TR01 - Trial And Retribution

by Lynda La Plante

  Belinda turned her eyes on Dunn. Be careful. But Dunn seemed hardly to be attending.

  "My flat? I don't know, do I? I mean, it used to be quite nice when I moved in, like. But me pals wrecked it, and the kids ..."

  He was shivering in rhythm with the throbbing of his head. The white paper suit that he again wore rustled slightly in the hollow room. All sensation, but especially the perception of sound and light, seemed swollen and bruised to him. He reached for the white cup of water and gulped. It felt good except there was no sting of alcohol in his throat.

  "You haven't answered the question, Michael."

  Trying to stub his cigarette out against the inside of the cup, Dunn was burning a hole in the styrofoam.

  "I found it."

  "When did you find it?"

  Still intent on extinguishing his butt, Dunn produced a tentative, truncated shrug.

  "About a year ago."

  Walker leaned forward. Where did you find it? "

  Dunn had by now poked the cigarette all the way through the cup. He peered at the protruding tip in surprise. An acrid smell permeated the room.

  "Will you please answer the question?"

  "On the building site that building site on the estate."

  "Are you sure about that, Mr. Dunn?"

  Dunn glanced sideways at his brief, who smiled encouragingly.

  "Yes."

  Now he was applying the tip of the cigarette tentatively to the white paper of his overall.

  "Do you like ice-cream?" asked Walker.

  "No."

  "But you have a lot of ice-cream wrappers in your flat. Where do they come from?"

  "I don't know. Lots of people, like, come and go." Suddenly he was shouting and waggling his head.

  "Ice- cream van Ding-dong, liing dong ..."

  By now he'd burned a series of holes in his sleeve so that the pale, goose-pimply skin could be seen. Walker shook out a Marlboro and snapped off the filter.

  "Did you see Julie Ann Harris last Thursday afternoon?"

  "No. I was with my friends, see? Like I told you."

  "Yes you have stated that you were with--' Walker put the unlit cigarette in his mouth and lifted up his notes.

  "Terry Smith, another man you were unable to name, and a woman named Midge."

  "Yes. I was."

  Walker lit the little bush of tobacco that stuck out of the end of his cigarette.

  "Well, I'm afraid, Michael, that Midge Parker-Brown was not with you last Thursday. We have established that. We know where she was, and it was nowhere near you."

  He studied Dunn intently. He was an angler again, scrutinizing the broken surface of the river.

  "What do you have to say about that?"

  Dunn was now mashing his cigarette into his arm, to stub it out once and for all.

  "I don't know," he mumbled.

  "Must have been mistaken."

  "Mistaken? Can I just go back over that, Michael. You say you were mistaken. About how exactly?"

  Dunn looked up from his sleeve, which had begun to smoulder.

  "What?

  Sorry, what was the question? "

  Walker opened his mouth to repeat the question but he was forestalled.

  A pale blue flame had appeared on the suspect's sleeve, rimming one of the worn holes he'd made with his cigarette. Then, abruptly, the fire took

  hold, turning yellow as it licked at the folds of the suspect's sleeve. Dunn was on fire. He leapt up, screeching and pawing at the flame, his chair clattering to the floor behind him. In the same instant Satchell reached for his own water cup, leaned across and threw it over Dunn. With a truncated fizzle, the fire died.

  For a few beats, no one spoke. Satchell couldn't, he was trying to control himself Belinda Sinclair's face could have put a fire out.

  Most of the water had gone over her anyway. She ran a hand through her hair and cleared her throat.

  "Superintendent Walker, I am suggesting a bathroom break."

  She smiled thinly at the interrogators.

  "If my client doesn't require one, I most certainly do."

  "Right," snapped Walker. Then, for the tape: "Interview suspended at seven-oh-two p.m." to allow Miss Sinclair to take a leak. "

  At the Forensic Laboratory, a junior scientific officer nib bed his eyes under his plastic protective spectacles. Sometimes he got called in on Sunday, but not usually for a long shift. Police couldn't afford it. Today, it seemed, was different and he could have done without it.

  Saturday's rugger match, the party in the evening at Netting Hill and his night with that girl from Streatham - what was her name? - had taken its toll and he was shattered. Still, Sunday overtime was something else on this job.

  He reached a latex-gloved hand, holding a pair of laboratory tongs, into the black dustbin bag which stood beside his test-bench, drawing out a crushed and soggy cereal packet. He carefully prized it open to see if anything had been pushed inside. Sometimes at parties he described himself for effect as a Garbologist. Other people's rubbish may be one of the least pleasant, but it was potentially the most revealing, of the stuff that came in for lab examination.

  He dined out on the story of when he'd found a set of false eyelashes in the bin of an international opening batsman and DNA testing proved that the cricketer had worn them himself. It actually had nothing to do with the case, but he had never been able to watch the guy play in a Test Match since then without wondering if he wore them on the field.

  The cereal packet was empty. He placed it with a pile of discarded packaging and recorded it on his inventory, then longed out a lump of cheese with a rich crop of furry grey mould growing all over it. Seven to eight weeks' worth, he estimated. He made a note of it and fished again.

  The tongs connected with something which at first slipped from their jaws. He took a firmer grip and pulled again. The thing was mixed up with other refuse and he had to tug it free. When it came loose he could see what it was a tangle of red and blue washing line. One end had a loop. The other looked cut.

  He flipped back the pages on his clipboard to the case report, just to make sure: "A piece of plastic-coated line ligated around the neck, resembling a clothes-line. Colour, red and blue."

  He left the desk and went looking for Arnold Mallory.

  "I don't know about any rope!"

  They'd been just about to resume questioning the

  suspect when North had clattered down the stairs. She virtually ran at Walker and Satchell, who'd been about to follow Dunn and his brief into the interview room.

  "Guv, hold it a second! Lab's found something ..."

  When she told him, his face tightened and he grabbed her shoulders, planting a kiss on her cheek.

  "Yes!"

  Back in the interview room, he told Dunn what he had found, then listened as the man tried pathetically to deny all knowledge.

  "I don't know how it got in my bin! I don't!" he bleated.

  Walker interrupted him, placing both palms flat on the tabletop and leaning forward to make sure he was clearly understood.

  "Michael Frederick Dunn," he said, "I am now charging you with the murder of julie Ann Harris ..."

  chapter 12

  MONDAY 9 SEPTEMBER. 9. 30 A. M.

  AT least an hour of Walker's insomnia that night had been occupied with the magistrate's impending decision on bail. It would complicate things badly if Dunn was released. Walker still needed unfettered access to his flat- with the unused section of washing line found there, more evidence had to be forthcoming. Had to be. But if Dunn was out and about living in the flat, because for sure he had nowhere else to go that would badly screw up the forensic effort.

  It was deep within Walker's nature to lie awake envying his wife's snores and worrying about tomorrow, but in this case it was all unnecessary. Next morning, Belinda Sinclair put in a noticeably half-hearted submission, probably preferring to have her client in the Scrubs where she could always find him and he couldn't drink. Knew what sh
e was doing, that girl. Walker had to admit it. The magistrate duly ignored her trite remarks about her client's good intentions and summarily denied bail. Sinclair didn't even appear disappointed; Dunn didn't look as if he knew the time of day.

  A dark fog of bewilderment swirled through the accused's head as he sat in the cells beneath the Magistrate's Court.

  Fresh as spring in her expensively labelled clothes, Miss Sinclair sat opposite him, pushing a small sheaf of forms and a Biro across the table.

  "Some more forms for you to put your signature to, Michael. This one's the final Legal Aid document. That's so that we can be paid for defending you."

  Dunn stared gravely at the paper and picked up the pen. But he did nothing. Belinda got up and looked at the Prison Officer standing guard by the door.

  "I just need to show him where to sign all right?"

  The screw nodded and she moved to Dunn's shoulder. He could smell the mix of different perfumes as she leaned nearer shampoo in her hair, a scented soap maybe and who knows what else? It stirred him out of his lethargy and he aimed the pen towards the dotted line, where her varnished fingernail gleamed.

  "Sign here-see?"

  Dunn looked up and down the document.

  "It's a blank form."

  "Yes we'll fill it out later. Just sign."

  Dunn wrote his signature in a shaky, childish script.

  "And here and here and finally here."

  Dunn kept signing until she was satisfied. She took the pen from his hand and moved back to her seat, opening a thick notepad. Dunn looked at her, squinting. He was not used to looking at beauty. It seemed to make his situation even more confusing.

  "OK, Michael. Let's start with your parents' name and address."

  "I don't have any parents."

  Belinda scribbled a note and said, "So, where were you brought up?"

  "Foster homes. I don't know if I can remember them all."

  She tapped the Biro against her perfectly white teeth and began to speak, but Dunn cut in.

  "I don't want to talk about them." He lit a cigarette. He was edgy, looking away into a corner of the room.

  "I don't, er, remember a lot of things. They said it was me blanking it all out."

  Belinda waited, staring at her client. She gave him a few seconds, then said, gently, "Blanking out what, Michael?"

  Dunn's attention was still fixed in the room's corner. He seemed not to hear her.

  "Blanking out what, Michael?"

  Three dull blows on the door echoed around the cell. The Prison Officer turned and looked through the spy hole

  "That's the transportation. Sorry, Miss, we can't wait any longer."

  With a sigh, Belinda closed her notebook. Dunn looked at her. He was quite good-looking really, under all that crud. But he also looked touchingly lost and alone.

  "Where are they taking me?" he asked, looking at her now. He had the eyes of an abandoned puppy.

  "You'll go to Wormwood Scrubs, Michael."

  "Prison?"

  "The Magistrate has denied your bail. You'll stay there until the trial."

  "What d'you mean? What am I going to do? What's it going to belike?"

  Sinclair may be a rookie, but she knew something about what it was going to be like. It was going to be hell in a box. Persecution without end, bawled at day and night, cut up in the showers, your food spat into. Nobody had a

  worse time inside than a man who might have killed a child except for a man who actually had.

  She stood up and said as softly as she could.

  "You'll have to be very, very patient, Michael. Do what they say, and don't cause trouble. Will you do that?"

  The Prison Officer swung the door open and moved to stand behind the prisoner. He hooked his hand under Dunn's arm and drew him to his feet.

  Going through the day like a robot, Anita had spent a lot of time waiting for the television news. There had been a bulletin on BBC1 at eleven and, still in her dressing gown, she watched it with close attention. The case wasn't even mentioned and she felt bitterly disappointed. Was this what it all amounted to? Her little girl's life worth a couple of days' media attention, and then nothing?

  After the news was over, she didn't move, just flicked the picture over to ITV, a morning chat show. She knew there was another news in an hour so she sat on, watching the image on the screen whisk from face to face. She couldn't have told you what they were saying.

  Peter was sitting with a pile of music CDs on his knee, sorting through them. He wanted to play something loud and violent. He certainly didn't want to watch a bunch of lottery winners and minor TV stars talking about their philosophy of life.

  "There wasn't anything about her on the news," said Anita.

  Peter grunted.

  She went on, "Maybe there will be on the later one."

  Peter tossed a CD down and picked up another one.

  "Great," he said.

  "Go on. You just sit there and wait for it. Whole place needs hoovering, but don't worry. You sit there. Nothing else to do, is there?"

  Anita dosed her eyes and rocked forward slightly across her folded arms.

  "Oh, stop it, Pete. Just stop it."

  But Peter was just starting.

  "There's no reason for your mother to stay either. I'm sick and tired of her bunking up inhere."

  He put on a mimicking falsetto.

  "Thomas this, Thomas that. You ask me, she fancies Thomas herself. And hasn't he been a pain in the arse? I'm glad he's gone back."

  "Maybe I need Mum."

  "And what about me? You don't need meY Anita looked at him. She seemed drugged, out of it.

  "I didn't say that."

  "Feels like it."

  He crashed the heap of CDs on to the coffee table, picked up another from the floor and began impatiently dealing them down on to the table like a pack of cards. When he spoke again, she heard the sing-song of self-pity in his voice.

  "I touch you and you, like, cringe away. Sleep as far from me in bed as you can. Don't cook any more. You bloody do nothing but sit in front of the TV, waiting for the news!"

  She slid back against the chair, her body going limp.

  "I'm sorry. I--' " So am I. "

  When Helen came in seconds later she found the two sitting in silence.

  She carried a tray which she placed on a low table. There were two mugs of tea on it.

  "Here you are, love."

  She handed Anita a tea then took the other one and

  subsided with a sigh into the vacant armchair. Peter looked at her murderously. Then, with a sweep of his arm, he knocked the CDs off the table, clattering them across the carpet. One or two hit the wall and bounced back. He jumped up, glared at the two women for a moment and slammed out of the room. A few seconds later they heard the flat's front door cannon against its frame.

  Helen took an audible sip of tea, staring fixedly at the wall.

  "Good riddance," she observed.

  Anita switched off the television and touched her mother on the arm.

  "Mum. Maybe, you know, it's a small flat and I do appreciate you being here. I don't know what I'd have done without you, really. But..."

  Helen looked. Her eyes and mouth were tight.

  "My God," she said quietly, through closed teeth, "you don't want me here for the funeral."

  It was a statement, not a question. Anita said, "I just don't know when they'll let me bury her. It's all, it's all..."

  "But that's not it, is it, " Nita? You let him run your life. Why you ever broke up with Thomas is beyond me. "

  Anita started to speak but her mother held up a hand.

  "I'm warning you! I kept my mouth shut, I never said a word about it, but there comes a time " A word about what. Mum? What are you saying? "

  "About why Jason wasn't at school that Thursday remember? About why you had to take Julie to the hospital, Christmas."

  Helen was staring hard at her daughter, challenging her. All she could see in re
sponse was exhaustion.

  Anita shook her head slowly.

  "For God's sake. Mum. Stop it, just stop it."

  A scream came from the kitchen. It was Tony, in his high chair. He hated being left alone. Helen got up.

  "You'll have to be in court," she said.

  "So will Peter. But, well, if you don't need me, fine. I'll go."

  She went to attend to Tony. Anita folded her hands more tightly over her stomach and rocked in her chair. Never had she felt so alone. Now it was just her and the baby inside. Everything else was just a side show, a nothing.

  Helen came storming back from the kitchen, pulling Jason behind her.

  "He's just dragged Tony out of his chair again! Here, you talk to him."

  She hurried back to the kitchen.

  "Jason," warned his mother gently.

  "I

  told you not to play around with him. He's just a baby. "

  Jason pouted.

  Anita got up and, wrapping her dressing gown around her, went into the kitchen. Helen was rocking Tony in the crook of her arm. She showed Anita a Gnutcrunch ice- cream, from the freezer.

  "Can I give him one of these?"

  "I'll do it. Mum. Give him me."

  Back in the lounge, Jason looked round to see if anybody was watching.

  Then he slipped across to the sideboard and selected one of the framed pictures of his dead sister. He looked at it closely, his eyes about four inches from the glass. He ran his finger over the image of julie face. Then he jerked his arm and threw the picture on to the floor.

  Then he began jumping on it, mashing the glass under his heel.

  Walker returned from the remand hearing determined to get the budget sorted. He could never remember if the Forensic Lab charged a flat rate for a black sack of refuse, or whether they levied a fee for each article they pulled out. He'd already worked out a sheet based on 500 pounds for a sack, but when he looked again at the faxed inventory of Dunn's rubbish, he thought they might be going to sting him for something like 25 an item and there were thirty-four items on the list. He groaned. He'd have to recalculate.

  The phone rang at his elbow.

  "Walker? Mallory!"

  "Oh, yes, sir. Anything new?"