The Sculptress

by Minette Walters

  Roz switched off her tape-recorder and reached for her briefcase. ‘I suppose there’s no doubt that she did it.’

  He stared at her as if she had said something dirty. ‘None at all,’ he snapped. ‘What are you implying?’

  ‘It just occurs to me that a simple explanation for the discrepancy between the psychiatric evidence of Olive’s normality and the quite abnormal nature of the crime is that she didn’t do it but is covering for whoever did.’ She stood up and gave a small shrug in face of his tight-lipped expression. ‘It was just a thought. I agree it makes little sense, but nothing about this case makes much sense. I mean, if she really is a psychopathic murderess she wouldn’t have cared tuppence about putting her father through the mill of a trial. Thank you for your time, Mr Crew. I can see myself out.’

  He held up a hand to hold her back. ‘Have you read her statement, Miss Leigh?’

  ‘Not yet. Your office promised to send it to me.’

  He sorted through the file and took out some stapled sheets of paper. ‘This is a copy you may keep,’ he told her, passing the pages across the desk. ‘I urge you to read it before you go any further. It will persuade you, I think, as it persuaded me, of Olive’s guilt.’

  Roz picked up the papers. ‘You really don’t like her, do you?’

  His eyes hardened. ‘I have no feelings for her, one way or the other. I merely question society’s rationale in keeping her alive. She kills people. Don’t forget that, Miss Leigh. Good day to you.’

  It took Roz an hour and a half to drive back to her flat in London and for most of that time Crew’s words – She kills people – obscured all other thoughts. She took them out of context and wrote them large across the screen of her mind, dwelling on them with a kind of grim satisfaction.

  It was later, curled up in an armchair, that she realized the journey home was a complete blank. She had no recollection, even, of leaving Southampton, a city she wasn’t familiar with. She could have killed someone, crushing them under the wheels of her car, and she wouldn’t have been able to remember when or how it happened. She stared out of her sitting-room window at the dismal grey façades opposite, and she wondered quite seriously about the nature of diminished responsibility.

  Statement made by Olive Martin

  9.9.87 – 9.30 p.m.

  Present: DS Hawksley, DS Wyatt,

  E.P. Crew (Solicitor)

  My name is Olive Martin. I was born on 8th September, 1964. I live at 22 Leven Road, Dawlington, Southampton. I am employed as a clerk in the Department of Health and Social Security in Dawlington High Street. Yesterday was my birthday. I am twenty-three years old. I have always lived at home. My relationship with my mother and sister has never been close. I get on well with my father. I weigh eighteen and a half stone and my mother and sister have always teased me about it. Their nickname for me was Fattie-Hattie, after Hattie Jacques, the actress. I am sensitive to being laughed at for my size.

  Nothing was planned for my birthday and that upset me. My mother said I wasn’t a child any more and that I must organize my own treats. I decided to show her I was capable of doing something on my own. I arranged to have today off work with the idea of taking the train to London and spending the day sight-seeing. I did not organize the treat for yesterday, my birthday, in case she had planned a surprise for the evening which is what she did for my sister’s twenty-first birthday in July. She did not. We all spent the evening quietly watching television. I went to bed feeling very upset. My parents gave me a pale pink jumper for my birthday present. It was very unflattering and I didn’t like it. My sister gave me some new slippers which I did like.

  I woke up feeling nervous about going to London on my own. I asked Amber, my sister, to phone in sick and come with me. She has been working in Glitzy, a fashion boutique in Dawlington, for about a month. My mother got very angry about this and stopped her. We had an argument over breakfast and my father left for work in the middle of it. He is fifty-five and works three days a week, as a book-keeper for a private haulage company. For many years he owned his own garage. He sold it in 1985 because he had no son to take it over.

  The argument became very heated after he left, with my mother blaming me for leading Amber astray. She kept calling me Fattie and laughing at me for being too wet to go to London alone. She said I had been a disappointment to her from the day I was born. Her shouting gave me a headache. I was still very upset that she had done nothing for my birthday and I was jealous because she had given Amber a birthday party.

  I went to the drawer and took out the rolling pin. I hit her with it to make her be quiet, then I hit her again when she started screaming. I might have stopped then but Amber started screaming because of what I had done. I had to hit her too. I have never liked noise.

  I made myself a cup of tea and waited. I thought I had knocked them out. They were both lying on the floor. After an hour I wondered if they were dead. They were very pale and hadn’t moved. I know that if you hold a mirror to someone’s mouth and there is no mist on it afterwards it means they are dead. I used the mirror from my handbag. I held it to their mouths for a long time but there was no mist. Nothing.

  I became frightened and wondered how to hide the bodies. At first, I thought of putting them in the attic, but they were too heavy to carry upstairs. Then I decided the sea would be the best place as it’s only two miles from our house, but I can’t drive and, anyway, my father had taken the car. It seemed to me that if I could make them smaller I could fit them into suitcases and carry them that way. I have cut chickens into portions many times. I thought it would be easy to do the same thing with Amber and my mother. I used an axe that we kept in the garage and a carving knife from the kitchen drawer.

  It wasn’t at all like cutting up chickens. I was tired by two o’clock and I had only managed to take off the heads and the legs and three of the arms. There was a lot of blood and my hands kept slipping. I knew my father would be home soon and that I could never finish by then as I still had to carry the pieces to the sea. I realized it would be better to ring the police and admit what I had done. I felt much happier once I had made this decision.

  It never occurred to me to leave the house and pretend that someone else had done it. I don’t know why except that my mind was set on hiding the bodies. That’s all I thought about. I did not enjoy cutting them up. I had to undress them so I could see where the joints were. I did not know I’d mixed the pieces up. I rearranged them out of decency, but there was so much blood that I couldn’t tell which body was which. I must have put my mother’s head on Amber’s body by mistake. I acted alone.

  I am sorry for what I have done. I lost my temper and behaved stupidly. I confirm that everything written here is true.

  Signed – OLIVE MARTIN

  The statement was a photocopy, covering three typed sheets of A4. On the reverse of the last sheet was a photocopied extract from what was presumably the pathologist’s report. It was brief, just a concluding paragraph, and there was no indication to show who had written it.

  The injuries to the heads are entirely consistent with a blow or blows from a heavy solid object. These were inflicted before death and were not fatal. While there is no forensic evidence to suggest that the rolling pin was the weapon used, there is none to prove it wasn’t. Death in both cases was caused by severance of the carotid artery during the decapitation process. Examination of the axe revealed considerable rusting beneath the blood stains. It is highly probable that it was blunt before it was used to dismember the bodies. The extensive bruising around the cuts on Amber Martin’s neck and trunk indicate three or four strikes with an axe before the carving knife was used to cut the throat. It is unlikely that she ever regained consciousness. In Mrs Gwen Martin’s case, however, the lacerations to her hands and forearms, inflicted before death, are consistent with her regaining consciousness and trying to defend herself. Two stabbing incisions below the jawline imply two failed attempts before her throat was successfully cut with the kni
fe. These attacks were carried out with savage ferocity.

  Roz read the pages through then put them on the table beside her and stared into the middle distance. She felt very cold. Olive Martin took an axe . . . Oh, God! No wonder Mr Crew called her a psychopath. Three or four strikes with a blunted axe and Amber was still alive! Bile rose in her throat, nauseous, bitter, gagging. She must stop thinking about it. But she couldn’t, of course. The muffled thuds of metal bouncing off soft flesh boomed loudly in her brain. How dark and shadowy the flat was. She reached out abruptly and snapped on a table lamp but the light did nothing to dispel the vivid pictures that crowded her imagination, nightmare visions of a madwoman, frenzied by blood-lust. And the bodies . . .

  How far had she committed herself to writing this book? Had she signed anything? Had she received an advance. She couldn’t remember and a cold fist of panic squeezed her insides. She was living in a twilight world where so little mattered that day followed day with nothing to distinguish their passing. She thrust herself out of her chair and paced about the floor, cursing Iris for bouncing her, cursing herself for her own insanity, and cursing Mr Crew for not sending her the statement when she’d first written to him.

  She seized the telephone and dialled Iris’s number. ‘Have I signed anything on the Olive Martin book? Why? Because I damn well can’t write it, that’s why. The woman scares the bloody shit out of me and I am not visiting her again.’

  ‘I thought you liked her.’ Iris spoke calmly through a mouthful of supper.

  Roz ignored this comment. ‘I’ve got her statement here and the pathologist’s report, or his conclusions at least. I should have read them first. I’m not doing it. I will not glorify what she did by writing a book about it. My God, Iris, they were alive when she cut their heads off. Her poor wretched mother tried to ward off the axe. It’s making me sick just thinking about it.’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘OK what?’

  ‘Don’t write it.’

  Roz’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. ‘I thought you’d argue at least.’

  ‘Why? One thing I’ve learnt in this business is that you can’t force people to write. Correction. You can if you’re persistent and manipulative enough, but the result is always below par.’ Roz heard her take a drink. ‘In any case, Jenny Atherton sent me the first ten chapters of her new book this morning. It’s all good stuff on the inherent dangers of a poor self-image, with obesity as number one confidence crippler. She’s unearthed a positive goldmine of film and television personalities who’ve all sunk to untold depths since gaining weight and being forced off camera. It’s disgustingly tasteless, of course, like all Jenny’s books, but it’ll sell. I think you should send all your gen – sorry about the pun – to her. Olive would make rather a dramatic conclusion, don’t you think, particularly if we can get a photograph of her in her cell.’

  ‘No chance.’

  ‘No chance of getting a photograph? Shame.’

  ‘No chance of my sending anything to Jenny Atherton. Honestly, Iris,’ she stormed, losing her temper, ‘you really are beneath contempt. You should be working for the gutter press. You believe in exploiting anyone just as long as they bring in the cash. Jenny Atherton is the last person I’d allow near Olive.’

  ‘Can’t see why,’ said Iris, now chewing heartily on something. ‘I mean if you don’t want to write about her and you’re refusing ever to visit her again because she makes you sick, why cavil at somebody else having a bash?’

  ‘It’s the principle.’

  ‘Can’t see it, old thing. Sounds more like dog in the manger to me. Listen, I can’t dally. We’ve got people in. At least let me tell Jenny that Olive’s up for grabs. She can start from scratch. It’s not as though you’ve got very far, is it?’

  ‘I’ve changed my mind,’ Roz snapped. ‘I will do it. Goodbye.’ She slammed the receiver down.

  At the other end of the line, Iris winked at her husband. ‘And you accuse me of not caring,’ she murmured. ‘Now, what could have been more caring than that?’

  ‘Hobnailed boots,’ Gerry Fielding suggested acidly.

  Roz read Olive’s statement again. ‘My relationship with my mother and sister was never close.’ She reached for her tape-recorder and rewound the tape, flicking to and fro till she found the piece she wanted. ‘I called her Amber because, at the age of two, I couldn’t get my tongue round the “l” or the “s”. It suited her. She had lovely honey-blonde hair, and as she grew up she always answered to Amber and never to Alison. She was very pretty . . .’

  It meant nothing of course, in itself. There was no unwritten law that said psychopaths were incapable of pretending. Rather the reverse, in fact. But there was a definite softening of the voice when she spoke about her sister, a tenderness which from anyone else Roz would have interpreted as love. And why hadn’t she mentioned the fight with her mother? Really, that was very odd. It could well have been her justification for what she did that day.

  The chaplain, quite unaware that Olive was behind him, started violently as a large hand fell on his shoulder. It wasn’t the first time she had crept up on him and he wondered again, as he had wondered before, how she managed to do it. Her normal gait was a painful shuffle which set his teeth on edge every time he heard its approach. He steeled himself and turned with a friendly smile. ‘Why, Olive, how nice to see you. What brings you to the chapel?’

  The bald eyes were amused. ‘Did I frighten you?’

  ‘You startled me. I didn’t hear you coming.’

  ‘Probably because you weren’t listening. You must listen first if you want to hear, Chaplain. Surely they taught you that much at theological college. God talks in a whisper at the best of times.’

  It would be easier, he thought sometimes, if he could despise Olive. But he had never been able to. He feared and disliked her but he did not despise her. ‘What can I do for you?’

  ‘You had some new diaries delivered this morning. I’d like one.’

  ‘Are you sure, Olive? These are no different from the others. They still have a religious text for every day of the year and last time I gave you one you tore it up.’

  She shrugged. ‘But I need a diary so I’m prepared to tolerate the little homilies.’

  ‘They’re in the vestry.’

  ‘I know.’

  She had not come for a diary. That much he could guess. But what did she plan to steal from the chapel while his back was turned? What was there to steal except Bibles and prayer books?

  A candle, he told the Governor afterwards. Olive Martin took a six-inch candle from the altar. But she, of course, denied it, and though her cell was searched from top to bottom, the candle was never found.

  Three

  GRAHAM DEEDES WAS young, harassed, and black. He saw Roz’s surprise as she came into his room, and he frowned his irritation. ‘I had no idea black barristers were such a rarity, Miss Leigh.’

  ‘Why do you say that?’ she asked curiously, sitting down in the chair he indicated.

  ‘You looked surprised.’

  ‘I am, but not by your colour. You’re much younger than I expected.’

  ‘Thirty-three,’ he said. ‘Not so young.’

  ‘No, but when you were briefed to appear for Olive Martin you can only have been twenty-six or twenty-seven. That is young for a murder trial.’

  ‘True,’ he agreed, ‘but I was only the junior. The QC was considerably older.’

  ‘But you did most of the preparation?’

  He nodded. ‘Such as there was. It was a very unusual case.’

  She took her tape-recorder from her bag. ‘Have you any objections to being recorded?’

  ‘Not if you intend to talk about Olive Martin.’

  ‘I do.’

  He chuckled. ‘Then I’ve no objections, for the simple reason that I can tell you virtually nothing about her. I saw the woman once, on the day she was sentenced, and I never even spoke to her.’

  ‘But I understood you were preparing a dim
inished responsibility defence. Didn’t you meet her in the course of doing that?’

  ‘No, she refused to see me. I did all my work from material her solicitor sent me.’ He smiled ruefully. ‘Which wasn’t much, I have to say. We would, quite literally, have been laughed out of court if we’d had to proceed, so I was quite relieved when the judge ruled her guilty plea admissible.’

  ‘What arguments would you have used if you had been called?’

  ‘We planned two different approaches.’ Deedes considered for a moment. ‘One, that the balance of her mind was temporarily disturbed – as far as I recall it was the day after her birthday and she was deeply upset because instead of paying her attention the family teased her about being fat.’ He raised his eyebrows in query and Roz nodded. ‘In addition, I believe, she made a reference in her statement to not liking noise. We did manage to find a doctor who was prepared to give evidence that noise can cause such violent distress in some people that they may act out of character in trying to stop it. There was no psychiatric or medical evidence, however, to prove that Olive was of this type.’ He tapped his forefingers together. ‘Two, we were going to work backwards from the appalling savagery of the crime and invite the court to draw what we hoped to persuade them was an inescapable inference – that Olive was a psychopath. We hadn’t a cat’s chance on the balance of her mind argument, but the psychopathy’ – he made a see-saw motion with one hand – ‘maybe. We found a professor of psychology who was prepared to stick his neck out after seeing the photographs of the bodies.’

  ‘But did he ever talk to her?’

  He shook his head. ‘There wasn’t time and she wouldn’t have seen him anyway. She was quite determined to plead guilty. I assume Mr Crew told you that she wrote to the Home Office demanding an independent psychiatric report to prove that she was competent to plead?’ Roz nodded. ‘After that there was really nothing we could do. It was an extraordinary business,’ he mused. ‘Most defendants fall over themselves to come up with excuses.’