And So It Begins

by Rachel Abbott

  ‘One last question, if I may, Miss Clarke. When did you manage to escape the tyranny of your grandmother and uncle?’

  ‘I tried to run away several times, but I had no money and I wasn’t good at it. In the end I told a friend and she gave me fifty pounds out of her own savings so that I could get away. I left just before my fifteenth birthday.’

  At that point, the QC asked for a recess, claiming that Miss Clarke needed a break before he continued with his questioning, and Cleo felt almost a sigh of relief run around the court. That hadn’t made good hearing, and for one moment she had felt a paradoxical sympathy for Evie. Cleo’s own childhood had been far from perfect, but it had been nothing like Evie’s, and if she herself felt like that, how would the jury feel? They had to see that, in spite of their empathy with Evie the victim, none of it mattered. Evie had killed Mark – that was the only thing they should be interested in.

  She pushed herself up abruptly from her seat. For a moment she couldn’t help wishing that Evie’s grandmother had carried out her threat and dropped her off that cliff.

  51

  The recess was short, and before long Evie was once again in the witness box. Her cheeks were pale, but she appeared to be under control. There was a quiet certainty about her, as if she knew she was in the right. One never knew, with Evie. The more Harriet got to know her, the more private a person she realised she was.

  Boyd took to his feet.

  ‘Miss Clarke, I’m sorry to have to ask you more questions, but there are a few matters we need to clear up. Can you explain to the court why you pretended your father was funding the series of photographs that you commissioned from Mr North?’

  Evie dropped her head. ‘I’m ashamed of this now, although I did explain it to Mark and he understood. He forgave me.’

  Harriet heard what sounded like a faint hiss from Cleo in the front row of the gallery.

  ‘I was visiting the area. I was wandering through the town one day and I saw a stunning photograph in the window of the Marcus North gallery. He was such a wonderful photographer and seemed capable of making anyone look beautiful. I had been told all my life that I was ugly, and I wanted to know if Marcus North could take a picture that would allow me to change my perception of myself.’

  Evie cast a pleading glance at the jury.

  ‘It was my uncle, you see.’ She pressed her lips together, her words harsh. ‘He told me I was an ugly little shit and nobody would ever want me. I needed some evidence for myself that I wasn’t totally hideous. When your confidence has been shattered all your life, it’s hard to explain.’

  She turned to the front again, shaking her head slightly.

  ‘I could never afford Mark’s prices, but I thought if I tempted him with my well-connected father, he might be persuaded. That’s why I made him up.’

  ‘Was that the only reason?’ Boyd asked.

  ‘No, I also wanted to use the experience to learn from Mark. Basically it was a very cheeky way of getting free lessons, because I love photography but I’m not very good at it. I’d hoped to make myself so useful, such good company, that maybe he would take me on as an assistant.’

  ‘And you told Mr North all this?’

  ‘Not straightaway, no. When I knew there was no way I could raise the money to pay him, I thought I would just have to say that my father had died, and then apologise and disappear. But I really liked Mark and thought he liked me, so I stayed and did what I could to repay the debt. When he started to become interested in me as a person – a girlfriend – I felt I had to tell him the truth. He understood. Mark had his problems, but when you stripped away the evil side, he could be kind.’

  Harriet heard another hiss and this time just made out the whispered words ‘Lying bitch.’ The judge was too far away to hear what was said, but he glared at the gallery, uncertain of exactly where the disturbance had come from. If Cleo wasn’t careful, she would be thrown out of the courtroom.

  Boyd continued with his questioning, seeking clarification on some of the content of Evie’s original statement, but Harriet was confident he had done a good job. Devisha, though, wasn’t going to be so kind.

  Devisha Ambo rose quickly to her feet and stood looking at Evie for a few seconds. Harriet recognised this as a ploy to unnerve her client, but it was too brief to cause comment from the judge.

  ‘I only have a few questions for you, Miss Clarke. Cleo North told the court that Mr North had a strong aversion to going into the lower level of the house – the basement where the gym was – as that was the site of his wife’s accident. She said he refused to go down there. Yet you claim that Mr North trapped your hand between the weights of a multi gym that was situated in that same basement room. How could that happen if Mr North never went into that part of the house?’

  Harriet watched Evie’s face, concerned that this question might throw her. But she should have known better. Evie was totally in control.

  ‘It was before Mark went on one of his trips. I was sure he was going to hurt me, so I hid in the basement – certain he wouldn’t follow me. Cleo is right that he almost never went down there, so I thought I was safe. I relaxed and made the mistake of dozing off while I waited for him to leave. When I woke up, he was standing there, fully dressed and ready to go.’

  The whole court was hanging on Evie’s every word. This wasn’t helping the prosecutor’s case and Harriet knew she would be keen to take the sting out of it.

  ‘Thank you, Miss Clarke. I imagine this is when you claim he injured you.’ Devisha rustled some papers, as if about to move on.

  ‘He had tears on his cheeks. “Not here, Evie. Not again,” he said. I didn’t know what he meant by “Not again.”’ Evie lifted her hand and stared at it. ‘He dragged me onto my knees, used his other hand to pull the bar that lifted the weights, thrust my hand on there, and then he let it drop.’

  The last words were almost whispered and the courtroom was totally silent.

  ‘So why, knowing that he was – according to you – a violent man, did you take a knife into the bedroom on a night when you knew he was most likely to hurt you – the night before he would be separated from you?’

  ‘I had bought him a present! I thought it might be a game-changer. I had set the scene with candles, so that he wouldn’t have the darkness he seemed to prefer when he was hurting me. I was excited because he seemed so pleased about the present, and in my haste I brought the knife instead of the scissors. It was easier to find in the dark – the lights had fused in the whole house, not only in the bedroom.’

  ‘Miss Clarke, I put it to you that you used the present as an excuse to bring a knife into the bedroom and that you had planned from the start to kill Mark North. You never intended to bring scissors – maybe you had even caused the lights to fuse so that Mark wouldn’t be able to see that you had a knife in your hand.’

  Evie didn’t rise to the bait. ‘I wouldn’t know how to fuse the lights, and the last thing I wanted was darkness. Why would I have lit the candles if that were the case? I can only imagine Mark fused them because he had something worse in store – he must have wanted to start hurting me straight away and needed to guarantee the dark.’

  There was a cry from the gallery and Cleo jumped to her feet. ‘That’s not true – he didn’t even like the dark!’

  Before the judge had a chance to exclude her from court, Cleo pushed past everyone and ran out of the courtroom.

  The prosecutor continued as if there had been no interruption.

  ‘Miss Clarke, we know you have provided evidence of your more recent injuries and you want us to believe that it was Mark North who hurt you. But we have no evidence other than your word that he was the perpetrator, do we?’

  Evie met Devisha’s gaze. ‘No, you don’t.’

  ‘And we have no evidence, other than your word once more – and let’s not forget that we know you have lied before – that you took the knife into the bedroom purely to open the present.’

  Harriet was s
hocked by the coldness of Evie’s eyes and prayed that she wasn’t going to lose control.

  ‘If I had been going to lie about that, I would have said that Mark brought the knife into the bedroom. Instead I told the truth.’

  Devisha was not to be deterred.

  ‘Even if it could be proven that Mark North hurt you, which it can’t, I put it to you that you decided you’d had enough, and you sought revenge against Mark North for the harm he had caused you. You carefully planned an attack on him in a darkened room with a knife that you took there for that very purpose.’

  Evie’s face changed. Two hot spots of colour flashed angrily on her white cheeks and her eyes glittered. Harriet wanted to signal her to calm down, but Evie was staring at Devisha Ambo.

  ‘Revenge? Do you seriously think that killing someone is any form of revenge?’

  The barrister looked taken aback, but Evie hadn’t finished.

  ‘If I’d stabbed Mark for revenge, he would have suffered nothing more than a moment or two of pain. That’s not revenge. Revenge is seeing someone suffer for a lifetime in retribution for what they’ve put you through. If I had wanted revenge on Mark, he wouldn’t be dead. He’d be feeling the kind of pain that I have felt every single day for a long, long time.’

  52

  Revenge. Such a powerful word, and one that covered a multitude of sins. Stephanie thought about the word and its implications. She had to wonder if she had been exacting revenge on Gus by refusing to talk to him about their relationship. Was she really protecting herself from further heartbreak, or was she making him suffer as a form of retribution?

  She had been finding it difficult to concentrate for the last couple of days. Saturday night had confused her so much, and she was furious with herself for giving in to her emotions.

  In the end, after her outpouring of grief, Gus had stayed for dinner. She had loved having him there, sitting opposite her as he had so many times in the past, and he had been enthusiastic about the chilli. But to Stephanie it hadn’t tasted of much. She had been too confused by her emotions: the renewed sadness about the baby she had lost and the pleasure of being with Gus had been tying her in knots. The truth was that when she’d told Gus she was pregnant she’d interpreted his reaction as one of horror, while he now claimed it had been one of surprise and confusion. She had been angry with him and devastated at their breakup, and then she had lost the baby. More than anything, she had needed Gus with her to share her grief. She’d wanted to be held close as her heart shattered into pieces for their child. But she’d had to bear it alone.

  She had said none of this to Gus, but he knew her too well.

  ‘Steph – I’m so sorry I wasn’t there for you. You deserved better, and if I’d known – if I hadn’t thought you despised me – I would have done anything to try to help you through it. Can we not forgive ourselves and each other?’

  She knew he was right, but she had been storing up the resentment for so long that she wasn’t sure she could let it go; when he asked if he could stay, she had said no.

  Even before she had closed the door behind him she was regretting her decision, momentarily fooling herself into thinking that she could have at least enjoyed a single night with him. But she was vulnerable, scared of loving him and losing him. There was no way their relationship should be nurtured back to life.

  Gus had turned at the front door as he left, seemingly unwilling to let her shut him out of her home, and her life.

  ‘I love you, Stephanie. You’re a stroppy, strong-willed woman and that’s one of the things I admire most about you. But I made a mistake. Given a chance I would have welcomed our child.’

  ‘You mean it’s my fault,’ she said, her pain hidden under cover of an aggressive scowl.

  ‘There you go again.’ Reaching out a hand, he rested it on the back of her neck, and for a moment she was sure he was going to pull her back into his arms. But he must have thought better of it. ‘Look, people hurt each other in relationships. They don’t always respond the way their partner wants or expects them to. It shouldn’t mean the end.’

  Logic was Gus’s strong point. Stephanie’s reactions were always instant, emotional, inflexible. And right now she was retaliating – making him hurt as much as she had – and Evie’s words about revenge kept piercing her thoughts.

  She dismissed the words from her mind as her attention was drawn back to the last stages of the trial. Devisha Ambo was on her feet addressing the jury, and was in the middle of her closing speech when her words penetrated Stephanie’s consciousness.

  ‘Miss Clarke claims that she was systematically abused by the deceased and there is no doubt that she sustained injuries. But do you believe it was Mark North who hurt her? At no time did she inform anyone other than the Samaritans that this was happening to her. Why was that? Maybe because it wasn’t the truth. There had been no calls to the police prior to the final incident – the time of Mr North’s death. We have no evidence other than that of Miss Clarke that it was, in fact, Mr North who was inflicting these injuries on her. Similarly we have heard statements about two disorders that may, or may not, have affected Mr North and caused these apparent outbursts. But he had never been diagnosed as having either syndrome, and there is no evidence whatsoever to suggest he did. And although Miss Clarke’s testimony about her uncle was compelling, once again we have evidence of injuries, but no proof of how these were sustained.’

  The barrister turned to her notes, then gave the jury one of her fierce stares.

  ‘We know that Miss Clarke took the knife into the bedroom, by her own admission. Is that something you would expect a woman who was being abused to do, given that it could be used as a weapon against her? I don’t think so. The knife injuries to her arms were superficial and she was in no immediate danger of being killed, so did she take the knife with her because she was out to avenge herself for the previous acts of violence against her? I put it to you that this was carefully staged – that Miss Clarke planned every last detail of the murder of Mark North.’

  Stephanie watched the jury. She knew this was going to be a difficult decision for them, and as the prosecution barrister continued, Stephanie moved her attention from one juror to the next in an attempt to deduce their thoughts. She had been late to court that morning, and so was seated right at the back. Gus was towards the front, and she could see his wide shoulders hunched as he leaned forwards, focusing every ounce of his mind on the prosecutor’s words.

  She switched her gaze back to the jury, and could see one or two of them were giving slight nods of their heads, jotting down notes. There were no signs of complacency, of people leaning back with arms folded as if to say ‘I’ve already made my mind up’, and to a person they were focused.

  If Devisha could convince the jury that Evie took the knife into the bedroom with the specific intention of killing Mark North, she would be found guilty of murder. She would never see her little girl grow up, and once again Stephanie felt sympathy for a woman who had been brought up for the first part of her life by an alcoholic, for most of her teens by a woman who allowed her son to physically abuse her, only to find herself living with a man who ritualistically hurt her.

  53

  As I sit in the dock waiting for Boyd Simmonds to make his closing speech, I feel my legs shaking. I’ve had plenty of time to prepare myself and I’ve always known this moment would come, but as I look at the jury I can’t help but wonder if I have behaved the way they might have expected. How should a woman who has killed her partner in a moment of total madness look? Should I seem repentant? Should I be sad? Or should I be terrified? I’m surprised that I feel anything at all, but I would be a fool not to consider that I might be found guilty of murder. It’s always been a possibility, and one that I believed I had accepted.

  Harriet has been working hard to convince me that it will all be fine in that fierce way of hers. She told me that on average two women are murdered each week in the UK by their partners or ex-partners, so surely th
e jury must believe that ultimately I might have been one of that number if I hadn’t acted? I know Harriet hopes the judge and the majority of the jury will understand that although I hadn’t been with Mark for long, the fact that I had been abused throughout adolescence – and I have the scars to prove it – might explain why I couldn’t take it again.

  Boyd starts to speak. He has a strange cadence to his voice, with the tone rising at the end of each sentence. I feel mesmerised by the sound, if not his words, which wash over me.

  ‘Here is a woman who has suffered abuse before in her life and who emerged scarred, but strong, and determined not to be tormented by another man. And yet she tried to live with it. By her own admission, Mark North wasn’t all bad, and like many women she clung to all that was good about him, hoping that the bouts of irrational anger would stop. It seems clear that he needed to be certain she would remain in the family home during his absence, and wouldn’t be free to go out without him – or run from him. Was that his concern? That she might find another, better life elsewhere? We will never know what drove him to cause such pain to the woman he claimed to love – the mother of his child.’

  Boyd put his notes back down on the bench as if he no longer needed them. Perhaps he didn’t. He spoke with passion.

  ‘Evie Clarke never planned to kill Mark North. Maybe – and we can’t ignore this – thoughts of the death of his former wife gave her cause for concern. The coroner stated at Mia North’s inquest that in the absence of any other evidence, he had to declare her death to be accidental, but we need to consider the phrase “in the absence of other evidence” very carefully. Whether Mark North was innocent of his wife’s death isn’t the point here. The point is that if Evie Clarke was troubled by the thought that he might have been involved, she may well have been terrified by the thought that the brutal attacks she suffered could escalate. She could, quite reasonably, have gone into her bedroom hoping that the present she had bought might have turned things around. But then she realised how wrong she was as he started to cut her. With her head full of fear of what might be coming next, what plans he had in store for the future, she reached the point where her terror took over.’