Girl in an Empty Cage

by Graham Wilson

  Chapter 9 - Who is Vincent Bassingham

  Alan rang Buck on his mobile just before he logged on to work in the mid-afternoon, having been told that he would be finished his prison visit by then. Buck picked up on the first ring. “Buck here.”

  “Well how did the visit go?”

  He heard a hesitation come down the line, but then it cleared, just a half grunt then nothing for a few seconds. It was as if Buck was reflecting for a second what to tell.

  “I was just doing a mental back flip about what to say. “Then I thought, we have been straight this morning, we might as well stay straight, and let the cards fall where they may.

  “Actually I can’t tell you much. She is her normal charming self, quite gorgeous actually. I told her I was sorry that I could not bring Firefly, the horse she rode last time. She starting laughing. It was the most delightful and unaffected laugh, we both laughed till tears ran down our faces.

  “But then I told her about Vic. Like you she had not heard the news, she had no idea it happened. When I told her he was missing and almost certainly dead it was as if someone put a knife through her soul’s brightness, her light was gone. She sat in the chair with her face on the table, tears streaming down her cheeks, she looked so defeated.

  “She told me she had flown with him in the Gulf with Mark and he had visited the day before Christmas; that he was the first person she had met who really cared about Mark. Now he was gone she was devastated, as if emptiness would swallow her.

  “Then she said she had told Vic something really important that day he visited, she said she had trusted him with a secret. It was like she had some hope he could help her get out of this mess, and with his loss her hope had crumbled. She looked so forlorn.

  “So I told her how Mark had entrusted me to try and help her. Then I tried to push her into telling me what the real story was, I started to spell out what I thought might have happened.

  “But she has a steel core. I have never met such a tough cookie. Just for a minute I thought she would crack and give me something. But it was like you told me about that day when you first brought her in for questioning in London. She starts to soften, then something happens.

  “This staggering self-control pulls her back. She is determined not to tell, she knows, you know and I know that something happened on that day, or maybe the day before, that told her that Mark was not who she thought he was.

  “We are only guessing but she knows something real. I don’t begin to know what it is but she is determined never to let it out. She more or less told me that she had a secret that could never be told, she would protect it with her life. She even suggested she would kill herself rather than let it out. She said it was to protect her baby.”

  “She told me she knew about the will, then she said she had killed Mark, but in doing so she made a terrible mistake. Now she is determined to plead guilty and take the punishment for her crime.

  “She implored me not to try and find out, not to seek the truth, she said it was much better that I did not know. In the end I gave her my word I would not try and find and reveal this secret. So, in a way, I am compromised by her determination for secrecy too.

  “I told her I would let it go. And so I must. That is why I hesitated. But I did not promise that I would not share this knowledge with you. And someone must find out. I have been thinking what to do for the last hour since I saw her. In the end I knew. I must hold to my deal with her, be her friend and dig no further.

  “But Mark was my friend too. I shared good times and bad with him over eight years. He must have done something terrible, but he has given me responsibility for her. If it came to a choice for him between him and her I know, with certainty, he would have chosen her. It was obvious every time he looked at her; there was something so tender and protective in his eyes when they were together.

  “So I cannot sit by and watch her spend twenty plus years in jail, to protect something she knows about him. I am completely sure Mark would not have wanted that. So I decided I must at least tell you what I know, perhaps it will open up a way to find who Mark was. There must be an explanation in his past life. In a way it makes sense, the man with no history is like the man who can never allow his history to be known.

  Perhaps he killed his parents as a child, perhaps he murdered a brother or sister in a fit of rage, perhaps he is wanted for a terrible crime in another country; there is something and she knows it.

  But she will not tell it. I have promised I will not try to discover it myself. If Vic was here perhaps he could. But my hope is dying that Vic and I will again sit together by a campfire and share more stories.

  So all I can do is tell you what I know. I leave it for you to see if you can get to the truth. I cannot swear a deposition that there was a will naming her or that Mark’s real name was Vincent Bassingham. But perhaps in that name lies a history that will open up this story.

  Alan felt a weight descend on him as these words were said. It was up to him, and his bosses had effectively closed the door on him working on this, at least officially. But yet he must find a way. He was glad Sandy was coming back in three more days. It might help to seek her wise counsel on this matter. He would struggle to find a way to chase this down without some real evidence. He contemplated making a sworn deposition that he had received this information from an anonymous source, in order to give him a basis to investigate. He was bound by his word to Buck, notwithstanding that he was an officer of the crown, just as Buck was bound by his word to Susan. Still a name was a name.

  Knowing that he could do nothing further this week and his life was about to be consumed by his new job he parked it in his mind. Remember Vincent Mark Bassingham!

  The next three days were frenetic and he barely had time to think. He was whacked when he logged off late Saturday, having just worked over forty hours in the last three days. He went home, showered, shaved and fell onto bed, having set the alarm to get up at 11 pm to meet Sandy off her Sydney plane.

  Homecoming was lovely, bed was even better, though a bit more sleep would have been nice. In the early morning, after renewing their intimate acquaintance yet again, Alan told Sandy about his need to find if this man was really Vincent Mark Bassingham.

  After a minute of silence Sandy looked at him and laughed. “Well you might have been pulled off the case. But no one has given any such instructions to me. And, as best I can recall, I am still official pathologist on the case.

  “I have a man with two names and possibly a third. Clearly I still have an identification to make. If he may not be Mark Bennet, or even Mark Butler, and may even be this new name, Vincent Mark Bassingham, then I have good grounds for further investigation of his identity, to try and locate the next of kin, to try and correctly inform the court as to his true identity, perhaps even to investigate, based on his DNA, whether he is related to any of the identities he claims.

  “So leave it to me to try and hunt down Vincent Mark Bassingham. It is an uncommon name, so even though it may take a month or two, it should be possible. At least I will try.

  “It is funny, but as I was by myself in Sydney, after you came back here, I sensed my work on this case is far from finished, that there is more for me to do. Perhaps it is some kind of funny thought transference from Susan and that strange crocodile spirit that I have sensed. So I am pleased to do this, particularly if it helps her. In the same way that Vic talked about Mark as his brother, I feel that Susan is my sister.

  “I think to start with I will visit her in jail. After all I have never actually met her, just glimpsed her in court, despite how well I feel I know her. I will not try to pressure or frighten her, but talk to her, woman to woman, ask her my own questions and see if my female intuition, combined with my pathology investigation skills, will lead me anywhere.”