by Crin Claxton
Like some sick tug-of-war, Somers began to gain control of the hammer. Tony clenched her jaw and held on to the hammerhead for dear life.
Suddenly, Somers stopped pulling.
Tony fell to the ground. She fell by an open bedroom doorway. She glanced inside.
Rose was crumpled on the floor.
Tony froze as the hammer came down.
At the last moment, she put both hands over her head.
The hammer smashed into her hands.
Agony. Tony was in agony.
The hammer crashed down again, and again.
Desperate now, she forced herself to her knees, and up.
She went for Somers, not caring what he did with the hammer. She clenched her right hand and punched as hard as she could.
Somers reeled back. He looked shocked. For a second, the hammer dangled from his arm. He rubbed his jaw.
Then rage filled his eyes and he swung the hammer again.
Tony was dimly aware of crashing noises and people shouting, but all she cared about was Somers. She rushed him.
He fell.
People thundered into the flat. Her arms were wrenched behind her back, and she was forced to the ground.
Face flat against the carpet, Tony took ragged breaths. Her heart thumped in her throat. Dizzy and nauseous, Tony barely made sense of a male voice growling in her right ear. “I’m arresting you on suspicion of grievous bodily harm. You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defense if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence. Do you understand?”
Tony didn’t understand. She didn’t understand at all. How were the police there? Could she even be sure it was the police?
She was hauled to her feet, her arms were pulled together in front of her, and handcuffs were snapped on each wrist.
Tony panted and blinked. She counted four policemen in the tiny hallway. Two were on either side of her, one was bending over Somers, and the other hovered near the doorway.
Ron Somers had reverted to frail old man. He was lying on the ground, breathing heavily.
“Oh, oh,” he groaned. “My hip hurts. Help me up, mate. I need to get to my friend, Rose. She’s in the bedroom.”
“No, no. Stay there.” The policeman’s voice was soft with concern. “The ambulance is on its way.” He turned to his colleagues flanking Tony. He glared up at her with disgust. “Get that piece of crap out of my sight.”
Tony was jerked toward the door. She walked stiffly with her hands in cuffs. The policemen marched her down the stairs and out the main door.
Police cars were parked haphazardly on the street, their blue lights silently flashing in the dark.
“I hate scum like you,” the constable on her right mouthed in Tony’s ear as they walked. “Attacking old people in their own homes. You make me sick.” He pulled her sharply toward the nearest vehicle.
A small crowd of onlookers had gathered near the cars. Tony kept her eyes facing front. She was horribly worried about Rose. She needed to figure out what had happened and how she was going to sort it all out with the police.
A hand bent her head down. She was pushed into the backseat, and the door slammed behind her. She closed her eyes and concentrated on not throwing up, as the police car pulled away.
Chapter Ten
“Name?”
The desk sergeant was probably a dyke. At least she looked to Tony like a dyke. Tony wondered if she’d be the best person to talk to.
“Tony Carson.”
“Address?” The sergeant barely looked at Tony as she gave her address. If she felt any solidarity, it wasn’t apparent. The arresting officer’s eyes were boring into Tony’s back, however. She glanced at him. He stared at her coldly.
“Date of birth?”
“Fifteenth of March, 1973.”
The arresting officer fell about laughing. “What a joker. If you want to give false information, give a false address, fool. What’s that? Your mother’s date of birth?”
Tony and the desk sergeant frowned at him.
He ignored Tony, but sobered up when he saw his sergeant’s expression. “What? You don’t find that funny? He thinks we’re going to think he’s…” The constable tailed off as he did the maths. “Forty-two,” he said a good three minutes later.
The sergeant’s eyes flicked to Tony. They flicked away before any real contact could be made. “She’s a woman,” she said quietly.
The constable pulled Tony round to face him and then dragged her under a light. He scrutinized her face for a couple of minutes. “Why didn’t you say you were a woman?” he said sharply, as if it was her fault. “Take off your belt.”
Pain shot through Tony’s hands as she fumbled with her belt. Eventually, she handed it to the officer.
“Empty your pockets.” The sergeant waved toward a container on the desk. She was looking at Tony sharply.
Tony tried to appeal to her: “Look, it isn’t just my gender you’ve got wrong. Let me explain.”
“You’ll get your chance to explain. Just empty your pockets.” The sergeant clearly wasn’t giving Tony any special concessions for being on the same team. Maybe she wasn’t a lesbian anyway.
Tony plonked her wallet, keys, mobile phone, and loose change into the container.
A female constable stepped up to her. “Arms out to the side.” She patted her down and then ran a metal detector down her torso and legs. Tony had been searched at the airport when she’d walked through the detector with keys in her pocket. It felt more degrading somehow at the police station.
“You’ve got it all wrong,” she said.
“You have the right to free and independent legal advice, be it in person or on the telephone,” the desk sergeant said.
“I don’t think I need it. Let me tell you what happened.”
The sergeant took a breath. “Save it for the interview,” she said firmly. “You need to listen to your rights.”
Tony looked at her. Her head hurt.
“You can have someone informed of your detention. You can consult the codes of practice book which informs you about your rights whilst detained. Have you drunk alcohol or taken drugs in the last twenty-four hours?”
Tony shook her head.
“Do you have any medical conditions? Do you consent to samples being taken? Are you feeling unwell? Have you got any injuries?”
Tony half tuned out of the series of questions the sergeant fired at her, nodding or shaking her head appropriately. She considered telling them her hands and head hurt, but she just wanted to get to the interview and explain.
“Hold your hands out like this.” The arresting officer stretched his hands out, separating his fingers.
Tony copied his actions stiffly. He swabbed her hands and then put the swab in a clear plastic bag.
“Move it,” he said.
He walked Tony into a small room and gestured toward a chair.
She sat down and rested her fingertips on the wood-colored Formica tabletop in front of her. There was nothing on the table but a piece of paper with her rights on it, and a square black tape recorder. The rest of the room was bare. There were no notices on the scuffed, pale green walls and no other furniture apart for the table and three hard, gray plastic chairs. In the center of one wall was a large window that Tony guessed, from watching cop shows on TV, was a one-way mirror. She looked toward it and then quickly away. She doubted she was a high profile enough arrest to have anyone behind it observing her, but you never knew.
The door opened. A white, middle-aged man in a charcoal suit came into the room. His graying, sandy hair was cut close. He had dark circles under his eyes, a ruddy complexion, and he needed a shave. He was carrying a buff folder. He sat in the third chair and unwrapped a blank disc. He took it out of its case and put it into the tape recorder. He inserted two more discs and then switched on the machine.
“For the benefit of the recording, my name is Detectiv
e Sergeant Paul Ashton. This is ten p.m. on the fifteenth of July, 2014, at Belsize Police Station. You do not have to say anything. But it may harm your defense if you do not mention when questioned something which you may later rely on in court. Anything you say may be given in evidence. You are currently under arrest on suspicion of aggravated burglary. You may seek legal advice at any time. Do you understand?”
Tony nodded. She hadn’t asked for a lawyer yet. She was sure she could get it all straightened out by explaining what had really happened.
“Say it aloud, please.”
“Yes,” Tony said. Her voice sounded weird.
“Do you want legal advice?” Ashton asked her.
“No.”
“Do you have any reasons for not wanting it?”
Tony was confused. “Why? Do you think I need it?”
“That’s up to you. Do you want it?”
Tony sighed and shook her head. “No.”
“State your name, date of birth, and address for the recording.”
Tony recited her details again.
Detective Ashton looked at her briefly before reading a sheet inside the folder. “So what’s a forty-two-year-old woman doing breaking into old people’s houses? Looking for cash, were you? Got a habit?”
“No,” Tony said, trying to sit up straight. Something about the chair and the light and the bare room made her want to curl over and avoid their eyes. She knew she hadn’t done anything wrong, but she felt guilty anyway. “You’ve got it wrong. I didn’t break into Rose’s flat.”
“You know her then?”
“Yes, I know Rose Henderson. Well, I know her a bit. I didn’t break in. I—”
“So she let you in because she knew you,” Detective Ashton interrupted her. “Technically, it’s not breaking and entering; it’s entering by deception. Doesn’t make much difference. It’s still attempted burglary, but that isn’t the worst thing anyway. The thing you’re going to do time for is attacking those frail old people.”
“Frail! He’s not frail.”
Ashton looked at her with disgust. “You’re a real piece of work, aren’t you?”
The constable pulled his chair closer to her. “That old man’s at the hospital right now. It’s touch-and-go.”
Tony pulled back and shut her mouth. What was going on? She remembered launching herself at Somers. God. Had she really hurt him? Did he hit his head on the way down? She remembered a look of triumph in his cunning old eyes just before she was marched out of the hallway. Maybe he’d collapsed after she’d left. She glanced at both the policemen. They were looking at her like she was evil.
She swallowed. “How is Rose?”
The policemen exchanged a look.
“You take the biscuit, mate,” the constable said.
“No, that’s actually good,” Ashton said. “She’s feeling guilty.” He leaned across the table. “How do you think she is, after what you did to her?”
Tony blanched.
“I don’t think she’s going to make it,” Ashton said.
“Look, I didn’t attack Rose. Please listen to me. I’m sure this is all to do with a crime Ron Somers committed when he was working in Holloway.”
“What?” Ashton sat back. He glanced at the officer next to Tony.
“He killed a prisoner called Frankie White. Or at least he let her die.”
Ashton folded his arms and clenched his jaw. “What a pile of crap. Ron Somers worked with my dad. He was a straight-up bloke. No way he’d do something like that.” He put his hands on the tabletop and bent across until his face was inches away from Tony’s. “They got me out of bed to take this case on account my dad worked with Somers. Somers asked for me specially when he called it in. That was when he heard you ransacking the place and beating up that old lady.” He stabbed a finger toward Tony’s face. “And just before you turned on him.”
Tony had a bad feeling it wasn’t going to get sorted out quickly at all.
“I want a lawyer,” she said. She sat back in her chair, trying to look confident.
The policemen exchanged a look.
“Solicitor. You’re not in America.” Ashton slammed the buff folder shut and snatched it off the table. “Take her to a cell,” he growled.
*
The legal aid solicitor, Daniel Solomon, sat next to Tony. He looked like he had talked to a lot of criminals in his time. Tony wondered if he had been full of youthful exuberance and lofty ideals when he started out. Impossibly, he looked more tired than Detective Ashton. They faced off against each other across the table like two old bears. Tony supposed that made her the bit of salmon lying on the forest floor.
Tony’s hands hurt and her face smarted. She had no idea what time it was, but guessed it was sometime in the early hours of the morning. She’d asked, but no one had told her how Rose was. She hadn’t appeared to Tony again, which she hoped was a good sign.
Daniel Solomon cleared his throat. “My client has explained to me that she went to see”—he glanced at the sheet of paper in front of him—“Rose Henderson and was attacked by Ron Somers there.”
“That’s a load of rubbish. Remind your client that Mr. Somers is sixty-five years old.”
“He’s very strong,” Tony said.
Dan Solomon turned to her. “You don’t have to reply. In fact, it’s sometimes better to think before replying.”
“All this has got to do with his confession. I just know it has,” Tony said.
“I’ve spoken to Ron Somers about that alleged confession. He doesn’t know anything about it. He says you’re lying.”
“Well, of course he would. That doesn’t matter. I have the confession as a sound file,” Tony said.
Ashton scanned his eyes over the custody record sheet. “You can play it to me. Is it on your phone? There’s no MP3 player or memory stick here.”
“It’s at home, on my laptop.”
“So how did Mr. Somers know about it then?” Ashton asked.
“I don’t know. I didn’t tell him. I didn’t know who he was until…” Tony realized she couldn’t say how she knew he was Somers. “Later,” she finished.
Ashton flicked his eyes toward the arresting officer who was sitting apart from them on a fourth chair pressed up against the wall. “It’s a load of old cobblers, isn’t it? You’re making it all up. Ron Somers has an exemplary service record. I don’t believe he would have had anything to do with the death of a prisoner. Why have you got it in for him? How do you even know him?”
“I was asked to look into the death of Frankie White. She was a prisoner in Holloway.”
Dan Solomon sat upright. “Okay, I see, so when did Ms. White die?”
“Nineteen sixty-seven.”
The policemen looked at her for a second then they both burst into laughter. Even Solomon looked doubtfully at Tony. “That’s a long time ago.”
“Yes. It’s like a, what is it called, a cold case,” Tony said.
“It’s not a cold case. It’s not a cold case at all. We haven’t got any open case on, what’s her name?” Ashton said quickly.
Solomon looked at his notes. “Frankie White. Maybe you should check.”
Ashton didn’t look happy. “Well, you know what? That’s not what I’m here for. I’m here to find out why she”—he pointed at Tony—“why she broke into an old lady’s flat and beat two old people up.”
“I didn’t break in. Somers was already there.”
“That’s a lie. He disturbed you trashing the place, after you’d beaten up the old lady. That’s when he called us.” Ashton glared at her.
Somers must have called the police while he said he was looking for nails. Tony was tired and frustrated. “I wish you’d just let me explain. Ron Somers is the subject of the case I’m on.”
“Case? What do you mean case?”
“Are you an investigator?” Dan Solomon asked.
“Yes, I am,” Tony said.
“And you hadn’t established this?” Dan Solomon sa
id to Ashton.
His eyes narrowed. “What are you, ex-prison service?” Ashton asked.
Tony shook her head.
“You’re not police. You don’t know anything. Ex-military?”
Tony shook her head again.
Ashton folded his arms. “Oh God, don’t tell me you’re a bloody amateur detective. Have you got a license?”
“No.”
“Well, you’re going to need one soon. Shame I can’t nick you for that right now. Amateur bloody detectives. If there’s one thing I hate more than ex-forces playing private detective, it’s bloody amateurs. No wonder you cocked this up. Right. Still doesn’t explain why you attacked the old lady, but I’m guessing you were after Somers. Trying to lean on him, were you? Got a bit heavy?”
“Let’s talk about the alleged assault on Ron Somers, and come back to the alleged assault on Rose Henderson,” Dan Solomon interjected. He had an unemotional voice. Tony found it very soothing. “First of all, what is the health status of Ron Somers? You said you’ve spoken to him. So he’s conscious, and able to talk?”
Ashton glanced quickly at the arresting officer. “He’s currently on an observation ward,” the officer said.
Solomon turned to him. “What’s he being observed for?”
“Signs of ill health,” the officer said defensively.
Ashton groaned.
“So, he’s not currently showing any signs of ill health?” Solomon pressed him.
The officer looked at Ashton.
“What was he admitted for?” Solomon asked.
“He said he had chest pains, and his hip hurt, and he was feeling dizzy and weak. He’s sixty-five.” The officer shot Tony a look.
“So, what did they find on examination?”
The officer looked at Ashton again. Ashton coughed. “It’s unclear at this time what the extent of Ron Somers’s injuries are.”
“I was defending myself. He attacked me,” Tony said.
“With a hammer? It was just lying around at Miss Henderson’s was it?” Ashton said.
“It was in a toolbox, in a kitchen cupboard.”
The officers laughed.
“It was. He was there when I got there. He said someone had broken in and attacked Rose, and she had gone to hospital. He asked me to help him fix her front door.”