The Waxwork Corpse: A legal thriller with a chilling twist (Charles Holborne Legal Thrillers Book 5)

by Simon Michael

  ‘Almost certainly.’

  The court begins to fill. The door to the public gallery is thrown open and the spectators rush for the best seats. The journalists and the sketch-drawers start filing in. Charles overhears Beaverbrook asking one if he could have the original sketch made of him as he cross-examined Jenny Sullivan; he wants to frame it. What a bizarre side-effect of cameras being banned, thinks Charles: a trade in court sketches for smug, self-important members of the Bar.

  The journalists are looking around, hoping to catch sight of Jenny and the children, but they’re absent. Running late or a tactical error? wonders Charles. He’d have wanted Jenny looking tired, pale and beautiful as she waits patiently for her man to be exonerated. He has no more time to consider it as the Recorder enters and the day’s proceedings begin.

  Charles calls Inspector Carr and, after him, Superintendent Hook. No questions are asked of either of the police officers, except to confirm that the accused was a man of good character. Hook reads through the whole of the interview with Steele in which he denied any knowledge of his wife’s death, and which, if Jenny’s evidence is true, is a pack of lies. Not a word of it is challenged, not a question asked, but Charles understands and agrees with the Defence strategy. Cross-examining the police officers would only emphasise the falsity of the statement given by Steele in interview. The man has an explanation, and he’ll give it when he goes into the witness box.

  Then, just as Charles is about to close his case, he hears a light groan behind him. He and the other barristers all spin in their benches to the source of the sound, and see that the accused is almost invisible, so low is he bent in the dock. He sits with his head in his hands, his eyes tightly shut.

  James Day stands quickly, bows to the Recorder and scurries back to his client while everyone waits. He speaks to Steele, who replies faintly, his head still buried, and then returns to counsel’s bench. He whispers his news to Beaverbrook; the QC nods and then sends Day back for more information. There’s another whispered conference at the dock and Day returns a second time to report to his leader. Beaverbrook frowns, gives a good impression of a man thinking very hard, and rises. The suspicion begins to germinate in Charles’s cynical mind that some pretty fancy footwork is being done by the normally ponderous silk.

  ‘My Lord,’ says Beaverbrook, ‘my client is feeling ill. He warned me this morning before he came into court that he thought that a migraine headache was coming on, and I fear that’s what has happened.’

  ‘Would you like me to rise and permit him to seek medical help?’ asks the Recorder, already collecting his pens in preparation.

  ‘That’s very kind of your Lordship, but it won’t be necessary. The Defence is reluctant to hold up the proceedings if that can be avoided. I anticipate that Mr Holborne was about to close the Crown’s case…’

  He pauses to allow Charles to confirm. Charles’s suspicion has now germinated and is putting forth its first roots. He doesn’t like the smell of what’s coming, and he isn’t happy to assist it. He has no choice, however, as the Recorder is waiting for him.

  ‘Yes, my Lord, I was about to close my case,’ he says.

  ‘Thank you,’ says Beaverbrook, smiling in a way that Charles knows forebodes some ploy. ‘My position is this: I have a number of witnesses who’ve been waiting to give evidence for some time. I doubt any of their evidence will be contested by the Crown. I wonder if it would be possible for your Lordship to break with the usual rule and permit them to give their evidence first? That would give time for my client to recover. These witnesses mainly go to character, although some also deal with alleged motive.’

  ‘What about your client?’ asks the Recorder. ‘Don’t answer unless you wish to do so, Mr Beaverbrook, but are you expecting him to give evidence in his own defence?’

  ‘Certainly, my Lord, but not with a migraine. I’m sure your Lordship would agree that it would be unfair to ask that of him. What I request therefore is permission for him to be allowed to leave court, at least until luncheon, so that he may lie down. I understand there is a first aid room here where he can rest.’

  ‘Does he have any objections to evidence being heard in his absence?’

  ‘Apparently not,’ replies Beaverbrook.

  The sick accused finds enough strength to raise his head and mouth “No”.

  Charles’s suspicions now burst into full flower and produce a good crop of fruit.

  The Recorder turns to him. ‘Mr Holborne, do you have any objections? If you insist, I shall adjourn and require the defendant to give evidence first, as is usual.’

  Charles curses silently. The Recorder has neatly completed Beaverbrook’s outflanking manoeuvre. Of course Charles doesn’t want to “insist” that a sick man be forced to the witness box. Equally, he doesn’t want to air his suspicions, namely that Steele is faking so as to defer giving his evidence until after the other evidence. Beaverbrook is saving him up for a final grandstanding act, trying to ensure that Steele’s is the last voice the jury hears. Charles weighs the disapproval of the jury if he is seen to be openly unsympathetic, against the detriment to his case if Steele gives evidence last.

  ‘Would a short adjournment, perhaps an hour or so, allow the accused to recover?’ he hazards.

  ‘No,’ replies Beaverbrook firmly. ‘My instructions are that once one of these migraine headaches start, it takes a couple of hours at least before they improve.’

  ‘Well, Mr Holborne,’ says the Recorder. ‘As I say, if you insist, I will of course adjourn. That’s your right. But surely in a case where the other witnesses are character witnesses, it makes little difference?’

  Under that pressure, Charles is forced to a reluctant decision.

  ‘No, my Lord. The Crown has no objections.’

  ‘Very well. The defendant may leave the dock.’

  An usher appears with the court usher’s cure-all, a warmish glass of water. The judge takes a weak sip from the glass and allows himself to be assisted to his feet. He does, Charles concedes, look extremely pale, but then so would he if he were on trial for his life.

  Beaverbrook waits until his client disappears out of the doors, wringing every last scrap of sympathy from the situation.

  ‘Do you in fact close the Crown’s case, Mr Holborne?’ asks the Recorder.

  ‘Yes, my Lord. That is my case.’

  Beaverbrook rises again. ‘Then I shall call my first witness, with your Lordship’s permission.’

  The QC calls a woman’s name, a name familiar to Charles. It belongs to one of Steele’s neighbours at the family’s last home before Lise disappeared. Charles leafs through his main index of witnesses, which includes not only the witnesses relied on by the Crown but also those whose statements the police obtained but were of no use to the prosecution. He finds her statement.

  A tall, elegant woman in her middle years, wearing an expensive Italian suit and a broad-brimmed hat, enters court. Beaverbrook guides her line by line through her statement. She details seven years of patience and forbearance by the defendant in the face of public humiliation and private unhappiness. She was a close friend, originally of the deceased, but then, as she came to know the family better, of the defendant. Her views, she said, were no different to those of anyone else who knew the couple. Everyone was sick of the alcoholic, adulterous wife and sorry for the husband. He coped unbelievably, he was totally devoted to the children and it was inconceivable that he could ever use violence unless, perhaps, in fear of his life. These last words are delivered with a gravity and deliberation that is deeply ominous to Charles’s ears. She finishes with an almost-humorous anecdote of a church fete where the deceased disgraced herself again and the accused employed, yet again, tact and diplomacy in diffusing the situation, when, by rights, most men would have thumped her.

  She’s good, concedes Charles, very good. She gives her evidence with calm assurance, looking every now and then at the jury, with a touch of humour here and there, but always conscious of the g
ravity of the proceedings. The jury likes her. She’s attractive to the men without being fast or loud, and just Woman’s Institute-matronly enough for the women to find her familiar and trustworthy. A sound choice for the first Defence witness.

  She is followed by four further witnesses, two men and two women, all of whom give evidence in the same vein. To the men, he was a quiet, pleasant companion at the pub and tennis club who suffered the burden of his wife with grace and patience, and who made efforts in the face of a busy professional practice to give as much time to the children as possible. To the women, he was a gentleman, in both senses of the word.

  The two female witnesses also have something to say of the deceased. Both experienced her at her worst, witnessing fits of frightening violence to inanimate objects and, once, to the defendant. One uses the word “predatory” of the deceased’s relationship with other men, and it sounds a chord.

  These witnesses are followed by two vicars whose statements, taken by the Defence solicitor, Charles did not have, one from the old community and one from the village where the Steele family lived until his arrest. Both make it clear that Steele’s religion is important to him, that until his arrest he was an active member of the church and that they would trust implicitly anything he says on his oath.

  Next, the jury hears from the woman who worked at the deceased’s antique shop, two of her relations and another neighbour. Finally, there comes a nanny who worked at the previous address several years before. A woman in her sixties, plump, with red cheeks and white hair curled in a bun, she is almost a caricature of a kindly, goodhearted, old-fashioned nanny. She details the deceased’s violent nature, her unreasoning hatred of the older boy, and her affairs. The contrast between her words — of blows, mental torture, smashed furniture and sexual rapaciousness — and her grandmotherly appearance is strikingly powerful, and her regard for Steele and the children, of whom there had only been two during her reign, is perfectly pitched and entirely credible.

  Charles has not a single question for any of them. By the time the parade ends, shortly after the luncheon adjournment, Beaverbrook has set the stage perfectly for the return of his client and, on cue, as the kindly, rosy-cheeked former nanny steps down from the witness box, an usher hurries up the aisle and hands a note to the court clerk. The clerk stands, turns and speaks to the Recorder, who nods.

  ‘Mr Beaverbrook, your client is, apparently, recovered. Yes,’ he says to the clerk, ‘let him return to the dock.’

  A moment later, Steele appears at the back of the court. He bows to the Recorder, who returns the compliment — a false note that, thinks Charles; it reveals to the jury the courtly relationship between the judge on trial and the judge conducting the trial — and steps quietly into the dock. Before he can sit, Beaverbrook calls him to give evidence.

  Steele walks to the witness box, takes the Bible offered to him and, without needing to read the words on the card presented to him, gives the oath.

  CHAPTER 31

  Steele’s voice is firm and calm, but there’s another ingredient, another quality that for a moment Charles struggles to identify. Then, it comes to him: it’s sadness. His well-modulated voice is saying: This is a terrible mistake, but I believe in the English system of justice, and therefore although this causes me pain, I am confident that the truth will prevail.

  In answer to Beaverbrook, Steele gives his name. He could have used “Sir”, for all High Court judges are knights of the realm, or even “Lord Justice”, but he gives just the name with which he was christened, thus making it clear that he expects no favours because of his rank. Beaverbrook takes three sentences to describe the judge’s career and then moves directly to his family life. If any member of the jury does not already know from the newspapers and the wireless about the brilliant young barrister, how he rose with spectacular speed through the ranks to Queen’s Counsel, then judge of the High Court, then the Court of Appeal, they’re not going to be interested now. They want to hear about his personal life. So Beaverbrook moves directly to that, to Steele’s marriage, the birth of his children and the move to their first family home in Kent. Then he pauses.

  ‘Was your wife faithful to you?’

  Steele’s face is sad, but resigned, as if his late wife’s affairs were a chronic illness which, although life-limiting, they had both learned to accommodate. ‘No, she was not. To my certain knowledge she had affairs from very early in our marriage.’

  ‘How did you feel about that?’

  ‘They saddened me. At first I didn’t think it was too serious. She was much younger than me, and she found marriage very restricting.’

  ‘Did you consider divorce?’

  The judge looks surprised. ‘No, of course not. I loved her. I could never quite believe that someone so lovely — she really was very beautiful, you know? — could love me, and yet she did. She’d be so sorry after … one of her … indiscretions, so apologetic. I was jealous, of course I was, but they never meant anything to her. It was a weakness, that need for excitement, and I hoped she’d grow out of it.’

  ‘Did she grow out of it?’

  ‘No. Well, for a short time they stopped, when she found she was pregnant with our eldest. She was so excited, so involved in it all, that I really thought she was settling down. I believed it was exactly what she needed, a child, someone she could love and who would depend on her totally.’

  ‘Did it work out that way?’

  ‘No. Just the opposite. After the first excitement wore off, she hated everything about it. She hated being pregnant, hated being fat and unattractive — or so she thought — and when the baby arrived, she hated him too. He represented everything that was tying her down, preventing her from enjoying her life.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘She started drinking.’

  ‘A lot?’

  ‘I didn’t appreciate how much until the health visitor came to see me. She had gone round several times in the mornings and found … well, my wife wasn’t up to caring for the baby at all.’

  ‘How was your relationship with your wife at this time?’

  ‘It was the beginning of a downward spiral. She’d get very angry with me, with the baby, with her whole life. She felt trapped, and her way out was through drink. She was very unstable. She would fly off the handle at the least provocation.’

  ‘Who with?’

  ‘Anyone. We had a succession of people who came to help with the children, nannies, home helps, a cook once,’ and he turns to the jury and addresses them directly. ‘You’ve heard from some of them. Not one of them lasted more than a few months.’

  Charles observes as several jury members nod. They’re lapping it up, he thinks.

  ‘The jury might wonder why you had a second child, if your relationship was so poor,’ comments Beaverbrook, asking the very question Charles would have asked at that point.

  ‘It wasn’t always as bad as that,’ replies Steele.

  Charles sees him flick a glance at the Recorder’s pen, and his speech immediately slows. He knows very well that if he speaks too fast, and the Recorder misses anything, the jury will not be reminded of it in the summing up, so he’s making absolutely sure that he speaks no faster than the Recorder can write. It may look like he’s just answering the questions as they come, without guile, thinks Charles, but this is all executed with minute precision. Inside the attractively humane exterior of Anthony Steele there hides a cold, methodical, thinking machine.

  ‘There were periods when she would try to get a grip, she’d stop drinking, tidy up the house, play at being the devoted mother and wife. She’d make romantic meals for us when I came home. She would try very hard for a short time, but then something would happen, she’d have a temper tantrum, and she’d start drinking again. Both the younger children were conceived during her periods of remission, at periods when we both hoped it would work.’

  ‘Remission? You make it sound like an illness.’

  ‘It was an illness. She was sic
k and, like many invalids, she made the entire family unhappy.’

  ‘You could have left her. Why didn’t you?’

  ‘You don’t leave your wife when she falls ill. You stand by her.’

  Very nice, thinks Charles. He had to hand it to Beaverbrook: this was an admirable piece of examination in chief. Everything that had preceded it had been designed to lead to that answer.

  ‘What, if anything, did you do to help her?’

  ‘I suggested various things, like hypnotherapy and counselling. The self-help organisation, Alcoholics Anonymous, was just starting in this country and I even suggested we went to some meetings. She wasn’t interested in any of it. I ended up going on my own. Eventually, I had the idea that maybe we should move, start again. There was a man, a lover, at that time, and he was becoming a nuisance.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘He was very serious about her, but unstable too. He would telephone at all hours of the day and night, they’d have rows. One time she came back from seeing him with her legs bruised. She wouldn’t tell me what had happened, but I think he kicked her. It seemed best all round to make a fresh start. So we moved from London to Kent. Right out into the country. I thought a hundred miles would be far enough. We moved into a small village where I thought we could live our lives unobtrusively, and I bought her a small business. I hoped it would occupy her mind and make her more financially responsible.’

  ‘Why “financially responsible”?’

  ‘She never could handle money. Even when we were first married, it went through her hands like water. When she started drinking, however, it became impossible. She spent all our savings, and got us into debt. I’d put aside money for my income tax, several thousand pounds, and when I went to pay the bill, it had all gone.’

  ‘I see. Did it work, the move?’

  ‘No. She wasn’t interested in the business except to spend the money. It became a huge drain on our resources. And she started another affair, actually within a week of our arrival. She met him at a party in the village; the first to which we were invited.’