Catalyst (20 page)

At 9.00am prompt, the same two security officers who had delivered him just over an hour ago, escorted him into the Perspex cubicle in the courtroom to face the three presiding magistrates, seated in a line in front of him. Also present were Clive Granville, his solicitor, Jane Duncan of the Crown Prosecution Service and DS Jo Cottrell. There was no media presence; no-one seemed to have had time to make the connection between the police statement from Parkside and the next sitting of the local magistrate.

The middle of the three magistrates was a handsome, fifty-something blonde woman dressed formally in a pale blue suit with a cream shirt and loosely-fastened tie striped with both colours. Her two colleagues flanking her were male, in their early forties, and dressed smartly in dark business suits.

The woman spoke to the prisoner.

“Could you please state your name and address?”

“James Philip Lorimar; 18 Barrington Mansions, Hammersmith.”

“Thank you.” She turned to Jane.

“Ms Duncan, would you speak for the Crown, please?”

“Yes, ma'am. The defendant is accused of the killing of three brothers in the Cullen Field area in May. We have evidence which –”

Clive Granville rose to his feet.

“If I may interrupt, ma'am, with apologies to Ms Duncan. If it would expedite the process, I can confirm that we shall not be requesting bail for Mr Lorimar.”

The other two magistrates leant in so all three could confer. They spoke for less than a minute then settled back in their seats

“Is Mr Lorimar intending to enter a plea?” asked the woman magistrate.

“No, ma'am.”

There was more conferring, this time for an even shorter time.

“Very well, the decision of this court is that Mr Lorimar be remanded in custody pending trial at Crown Court, the date and venue to be set within twenty-four hours of this hearing. You may take the prisoner away.”

James Lorimar was escorted from the box and taken back to the court cells to await his onward journey.

When Tom finally arrived at his constituency office at 10.50 am that morning, the press – having picked up on the previous evening's statement – had already gathered in substantial numbers in front of the building. He was not in the greatest of moods. Traffic accidents and roadworks had more than doubled the time it would normally have taken him to make the journey from SW1 to Marlburgh on a Saturday morning. He pulled into the small parking area at the side of the building and got out of the car.

“Mr Brown. What are your feelings this morning on hearing the news of the arrest?” The reporter was a small attractive woman with straight blonde hair, wearing a short blue dress and white jacket. She smiled sweetly at him as she stood at his side so that the TV camera could get them both in shot.

“Well, if this man
is
the perpetrator of this crime,” said Tom, addressing the crowd in general, “then obviously I'm pleased that he has finally been found and I congratulate the police on what, hopefully, will be the resolution of a very difficult case.”

“You have said more than once that you have sympathy with the residents of Cullen Field, and have admitted that this man has done them a favour. Are you not a little saddened that he is likely to receive a long custodial sentence for what in effect is just a good deed?”

“Well, firstly,” said Tom, “we do not know yet if this is the man who committed the crime, so let's not get ahead of ourselves by speculating about a sentence. Also, we have no idea at this stage
why
the killer – whoever he is – carried out this crime. What we do know, is that it was to the benefit of the community. But we should be wary of assuming that this is why he did it; of making him a hero before we know his personal motivation for the act.”

“But if he
did
do it specifically for the benefit of one, or some, or all of the community… ” Someone else called out the question from the back of the crowd.

“It would be unfortunate if this person carried out the crime because he felt it was his only recourse to justice. That is why I have said, on several occasions, we must have in place a means of addressing this sort of issue within the law. To do that, we need to review our current practices and, if necessary, take some serious decisions about the way we approach the problem of intimidation and violence on our streets.

“Now if you'll excuse me, I have a number of meetings scheduled which I must get to right away. Thank you.” He treated the woman to a friendly smile before going inside.

The reporters turned away, some to get to their next story, some to remain for further comments when he left later. Tom went straight to his office, saying his usual breezy ‘good morning' to his PA, Jenny Britani, on the way. He checked his watch – 11.00 am. Better late…

Grace popped her head round the door. She was wearing one of her ‘dress-down-Saturday' outfits, as Tom liked to call them. A short yellow flared dress, low cut and belted at the waste, and black leggings. Her hair was free of constraints and fell naturally and lush onto her shoulders. The dark-rimmed glasses had been discarded in favour of contact lenses.

“Good morning.”

“Good morning. What are you doing here?” he asked, feeling suddenly better.

“I work here,” she said, and then read from a small post-it note stuck on the palm of her hand, “Message from Mr George Holland – about you chairing a meeting or something. He phoned just after nine o'clock – when you
should
have been here. Here's the number.” She placed the note on his desk in front of him.

“George Holland,” said Tom. “That name rings a bell… ”

“Chairman of the 3AF in Meadow Village. The group that are doing the debate.”

“And is that the meeting he wants me to chair?”

“He didn't say; just asked for you to phone him. But it seems likely, don't you think?”

“Mmmm… yes, I guess it must be. If it is, what do you think? Should I do it?”

“I think it could be a good thing,” said Grace. “It would mean you'd have to be absolutely neutral, of course, assuming that you're actually capable of that,” she added, with a critical smile.

“Don't you start on me as well,” said Tom. “Andrew had a real go this morning after that exchange in the House yesterday. Do you know what his opening gambit was? ‘You're not in the bloody Marines now, Tom. You don't have to take spontaneous decisions on the ground when the official chain of command is clearly visible and sitting right in front of you!'”

The sudden tinkling of very girlish laughter took him by surprise. He raised his eyebrows at her.

“Well, that's a reaction I've never been able to squeeze out of you,” he said. “I must get Andrew to chastise me more often. I'll get you a ringside seat next time.”

“I've absolutely no sympathy,” said Grace, recovering her poise but still smiling at him. “I'm not sure how he could have put it any more plainly to you beforehand – if what you told me was true – that he didn't want you challenging the government over their public disorder record.”

“I wasn't challenging their record – I was challenging their budget for further funding.”

“Well, I watched you on last night's
House Calls
and I have to say, I couldn't tell the difference.”

“Well, it must have been very badly edited,” said Tom, dismissively. “Because it wasn't like that at all. And now, Ms Goody, if you're through giving me my weekly appraisal, would you please wheel in the first victim.”

She left the office, stopping briefly in the doorway.

“Hey, I've just thought of something. I spent all last night washing and pressing my canary suit. I suppose that was a waste of time if you're chairing the debate.”

“That's politics,” he called after her, enjoying the mental image of Grace in her fancy dress and reflecting on the rare unguarded moment when she had let the information slip. No-one knew anything about Grace's life outside her work. There was never any mention of a partner, male or female, and given the amount of time she spent at her job, and her availability at short notice at all hours on any day, it seemed unlikely that one existed. It was rumoured that in the past she had experienced a deep emotional trauma which had caused her to build a defensive wall around herself. But it was only a rumour, like the one about her having a long-term – albeit unspecified – working relationship with Andrew Donald.

As Tom prepared to start his first constituent meeting, he couldn't help but feel slightly privileged that she had chosen to step out of character to share that small private secret with him.

Four hours later he phoned George Holland.

“
Six weeks!
” Jo's eyes were wide in disbelief.

“That's right; that's what Jane said.”

“But that's about – what – a tenth of the time I would have expected.”

“Well, they are trying to reduce the period between charging and trial… ”

“Yes, but even so,
six weeks
!”

“It's not going to get any longer just by you repeating it over and over,” said David, laughing.

“And was Jane okay with that?”

“Yes, she seemed pretty relaxed… ”

“But why?”

“Why was she relaxed?”

“No, you know what I mean. Why such a short time?”

“I don't know. All Jane would say is that they want our man off the radar as soon as possible. Seems he's just too high profile.”

“In which case, why the Old Bailey?”

“No idea. Just add it to the list of things I can't work out. Anyway, Detective Sergeant, here's to a result at last – as far as it goes.”

They raised their glasses and took a celebratory sip of their drinks. David Gerrard looked pensively out of the window of the Dog and Duck. After the drama of the past few days they had decided to take time out from the familiar surroundings of Parkside. They were seated in the main bar area, overlooking Settlement Lane at the point where it became Main Street. The place was filling up and the atmosphere was friendly and relaxed. The venue had been Jo's suggestion, after visiting the library on the estate the previous day and seeing the notice about the debate. It was the first time either of them had been in the pub.

“Because there's still a lot of stuff I don't get,” David went on. “His confession doesn't go anywhere near answering all the questions. Here's a few that really bother me.” He leant across the table towards Jo, speaking softly and counting them on his fingers.

“One – how come he knew the names, especially the middle names, of Deverall's parents? I don't know why, but that's kept me awake the last few nights. Two – why did he take such care not to leave a trail to Mrs Deverall when she moved? All that stuff about cash and her maiden name – totally unnecessary. Three – how come not one of those guys from the same unit, who all knew Deverall, had ever heard of him? Four – if Deverall was killed instantly, what was all that crap about a dying request? Five – assuming he's the one responsible for vacating the property – letter to the council with forged signature – why did he wait until after he'd killed the Bradys to do it? Why not immediately after Alma's death? Six – why did he confess when he did, and, seven – what the hell was his lawyer doing sitting there contemplating his bloody navel while he was doing it?”

“Well, he didn't actually confess, did he, sir, even though it was sufficient for the CPS? I think he said just enough to stop us pursuing the answers to those questions.”

“That's right. Like someone had a word with Granville and told him to advise his client to give us at least enough to bring a charge. Even if he did do that, if I was Lorimar, I'd have told him where to shove his advice and got another lawyer.”

“The thing is,” said Jo, “all this doesn't really matter now in the process of law. Getting answers to these questions would have been critical without that clear statement of intent, but now they're academic, I guess, unless he chooses to retract it?”