A Mind to Kill

by Brian Freemantle

  ‘You feel guilty about that?’

  ‘ Of course she didn’t. Mad whore.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jennifer. ‘Jane says I didn’t but I did.’

  ‘Before his wife died? Or after?’

  ‘Before and after.’

  ‘ Liar.’

  ‘Did she know it was going on?’

  ‘No, she didn’t. And she called me a liar.’

  ‘ No, I bloody well didn’t know, you cheating whore! ’

  ‘Were you going to tell her?’

  ‘I wasn’t. Gerald wanted to. She’s calling me a cheating whore.’

  ‘Why didn’t he?’

  ‘I asked him not to. I didn’t want to be the person to break up a marriage.’

  ‘ Lying whore! ’

  ‘She says I’m a lying whore.’

  ‘Are you lying?’ asked Mason.

  ‘No.’

  ‘What did Gerald say?’

  ‘That he didn’t want things to go on as they were. That he didn’t love Jane and wanted the marriage to end.’

  ‘ LIAR! ’ The voice roared, making Jennifer wince. Only slightly quieter, Jane said, ‘ Happy with me. Loved me until you came along.’

  ‘What does the voice say?’ anticipated Mason.

  ‘That I’m lying. That Gerald was happy with her until the affair started.’

  ‘You think that’s true?’

  ‘Gerald said it wasn’t.’

  ‘You thought everything was all right between you and Gerald, didn’t you?’ pressed Mason.

  ‘You want me to talk about Rebecca?’

  ‘Do you want to?’

  ‘Answer me!’ demanded Jennifer, angrily. ‘Why do you respond to every question I ask with another question? Can’t you think for yourself?’

  ‘ They got a crap psychiatrist, Jennifer. Because they’re just going through the motions. You don’t even know if he’s qualified: from the way he’s dressed, he could be a hospital porter.’

  ‘Are you?’

  ‘Am I what?’

  ‘A qualified…’ began Jennifer, before stopping. ‘She says you’re a crap psychiatrist. Could even be a hospital porter.’

  Mason laughed. ‘We’re really upsetting her, aren’t we?’

  All the gauze-thin confidence that she could confront Jane had gone. Once more Jennifer felt totally lost, as if she was being sucked towards a whirlpool that would drag her down into a vortex from which she’d never escape.

  ‘ That’s it, honey. That’s how it’s going to be. Suffocating. Drowning. Like this…’

  It became difficult for Jennifer to breathe: it was as if someone had their arms wrapped around her, squeezing the air from her and not letting her inhale any more. She began to pant, noisily.

  ‘You’re panicking,’ said the psychiatrist, calmly. ‘Don’t do that

  …’ He felt out, enclosing her hand in both of his. ‘Breathe with me, slowly now…’ He began to space his words. ‘In and out, in and out, in and out…’

  Gradually – too gradually – the band around Jennifer’s chest began to ease. ‘That was awful. Frightened me.’

  ‘You’re all right now.’

  ‘She could kill me, couldn’t she? Make me kill myself?’

  ‘ Good thought, honey. I’ll keep it in mind…’ There was the cackling laugh. ‘ Your mind, my mind, somebody’s mind. Thanks for the idea.’

  ‘I thought you said you could resist her?’

  ‘Not when she makes me move my…’ She stopped as first her left leg, then her right, kicked up under the bed covering. ‘Shit! shit! shit…!’

  ‘You stopped telling me what Jane’s saying?’

  ‘She said making me kill myself was a good idea. And that suffocating, as if I was drowning, was how she was going to make me feel. It was what it seemed like, when I couldn’t breathe.’

  ‘You can now.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So how else do you feel?’ demanded Mason, quickly.

  ‘How do you think I feel?’

  ‘Don’t answer my question with another question.’

  Despite herself – despite everything – Jennifer smiled at having her earlier protest thrown back at her. ‘Frustrated! Impotent!’ Then she repeated, ‘How else do you expect me to feel?’

  ‘Very different from that.’

  ‘ What’s he mean? ’

  ‘She wants to know what you mean?’

  ‘If she’s so clever, tell her to work it out for herself.’

  ‘ Tell me! ’ It was a shout, loud enough to make Jennifer grimace yet again.

  ‘Don’t tell her!’ Jennifer used the ploy she’d learned, uttering the words before the thought came in time for Jane to intercept.

  ‘I’m not going to.’

  ‘ Bastard! ’

  ‘She’s angry. Called you a bastard.’

  ‘Good.’ Then, quickly, ‘You didn’t know about Rebecca?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Do you believe it?’

  ‘I want to hear Rebecca say it.’

  ‘Don’t you believe the police?’

  ‘I want to be in a room… somewhere… where she has to say it in front of me.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I thought she was my friend. Wouldn’t do a thing like that to me.’

  ‘Have you got a lot of friends?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Does that worry you?’

  ‘It didn’t, until now.’

  ‘Why does it worry you now?’

  ‘I need someone to help me. Clothes. And there’s Emily.’

  Both lawyers stirred against the wall. Mason and Fosdyke ignored them.

  ‘Tell me about Emily,’ suggested Mason.

  Jennifer smiled, distantly. ‘She’s our life, Gerald’s and mine. He wanted a baby so much.’

  ‘ Liar. Made me take the pill. ’

  ‘She says I’m a liar. That he made her take the pill.’

  ‘Do you know if that’s true, about the pill?’

  ‘Jane was a severe diabetic: that’s what she died of, an insulin overdose. I know Gerald was warned that medically it would have been dangerous for Jane to become pregnant.’

  ‘ Murderers.’

  ‘She’s calling me a murderer. That’s what she says: that Gerald and I murdered her, so we could be together.’

  ‘Did you?’

  ‘Of course we didn’t. It’s an absurd thing to say.’

  ‘Gerald didn’t ask you to take the pill?’

  ‘I told you, he wanted a baby very much.’

  ‘But there’s only Emily?’

  ‘I just didn’t become pregnant, afterwards. I had tests: we both did. There was no reason why it didn’t happen. It just didn’t.’

  ‘Will you hate Rebecca, if she admits the affair in front of you?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Will you hate Gerald?’

  ‘I couldn’t hate Gerald. Ever.’

  ‘Not even if it’s true?’

  ‘It wouldn’t have been love. Just sex.’

  ‘Wouldn’t you hate her, just the same?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘Why not?’ The psychiatrist had come forward on his chair, jabbing the questions at her.

  ‘If he needed another woman it would have meant I was inadequate, wouldn’t it? That I’d failed. It would have been my fault.’

  ‘ That you weren’t such a good fuck, after all.’

  ‘She says I’d realize I wasn’t such a good fuck after all.’

  ‘Were you?’

  Jennifer felt herself colour. ‘I thought we had a more than satisfactory sex life,’ she forced herself to say.

  ‘You’re embarrassed?’

  ‘Of course I’m embarrassed.’

  ‘Do you swear?’

  ‘Swear?’ frowned Jennifer.

  ‘ Fuck, fuck, fuck.’

  ‘She’s saying fuck all the time.’

  ‘Do you? Use the word, I mean.’

  ‘Yes,’ adm
itted Jennifer at once.

  ‘So you’re not offended by it?’

  ‘No. Are you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Tell me what you thought about driving up from the country.’

  ‘I don’t remember much about that. It was as if I was a passenger.’

  ‘What about when you got to Gerald’s office?’

  Jennifer shook her head. ‘I don’t properly remember that. I mean I do, but not as if I was part of it. It was as if I was looking on.’

  Fosdyke stirred, a signal. ‘What illnesses did you have, as a child?’

  Jennifer frowned. ‘The usual, I suppose.’

  ‘I want to know, specifically.’

  ‘I’m not sure, specifically. Is it important?’

  ‘Very. Can we find out from your family?’

  ‘I don’t have a family. My mother died twelve years ago: my father four years later. I don’t have any brothers or sisters.’

  ‘No aunt or uncle who could help?’

  ‘Both my parents were only children, like I was.’

  ‘We could try a trace through the family doctor,’ offered Peter Lloyd, from the bottom of the bed. ‘We’ve got his name on the case notes.’

  ‘Do that, will you? Now,’ said the neurologist, without turning to the doctor, who hesitated and then eased his way past the silent lawyers.

  ‘What about accidents?’ persisted Fosdyke.

  ‘ Being born.’

  ‘She says my being born was an accident,’ Jennifer told Mason, who nodded but didn’t say anything.

  ‘What’s the proper answer,’ prompted Fosdyke.

  ‘No.’

  ‘No broken legs? Arms?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘What about head injuries?’

  ‘ I’ve convinced them. You haven’t any idea how insane you sound .’

  ‘She says you’re convinced I’m insane… that I sound insane.’

  For the neurologist’s benefit, Mason said, ‘What about a head injury, at any time?’

  ‘No. Never.’

  ‘How about your pregnancy?’

  ‘Perfectly straightforward… wonderful… no problems at all.’

  ‘The birth itself?’

  ‘The gynaecologist said it was the easiest he’d ever known.’

  Fosdyke turned invitingly to Mason, who shook his head. To the lawyers the neurologist said, ‘I’m going to carry out a physical examination. Excuse us.’

  Hall and Perry filed obediently into the corridor to the hostile glares from the two policewomen. The barrister continued walking until he was beyond their hearing before turning to the solicitor. ‘Well?’

  ‘I don’t know a court that would put up with it,’ said Perry, flatly.

  ‘I don’t think I do, either.’

  ‘I’m frightened what the reaction might be to what I’ve got to tell her about Emily,’ said Perry. ‘Maybe I should wait until tomorrow?’

  Hall shook his head, forcefully. ‘Not in the circumstances. Make sure Lloyd’s with you.’

  ‘What about you?’ asked the solicitor, seeking as much support as possible.

  Hall looked sceptically at the older man. ‘All right.’

  Peter Lloyd emerged from the elevator at the far end of the corridor. When he reached them Lloyd said, ‘The family doctor is faxing what medical records there are. Which aren’t very much. We went through it on the phone: she’s never had a day’s illness in her life.’

  ‘Until now,’ said Perry, as the doctor moved on to the ward. ‘And now she’s making up for all the lost years.’

  Inside the tiny room Jennifer lay on top of the bed as Fosdyke went through the neurological routine. Her toes contracted when a pencil tip was drawn across the soles of her feet and with her eyes closed she correctly isolated every point at which he lightly touched a pin against unbandaged parts of her arms and legs. Still with her eyes closed she correctly brought her finger-tip unfalteringly to the tip of her nose and resisted his pressure when he pushed against her raised legs. He repeated the test more gently against her injured arms but she was still able to respond.

  ‘If you can’t prevent it, don’t worry, but I don’t want to hear anything the voice says in your head,’ warned Fosdyke. ‘I just want your answers to my questions.’

  ‘Jane isn’t here,’ broke in Jennifer.

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘There’s no tingling, burning sensation.’

  ‘Why didn’t you tell us about that earlier?’ demanded the neurologist.

  ‘I didn’t want her to know. That’s how I’m warned she’s with me: how I can beat her.’

  ‘When were you born?’ demanded the neurologist, briskly.

  ‘June eighth, nineteen sixty-six.’

  ‘So you’re thirty-three?’

  ‘Thirty-two.’

  ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘What?’ frowned Jennifer.

  ‘Answer me.’

  ‘Jennifer Lomax.’

  ‘What was it before you were married?’

  ‘Stone. Jennifer Stone.’

  ‘Where were you married?’

  ‘Caxton Hall.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘January fifteen, nineteen ninety-three.’

  ‘What time?’

  ‘Two o’clock.’

  ‘Your degree’s economics?’

  ‘And mathematics. I took an additional module.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Oxford.’

  ‘What was it?’

  ‘Double First.’ Before either man could speak further, Jennifer said, ‘Why is this important?’

  ‘That’s for us to decide,’ said Fosdyke. ‘Do you know what a brain scan is?’

  ‘Like an X-ray, of my head.’

  ‘ They won’t see me! ’

  ‘She’s back. Says you won’t see her.’

  ‘I’m not looking for her.’

  ‘ What’s he want? ’

  ‘She wants to know what you want.’

  ‘It’s nothing to do with her.’

  ‘ Tell me! ’

  ‘She’s demanding to know.’

  ‘She isn’t going to,’ said Fosdyke. ‘Do you think you could walk to the scanner? It’s one floor below.’

  Jennifer looked to Lloyd, who said, ‘Do you feel up to it?’

  ‘Of course.’

  Lloyd helped Jennifer into a shapeless hospital dressing gown, over the smock that had been changed after she’d wet herself. Jennifer looked down at herself, then smiled wanly up to Mason. ‘Not actually haute couture, is it?’

  ‘That worry you?’ asked the psychiatrist.

  Jennifer remained smiling, although sadly. ‘I was going to ask Rebecca to bring some of my own stuff in. That’s ironic, isn’t it?’

  The two policewomen straightened into something like attention when Jennifer came out into the corridor, hands clasping the dressing gown around her. They quickly fell into step behind the specialists, who walked either side of Jennifer. It wasn’t until they shouldered into the elevator that Jennifer realized Hall and Perry had joined them. No-one spoke. Jennifer remained tensed for Jane, who never came. The lawyers and the policewomen stood separately outside the scanner room.

  Sure he was beyond their hearing, Perry said, ‘You sure it was a good idea to antagonize Bentley quite so much?’

  ‘It was a good idea to close down any further interviews.’ Hall nodded towards the uniformed women. ‘And insist they remain outside. From now on the prosecution is going to be kept strictly within the rules of exchange and disclosure.’

  ‘Does that matter, considering the case they’ve got?’

  Hall smiled at the solicitor. ‘If they’ve got enough then they’ve got enough.’

  It was almost an hour before Jennifer and the doctors left the scanner room. In the tiny outside vestibule Fosdyke said to Lloyd, ‘We’ve got all the samples?’

  ‘The spinal tap was with pathology an hour ago,’ said Lloyd.

  ‘Then I�
��m finished.’ He looked at Mason, who said, ‘I’ve got enough, for the moment.’

  ‘For a preliminary finding?’ demanded Hall.

  Jennifer felt the onset of numbness and blurted, ‘Not in front of me: I don’t want her to know!’

  ‘ Bitch! ’

  ‘Too quick for you,’ said Jennifer.

  ‘She back?’ asked Mason.

  ‘Called me a bitch.’

  ‘I’ll need an hour, to go through the tests, apart from my own,’ said Fosdyke.

  ‘I’d like to think about it too, before we talk. Let’s make it an hour, shall we?’ suggested Mason.

  ‘My rooms,’ offered Fosdyke.

  ‘We’ve got some other business to go through,’ said Hall. He looked at Peter Lloyd. ‘And I’d appreciate your being with us.’

  No-one spoke during the walk to the upper corridor. Immediately inside the ward again Jennifer said to Perry: ‘Can you arrange for me to get my own clothes in here? Have someone call Annabelle and go down to fetch them…?’ She smiled, as the uninterrupted thought came to her. ‘Would it be possible for me to see Emily?’

  There was a moment’s silence between the two lawyers. Perry said, ‘That’s the other business we have to go through, Mrs Lomax. Social Services want to get involved with care provisions for Emily.’

  ‘ NO!’ screamed Jennifer.

  ‘ Everything destroyed completely,’ mocked the voice. ‘ I’ll leave you all by yourself to think what it’s going to be like to lose Emily for ever. ’

  Chapter Eleven

  ‘She can’t be taken away! She’s all I have now.’ There was no sensation of Jane and Jennifer forced herself to remain icily calm after the initial outburst. Panic or hysteria wouldn’t save Emily. And saving Emily – keeping Emily – was abruptly the most important consideration. The only consideration. It was still difficult to sit on the side of the bed and not do more, speak louder, to make them understand. Dr Lloyd was beside her, still holding the wrist he’d snatched up to check her pulse rate at the screamed protest.

  ‘Is she all right?’ demanded Hall, worriedly.

  ‘Pulse is OK,’ nodded Lloyd.

  ‘Don’t talk across me!’ demanded Jennifer. ‘I’m perfectly under control: Jane isn’t here. I said Emily isn’t being taken away from me. You’ve got to stop it. Stop it now.’

  ‘Is there no family, on either side, who could become legal guardians in your…’ Perry hesitated. ‘… in your absence?’