used, the time capsule, and kept trying to link up to it.
- Why did I not think of this before?
I snapped the lid shut and raced up the stairs to the office, laptop in hand. The desk was clear apart from the monitor, but there was still a pile of stuff on the windowsill. It looked like junk, which was exactly why I had shown no interest in it until now. An old radio, a lamp that didn’t work, desktop speakers, an assortment of books and some headphones. My heart sank, but something inside my head repeated insistently that the device would not show up on my laptop unless it was actually there in the house. I moved the curtain to one side and sure enough, nestled there amongst the jumbled mess was a shiny white box, the size of a small box of chocolates, with the unmistakable silver apple logo on the top. I punched the air in elation.
‘Yes! Come to Mama, you little beauty,’ I screamed out loud.
I could not believe my luck that somehow, in his initial hurried confusion to clear out the office, my darling husband had missed this little gem and seemed to have forgotten all about it in the ensuing chaos. Or maybe he was just so arrogant he thought it didn’t matter, as I was too thick to know what it was anyway.
I carefully removed it from the windowsill and avoided the unpredictability of the WiFi by plugging the USB cable into my own laptop, only to be greeted by the inevitable message: Enter password. For the next ten minutes or so I tried every combination of letters and numbers I could imagine Daniel using, but none of them worked. I was fighting a losing battle and was beginning to fret about how many attempts it would allow me to make before locking me out. Undoubtedly not many.
Think! - I admonished myself, determined not to be outdone.
People forgot passwords all the time. I certainly did. There had to be a way to reset everything when that happened. I opened Safari and searched ‘how to reset the password on an apple time capsule’, praying that it would not involve sending a link to an email I had no way of accessing. I opted for a short Youtube video, which talked me through the process step by step. To my sheer and utter amazement, it turned out to be so simple a five-year-old could have done it. All I had to do was locate a tiny hole at the back of the device, stick a pen tip in it for five seconds and lo and behold the password was wiped. I stared in awe and disbelief as the folder entitled Daniel’s Macbook Air flashed up on the screen of my laptop.
I always thought Daniel just used the iCloud, but apparently not. There were literally thousands of documents suddenly at my disposal, all neatly filed and organised, unlike their paper cousins. As I scrolled rapidly through the list, the ones called Cars and Vett (presumably short for Vettriano) caught my attention immediately.
I tried the Vett file first, but it turned out to be disappointingly sparse, containing nothing more than some background information on the painter and a couple of invitations to auctions. I had heard of Jack Vettriano but knew nothing about him, so I was intrigued to read that he was described by some critics as a ‘purveyor of soft porn’ and a ‘painter of dim erotica’. That sounded right up Daniel’s street, I thought to myself. I did a search of his paintings that had been sold recently and found one called Scarlett Ribbons that had gone for £32,000, apparently. The painting was of a woman, naked except for a white bra and suspender belt with black stockings, dark pubic hair on full display. She was standing up straight with her arms slightly out to the side and bound by red ribbons to a frame. Her head was thrown back, exposing her neck but her face was obscured. There was certainly no denying the eroticism. I wondered whether that was one of the paintings Daniel had bought but had to content myself with printing off general information for the moment.
I turned my attention to the Cars folder, clicking on it to reveal a separate file within for each car. There, in the one called Ferrari, was the original bill of sale, dated several weeks earlier with Daniel’s name and signature on it, no mention of The Whale anywhere. That would prove the bastards were lying about her owning it for a start. I pressed ‘print’ triumphantly, then sat back and waited, knowing that, at last, I had found the goose that would lay me some golden eggs.
I tried to ignore the nagging little voice in my head, urging caution and telling me that it was not quite that simple. My solicitor had warned me on more than one occasion that I had to be very careful about how I obtained any of the documents I was intending to provide to the Court, her suspicions having been aroused when I suddenly produced the insurance schedule for the cars. I remembered our last conversation very clearly, as I had been made to feel like a naughty schoolgirl, summoned to the Head’s office for a telling off.
‘The Court is very strict about this Grace,’ she said sternly. ‘People, even Daniel, have a right to privacy and if you obtain information by means that infringe that right, then I’m afraid it will simply not be admissible in court.’
‘That’s ridiculous,’ I retorted angrily. ‘If the documents exist and prove that Daniel is doing things that are at best underhand and at worst illegal, surely it doesn’t matter how the hell I got hold of them?’
‘I’m afraid it does,’ she replied curtly. ‘As I said, anything obtained by hacking someone’s computer, opening mail addressed to them, stealing mail addressed to them, stuff like that…simply won’t be allowed. That’s the law.’
She looked at me pointedly.
‘Well, the law stinks. And it clearly exists to protect the wrong people. I thought you were supposed to be on my side,’ I added sulkily.
‘Believe me, Grace, I am, but you simply cannot afford to be anything other than lily-white here.’
I felt bitter and let down by the system. Daniel was lying through his back teeth to everyone, including the Courts, and it seemed to me that there was a very good chance he would just get away with doing so. Nobody seemed to be prepared to stand up to him.
I tried to keep calm and think things through logically. Maybe I was going about it all the wrong way.
From what my solicitor was saying, there was only a problem if I hacked into his computer or back up device. If I could prove I had legitimate access to the time capsule and had simply forgotten the password, then I was doing nothing wrong. A plan began to form in my mind and I smiled to myself as I thought how impressed Daniel was going to be with my new IT skills, given that he had always thought I was something of a dunce in that department.
First, I opened the Finder screen on my laptop and took a screenshot of it, clearly showing the all-important words time capsule shared device. It was the word ‘shared’ that had given me the ide
a and was the key to everything.
Next, I set about copying the contents of my own laptop over to the time capsule, saved the folder and named it appropriately, smiling as it appeared on the screen exactly as I wanted it to:
Daniel’s Macbook Air
Grace’s Macbook Air
I immediately took a screenshot of the two folders, which proved, in my opinion, that the device was indeed ‘shared’ and we both had access to it.
Finally, I copied the entirety of the Daniel folder over to my own Maxtor hard drive and I was done. Simple as that. I had the information I wanted and I had the proof to present to the Court that I had obtained it legitimately.
I yanked out the leads of the time capsule, wrapped the wires around it and promptly hid it in my special place between the mattress and base of my bed in the spare room. I would get it out of the house later so that there was no chance of it being subjected to any kind of forensic examination when Daniel found out about it.
I reminded myself once again that I was not the main suspect in a murder case.
Settling down to business in the kitchen, I knew that time was of the essence. I had two days to go through all the files before the meeting with my solicitor to finalise my witness statement for court and I urgently needed evidence to support every claim I was making about Daniel’s ownership of assets.
The time capsule treasure chest of files did not disappoint.
When I arrived at Eleanor’s office for our meeting I was carrying a large box full of documents I had printed off and files of evidence I had laboriously prepared. I could hardly contain my excitement as I presented her with the original bill of sale for the Ferrari, in Daniel’s name of course, together with the amended one in The Whale’s name that I had found in Stainsford.
‘Just look at that,’ I announced, slapping the bill of sale down on the desk in front of her. ‘I told you they’re obviously in cahoots together and this proves it. She must be so desperate she’s prepared to put up with anything to keep him. Well, she’s welcome to him, but there’s no way on earth she’s getting to keep that car, I’m going to make sure of that.’
‘I admit this is good, Grace, and I hate to rain on your parade, but I am a little concerned about how you got hold of it. Questions will be asked you know.’
‘I know that,’ I snapped caustically. ‘You explained already. The thing is I found the fake documents in the office in the house. He must have left them there by mistake at some point. Obviously, these are just copies; I left the originals on the desk for him. They disappeared, so I assume he took them when he was sneaking around on one of his visits to the house when I was out. So I haven’t done anything wrong, have I?’ I asked, challengingly.
I looked her straight in the eye and waited for a response. I took particular care not to look to the right, as my research on lying had told me that normal right-handed people always look to the right when they are telling lies.
‘Okay, go on,’ she continued. ‘Tell me about the time capsule you found.’
Without hesitation, I trotted out the pre-prepared story I had come up with.
‘The time capsule was a shared back up device that we both used.’
I handed her the screenshot I had printed out and helpfully pointed out the words shared device.
‘Daniel was always telling me to keep my stuff backed up the way he did, he had once lost a load of stuff when a computer crashed. When everything was thrown up in the air by the email, there was total mayhem as you know and I think we both forgot all about the time capsule. To be honest I think he started using the Cloud for everything instead, as he thought it was more secure. For some reason, I suddenly thought about the time capsule a few days ago and realised that Daniel would potentially have access to all my files, so I decided to erase my stuff from it, as a precaution. Unfortunately, the password didn’t work, so I thought I had either forgotten it or Daniel had changed it without telling me the new one. I eventually managed to reset the password and get my files off it, but as I was doing that, I couldn’t help seeing some of Daniel’s files for the cars and other stuff on there. I presumed there was nothing confidential, as he had left the time capsule in the house, knowing full well I had access to it and used it regularly.’
I looked at my solicitor defiantly, daring her to say something to contradict my story, but she didn’t. She accepted my version of events. Just as I expected the judge to do.
‘Right, I see. Good. I don’t see the judge having any objection to that. So, where is the time capsule now?’
‘I don’t know. It’s disappeared, so I assume Daniel took it. I know he comes in and out of the house all the time when I’m not there. Obviously, I left it on the desk for him so he could take it once I had erased my own files.’
‘Okay. Great. Well, I guess we better crack on with this final witness statement. We don’t want to miss any court deadlines. You need to appear whiter than white, as I’ve already said. The more Daniel refuses to comply, the more damage he is doing to his case. I have to say, Grace, I take my hat off to you. Most women who found themselves in your position would just curl up in a corner and give up. When I first met you I wasn’t sure you had it in you, but I was wrong. You have a tough streak and appear to have discovered nerves of steel from somewhere. I wish more of my clients were like you. I really mean that.’
There was a look of genuine admiration on her face as she spoke.
‘Wow, thanks Eleanor,’ I said in surprise. ‘At the end of the day though, I had no choice. The only other option was to lie down and die, which was never going to happen.’
It took us a full three hours to put my statement together. I baulked at the mounting cost of it all, at over £300 an hour for Eleanor’s time, but I was finally satisfied that it was good and it was comprehensive. In the end, there were two lever-arch files of exhibits for Judge Barraclough to wade through. It was to be the poor man’s last case before retirement, apparently. I suspected he would remember it for a very long time.
As I lay in bed that night, I was kept awake by my anger at the injustice of the British legal system I found myself trapped in. Daniel had shown utter contempt for the whole process (although why that surprised me, I had no idea), refusing to attend any of the initial hearings and failing to provide any of the required financial documents. There were warnings about the consequences of perjury and failure to comply with Court Orders but, to my increasing frustration, nothing ever happened to him. He was laughing at them all.
Of course, I had no choice at that stage but to remain on the relentless hamster wheel of justice, but it was becoming increasingly obvious to me that the only way to deal effectively with Daniel was to take matters into my own hands and play as dirty as him. People like him simply had no respect for the law. My thoughts returned to the black business card with the gold writing on it that Spike had given me at Charles’ funeral. Nicholas Barrington. Nice name. Maybe I would give him a call, just for a chat.
Whatever the outcome in court, I was determined to make Daniel rue the day he underestimated me. Two could play at the lying game. It was turning out to be surprisingly simple and actually quite a lot of fun, now that I finally understood the rules.
A courtroom battle
Never confuse justice with law. Justice is an ideal, seldom attained by the tools of the law.
Grace
I stood tall in front of the full-length mirror, pulled back my shoulders and took a deep breath. This was it. The day to settle the score.
I was wearing a grey fitted dress from French Connection, knee-length and demure neckline, bought specially for the occasion. Plain black, suede court shoes and sheer, flesh-coloured tights, together with my favourite black, Mulberry handbag, added the finishing touches to my outfit. I had opted for minimal makeup, just a bit of blusher, mascara and a new nude lipstick. My hair was piled up in a neat bun, secured with a pearl clasp to match my pearl earrings and necklace. I took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, confident th
at I was portraying exactly the right image for the judge. I slipped on my timeless, Jaeger, camel coat, picked up the car keys and set off for court. There was no Lola to worry about, as my friend Sue was looking after her for the day. She would need to have her tomorrow as well if things dragged on as expected.
My phone pinged and there was a message from my brother.
Good luck for today. I’m sure everything will be fine. Text me when you get out.
There was a string of other messages wishing me luck on WhatsApp. I had spent most of the previous evening on the phone to my Mum and various other close friends, but there was nothing more I could do. My fate was now in the hands of one man, the illustrious Judge Barraclough. I was trying hard to remain optimistic, but I had heard a particularly irritating phrase rather too often from my solicitor recently:
‘There are no guarantees in litigation.’
In my opinion, that wasn’t strictly true. There was one cast-iron guarantee in litigation, namely that the whole entourage of solicitors and barristers would get their hefty fee, no matter whether I was hung out to dry or not. I prayed they were worth it.
Eleanor was waiting for me outside the court so that we could go in together. Safety in numbers. Anthony, my barrister, was already there in the little office assigned to us, doing his final preparations. He smiled reassuringly as I entered.
‘Don’t worry. You have a very good case and I intend to do everything in my power to get a good result for you. Judge Barraclough is a fair man with a lot of experience under his belt. I don’t believe he will tolerate any nonsense from Mr Callaghan today. It’ll be his turn for cross-examination first, so you don’t have to worry about going on the stand until this afternoon, maybe even tomorrow.’
My stomach was churning and I still felt anything but reassured.
Twenty Years a Stranger (The Stranger Series Book 1) Page 27