The Madam

by Jaime Raven

  I took out the piece of paper my mother had given me and called Dewar’s number in the hope that he was in on a Saturday. It so happened that he was. I told him my mother had passed on his message and he said he was keen for one of his reporters to interview me. I said I was prepared to come and talk to him personally, but in return I wanted information on Rufus Benedict.

  ‘I’ll tell you what I can,’ he said. ‘So long as you give me a good story.’

  Dewar was waiting for me when I walked into the paper’s sprawling single-storey office building fifteen minutes later. He was a cube of a man in his fifties, with grey hair and a beer belly.

  We shook hands and he took me to his office, which was small and cluttered, with a view of the car park out front.

  ‘We got tipped off that you’d been released,’ he said, when we were facing each other across his desk. ‘As you probably know we gave extensive coverage to your trial. Now we’d like to hear what you have to say about that and about your time in prison.’

  ‘And in return I want to know more about Benedict,’ I said. ‘I’ll treat whatever you tell me in confidence. The more open you are with me the more forthcoming I’ll be with you. Is that understood?’

  ‘Of course, but may I ask why you want this information?’

  ‘Because I didn’t kill him, and I want to find out who did.’ He looked perplexed, so I continued. ‘I pleaded guilty to manslaughter rather than risk a life sentence for murder. But I was framed.’

  ‘I’ve looked back at the cuttings,’ he said. ‘You testified that you were drunk or drugged and weren’t fully aware of what was going on, except that you were attacked and that you must have used the knife to defend yourself.’

  I nodded. ‘That’s about right. But it wasn’t your lecherous reporter who attacked me.’

  He gestured towards a digital recorder on his desk.

  ‘Is it all right if I tape the interview? I want to make sure I get everything down.’

  ‘No problem,’ I said. ‘But before I say any more I’ve got some questions for you.’

  ‘Then fire away.’

  I took a moment to collect my thoughts. My eyes felt heavy and dry and my pulse roared in my ears. I knew that when the story appeared, Ash would go ballistic. But I also knew that the publicity would probably work in my favour. Hampshire police would be forced to deny that I’d been threatened and intimidated by one of their senior officers. Ash would be thrust into the limelight and would have to be careful what he said and did. He’d hopefully be ordered by his superiors to steer clear of me.

  ‘At the time he was killed, Benedict was working on a story for you about Joe Strickland,’ I said. ‘What exactly did he find out?’

  Dewar stuck out his bottom lip. ‘Nothing we could publish. I told that to the police and to your lawyer when he came to see me.’

  ‘So how long did Benedict spend on the story?’

  ‘A couple of months. As our investigative reporter, Rufus worked to his own timetable. He kept telling me he was gathering evidence that would prove Joe Strickland was involved in all kinds of illegal activities. But I never got to see any of it before he died.’

  ‘What about his notes and computer files?’

  ‘The police took it all away, but they said they couldn’t find anything to do with the investigation.’

  ‘Wasn’t that strange?’

  ‘Yes, but then Rufus always played things close to his chest. He probably kept all his research material in a safety deposit box or an online storage facility that nobody knew about.’

  ‘But surely as his editor he would have spoken to you about what he was up to.’

  ‘Of course he did. We had regular meetings. But the Strickland investigation was only one of the stories he was working on, and it wasn’t one that I assigned him. He convinced me it was going to result in a big exclusive. So I let him get on with it. That was how Rufus liked to operate.’

  ‘What about his contacts and the people he spoke to?’

  ‘He interviewed a lot of people during the course of the investigation, and I gave their names to the police. Among them was the woman who was apparently his main source of information and the person who got him started on it in the first place.’

  ‘Who was she?’

  ‘Her name’s Karina Gorski and she’s Polish. Rufus claimed she had some sort of relationship with Joe Strickland and had information on his dodgy dealings.’

  My heart slammed to a stop.

  ‘Are you sure that was her name?’ I said.

  ‘Absolutely. I signed over three cash payments to her totalling four thousand pounds.’

  My mind whirred. This had to be a significant lead. Karina had worked as an escort and according to Ruby Gillespie, Benedict had been one of her regular clients.

  ‘Benedict only ever wanted one girl,’ Ruby had told me. ‘He was infatuated with her and when she suddenly disappeared from the scene he stopped calling.’

  So where did Strickland fit into it? I wondered. And what kind of ‘relationship’ had he had with her? Did it involve more than taking a cut of her earnings?

  ‘Do you know where I can find Karina Gorski?’ I asked.

  ‘That’s the thing,’ Dewar said. ‘Nobody knows. She vanished four years ago. Benedict said he had no idea why, and he was very anxious about it. He didn’t want to admit that she might have strung him along to get paid before doing a runner.’

  ‘So what did Benedict actually tell you about her?’

  ‘Nothing much. We didn’t discover until after his death that she was a sex worker living in Southampton. We tried to find her ourselves but got nowhere.’

  ‘Did the police manage to question her?’

  ‘Apparently not. I’ve spoken a few times to the detective who was in charge of the case, and he reckons she probably went back to Poland.’

  ‘You mean DCI Ash?’

  ‘Correct. He told me that he suspects Rufus was actually visiting the woman as a client. But that didn’t surprise me. It was common knowledge here at the paper that he went with escorts even before it all came out at the trial. He confided in a colleague once that he was hooked on sex with younger women despite the fact that he was married with a family.’

  ‘But you’re saying you didn’t know that Karina was an escort until after Benedict died?’

  ‘That’s right. Rufus didn’t tell me and neither did he specify the exact nature of her connection to Joe Strickland. He simply said she had a relationship with him. But Strickland told the police he’d never even heard of the woman, let alone met her.’

  ‘So do you think he was telling the truth?’

  Dewar gave a mirthless grin. ‘Between you and me I think Strickland is a lying shit. He’s a crook who pretends to be an honest businessman. We’ve been trying to get something on him for years, but without success. I’m convinced he knew Karina Gorski, but the police took his word for it that he didn’t. They drew the same conclusion as I did – that she’d most likely fed Rufus some spurious information with a view to ripping the paper off.’

  I thought about this and realised it had to be a distinct possibility. Like me, Karina had turned to prostitution because she’d been desperate for money. I’d only met her once when we shared a bottle of wine at Ruby’s place. As well as being very pretty she had struck me as shrewd and hard-headed. I certainly wouldn’t have put it past her to exploit a randy dickhead like Rufus Benedict.

  ‘Are you aware that Strickland is involved in the agency that I used to work for?’ I said.

  Dewar shook his head. ‘As a matter of fact I wasn’t.’

  ‘Well, that’s what I’ve been told. I didn’t know it at the time, and I never met the man before yesterday.’

  ‘But am I right in assuming that you did know Karina?’

  ‘I didn’t know her,’ I said. ‘But I did meet her once.’

  He drew a breath. ‘Then I reckon it’s now your turn to answer my questions, Miss Wells.’

  I
left Dewar’s office after giving him an interview and allowing one of his photographers to take a couple of photos of me. He said he would carry it on the front page of Monday’s edition of The Post, since they didn’t publish on Sundays.

  At first he’d asked me to describe what had happened in the hotel room four years ago, even though it was more or less a repeat of what I’d said in court. Then he questioned me about prison and how I’d coped after Leo’s death. That was the hardest part, and it made my eyes water.

  But for Dewar the most newsworthy element of the interview was when I told him what had happened since my release. He hadn’t known about the threats and the attacks on my brother and me. Or about the episode in the Centurion bar.

  Some of what I told him he obviously couldn’t print, including my allegations against Strickland, Ruby and the police. But he said that my quest to get to what I believed to be the truth made for a cracking human interest story.

  Of course, I wasn’t sure how much of it he believed, but that didn’t matter so long as he drew attention to what I was doing.

  I kept some things back, including my relationship with Scar and my encounter with Pamela Ferris. And I insisted he shouldn’t send reporters to harass my mother and brother.

  All things considered, I was pleased with the way it had gone. Dewar struck me as an old school hack who would like nothing better than to stir up a shit-storm.

  I was convinced that giving the interview was a good move. It was impossible to know if it would evoke much sympathy, but at least it would put paid to the idea that I could be muzzled. And I was hopeful it would encourage the police to continue investigating the attack on me, despite Ash’s view that it didn’t happen.

  I was lost in thought as I walked out of the newspaper building and across the car park. So I wasn’t aware that someone had fallen in step behind me until I heard a voice.

  ‘Lizzie Wells.’

  I stopped and turned. At first I couldn’t put a name to the face. The woman was in her early fifties, slim and smartly dressed in black trousers and white blouse. She peered at me through thick-rimmed glasses.

  ‘I want to talk to you,’ she said.

  My stomach knotted with conflicting emotions when I realised who she was.

  ‘Hello, Mrs Benedict,’ I said.

  Anne Benedict, the widow of the man I was jailed for killing, stood before me, her eyes small and unfriendly.

  She’d lost weight since we’d stared at each other across the courtroom, and the last four years had not been kind to her. The black, shoulder-length hair was now grey and lifeless, and her face was hollow and pale.

  ‘I was wondering if you would remember me,’ she said.

  ‘How did you know I was here?’ I asked her.

  She shrugged. ‘My husband had many close friends at the paper. One of those who stayed in touch with me saw you arrive earlier and knew why you’d come. So she called to tell me, and I came over and waited.’

  ‘I was going to contact you actually,’ I said. ‘I was wondering if I might ask you some questions about your husband.’

  Her eyes narrowed inquisitively. ‘Are you serious? Why on earth would you think I’d answer them? You’re the whore who murdered him.’

  I drew a careful breath and told her what I’d been telling everyone else: that I was not a murderer. But as she listened it was obvious she didn’t believe me.

  ‘So that’s your game is it?’ she said. ‘Now that you’re out of prison you’re planning to cash in on your notoriety by saying you want to clear your name. You’re a disgrace. How much is the paper paying for your story?’

  ‘I’m not being paid and I’m not trying to cash in,’ I said. ‘I just want the truth to come out.’

  She gave me a withering look. ‘The truth is you stabbed my husband to death and wrecked my life. I’ve come here to ask you not to bring it all up again for my family’s sake. My two sons are still grieving the loss of their father. I don’t want your face splashed across the front pages again along with all the sordid details.’

  My heart went out to the woman. She was another innocent victim of what had happened and like me she’d probably never fully recover from it.

  ‘Have you no shame?’ she said. ‘Why can’t you just go away, and let us carry on with our lives in peace?’

  ‘It’s not as easy as that,’ I said.

  ‘Well, it should be. You got off lightly considering what you did. It’s a scandal that you’re not still rotting in prison.’

  There were tears in her eyes now, and her voice broke with emotion. Luckily there was no one else in the car park to hear her berating me. But that didn’t make me feel any less uncomfortable. I realised there was nothing I could say to placate her – not unless I agreed to get the paper to drop the story. And that was out of the question.

  She pointed at me accusingly. ‘What you did was despicable. I know my husband wasn’t perfect. He did some shameful and disgusting things. But he didn’t deserve to die like that. And my boys don’t deserve to suffer all over again because you want to exploit the situation.’

  She took another step towards me and it made me flinch. I could tell she had already worked herself up into a frenzy that was borne out of frustration and a perceived injustice. It made her frighteningly unpredictable.

  ‘Just go back in there and retract what you’ve told them,’ she pleaded. ‘The world doesn’t need to hear your lies and excuses.’

  ‘I can’t do that,’ I said.

  Her face reddened, and she started to shake. ‘You vile fucking whore. Have you any idea how much distress you’re going to cause? Have you?’

  ‘I can’t help that,’ I said, taking a step back. ‘I just want to expose a wrongdoing.’

  She shook her head. ‘No, you don’t. You want to inflict more pain because that’s what people like you thrive on. You don’t care how much damage you cause. That’s why you sell your body and prey on weak and vulnerable men.’

  I wanted to tell her that her husband had not been weak and vulnerable, that he was just a dirty sod who had enjoyed fucking young prostitutes. But I held my tongue because inside I understood how she felt and I sympathised.

  ‘Rufus was a good man despite what he did,’ she screamed at me. ‘I won’t let you drag his name through the mud again. It’s not fair.’

  A fierce rage shivered behind her eyes and just as I opened my mouth to respond, she lashed out at me. I failed to see it coming and her right hand struck my left cheek. The blow was loud and stinging, but it seemed to sap the woman’s strength in an instant.

  Her face crumbled, and her body appeared to collapse in on itself. She started to cry, and her shoulders heaved with every sob.

  I reached out instinctively and touched her arm, but she pushed me away.

  ‘Don’t you dare lay a hand on me,’ she shouted. ‘Just go away and crawl under the nearest rock. That’s where you belong.’

  She was inconsolable, and the sight of her sent a great wave of sadness rolling over me.

  I didn’t want to leave her, but I knew I had no choice. If I stayed then things were likely to turn even uglier.

  So I walked away from her, resisting the urge to say something. There was a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach and the guilt was tormenting me yet again.

  I looked back when I reached the car and saw her standing there staring at me and looking utterly dejected and pathetic.

  I wanted to go back and try to comfort her, to tell her I was sorry for all that had happened. But I knew it was a bad idea, so I pulled open the door, got in and drove away from there with a heavy heart.

  15

  I felt terrible. As I wrestled with my conscience, I couldn’t clear my mind of the image of a tearful Anne Benedict.

  It was bad enough that she knew her husband had paid me to have sex with him. But her pain and despair were magnified a hundred times over because she believed I’d also killed him.

  How could I reconcile the fact that I was
going to inflict more pain through my own desperate need to get at the truth? I was in a no-win situation.

  I took out my phone and called Scar as I drove, but it went to voicemail. I was momentarily nonplussed. I didn’t know what to do or where to go, but I realised I wanted to talk to someone. Anyone. If only to offload the guilt-inspired tension that was building up inside me.

  Without giving it much thought I headed for my mother’s house. Even if I got a frosty reception I reckoned it’d be better than going back to an empty flat.

  I spotted Tiny’s car as soon as I entered the street. It was parked about twenty yards back from the house so it couldn’t be seen from the front windows. He was sitting behind the wheel and he gave me a wave as I pulled into the kerb in front of him.

  I got out and walked back to his car. He wound down the window, and I asked him if everything was all right.

  He smiled. ‘Nobody has entered or left the house since I arrived a couple of hours ago. And I haven’t seen anyone acting suspicious.’

  ‘That’s good. I’m just popping in to see them.’

  ‘What’s up, Lizzie? You look as though you’ve had a bad morning.’

  ‘I have.’

  ‘Well, get in the car and tell me about it.’

  I got in the passenger side and was struck by the smell of coffee and cigarettes. Tiny offered me a smoke and I accepted. After lighting up, I told him about my morning, beginning with my encounter with Pamela Ferris at the cemetery. He listened in silence and raised his eyebrows a couple of times.

  ‘It’s all pretty odd,’ he said. ‘Especially that business with the Polish girl. If she was involved with Benedict and Strickland at the same time then maybe everything that happened revolved around her.’

  ‘It would help if we could track her down,’ I said.

  ‘Is Donna getting anywhere with that?’

  ‘I just called her, but it went to voicemail. She told me earlier she was trying to contact Karina’s brother.’

  ‘What about the police? Have you asked them about her? It could be she’s officially listed as a missing person.’

  ‘I haven’t asked them yet, but I will. What about you? Did you manage to identify the guy with the tattoo?’