The Judgement Book

by Simon Hall

  ‘We believe we have a picture of the blackmailer.’

  Adam waited again, let the pack react. There were a few gasps, a couple of whistles and several nudged each other. It was pure theatre.

  ‘It’s taken from CCTV pictures,’ Adam went on. ‘For those of you in television, I will be making a copy available. For those of you in print, I have a series of stills taken from the video. I have some more information for you, then I’ll take a few questions.’

  A uniformed sergeant began walking around the room, handing out CDs and photographs of the CCTV film. Dan noticed El took a handful. He must be looking after several papers and making good money from them. No wonder he wore his trademark sleazy grin.

  ‘We believe the blackmailer has now claimed their second and third victims,’ continued Adam, his voice grave. ‘I regret to inform you the second was a police officer, one who worked here in Plymouth. Her name was Inspector Linda Cott. Her car was found in a car park on the north Cornwall coast, near St Agnes. We have an eyewitness report of her jumping from the cliff. The identity of the third victim I cannot release to you as inquiries are continuing.’

  Adam looked around the room. It was silent, all the journalists scribbling at their notes, the cameramen and photographers intent on their shots. And still the punch line was yet to come.

  ‘I have one further thing to say,’ the detective continued. ‘This blackmailer is very dangerous. He, or she, is wrecking lives. He needs to be caught before he destroys another. I would appeal for anyone who thinks they might recognise the person in the pictures to get in touch with us and help us put an end to these dreadful crimes.’

  The silence returned. Adam caught Dan’s look and gave him a slight nod. It was working perfectly. Now he’d take some questions. They’d hoped one of the hacks would ask the right one, but if they didn’t Dan was ready, just in case.

  There were a couple of questions about Linda and her career. A newspaper reporter wanted a photo of her and Adam promised he would get one. Dan silently chastised himself for not thinking of that. A radio reporter asked about progress in the inquiry, and Adam managed to sound upbeat without giving anything away.

  The detective pointedly checked his watch. ‘Now, ladies and gentlemen, if that’s all?’

  ‘Keep recording,’ Dan hissed to Nigel, who had stood up from his camera. ‘Go in tighter on him, get us a big close-up. This bit could be good.’

  Dan rose from his seat and put up his hand. ‘Mr Breen, just one final question, if I may?’

  Adam turned to him and nodded. ‘Go on.’

  Dan waited for the whirr of the camera’s motor, zooming in. The closer the shot, the more powerful the image, the tension and passion revealed in each line and motion of the face.

  ‘What do you think of the blackmailer? What do you believe are the reasons for his crimes?’

  Adam looked down at his notes, composed himself.

  ‘This is what I think,’ he said finally. ‘The blackmailer is clearly sick. He might think he has some grand purpose in what he’s doing, but he, or she, doesn’t. He’s just a common criminal. In fact, it’s worse than that. At least common criminals have the decency to show themselves. This blackmailer hides behind poisonous little notes. That makes him a coward, a pathetic one who can’t make a mark on society in any other manner but to sneak around, looking for ways to have some sordid hold over decent people. As to what drives him to do it, I can only speculate. But I can say this. He or she must be a very lonely, sad and utterly inadequate person.’

  When the other hacks had left to file their stories, the door opened again and Claire walked in. She kept her head high and didn’t even glance at Dan, but strode over. He looked at her and tried his best smile. It wasn’t returned.

  His efforts at bringing a thaw felt as effective as holding a lighter to an iceberg.

  ‘I will talk to you about Linda,’ Claire said frostily. ‘But I want to make it clear I’m doing it for her, not you.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ Dan replied, trying to keep his voice level.

  Nigel sat Claire down and clipped a tiny personal microphone onto the lapel of her jacket.

  ‘What do you want to ask?’ she said.

  ‘I want to know what kind of a woman Linda was, and if you have any special memories of her. It’ll give the viewers a sense of her personality. Two sound bites will do me fine.’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘Recording,’ said Nigel, from behind the camera.

  Dan asked his questions and Claire answered, fluently and easily. She’d been rehearsing it, he thought.

  ‘Linda was a dedicated police officer. She joined the force because she wanted to make a difference to people’s lives. She was a great champion of neighbourhood policing and she wanted to make communities safer and happier places. She wanted people to see the police as friends who they could turn to for help. I think the best way to remember her is someone who achieved that. She really made a difference in the communities she served and she’ll be sadly missed.’

  Dan tried not to smile. Good answer. So she was listening all those times I ranted on about how important it is to make an interview vivid and human, not the usual robotic police spiel about “apprehending the aforementioned suspect to assist us in our inquiries”.

  He’d never understood why they did it. Officers who were perfectly normal when you chatted to them before the interview suddenly became automatons when the camera was rolling. Not Claire.

  He hesitated to think it, but did anyway. It felt good. His Claire.

  He hoped so, anyway.

  He forced his mind back to the job. ‘And how will you personally remember her?’

  Claire clasped her fingers together, gathered her thoughts. Beside him, Dan heard the whirr of the camera’s motor as Nigel zoomed in the shot.

  ‘Linda was a friend to me in times of need. Even today, it’s not always easy being a woman in the police. In the dark moments, she’d sit down with me and let me pour it out. She told me she’d gone through just the same and that I should stick at it. The bad days passed and good ones came to take their place. It’s always stuck with me. Bad times go and good times come to replace them. It’s what I cling on to now when I’m having a rotten day. She was a great woman. A fine and dedicated police officer and a good friend. I’m proud and privileged to have known her.’

  Nigel drove them back to the studios to cut the story. Sitting in the edit suite, Dan had to struggle hard to concentrate. Claire’s face on the monitors was a terrible distraction. For the first time in many years he properly understood a universal truth. Why was it that you only really appreciated what you had when you felt threatened with losing it?

  Lizzie was having the weekend off, a rare phenomenon, renowned only to be forced upon her by the demands of her family, but that didn’t mean he could relax. It was an oft-repeated joke that her ghost patrolled the building. Like many journalists’ tales, it was heavily embroidered, but still retained an element of truth. If she wasn’t at work, Lizzie always watched every bulletin from home and had a block setting on her TV system to record them in case she happened to be out.

  Dan debated how to start the story. It was a fine call. The two broad rules of television reporting collided on this one. It was generally agreed you should begin your report with the best material you had, and that often came down to a powerful personal story or some striking pictures. He had both, Claire’s moving comments about Linda and the CCTV of the blackmailer.

  Dan went back to basics, something he’d first begun doing as a cub reporter, all those years ago. He jotted down the pros and cons for each on his notebook but still couldn’t decide, so he flipped a coin. The CCTV pictures won, so given the luck he’d had lately he went for the human interest.

  He began the story with the photo of Linda and explained what had happened to her. They used some pictures of the cliffs where she had jumped, Dan talking about an eyewitness seeing her fall and her car being found close by. Then it was in
to Claire’s interview. After that came the CCTV, a recap of what had happened to Freedman and Adam talking about what he thought of the blackmailer.

  They watched it back. Dan still wasn’t sure he’d got the report the right way around for the TV purists, but, whatever, he knew the viewers would find it compelling and that was what counted. Claire’s words were powerful and Adam’s attack on the blackmailer was captivating. It could well prompt a reaction and give them a chance to catch him. Even better, the story had the exclusive angle that Lizzie so craved.

  He could imagine her at home, playing with her kids while watching the bulletin, nodding with the nearest she ever came to contentment. It should keep her off his back for a couple of days longer. The case was fascinating and he didn’t want any risk of being taken off it.

  The clock on the wall said it was just after four. Dan realised he was hungry. With all that had happened he’d forgotten to eat. Time to get a sandwich. No, even better, how about a burger from one of the take-aways on Mutley Plain? Claire wasn’t here to nag at him and he deserved a treat. It could even be a small measure of revenge for the way she was treating him. He managed a weak smile at the thought.

  His mobile rang, Adam’s name flashing on the display. As Dan answered, he knew his chance of a sly snack had gone.

  ‘What’s that?’ he said, as the phone buzzed with the detective’s excitement. ‘Really? Wow! That’s two big developments then. OK, I’ll be right there.’

  Dan grabbed his satchel and jogged down the stairs to the car park.

  Chapter Fourteen

  A WONDERFUL WASH OF warm relief enveloped Dan as he walked into the MIR. Claire smiled to see him, and it was genuine. His chest lost its tightness and he could breathe again. He smiled back, tried not to make it too pathetically delighted, and felt a sudden ache behind his eyes. Tonight they would cuddle up together at her flat and talk about the new house. If she wanted an Aga, she would get it, no matter what it took. She deserved it.

  Adam sat on the edge of a desk, Claire stood next to him. Michael was leaning against the windows at the back of the room, looking down at the passing traffic. He turned and gave Dan his nervous smile. Eleanor stood at the front, by the green boards. She looked like a teacher about to give a lecture, and played the part.

  ‘Settle down please class,’ she said with her gentle smile. ‘Now, I haven’t said that for a few years.’

  Dan quickly perched on the edge of a desk next to Adam. He could feel the anticipation in the room. On the table beside Eleanor was a pile of Sunday newspapers.

  ‘This code wasn’t too tricky to break,’ she said. ‘And I’m suspicious that was deliberate. In fact, perhaps there’s even a pattern emerging.’

  ‘Like what?’ Claire asked.

  ‘That first code, Freedman’s, it was a tough one to crack. I wonder if it was designed that way, so he couldn’t solve it. The second one, Linda’s, was probably easier, as she cracked it. This one wasn’t difficult either.’

  ‘And why would the Worm do that?’

  ‘Perhaps because of meaning what they say about giving people a chance to crack the codes and save themselves. So the Worm needed Freedman to fail, to justify exposing him. And with that, came all the publicity to start off the game. For the Worm, it was like the official and spectacular launch, if you like.’

  ‘But the next two codes?’

  ‘Easier because they don’t matter so much. The game is underway. You know five notes are coming. You’re working against the clock. The media interest is building. The pressure on you is growing.’

  Claire smoothed a lock of hair behind her ear. ‘Which would answer a question that’s been bothering me. Why set the codes at all? So it has to be a taunt. Aimed at us, the police, as a figurehead for the “authorities” the Worm’s hitting out at.’

  Eleanor smiled again, her face softly lined with a grandmother’s wisdom. ‘That would be my guess. But I’m straying outside my specialism here. That’s a matter for you, and Adam.’

  He nodded thoughtfully, looked more relaxed than earlier. His face had lost some of its tautness, but his voice was hoarse and he sounded tired as he said, ‘All thoughts welcome. So, come on then, Eleanor, tell us about the code.’

  She picked up a couple of the papers. ‘It was the misspelling of “tel” that gave it away. I immediately thought our blackmailer wouldn’t make a mistake like that. So, look at the sentence.’

  Eleanor pointed to it, highlighted in Osmond’s note on the board behind her. ‘Why would “Now tel me” have special significance on a Sunday?’

  The room was quiet as they all stared at the words.

  ‘Newspapers,’ said Dan slowly. ‘Now means News of the World. Tel means Telegraph. M and E mean Mail and Express.’

  ‘Or Mirror and Express,’ said Eleanor. ‘But you’re right, yes, it did turn out to be the Mail. The words all refer to Sunday newspapers.’

  ‘Clever,’ said Dan. ‘Simple, but clever.’

  ‘So what about the numbers?’ asked Claire. ‘What do they mean?’

  Eleanor picked up a copy of the News of the World. ‘That was what took me a little while. I wasn’t quite sure and it needed a bit of experimenting.’

  Dan silently cursed himself for being so slow. He should have seen that code, he thought. But then, he had been rather preoccupied with other things. Covering the story, managing the media for Adam and worrying about Claire. He glanced at her, and she winked from the corner of her eye.

  The sun shone in his sky. Life was feeling so very much better.

  ‘Take the first number, 1112,’ continued Eleanor. ‘I think each of the blocks of figures refers to one of the newspapers the blackmailer’s given us. So we’re looking for four words, one from the News of the World, one from the Telegraph, one from the Mail and one from the Express. The numbers give us the location of the word we want within the paper they refer to.’

  ‘Blimey,’ grumbled Adam. ‘How?’

  Eleanor smiled indulgently, a classic teacher’s look for a struggling pupil.

  ‘Take 1112,’ she said. ‘It means go to the News of the World, page one, column one, line one, word number two.’

  She held up the paper to show them and traced her finger along the front page, past the screaming “Three-in-a-Bed Sex Shocker” headline about some snooker player Dan had never heard of.

  ‘Column one, line one, word number two, and you get the word “the”’.

  ‘The?’ repeated Adam dubiously.

  ‘Yes,’ Eleanor replied. ‘Bear with me. That’s only the first part of the answer.’

  Adam drew in a heavy breath. ‘Well, I’m glad we’ve got you here to solve these things for us. I would never have cracked it. But as time is pressing, rather than taking us through the other words would you mind putting us out of our misery and just telling us the answer?’

  Eleanor tutted. ‘That goes against my teacher’s principles. I should make you work through the other numbers to show me you understand. But as you asked so nicely, when you do all that the code reads, “the answer is memorial”’.

  There was a silence. ‘Memorial?’ said Adam, finally. Dan couldn’t tell if his voice was more full of disbelief or scorn, but there was certainly plenty of both.

  ‘Yes,’ replied Eleanor calmly. ‘Memorial is your answer for part three of the Worm’s riddle.’

  Adam stood up from his desk and walked over to the green boards.

  ‘Memorial,’ he said again. ‘So put that together with the other clues and we’ve got “Open original memorial”, plus two missing words to come.’

  He folded his arms and stared at them. “Open original memorial.” How the hell does that help us?’

  The expression on each face made it clear that was exactly what they were all thinking.

  The damage wasn’t serious, but it looked impressive. The image on the TV screen steadied and focused on a window, a fist-sized hole in its centre, a radial pattern of jagged cracks spreading from the wound.
The camera panned quickly to the next window. It had suffered a similar assault. Shards of glass littered the patio surrounding a couple of half bricks, the missile of choice.

  The front of the old Victorian building had been a proud white, but was now daubed with sprays of royal blue paint. The black wooden door had taken a splash of streaks of blue too, but the mainstay of the pot had been reserved for the brass name plaque. The legend “Plymouth Traditionalist Association” was barely discernible through the repeated attacks of the flying paint.

  Adam stopped the DVD player. ‘Recorded earlier by the bobbies who were called. They found Yvonne Freedman waiting outside to be arrested. She’s down in the cells. Let’s go have a chat.’

  They followed him down the stairs to the basement. Dan was so tired he had to concentrate on each step. He noticed Claire was holding the banister carefully. She must be struggling too, particularly if she wasn’t feeling well.

  At the thick black metal bars which marked the entrance to the cells complex, Adam paused. ‘Claire, will you take the lead on this please? I think she responded better to you the last time we spoke.’

  Yvonne Freedman was sitting on the edge of a thin blue plastic mattress covering a hard, metal shelf which passed for a bed. She looked up expressionless as they walked in. It couldn’t have been often the custody suite hosted such an unlikely criminal. She was still dressed smartly in the outfit of widowhood, a white blouse, black jacket, knee-length black skirt, and black shoes.

  The cells were cold, but she didn’t seem to have noticed. Her expression was vague, as though her focus was inside herself, the world around merely of passing interest.

  Dan and Adam stayed standing in the cell doorway, Claire sat beside her, said gently, ‘Hello again, Mrs Freedman.’

  She didn’t reply, just stared straight ahead at the whitewashed brick wall, her hands in her lap.

  ‘How are you feeling?’ Claire asked. ‘How’s Alex?’

  Again no reply. ‘How are you coping?’

  Still no response. Claire and Adam exchanged looks. ‘Why did you do it, Yvonne?’ Claire persisted. ‘Why attack the building? Was it because of Will?’