The Verdict (14 page)

‘Just so you know, I’m dying. But not today,’ Christine Devereaux said.

She was joking, but only just. She was falling apart at every nail, and it was a terrible thing to see. Life was deserting her.

She’d been waiting for us in a chair in the middle of her office. She used a thick walking stick to stand up to greet us – and to help her sit back down. She was the colour of milk in moonlight. Pale, faintly blue, and with a lot of darkness about her. I wasn’t sure she’d be able to get through our meeting, let alone make it through the trial.

We pulled up chairs around her in a semicircle, Janet, me and Liam Redpath – the designated junior barrister, the second in command.

She started by giving us a rundown of her ailments. She’d been battling lupus for the last four years. It had been misdiagnosed twice. The doctors had told her it was fatigue, then the flu. They didn’t call the illness ‘the great imitator’ for nothing.

There was no cure for it. Now it was attacking her from every front. She was on a cocktail of painkillers, heart medication and immunosuppressants. She tired easily, found it difficult to concentrate for long periods of time and was becoming forgetful.

‘The other symptom is that I can’t be exposed to sunlight for too long,’ she said. ‘So that’s ruled out my tour of the ten places to see before you die.’

Her words made a vacuum in the office. That tense silence where someone’s said something uncomfortable and no one knows how to respond, where to look, what to think. And no one wants to be the first to break the silence lest they make things worse. The indefinite pregnant pause.

We all heard life carrying on through the door and walls. Phones ringing, conversations along the corridor, the whirr of the computer fan coming from her desk, the broken drone of traffic several floors below on Fleet Street. Any quieter and we could have heard the hairs on our collective heads growing. Two barristers and a solicitor, professional mouthpieces with years of billable hours between them, and not one of them could think of the right words.

So I blundered right in.

‘Not to be insensitive or anything, but…’

‘Will I croak before or during the trial?’

It wasn’t what I was going to ask, but that didn’t matter. The tension had left the room.

‘Highly unlikely.’ Christine smiled at me. ‘The doctor’s given me six months of mobility. He’s reliable. He told three of my friends when they’d die and he’s been right so far.’

She said the latter with a glint in her eye. Typical British humour: the bleaker the situation, the better the quips.

‘Have you had a chance to read the files I sent you?’ Janet asked her.

‘Yes,’ she said.

‘And?’

‘Horseshit,’ Christine said.

‘Which part?’

‘Our side. Our story.’ The fact that she was referring to the case in the possessive meant she was already immersed in it, taking ownership. VJ was now part of her, part of us. He was already our client, but his trial was
our
trial.

‘That’s a bit… negative.’ Redpath leaned in, frowning.

‘He’s been charged with
murder
,’ she said, lancing him with a look.

Liam Redpath was mousy-haired and mousy-eyed, of medium height and narrow build. We were the same age, but his face was as fresh and uncreased as newly spun cotton, as if he’d never known a moment of hardship or anguish.

Christine handed out a two-page timeline of VJ’s story, and gave us a minute or two to study it before she started.

‘As we’re already familiar with what he’s claiming, let’s concentrate on the problem areas – of which there are many,’ she said. ‘James checked into the Blenheim-Strand at 5.30 p.m. His PA booked the room, Suite 18 on the twelfth floor.

‘He worked on his speech in the lounge between 5.40 p.m. and 7.30 p.m. He says he never set foot in the bedroom at all. He claims he didn’t even know what it looked like until he saw the crime-scene photographs. And that’s the first problem. Where did he change his clothes? He doesn’t say anything about that here.’

Janet and I made notes. Redpath looked around the office and lightly drummed his fingers on his pinstriped trousers.

‘Next point, his drinking. Not one witness has described him as drunk or even tipsy. But according to his statement he had six vodkas. Neat. Doubles. Two in the suite. Two more at the awards dinner, before he made his speech. He was discreet about those. He tipped the waiter who was serving his table £50 to have the drinks waiting for him at the bar. He downed them on his way to the lavatory. Then he had two more at the Casbah club, before he ran into Evelyn Bates. He switched to water at the Circle bar on the eleventh floor, where he was with the woman he says he went up to his room with – the
other
blonde in the green dress. “Fabia.” Six big drinks. That’s about half a bottle, depending on the measure. That would have affected his powers of observation and recall.’

Christine looked at us one by one to make sure we were in agreement. Then she continued.

‘Now, this… “Fabia”. He claims he first saw her while he was making his speech. She was sat very close to the stage, directly in front of him. What are the two immediate problems with that?’

She was looking at me.

‘The dinner was invite only. There’s no Fabia listed on the hotel’s table plan,’ I said. The police had been quick to check out VJ’s story. A guest list from the Ethical Person’s award ceremony was included in the initial disclosure file Janet had been handed at Charing Cross nick.

‘Where are we with CCTV?’

‘Still waiting on that,’ I said.

‘Channel 4 filmed the speech. Contact them to get footage. With any luck Fabia will be on the tape. If we find her and she backs up his story, the prosecution’s case will be much harder to prove.

‘Terry, you’re to look for her – or at least for concrete evidence that she was there with him. Who’s your investigator?’

‘Andy Swayne,’ I said.

Christine winced and looked at Janet in surprise. Janet shrugged, as if to say it was out of her hands.

‘What if she’s a figment of our client’s imagination?’ Redpath asked.

‘Our job is to believe him,’ Christine said, shooting him a cutting look. ‘We have to know, one way or another, if she – or someone matching her description – was at the dinner. If it turns out she wasn’t, and she doesn’t show up on CCTV or on any other recording, then we’ll have to tell our client to stop wasting our time and tell us the truth.’

Fair enough, I thought.

I knew where to start – at my desk, with a few phone calls.

‘Now to the difficult part – the initial statements Vernon made to the police,’ Christine said.

She quickly summed up the contradictions and outright lies VJ had told DCI Reid.

‘Any suggestions as to how we explain away what’s tantamount to a confession? Liam?’

‘It’s a tough one,’ Redpath said.

‘Illuminating,’ she sighed.

‘How about putting it down to duress?’ I said. ‘When the police came to see him, he was tired, hungover, confused and in shock too, because he’d been assaulted. They tell him a woman was found dead in his hotel room and arrest him for murder. He doesn’t have a clue what’s happening. It could happen to anyone in those circumstances.’

It was my turn to get one of Christine’s howitzer looks.

‘Have you met Vernon James?’ she asked me.

My stomach tightened. I didn’t know how to answer.

‘Not yet,’ Janet interjected.

‘When you do, you’ll realise that he’s not just “anyone”, Terry. He’s a multimillionaire. He runs a hedge fund that manages £6.8 billion’s worth of investments. The jury won’t accept that he’s like them – that he’s “anyone”. They won’t believe someone that rich gets confused, frightened, that he even knows the meaning of duress,’ Christine said. ‘The prosecution will make hay with the social disparity angle. It’ll be his word against DCI Reid’s. His Oxbridge vowels against her Essex ones. The elite versus the masses. She’ll say he lied to her, which he did. And no one will believe a thing he says after that. Even if it’s true.’

The three of us said nothing.

‘What else is wrong with his story?’ Christine asked.

Janet studied her notes. I looked at mine. Redpath glanced through a witness statement. The CPS had sent us more disclosure this morning: crime-scene photos, including the actual murder scene, on the lounge floor, an evidence manifest, and more witness statements. It still didn’t come close to matching what Swayne had given me.

Christine held up a photo of the victim on the bed.

‘Anyone notice anything
really
obvious?’

Silence. Everyone craned forward.

Blanks all round.

‘The bed’s barely ruffled,’ she said. ‘The prosecution will say he killed her next door, carried her into the room and
posed
her, in that way. In other words, they’ll put a pathological slant to this, and any hope we have of a manslaughter defence is gone.’

More silence in the office. More sounds of phones ringing and conversations coming through the walls. I heard car horns and conversations on Fleet Street.

‘Our options here are limited,’ Christine said. ‘Best-case scenario – Terry or the police find Fabia. If she confirms our client’s story, there might not even be a trial. Worst-case scenario is we go to court.

‘Now, we can mount one of two kinds of defence. Stupid or Ugly. If we go Stupid, we take on the prosecution’s case witness by witness, expert by expert. We rebut their testimony with ours. The drawbacks to that are major, not least that we bore the jury.

‘Alternatively, we go Ugly. We attack the victim. Dig up whatever dirt we can find, expose it, expose her. Tarnish credibility, destroy reputations. We do the same with the witnesses, the people who gathered the evidence, the arresting officers. It’s very risky. If we’re too brutal, we alienate the jury.’

Again, more paralysed silence.

‘When are we getting DNA?’ Janet asked me.

‘Monday week. Maybe sooner,’ I said. Swayne would get the report before we did.

‘Then I say Stupid,’ Janet said.

‘I don’t think we’ve got much choice,’ Redpath said.

Christine nodded. They’d agreed.

‘Could you all stop writing now please,’ she said.

We did as asked.

‘What I’m going to say is off the record and doesn’t leave this room. We’ll speak about this today, and then never again. Agreed?’

We nodded in unison.

‘Liam – do you think our client is innocent or guilty?’

‘Guilty.’

‘Why?’

‘The evidence against him is overwhelming.’

‘Janet?’ Christine asked.

‘Have you ever defended anyone innocent?’

Christine laughed.

‘What about you, Terry? What do you think?’

‘I think he’s innocent – till proven guilty,’ I said.

‘But do you think he did it?’

Yes, I think he could have done it, Christine. But I’m not sure if it’s because I want it to be so. Or because I know he may have killed before. Or because I genuinely feel he did it. I’m almost convinced he killed Evelyn Bates. But I still have a doubt. In him, and in myself.
 

‘We haven’t had all the evidence yet,’ I said. ‘So I’m keeping an open mind – for now.’

‘Lawyers don’t sit on fences,’ she said.

‘I’m not a lawyer.’

‘… yet,’ she smiled, and then turned to the others. ‘I’m going to be frank. The chances of us getting a not guilty verdict are slim to non-existent. And if forensics puts our hands around her throat, slim leaves town. But don’t worry. I’ve been here before – defending a certified loser, and I’ve won most of them. Unfortunately, this time out, things are different. The prosecutor is Franco Carnavale – not only one of the best barristers in the country, but
the
best prosecutor in the land. I should know. I taught him.’

Was
that
why Kopf had insisted on her – because she had the inside track?

‘Franco started his career here, in these chambers. I mentored him. The first thing I taught him was always to think like the opposition. He knows how I fight. And he knows me,’ she said. And then she moved herself round so she was facing me. ‘When you’re faced with insurmountable odds, there are three things you can do: Fight, fold or cheat. Fighting losing battles isn’t my style. Folding isn’t my style either. And I
definitely
don’t cheat. At least, not knowingly.’

She wasn’t only looking straight at me, but straight into me.

‘This is where you come in, Terry,’ she said. ‘We’re going to need some silver bullets here, something that kills or at least fatally weakens the prosecution’s case. And you’re going to have to find them.’

‘How?’ I asked.

‘You’re to interview all the police witnesses, especially the barman who says he served Vernon and Evelyn Bates before midnight, and the waiter who delivered the champagne to the room.’

‘How’s that going to help?’ Janet asked.

‘The police showed the witnesses this picture.’ Christine held up a post-mortem photograph of the victim, cropped to show just her head. ‘It’s prejudicial. They need to see another picture of Evelyn Bates, alive and preferably smiling. Show that around and ask again.’

‘OK,’ I said.

‘When you interview the witnesses, look for weaknesses – contradictions in their statements, anything I can use against them on the stand. If they’re vague on details, plant doubts in their minds. For example, if they say they’re not sure if the dress was green or blue, make them believe it could have been blue. Check things like their eyesight, alcohol and drug history. Research them. Know them. Get their medical and bank records if necessary. Identify the nervous types too, the ones who are likely to crack under pressure. And I want to know everything about the victim too. Get me dirt.

‘One thing to bear in mind is that the witnesses are under no legal obligation to talk to you – especially if you identify yourself as a member of the defence team. Andy Swayne knows his way around that particular loophole. Work with him.’

So she was indirectly asking me to impersonate a cop – or at least a member of the CPS – to get her evidence.