by James Nally
He led the way, shoulders slumped, head down.
I pinned him against the outside wall, shouted into his wincing face.
‘I’ll have the truth about you and Eve later. Right now, I want the truth about you and Shep, starting at the Feathers.’
Chapter 37
Clapham Police Station, South London
Sunday, August 18, 1991; 11:00
My entrance silenced the incident room. Being last in didn’t help. Trust me to have my first good sleep in years at a murder scene. And Fintan had a lot to tell me.
‘Glad you could join us, Lynch,’ Shep said drily.
‘Sorry Guv, domestic thing.’
I sought somewhere to perch and felt all eyes on me.
He’d turn the team against me now, for sure – if he hadn’t already done so. I’d served my purpose. He was ready to dish me up. I told myself to box clever for once. If I threw my one big shot too early, he could evade it and destroy me. I had to bide my time.
‘I’ve already told the team that the Commissioner has announced a full investigation into how the Sunday News and more specifically, your brother, got hold of Karen’s latest statement and the wedding video,’ he announced.
I hated myself for reddening. I wanted to tell everyone it was anger, not shame.
Shep eyed me coldly.
‘Just to reiterate, we will find out who did this, and that person or those people will never work for the Met police again. As I’m sure you can appreciate, Lynch, this is the last thing we need right now.’
I stood up. Shep squinted, Dirty Harry-style, at the punk not making his day.
‘I am not the source of this story,’ I said clearly. ‘I’ve never passed information to my brother about any case. Think about it. Everyone knows he’s a crime reporter. It would be career suicide.’
Had I got photographs of Shep and Fintan coming out of the Roundhouse pub yesterday, I would have produced them, there and then. As it stood, the only person who could corroborate what I saw was that taxi driver. I scolded myself for not making a note of his driver ID number. All I knew about him was that he was fat, bald, Cockney, objectionable and grasping which, when it came to black cab drivers in London, didn’t exactly narrow it down. I’d pop over to the rank later today, try to trace him. If I was to be the fall guy, I’d do all I could to take Shep down with me.
Shep now adopted a lighter tone: ‘On the plus side, the story has made our lawyer have a re-think. That, and a call from the Commissioner. So our legal eagles are re-examining our evidence against Karen Foster this morning. In the meantime, Laura Foster is in suite three, waiting to be interviewed. Let’s see what we can squeeze out of her.’
As the prime suspect in Leakgate, I didn’t bother asking permission to observe Laura Foster’s interview. Rather than give Shep the pleasure of saying no, I tracked him at distance down that long corridor to the interview suites. As he punched in the secret code to the security door and heaved it open himself, I realised I wouldn’t beat the slam unless I ran. If Shep caught me, he’d send me back – but I’d nothing left to lose.
I launched into a Penelope Pitstop-style series of silent, high-speed, extra-long paces. I felt ridiculous but I caught the door an inch shy of shutting. I expected Shep to turn round at any moment, but he didn’t. Blinkered Olympian speed-walking had proven his downfall again, just as it had when I’d followed him to the Roundhouse pub yesterday.
I followed him into the observation room, took a seat and ignored his lighthouse glare.
The beauty of a two-way mirror is you can stare all you like. Laura Foster was worth a good look. Slim, with lightning blue eyes, she had a pretty, sculpted face and a lithe body – a real beauty. How Karen must have resented her sister’s outrageous good fortune in the genetics lottery.
She wore textbook South London clothing – faded jeans torn at the knees, tight white t-shirt, a chunky gold necklace and a pair of trendy, box-fresh trainers.
The only let down was her voice: like Karen, she spoke in a nasal and whiney monotone.
She sat alongside a podgy man in a tight suit who busied himself with stationery and kept telling her that everything was going to be okay. He looked far more nervous than she did. Just like Karen – and Peter Ryan, for that matter – Laura seemed oblivious to the gravity of the situation. You’d think they got quizzed about a murder every few weeks. I didn’t know whether to put their collective ambivalence down to arrogance, guilt or just plain ignorance.
Mick and Colin burst in, all-business. They sat down and began reading material without saying a word. I saw Laura glancing sideways at her solicitor. He raised his eyebrows as if to say: ‘Fucked if I know.’
This was it: our one-and-only chance to nail Laura. She had lied consistently to protect Karen, and possibly to avoid incriminating herself. One thing was certain: Laura knew a lot more than she was saying about Marion Ryan’s murder. But we had nothing on her. Unless she slipped up now, or broke down and confessed, she’d walk out of here for the last time. She could even get her sister off the hook, if she put on a good show.
After what seemed an age, Mick put his papers down and whistled lightly, as if to say: ‘I’ve got all I need now.’ Without signal, Colin turned on the tape recorder, announcing the time and guests.
Mick opened with the afternoon of the murder. Just like her older sister, Laura couldn’t remember any of the boutiques they’d browsed in Blackheath. They’d clearly thought it through: shops have CCTV.
Laura repeated her alibi as if by rote: returned to the Pines after five, met Bethan Trott in the communal kitchen, watched TV until six when Karen left to service the home’s fish tanks with Peter. They let her regurgitate the entire story, confidently and at length, without mentioning that it had now been completely discredited by the only independent witness – Bethan Trott. I hoped that, sometime soon, a jury would get to decide which of these young women was telling the truth.
Mick tried a fresh tack: ‘Have you ever been to Marion’s flat, Laura?’
She shook her head.
‘The client has shaken her head to indicate a negative to the question. It’s better if you speak, Laura, so that we can get it on tape.’
‘No,’ she said, sullenly.
‘No what, Laura,’ sighed Mick.
‘No, I’ve never been to Marion’s flat.’
‘Do you know where it is, Laura?’
‘It’s in Clapham somewhere.’
‘And how do you know that?’
‘How do you think I know?’ she sneered, then screwed up her face in disbelief at the question. ‘Karen used to go there all the time, to see Marion and Peter.’
Colin sprang to his feet, spun away and prowled the top of the room. He composed himself, sat back down and took over.
‘Karen’s obsessed with Peter Ryan, isn’t she, Laura?’
‘No, she isn’t.’
‘She moved out of your family home and into staff accommodation at the Pines a month before his wedding to Marion, didn’t she, Laura?’
‘Yes but …’
‘In a last-ditch attempt to win Peter Ryan, wasn’t it?’
‘No.’
‘To stalk Peter, spy on Peter, tempt Peter.’
Laura’s face reddened.
‘No.’
‘So that Peter could have her any time he felt like it.’
‘No,’ shouted Laura, ‘she moved out because of my dad.’
‘Oh come along now, Laura. You don’t expect us to believe that.’
‘My dad, when he gets drunk, he can get … aggressive.’
‘Really? The police haven’t been called to your home. Doesn’t sound like the violent type to me?’
‘He’s different when he’s drunk. He’s attacked us all, loads of times.’
‘Attacked?’ sneered Colin.
‘Karen used to stand up to him, to protect me and Stacey. That’s when he turns into an animal and beats the hell out of her, smashing her head into the wall and al
l sorts. When she got a chance to move into a room she could afford, we persuaded her to go for it. By then, me and Stacey were old enough to look after ourselves. Sometimes, when Dad’s drinking, I go and stay with Karen. I’ve got a spare key.’
Shep got to his feet and walked to the glass. ‘I wonder what else Karen had to protect her pretty little sister from? Their dad, Terry, probably wasn’t attracted to Karen, so moved straight on to Laura. I’ve seen it before. That’d partly explain Karen’s crippling insecurity, and Laura’s blind loyalty. Lynch, as soon as we’re finished here, call up Terry Foster’s previous, and find out if social services have taken an interest.’
As usual, Colin and Mick seemed to be thinking along the same lines.
‘So, you’d describe yourself as a loyal sister?’ asked Colin.
‘Yeah, of course,’ she said, frowning in disdain at the question.
‘She took a few beatings for you, did she, Laura?’
‘Yeah, quite a few actually.’
‘It’s fair to say you feel a sense of debt to Karen for this?’
Laura nodded.
‘Can you please speak?’
‘Yes I do.’
‘So when she asked you to come with her, to confront Marion, you weren’t really in a position to say no, were you, Laura?’
‘Like I said, I’ve never been to Marion’s home.’
‘You thought she was only going to tell Marion about the affair, maybe scare her a little. But then it all got out of hand, didn’t it, Laura?’
‘No comment,’ said Laura. I noticed she wasn’t looking at Colin or Mick now. She’d picked a spot on the far side of the room and was focusing on that. I’d read about this in one of my correspondence classes: a classic anti-interrogation technique, used by IRA suspects and the like. It made her look as guilty as sin. But no jury would ever see this – only sound was being recorded.
‘And now you’re going to get done for murder as well, Laura, as an accessory. You know why, because you’re not taking this chance to tell us the truth? What do you say to that, Laura?’
‘No comment,’ she said, unblinking, spectral.
They needed to get her talking again, or all was lost.
‘Well guess what, we know the truth. We’ve got evidence putting you at the scene.’
Laura’s stare faltered for just a nanosecond, then refroze.
‘You’ll go down for life, Laura, don’t you understand? Twelve years in Holloway prison. That’s what you’re facing. Is that what you want?’
‘No comment,’ said Laura.
Colin sat back and took a deep breath. Shep pressed his forehead against the two-way. ‘This is it,’ he said to the glass, ‘last throw of the dice.’
Colin began gently: ‘You know what they hate most in prison, Laura? Nonces. You know, paedophiles, child molesters, perverts who target children. Did you know that?’
‘No comment.’
‘Do you know what they hate most after nonces, Laura? They hate child killers. Especially people who kill really young kids.’
Laura just glared at that spot, her brain in auto-focus.
‘You did know Marion was pregnant, Laura?’
She stiffened, then shivered, losing her focus spot on the wall. This was it: if she was ever going to break, it would be now.
After a series of sharp breaths, Laura turned to her solicitor and whispered something.
He spoke up. ‘My client is feeling unwell and would like some fresh air. And I really must object to this tone of questioning.’
Mick told the tape recorder the news and shut it down.
‘Fuck,’ screamed Shep, butting the glass, ‘that’s all our ammo gone. She’s never gonna break now.’
A uniformed WPC walked into the suite and signalled to Laura and the solicitor to come with her. The solicitor ushered Laura to the door first. It was then that I spotted just how garish her trainers were. They had a quirky blue and green, cross-strap design on the side that reached above the ankle and bright green soles. I’d only been off the streets a few weeks but I’d never seen a pair like it, even at our Nike trainer identification seminar last year. I couldn’t help thinking: what delicious irony if she got stabbed for them.
I walked out to the corridor just as Laura was being led past. I took a closer look at her shoes: they were Nike, but not the much-stabbed-for Air Jordans. The WPC led them to the security door that divided the interview suites from the main block. Laura’s idea of fresh air clearly meant a Superking in the car park. The WPC hit the green release button, pulled the tightly-sprung door open towards her and walked through, making just a token effort to hold it for Laura.
Feeling the weight of the door, Laura instinctively turned her back against it to keep it open and signalled for her solicitor to walk through next. But he was lumpen, meaning that Laura needed to push the door back further so that he could get past. She achieved this by planting the sole of her trainer against the door and pushing her foot back. While doing this, she turned and looked directly at me.
The case rewound before my eyes, to a soundtrack of the door of 21 Sangora Road slamming shut, over and over. ‘Oh my God,’ I said out loud.
I turned and chased Shep, already galloping towards the kitchenette.
‘We’ve got to ask her about her trainers, Guv,’ I said. He looked at me with withering contempt.
‘Look, Lynch, our case is falling apart in there …’
‘Please, Guv, I’m serious. Just get them to ask her where she got them. Please, you’ve got to trust me on this.’
‘Jesus, Lynch,’ sighed Shep, shaking his head, ‘this better be good.’
Back in the interview suite, before switching on the tape recorder, Good cop Mick cracked a bashful smile and said: ‘Laura, can I ask you something before we start, though it’s a little embarrassing?’
She looked sideways at her solicitor, then back to Mick.
‘It’s just that we’ve got a very fashion-conscious WPC in the team who’s really taken a shine to your trainers. She just wanted to know where you got them from.’
Laura turned again to her solicitor, her frown flipped, clearly dying to elaborate. Her solicitor shrugged as if to say: ‘No harm in it, I suppose.’
‘They’re Nike Air Huaraches,’ she announced loftily. ‘My uncle sent them over from the States for my birthday last month. They’re not even on sale in the UK yet.’
I told Shep I’d be back in a few minutes and ran into a nearby office. I called Fintan for one reason: he had an extensive cuttings library at his behest. He didn’t answer, so I paged him. He knew I’d only do this in an emergency. He called back right away. I told him to find out all he could about Nike Huarache shoes and to let me know as soon as possible. He didn’t dare ask why or object.
He got back to me in record time.
I learned that the Nike Huarache trainer was the brainchild of Tinker Hatfield, also the designer of Air Jordans and the Air Max. It was inspired by his water-skiing boots, and has a sock-like lining which they called Dynamic Fit.
‘Is any of this relevant?’ asked Fintan.
‘Just keep talking.’
Because of their unusual design, sales of the Huarache shoe hadn’t taken off. Last year, Nike didn’t get enough pre-orders to go into production. But then, a few months ago in April, some marketing guru decided to sell them, guerrilla-style, at the New York Marathon. Suddenly demand soared. Last month, Nike had re-launched the Huarache in the US, but they weren’t scheduled to be sold in the UK until October.
I raced back to Shep and told him the news.
‘There can’t be more than a handful of Huarache shoes in the whole of the UK,’ I said.
‘But forensics combed the scene for footprints. If they found prints from a shoe that rare, they would have flagged it up,’ said Shep.
‘Yes but I want them to check the doors.’
‘For shoeprints?’
‘Yes. You’ll see why, next time they take a break,’ I said,
my growing conviction somehow eclipsing my inner terror at making a total arse of myself, yet again.
By now, Laura had reverted to her ‘no comment’ wall stare. Good cop Mick tried reason. Bad cop Colin attempted terror. He managed to scare the shit out of everyone, except Laura.
I stood and walked to the corner of the two-way to get a good look at those trainers. Beside the solicitor’s brogues, they looked tiny.
‘Get them to ask her what size shoe she is,’ I said.
Shep shuffled in his seat, irritated and reluctant.
‘Please, Guv, it’s just one more question.’
He paged Mick and met him at the door to the suite. I could see Shep having to work really hard to convince him. As Mick shut the door, he turned to the two-way, shook his head and mouthed, ‘wanker’.
After a time, Laura’s solicitor asked Mick if his client could take a bathroom break.
‘Of course,’ said Mick, terminating the interview and switching off the tape recorder.
As they all got to their feet, Mick smiled at Laura and said: ‘Before you go, our foot fetishist was wondering what size shoe you take.’
‘These are a size three,’ she smiled, ‘and even that’s a bit big for me. I have to wear thick socks.’
I ushered Shep to the corridor: ‘I want you to watch them go through the security door, Guv, really closely.’
After ten seconds, I almost had to shove his sceptical arse out to the corridor ahead of me. I hoped to God Laura would do the same as she did before. Otherwise, my theory would never fly and my career might crash land before it even had the chance to take off.
We watched the trio of WPC, Laura and lawyer walk towards that security door. As before, the WPC pressed the green release button, pulled the security door towards her and walked through first. Laura took the weight of the door with her arm, then turned her back against it, once again inviting her solicitor through next. As he waddled closer, I willed her to use her foot again.
‘Use your foot, Laura,’ I mouthed at her head, ‘use your foot.’
As the solicitor got within touching distance, her foot went up, her trendy green sole planting itself on the door and pushing it back, right up against the wall.