Struggles of Psycho

by Rhyam O'Bryam

  ‘And Ivy didn’t kill Mike?’

  ‘Of course not.’ McCarthy waved away the idea with a derisive gesture. ‘What? She made Philips brick her up in that wall? No way.’

  It was good to have a partner like McCarthy. My spirits lifted. Obviously, she was right and I should not have let Philips get into my head. ‘We need a clincher though.’

  ‘I know.’ McCarthy dropped heavily into a chair. ‘It’s a stupid story but I wouldn’t trust a jury with it.’

  ‘Ivy was odd.’ I looked over at McCarthy.

  ‘How so?’

  ‘She was upset, as though remembering the rape and the death of her brother.’

  ‘Ahh. Come on now, Doyle. Put yourself in her position. Listening to that crap. Of course she was upset. She was probably remembering her brother and mourning him.’

  ‘Shall we ask her?’

  ‘All right, but go easy on her.’

  In the debriefing room, Ivy was cupping a hot tea in her delicate fingers. Beside her, Ms Patterson looked frail and tired. When she saw us, however, she was hopeful. ‘Well? Did you learn anything?’

  McCarthy handled the answer. ‘Only that Philips is a good liar and will try to defend herself by creating doubt in the minds of the jury. She’ll suggest it was Ivy who killed Mike.’

  Mrs Patterson looked fierce now and shook her head.

  ‘Ivy,’ I sat opposite her. ‘Can you help us catch her out? Where are the inconsistencies in her story?’

  As though cold, Ivy left the cup on the table and rubbed her shoulders. ‘The wall. There’s no way I would have gone into that terrible hole unless I’d been forced to.’

  I nodded, with what I hoped was sympathy.

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. Lots of things.’

  I waited, but she did not elaborate.

  ‘You know, when she described your brother attacking you, you began to cry.’

  Ivy nodded. ‘You think it might be true?’

  ‘No, no. I believe you.’

  ‘Well, it was true.’ For a moment my heart leapt in panic, but then Ivy continued, ‘Years earlier. She made Mike do it and I forgave him afterwards. But that’s how Philips works. She makes her lies out of truths. And just now she described a scene that she knew would trigger a response in me.’

  All at once I was flooded with relief and my reservations, which I had clearly been holding on to despite saying otherwise, fell away, leaving me with absolute faith in Ivy.

  ‘We still need something for the jury,’ said McCarthy, a touch too candidly for my taste. I frowned. ‘There must be a way they can decided between your story and hers.’

  Ivy just shook her head. ‘I don’t know. I can’t think straight.’

  Her mother put her arm around her and gave me a look of concern.

  ‘Don’t worry. We’ll find something. You go back to the hotel and rest.’

  ‘I’ll arrange a lift,’ added McCarthy.

  Back in my office I took out two sheets of paper. On one I wrote “Philips” and on the other, “Ivy”. Then I carefully drew up a timeline on each, going over my notes and making sure to put every detail down. What were the material differences? Fingerprints on the knitting needle. Wiped. The amount of blood on the carpet? There was something in that. In Ivy’s version, more blood was collected to fake the scene than in that of Philips. I’d get on to forensics with that question, but deep down I knew it wouldn’t be enough to sway a jury.

  And then I had it. Philips had made a mistake in her account. It was a mistake she could rectify, so I had to be careful not to alert her or her lawyer. I’d have to rely on the testimony of the pathologist, rather than the more satisfactory photo evidence, which Philips would get to see before she took the stand.

  Picking up the phone, I left a message with the pathologist who had examined Mike’s body. When she rang me back later that afternoon I felt a pleasurable glow run through me. I had what I needed.

  The publicity around the case was exactly as the DPP had predicted and then some. I have to say that I enjoyed being the hero who had rescued the beautiful heroine just in the nick of time. As per our protocol, I never strayed from the statements prepared for me by the PR consultants. All the same, off the record, I had a lot of communications, phone calls mostly and some emails. Most of them, especially the journalists, I did not reply to, but my colleagues who rang to congratulate me wanted more details and I was happy to supply them.

  The frenzy really became a hurricane around the trial itself, with the tabloids relishing the idea that a BDSM club operated out of a Wexford farm. The castle was featured in a dozen news programmes, with a camera crew even coming from Germany to cover the case.

  I attended every day, of course, but not in a formal role. The clerk made sure I had a seat in the front row of the public gallery. Fortunately, the trial was heard in one of the new courts in Smithfield, because there would have been crowds turned away from the old wooden courtrooms in the Four Courts. As it was, not everyone with an interest got a seat. The walls were lined with journalists leaning against them.

  Considering that Brian Healy had cut such a miserable figure in the police station, constantly being hectored and overridden by Philips, I was surprised how well he did for her in court. Despite the best efforts of the prosecuting team to cut down on speculation and conjecture, he did manage to build up in the minds of the jury a scenario in which Ivy killed her brother and he made it sound plausible. Even some of the journalists must have had second thoughts about the case because the tone of the coverage, which had more or less assumed Philip’s guilt, while throwing in “allegedly” to cover themselves, became more nuanced and cautious. No one wanted a libel case.

  The crucial moment came on day six, when Amy Philips was in the stand and facing Marion Whyte, the state’s prosecutor. I had been admiring Philip’s performance. It was extremely good, consistent, well thought out. Perhaps a little cold, because she could never act distressed or upset with any realism, but good enough to cast reasonable doubt. She knew it too and would sometimes risk a look in my direction. A look that had a flash in them that told me she was gloating. It was easy to imagine her planning ahead, to what she would do to avenge herself on Ivy once the jury had failed to reach a decision.

  After a few exploratory questions, Whyte asked, ‘You say you hit Michael Patterson hard with a whip?’

  Philips paused, licked her lips and saw the trap. I was holding my breath. ‘Not all that hard, actually.’

  ‘But you said earlier, “I was furious with him for hurting Ivy and for being so ignorant of her feelings. So I let it out with a blow that made him scream”. You made him scream?’

  ‘He yelled. But then again, he was very sensitive.’

  ‘Is this the whip?’ Whyte held up an evidence bag. We had submitted all the BDSM equipment found on the farm as evidence, in the hope that the significance of this particular item would be hidden. And so it must have been, because Philips visibly blanched, her jowls fell and the silence grew. Her problem was that the whip was a vicious-looking one and even a half-hearted blow from it would have left clear marks on the body. Marks that the pathologist would testify were not present on Michael Patterson’s body.

  The silence lengthened. At last Philips spoke. ‘No. Not that one. A small one. More a rod.’

  ‘Is that rod present among these exhibits?’

  ‘No, I threw it in the river, along with the X-frame.’

  Whyte gave her opportunity to say more, but when Philips remained quiet, simply said, ‘I see,’ in a voice that suggested she saw only too well that Philips was lying.

  And that was the turning point. Never again as poised and confident, it was clear that Philips was upset by that trap. And really, it was a clumsy mistake. There had been no need to say that she’d hit Michael Patterson with the whip. But she loved her own stories and the details she’d supplied in those long hours of interviews must have felt convincing to her.

&n
bsp; Whyte was very good, of course and hammered home the issue. The jury knew full well that Philips had lied about whipping Michael and if she had lied about that, then her entire story looked so much weaker than that of Ivy. For her part, Ivy did enough. Much more hesitant than Philips, and at times clearly ashamed and blushing as the questions veered to details about the blackmail pictures and her sexual relationship with Philips, Ivy was strong enough at the important moments and even without the evidence of the pathologist, her account of being forced into the cavity in the wall was moving enough that the jury might have returned a “guilty” verdict in any case.

  As it was, they took only five hours to return and I was never in any doubt about the result. Nor was Philips. I was watching her as the jury spokesperson said the word, ‘Guilty,’ and she didn’t look at all surprised. In fact, she turned her head in my direction and although there was pain and defeat in her expression, there was also a faint tip of her head, as though we had shared a good game of chess together.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Seven months after the trial, I met McCarthy, coming out of the gym, face flushed red, hair held back with a thick sports band. She smiled, obviously pleased to see me.

  ‘Got all you need for the weekend?’ She glanced at the two large carriers I had, one in each hand, that contained boxes of cans of beer.

  ‘It’s for the barbeque.’

  ‘Ahh, here there. Let me help.’

  I didn’t object, they were heavy and it was a relief to be able to heft one bag on both hands. With only the slightest indication that this was an effort for her, McCarthy fell in with me and we crossed the car park to my car.

  After dropping the bags into the boot, I offered her a lift.

  ‘That’s me, over there,’ she gestured towards an old Ford Focus. She turned to go, then paused. ‘What did you think of the sentence for Amy Philips?’

  ‘Too short. She could be out in seven years.’

  ‘Exactly my feeling too. It’s a shame the judge didn’t hear everything we had on tape, or he’d have seen the need to keep her in as long as possible. I think she’ll be a danger again, especially to Ivy.’

  ‘If she finds her.’

  ‘She will. She’s smart and she won’t let go.’

  I sighed. ‘You’re probably right.’

  ‘Still, let’s not be glum.’ McCarthy gave me a thump on the shoulder. ‘You are the nation’s hero and Philips is out of the way for a long time.’

  ‘Out of sight, but not out of mind.’ I tapped my head.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘She’s in here. All that talk. All those lies. I’ve never met anyone like her and she’s got into my head. I have dreams with Philips in them, smiling, mocking me, like she knows something I don’t.’

  ‘I know what you mean, Doyle, but trust me. A few more cases, plenty more beers and you’ll have forgotten her.’

  I gave McCarthy a smile, but I knew it wasn’t true. Philips had changed me. Even when off duty, I found myself watching people more and judging them, judging the stories they were telling. It now seemed to me that no one ever quite told the truth, even when being sincere. There was always a slight twist, a new colouration to the anecdote and I just knew that if I could see myself in the mirror at those moments, I’d have the cynical, knowing expression on my face that I’d acquired from Philips.

  Still, cynicism suited me, suited my work. Perhaps it was no bad thing.

  I watched McCarthy reverse her car out of its bay and waved to her when she gave me a beep. Now there was someone who would never sink into misanthropy. McCarthy was brash, direct and so focused on getting on with things that psychology held no interest for her. And that spirit, I thought, getting into my BMW, was exactly what I needed more of in my life.

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