There was anger too, with all of it directed firmly in my direction.
‘Inconsiderate bitch,’ I heard someone say.
I suppose I should be sorry for ruining their evening – the Injured Jockeys Fund was close to my heart too – but the thought hadn’t even crossed my mind.
One of the major effects of cocaine was that the world outside one’s ‘self’ became irrelevant. Me, me, me was the mantra of the cocaine addict, and to hell with everyone else.
Both Rupert Forrester and I were still sitting on the dais together with the paramedics and DC Filippos, while the other two policemen went to the tables to start taking down details of the guests.
And into this bizarre scene walked Big Biceps, no doubt arriving to drive his boss home.
I happened to be looking at the main door as he came through it.
Even the sight of him made the hairs on the back of my hands stand up in fear. But he hadn’t seen me because DC Filippos was still crouched between us.
I watched as he asked something of a man sitting on the table nearest to the door. Then he looked over towards Rupert Forrester, who was now being helped up onto a chair by the paramedics. Big Biceps clearly hadn’t seen the two uniformed policemen who had made their way to the back of the room.
He walked over towards the dais and now the hairs all over my body were standing up as the adrenalin teemed into my veins. My caveman flight-or-fight reflex was running at full power.
‘That man tried to kill me earlier this evening,’ I said clearly and quietly to DC Filippos, hardly able to contain an urge to stand up and run.
The detective turned and looked, and only at that point did Big Biceps notice me sitting there.
The colour drained out of his face like sand out of an egg timer, from top to bottom, only faster, and he stumbled.
He looked quickly from me to Forrester and back again, and then he saw the two uniformed policemen.
He turned for the door and ran.
‘Stop that man!’ shouted DC Filippos loudly, leaping to his feet.
The two uniformed officers were too far away but still Big Biceps didn’t make it. Three men from the table near the door stood up and blocked his way. Their evening had already been ruined and they were in no mood for forgiveness.
The man turned round and round twice, looking for an alternative escape route, and then aimed for the nearest door to the kitchen but he was too late, far too late.
DC Filippos caught him from behind when he was still several yards away from it, dragging him down to the floor.
But he wasn’t giving up that easily.
Big Biceps punched the young detective full in the face and threw him off as if he were a child, before starting again for the door to the kitchen.
By now the other two officers had responded and, between them, they managed to manhandle Big Biceps back to the floor.
It took all three policemen to cuff Big Biceps’s hands behind his back but he was still not giving up, kicking out at them as they dragged him over to one of the robust-looking central-heating radiators to which they shackled him using a second set of handcuffs. Even then, he tried to escape by attempting unsuccessfully to pull the radiator off the wall.
When the officers eventually stood up they received a rousing round of applause from all the guests in the room who had witnessed it all. More entertaining, I thought, than listening to the racecourse managing director.
I, meanwhile, had been watching Rupert Forrester’s face, searching for some reaction to the fact that his muscular sidekick was captured, but there was only hopelessness and despair written into his features.
‘Now,’ said DC Filippos, dabbing with a handkerchief at a trickle of blood coming from his nose. ‘What the hell is this all about?’
36
I spent almost the next three hours with the police, first in the hotel and then at the police station where I was formally arrested on suspicion of assault causing actual bodily harm.
I had my fingerprints taken and the inside of my cheek swabbed to provide a DNA profile. I also insisted on being seen by a police medical examiner to have samples taken of my blood and urine.
DC Filippos had called in his boss, DS Merryweather, and he in turn had requested the presence of a detective chief inspector. The incident at the charity dinner was clearly deemed important enough to bring in the top brass.
The four of us sat together in an interview room, I having waived my right to a solicitor in order to speed things up. Why did I need legal representation when I had nothing to hide?
DS Merryweather started the recording equipment.
‘Now, Dr Rankin,’ said the chief inspector, ‘please tell us why you assaulted Mr Rupert Forrester.’
I told them the whole story from the time I’d arrived back at the racecourse medical room right up to the instant I’d stuck the needle into Forrester’s neck.
I could tell that none of them believed any of it.
They didn’t actually say that my story was far too implausible and far-fetched to be true, but I knew it was exactly what they were thinking.
‘I am not making it up,’ I said yet again. ‘And I’m not mad.’
I implored them to go to the racecourse and do a forensic search. I told them they’d find traces of cocaine-laced alcohol on the bed in the medical room where I had managed to spit out some of the deadly stuff, plus the small empty bottle with my fingerprints on it.
I even showed them the faint marks on my wrists where I’d been tied up with the bandage tape.
Gradually, after more than an hour of trying, during which I had to go through the whole story at least four more times, I began to feel that some of what I’d said was at last breaking through their scepticism.
‘Get my blood results,’ I said. ‘It will have cocaine in it. Or there will be benzoylecgonine in my urine, which will prove I’ve had cocaine in my system. And why did Forrester’s driver try to run if it hadn’t happened? He obviously had something to hide.’
They didn’t answer but DC Filippos nodded in agreement.
He knew.
He had been there, and he’d received a black eye and a bloodied nose for his trouble. And he had also witnessed the colour-draining reaction when Big Biceps had first seen me.
The three policemen left me alone in the interview room for quite a long while as they went outside for a conference.
I thought back to what had happened in the Regency Suite after Big Biceps had been restrained.
Much to their annoyance, the dinner guests had to give not just names but also their addresses to the police, something that seemed to take forever.
Six more uniformed officers had arrived to assist in the mammoth task and also to take away Big Biceps, who was formally cautioned and arrested for assaulting a policeman.
He had continued to stare at me throughout, perhaps disbelieving that I was even there and wishing he’d done a better job at bumping me off.
I was extremely thankful the handcuffs had remained in place and that he’d been surrounded by four burly boys in blue as he was taken out to a waiting police van, still resisting by kicking out at his captors.
All the while, Rupert Forrester had been attended to by the paramedics before being placed on a stretcher and taken away in an ambulance. The naloxone had a much shorter half-life in the body than the morphine so, as the effects of the antidote wore off, those of the morphine would return. He would probably need another dose of naloxone at the hospital.
I had watched him depart with huge trepidation.
‘Please don’t let Rupert Forrester go,’ I’d begged DC Filippos.
‘Why not?’
‘Because he also tried to kill me.’
The detective had looked at me as if I were a crazed old lady with a persecution complex, accusing anyone and everybody of trying to kill her.
‘Forrester and that other man. They did it together. Why else do you think I stabbed him?’
I didn’t
for a second think that the detective had been convinced but, nevertheless, he’d called over one of the uniformed policemen who was busy taking names and addresses and told him to go with the ambulance instead, and not to let Rupert Forrester out of his sight.
‘Has he been arrested?’ the copper had asked.
‘No. But keep your eyes on him anyway.’
I suppose it was better than nothing but I’d have been infinitely happier if they’d locked him into the police van with Big Biceps, and then thrown away the key.
The three detectives finally came back into the interview room and sat back down on their chairs.
‘Dr Rankin,’ the chief inspector said in an almost embarrassed tone. ‘We are now inclined to believe you.’
Hallelujah, I thought.
He went on. ‘A test on your urine sample has proved positive for you having had cocaine in your system at a significantly high concentration.’
‘So now what?’ I asked.
‘You will need to make a detailed statement and then you will be bailed and allowed to go home.’
‘Bailed?’ I said. ‘For what?’
‘Assault,’ the chief inspector said. ‘You remain under arrest.’
‘But Rupert Forrester tried to kill me,’ I said. ‘It was self-defence.’
‘He was not trying to kill you when you assaulted him,’ he said dryly.
I looked at the three of them with astonishment. DC Filippos wouldn’t meet my eye.
‘So am I being charged?’ I asked.
‘Not at this time,’ he said. ‘You will be bailed to return to the police station at a future date.’
‘And how about Sheraton, Forrester and his driver? Are they under arrest too?’ I tried hard to keep the sarcasm out of my voice.
‘The driver is already in custody in connection with his assault on DC Filippos. He will now be arrested and interviewed concerning this other matter. Rupert Forrester will be detained at Cheltenham General Hospital and an arrest warrant will be issued for Mr Michael Sheraton. That will be executed by Thames Valley Police at his home in Wantage as soon as possible.’
I’d only be happy and feel safe, I thought, when all three of them were under lock and key.
‘And how about Jason Conway?’ I said. ‘He’s up to his neck in this as well. He’d have probably been there too if he hadn’t been concussed yesterday.’
‘We can’t arrest someone just because they would have probably been there but weren’t,’ the chief inspector said.
‘But you could surely arrest him for conspiracy to murder Rahul Kumar.’
At one o’clock in the morning, I was taken home in a police car, again abandoning my Mini. At least I hadn’t been charged with driving away from the racecourse under the influence of drugs.
Grant was still up, beside himself with a mixture of worry, sympathy and anger.
When I hadn’t arrived home by eleven, he had tried calling both the hospital and the racecourse but without any success.
In desperation he had then phoned the police to report me missing, only to discover that I was under arrest.
‘At least I wasn’t dead,’ I pointed out.
He and I sat at the kitchen table and I went through the whole story again.
He was shocked and outraged in equal measures, as well as feeling a little uncomfortable, I imagined. He had been one of those who hadn’t believed me.
‘Thank God you’re safe now,’ he said, stroking the back of my hand.
It was the first act of tenderness he had extended to me for many weeks and that, plus the release of tension in knowing that it was all over, made me cry.
‘How are the boys?’ I asked, dabbing at my eyes with a tissue.
‘They’re good,’ Grant said. ‘I didn’t let on to them that I was worried you weren’t here. They went off to bed with no trouble. I told them you’d be back in the morning.’
The twins were well used to me not being there at bedtime. It was one of the prices they paid for me working shifts.
‘Let’s go to bed,’ Grant said, glancing at the kitchen clock on the wall above the window. ‘It’s five past two.’
The house phone rang loudly in the night stillness.
‘Who on earth’s calling at this time of night?’ Grant said as I picked it up.
It was DC Filippos and he sounded breathless.
‘Dr Rankin,’ he said quickly. ‘I’m afraid there has been a development. Rupert Forrester has disappeared from the hospital after giving the constable there the slip.’
My heart missed a beat.
‘When was this?’ I asked.
‘About an hour ago. I went there to arrest him and he was gone.’
An hour ago!
‘Why didn’t you call me before?’
‘Because we had no reason to believe you were in any danger.’
It was his use of the word had that worried me.
‘But now you do,’ I said.
‘I am currently at Mr Forrester’s house and I’ve just spoken to his wife. She wasn’t at the dinner and knows nothing of the events of this evening at the Queens. However, when her husband arrived home a while ago, he told her some nonsense about there being vermin at the racecourse that he had to deal with immediately, and he left again in his wife’s car. And he took his shotgun with him.’
My heart missed another beat.
‘I explained to Mrs Forrester that I had come to arrest her husband and why. She is now deeply upset and very anxious that he intends to use the gun to kill himself. But I thought you should know.’
‘I want protection,’ I screamed into the phone. ‘I want it now for me and my family.’
‘I will dispatch a patrol car to your house right away,’ he said, and disconnected.
I looked at Grant. ‘Forrester has escaped and he’s got a gun.’
‘Surely he won’t come here,’ he said.
I wasn’t so certain.
Revenge is a deep and powerful emotion. I knew. It had been revenge that had forced me to survive the cocaine and then to drive to the Queens Hotel when I’d had no right to be on the road.
In Forrester’s warped logic, he would believe that I was the reason for his downfall and, even if he did intend to kill himself, I feared he would want to take me with him.
‘I’ll get the boys up,’ I said decisively. ‘We’re going somewhere else.’
‘Where to?’
‘I don’t care, but away from here,’ I said. ‘Forrester knows exactly where we live. It was either him or his driver who drove over Oliver’s bike and put it back on our driveway.’
I walked down the hall towards the stairs but was only halfway there when there was a long shrill ring from the front doorbell.
That was quick, I thought, assuming that it was the police.
I almost had my hand on the latch before I realised it might not be the police after all.
The bell rang again.
I went into the dark sitting room and glimpsed out through a tiny gap in the curtains.
Rupert Forrester was standing there with the shotgun raised to his shoulder, aimed directly at the door, waiting to shoot whoever opened it.
My heart was now racing almost as fast as it had done earlier, but it was no longer due to cocaine. Mortal danger was a much more potent stimulant.
Keeping low, I slipped back into the hallway and down the corridor towards the kitchen. Grant was still there and he didn’t need to ask me who it was. He could see the fear plainly writ in my eyes.
‘Call the police,’ I whispered urgently at him – but how could anyone get to us quicker than the patrol car already dispatched by DC Filippos?
Grant had just been put through to the emergency operator when there was an almighty bang and crash from the front door.
Forrester had obviously become fed up waiting for someone to answer the doorbell and had decided to expedite matters by shooting the lock off completely, sending shards of glass and wooden splinters right down the
hallway into the kitchen.
I screamed.
‘Out the back,’ Grant shouted at me. He made a beeline for the back door and disappeared out into the darkness
What? And leave my boys alone in the house with an armed madman?
It was surely my life he wanted, not theirs, and I’d gladly die if it meant my twins were saved. I stayed exactly where I was.
Down the hall, I could hear as Forrester pushed open the remains of the front door.
But what if he first went up the stairs? Up towards the boys?
I couldn’t allow that to happen.
‘In here, you bastard,’ I shouted. ‘I’m in here.’
I searched around for a weapon, but even the carving knife from the block on the kitchen counter would be unlikely to be much use against a double-barrelled 12-bore shotgun.
Not unless I threw it.
I drew the sharp blade out of the wood and raised it above my right shoulder, ready to fling.
Then I awaited the inevitable, my respiration becoming shallow and fast as awful trepidation twisted my stomach into knots, making me feel sick.
The first sign of my impending doom was the sight of the long barrels appearing through the kitchen doorway, the twin circles at their ends moving from side to side like eyes seeking me out.
I was literally shaking with fear.
I threw the knife as soon as I saw his head, wanting to catch him unawares before he had a chance to shoot me.
He was surprised, so much so that he jerked the gun up in front of his face to protect himself, loosing off both the barrels as he did so.
The noise in the confined space of the kitchen was horrendous and debilitating. The lead shot slammed into the wall above the window, detaching huge chunks of plaster and totally destroying the kitchen clock. But the knife had failed to reach its mark too, falling harmlessly to the floor.
I stared at him as he dug into his coat pocket for more cartridges to reload, snapping the gun closed before I even had a chance to react.
‘What’s happening, Dad?’ one of the boys shouted down from the landing, the terror clearly audible in his voice.
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