The Redeemed

by M. R. Hall

  Jenny said, 'Can you call the police?'

  'They're on their way.'

  Sensing Alison's disapproval, Jenny said, 'I had to do it-'

  'Mr Donaldson wants to give evidence,' Alison retorted. 'His solicitor would like you to call him this afternoon. He's writing a statement now.'

  'Good. I'll hear from him whenever he's ready.'

  'Her old boyfriend Joe Cassidy's finally answered his summons, but there's no sign of Freddy Reardon yet. No one's picking up the phone at his home address.'

  'He'll be nervous. He might need a bit of encouragement. Maybe you can ask the police to send someone to get him.'

  'And if he doesn't want to come?'

  'I'll give him a chance to cooperate before I issue a warrant. I'm sure he will.'

  Alison gave a doubtful grunt.

  'What is it?' Jenny said. 'I've done something you don't approve of. I can tell.'

  Alison stalled at the door. 'It's not you. It's that priest, Father Starr—'

  'What about him?'

  'It's just an instinct - there's something not quite honest about him. Even when we were at the prison, it didn't feel as if he was being completely straight with us.'

  It was a concern that had been nagging at Jenny too, but she had put it down to her insecurity on being confronted with a man who led such an austere and observant life. His triumph over normal human weaknesses served to make her more painfully aware of her own.

  'What has he got to be dishonest about?' Jenny said, asking herself as much as Alison.

  'You wouldn't find me at the Mission Church of God,' Alison said, 'but at least they're achieving something. On the brink of changing the law, churches all over the world, getting kids off the street and out of crime. How many would turn up to hear Father Starr on a Sunday morning?'

  'You think he's jealous?'

  'My husband's a Catholic, or was,' Alison said. 'They might pretend to be tolerant, but believe me, there's only one road to heaven as far as they're concerned, and it goes through Rome.'

  The ranks of journalists had swelled and the air was stuffy with the smell of too many bodies crammed tightly together. The Turnbulls and Lennox Strong had yet to return to their seats. Jenny assumed they were still outside in their vehicle, being tutored by members of their legal team. The faces of the lawyers in the courtroom had hardened. All three advocates seemed to have united to form a single opposing front. Sullivan wore a permanent threatening scowl. Behind him Ed Prince brooded like a wounded bear. Attempts to secure an emergency injunction had clearly failed. Jenny had outmanoeuvred them and embarrassed their clients. Human nature alone dictated that they would be seeking revenge.

  Ruth Markham half-rose from her chair. 'Ma'am, might it be appropriate for Mr Kenneth Donaldson to give evidence first?'

  'Very well,' Jenny replied.

  Donaldson marched to the front with the cold determination of a battle-scarred general about to testify before a committee of cowardly politicians. He completed the opening formalities with no hint of emotion.

  The jury listened respectfully as Donaldson gave a brief, but moving history of his daughter's early life. She was an only child, he explained, and had been particularly close to her mother, a successful fashion model turned photographer, whose own life was cut short by cancer when Eva was only fourteen. It was a loss from which she would never fully recover. She spent most of her teens at boarding school, where initially she did well, but as she grew older increasingly found herself in mild bouts of trouble for all the usual teenage reasons - drink and boyfriends, though fortunately never any mention of drugs. Despite several near misses, she clung on and gained a place at Bristol School of Art. It was then that rebellion tipped over into outright rejection and defiance. Despite his best efforts to share in his daughter's life, Eva drew further away, refusing to visit home even in college vacations. He was hurt and confused at her behaviour, but listened to the advice of friends who told him to trust that in time she would mature and reconnect.

  'I'd send her money, but she'd post the cheques back or never cash them,' Donaldson said. 'She was very determined to be independent. She kept saying she didn't want to be reliant on me. I did what any father would do: I told her I would always be there whenever she needed me.'

  'And she continued to go her own way?' Jenny asked.

  'Yes. She would phone occasionally but never tell me very much. For example, I didn't know she had abandoned her college course until six months after the event. It was a schoolfriend of hers who told me that she had left to become involved with films. I tried to persuade her out of it, but she was twenty years old and hell-bent on doing as she pleased. She was clearly making plenty of money, so I didn't exactly have much leverage.'

  'Did you have any contact with your daughter during her career in the film business?'

  'Very little. There'd be the odd birthday card. She came to visit one Christmas, but she was very remote. I hardly saw her in four years - until she had the accident, in fact.'

  'What happened then?'

  'We spoke more often. I wouldn't say it was a normal relationship, but things certainly started to thaw. Once she became involved with the Decency campaign we spoke quite regularly.' Eva's father hesitated, showing the first hint of emotion since entering the witness box. 'We started to meet. She would come round every few weeks. We had dinner once a month, perhaps. Eva talked about her work, her life at the Mission Church. I was very pleased for her. Her life had a purpose.'

  Jenny said, 'Did she seem to be having any particular problems in the months before her death?'

  'She wasn't earning what she was used to, but she seemed determined to manage somehow. She certainly never asked me for support.'

  'And emotionally?'

  'She was always tired; she had a tough schedule of commitments. That apart, I would say she was the happiest I had seen her in years.'

  Jenny looked down at her notes, feeling three sets of eyes boring into her. She pretended to read for a moment, preparing to broach the subject she had so far managed to avoid.

  'Mr Donaldson, we heard evidence this morning that several weeks before she was killed, your daughter had a tattoo—'

  'Yes.'

  'Did you know she'd had it done?'

  'No.'

  'Have you any idea why?'

  'None. If Mr Turley's dates are correct, we met the following day - the Saturday. She was in good spirits.'

  'You don't know what the words mean?'

  'No.'

  Sullivan interjected, 'Ma'am, before you go any further—'

  'A witness here has the same protection against self- incrimination as he would in a criminal court, Mr Sullivan. I presume that's your concern.'

  'Yes, ma'am,' Sullivan barked.

  'Then you have nothing to worry about, have you?'

  Reluctantly giving way, he dropped back into his seat.

  Jenny turned to the witness. 'I am obliged to remind you that you do not have to say anything which may incriminate you, Mr Donaldson. Nevertheless, I would like to ask you if your daughter ever suggested to you or anyone else that she believed you had at some time behaved inappropriately towards her.'

  'You're asking if I interfered with my daughter. Never. Never. Never.' His denial rang around the silent courtroom. 'Eva undoubtedly slept with young men while she was still at school, possibly when she was as young as fourteen. But there was never anything untoward between us.'

  'I understand, Mr Donaldson,' Jenny said gently, 'but my question was whether to your knowledge she believed there might have been.'

  'No. Definitely not. She expressly told me that her decision to appear in pornographic films was nothing to do with me or how I had behaved. If I'm forced to psychoanalyse, I would say she was deeply hurt by her mother's death and sought love elsewhere, but I'm not sure I would even go that far. She made a foolish mistake and she accepted that.'

  'Mr Turley said that she seemed sad when she came to his studio. He likened her t
o someone who was grieving.'

  Kenneth Donaldson then dipped his head as if he had been suddenly assailed by unexpected emotions. 'I've had very little time to think, but I wonder if the truth is that Eva was grieving for a lost childhood, a lost innocence even.' He struggled to find words to express his confusion of feelings. 'These marks that people make on their bodies strike me as elemental. It's possible she didn't know the reason for it herself.'

  Jenny felt a pang of sympathy and wrote a note to herself: At a loss to explain. Believe his reaction genuine. Unpolished. Thinking aloud.

  'Where were you on the night your daughter was killed, Mr Donaldson?'

  'At my home in Bath. I was entertaining former colleagues, the MD of my former firm and his wife. I gave details to the police.'

  Jenny could have concluded her questioning there, but her gut told her that having opened Donaldson up, he had more to offer.

  'Is there anything else you would like to tell the court?'

  She saw Ed Prince trying to catch Donaldson's eye, shaking his head from side to side, urging him to remain silent. Donaldson ignored him, frowning through painful memories. 'Only this: that she was a more complicated young woman than I think any of us can or will understand. We talked once or twice about forgiveness; the church had asked her to contribute to a book on the subject. I remember she was a little melancholic about a conclusion she'd reached. She said she had come to realize that giving and receiving love wasn't the profoundest experience in this life, it was giving and receiving forgiveness. To her, sadly, it meant that our highest expression is always bound up with sin.'

  'Thank you, Mr Donaldson,' Jenny said, still struggling to make sense of his evidence. She addressed the advocates' bench. 'Cross-examination?'

  All three lawyers shook their heads.

  Detective Constable Ray Stokes immediately struck Jenny as the safe pair of hands DI Goodison would have needed to organize the investigating team on the ground in a sensitive case. Well into his fifties, he was a solid, reassuring character who had managed to maintain a sense of humour after nearly thirty years of front-line police work.

  Alison handed him the handwritten list of people spoken to at the Mission Church of God on Monday, 10 and Tuesday, 11 May.

  'Yes. I wrote that,' he answered.

  'Did you make any more detailed notes?'

  'Individual officers might have done, but if they didn't form any part of the investigation they wouldn't have made it into our files.'

  'What sort of notes might they have made?' Jenny asked.

  'I had a team of half a dozen detectives. I sent three of them into the church to ask anyone who knew her if they had heard anything of interest, whether she was having a problem with anyone, that sort of thing.'

  'And this is a list of people they spoke to?'

  'It is. And we didn't get anything out of it as I recall. We'd already established from Mr Strong that she'd stayed at home on the Sunday evening feeling tired, but that was about all of any use we learned there.'

  'Why was that useful?'

  'It wasn't particularly. It just served to rule out everyone who was at the service. We had a time of death at about eight or nine p.m. The service wasn't over until nearly ten.'

  Jenny said, 'One of the names on the list is Alan Jacobs. Do you know who questioned him?'

  'It was me. I had a list of people in her study group. There were about four or five names. I spoke to each of them.'

  'Do you recall the conversation with Mr Jacobs?'

  'Yes. I caught him at work, up at the Conway Unit. He was very helpful as I recall. He said that he had met Miss Donaldson a number of times in a group at the church, and that he'd been at the service on the Sunday night.'

  'Were you able to verify that?'

  'I think he gave a few names, people who confirmed he was there.'

  'You think?'

  'It was early days. If Craven hadn't come forward so soon the investigation would have dug deeper. As it turned out, it wasn't necessary.'

  'Would you have made a note of the names he gave you?'

  'If I did,' DC Stokes said, 'I'm afraid I haven't got it now. It was just preliminary stuff, running around. You scribble something down or make a note on your phone and don't necessarily hold on to it.'

  'You didn't follow up on his movements or those of anyone else at the church?'

  'Not in detail, no, ma'am,' the detective said with a shrug. 'Like I said, we talked to lots of people.'

  Jenny considered what a study group might mean. She assumed it was a sociable gathering and that the conversation must have drifted to the group's families and work. It was hard to imagine Alan Jacobs and Eva Donaldson not having found each other interesting. It must have occurred to Jacobs that Eva could have served as an inspiration to many of the kids in his care, particularly the drug-addled teenage girls who'd have sold themselves for their next fix. And she in turn must have been intrigued by a man who worked with young people of precisely the sort her church was setting out to reach and help.

  Jenny said, 'It must have struck you that professionally at least, they had much in common. Did you ask him if he discussed his work with Eva?'

  'No. We didn't get much beyond the basics I'm afraid.'

  Ed Prince and his team were in whispered conversation with Fraser Knight and his solicitor. What the hell is she driving at? Prince was undoubtedly asking. Nobody seemed to have any answers. Neither did Jenny. There was only a hunch, a vague, uneasy suspicion that two deaths in one study group amounted to more than mere coincidence. She knew there were many more answers to come - her problem was finding the right questions. From his seat at the back of courtroom Starr held her in his calmly critical gaze, judging, assessing, and fiercely willing her on.

  Michael Turnbull returned to the hall accompanied by his wife and Lennox Strong. The three seemed inseparable. As he came forward and prepared to testify, Jenny could tell that it wasn't facing the court that daunted him, but the fact that his words would be broadcast around the world within moments of him uttering them. There was no room for error.

  The consummate professional, Turnbull sat angled towards the jury, speaking to them as if they were concerned friends. Jenny wanted them to hear Eva's story from his perspective and led him through the chain of events which had brought them together. Turnbull began by describing the occasion when Pastor Lennox Strong first introduced her to him. He had been wary at first, he admitted, but over the course of several discussions in the following weeks Eva convinced him that she had been led to the Mission Church for a reason: to combat the industry that was corrupting a generation. He offered up many prayers before presenting her to Decency's board as a potential ambassador, but they were unanimous in their decision to take her on.

  'She made me rethink the whole issue,' Turnbull said. 'Before I met Eva, my focus had been on the damage done to consumers by this material, how it engendered brutal feelings towards women and led to a spiral of dishonesty and guilt. But I always struggled against well-intentioned, liberal-minded people, both men and women, who said the effect was the opposite; that tolerating pornography was a necessary part of a free and honest society. Eva's argument was simple: no one can be set free by watching men and women debase themselves. To obtain pleasure from that is to be corrupted. That is how corruption works - by preying on our greatest vulnerabilities.'

  Eva's media appearances, Turnbull said, took the Decency campaign from a fringe group treated as an object of derision by the popular press to the heart of the mainstream. Here was living, breathing proof of the damage the so-called 'adult entertainment' business wrought. Without Eva Donaldson, he conceded, he would not, in only a few days' time, be faced with the realistic possibility of taking the first steps to passing a stringent anti-pornography law. Her contribution had been nothing short of miraculous.

  'This was a multi-billion-pound business you and she were attacking,' Jenny said. 'You must have collected enemies.'

  'There was a stea
dy stream of abusive correspondence, certainly.'

  'Were you aware of Eva receiving threats to her personal safety?'

  'Quite the contrary. Eva was deluged with messages of support. Much of it from men addicted to pornography. They wanted to be set free.'

  'But what about the vested interests, the companies such as the one Eva used to work for?'

  'They're very sophisticated. Like the tobacco business, they hire lobbyists and seek to persuade politicians with the economic arguments. And no doubt they've prepared amendments to our bill designed to allow material which has passed certain ethical standards. If they play the politics right they could still be the big winners. Instead of a ban they would get regulation in exchange for legitimacy.'

  'So you're saying they had no motive for silencing Miss Donaldson?'

  'I'm sure they would have loved her to support their compromise position, but I don't think for a moment they thought she ever would.'

  'Do you think they might have tried to win her over?'

  'I can guess what you're driving at,' Turnbull said. 'But I can assure you Eva was as committed as it was possible to be. No amount of money would have bought her. Ask anyone - once Eva was set on a course there was no persuading her from it. She had a will of iron.'

  Jenny saw Kenneth Donaldson nodding in agreement.

  She moved on, touching briefly on Eva's financial problems, but Turnbull was dismissive, saying that if she had needed more money there were any number of PR companies who would have paid her many times the salary she earned from Decency. She was acting out a vocation; money wasn't her focus.

  She broached the issue of the tattoo, but Turnbull denied all knowledge and refused to speculate on her state of mind. He was her employer, not her confidant, he insisted.

  'Are you honestly saying you have no thoughts on what might have motivated her to have that tattoo?' Jenny asked.