Murder Club (12 page)

Stephanie Hewson took another sip of her water and the prosecuting attorney waited for her to collect herself.

‘Please tell the court exactly what happened, Miss Hewson.’

‘I left the station at approximately ten to eleven.’

‘Had you looked at your watch?’

‘No, but the ten-thirty train was on time from Marylebone. It takes about twelve minutes to get to Harrow, and so a few minutes to walk up the steps, through the concourse and out the back entrance.’

‘The one that leads out to the hill, and not to the shopping centre?’

‘Yes. I walked down the steps and up to the alleyway that runs through to Roxborough Park.’

‘Were you aware of being followed?’

The defence counsel stood smoothly to his feet. ‘Objection, My Lord, it has not been established that Miss Hewson was indeed followed. Counsel is leading the witness yet again!’

‘Sustained.’ The judge threw Selena Carrow a look. ‘You really do know better than this.’

‘Sorry, Your Honour.’ If she meant it, it wasn’t evident in her expression. She turned to the witness stand again. ‘At that time were you aware of anyone else?’

‘No, I was not. I was walking home and didn’t notice anybody else out. But, like I said earlier, I was lost in my thoughts a little.’

The prosecution lawyer consulted her notes. ‘Yes, you said you were in a happy mood.’

‘Relevance, Your Honour?’ asked Hector Douglas.

The judge gestured to the prosecution counsel.

‘State of mind, Your Honour. We intend to establish that the accused, Michael Robinson, targeted Miss Hewson, that he followed her home on the train, that he pursued her down the alleyway that she has just described. That Miss Hewson was not aware of anyone else that night was because her thoughts were preoccupied.’

‘Your Honour,’ Douglas stood up. ‘My client has never denied being on that train – he lives in Harrow. That her mind was elsewhere prior to this terrible assault taking place is evident in that she has mistakenly identified my client as the man who attacked her.’

‘Sit down.’ The judge rapped her gavel sharply. ‘You will have ample opportunity to cross-examine, Mr Douglas. Please continue, Miss Carrow.’

‘I am obliged, My Lord. Miss Hewson, please tell us what happened next.’

‘I came out of the alleyway into Roxborough Avenue, when a man suddenly appeared behind me and said that if I screamed, he would kill me.’

‘And did you believe him?’

‘Your Honour, leading the witness!’

‘Sustained.’

‘He had a knife in his hand, which he held to my side. I was too terrified to scream.’

‘This alleyway, and the one opposite, is overlooked by housing.’

‘Yes, there are apartments. But I was too scared to call for help. His voice …’ She took another sip of water. ‘His voice was ugly, terrifying!’

‘So, as you say, you were in fear for your life?’

‘Yes.’

‘What happened next?’

‘He stood beside me telling me to keep my head down, so as not to see his face, and led me into the alley that leads to the hill.’

‘And did you see his face?’

‘Not at that time.’

Selena Carrow consulted her notes again. ‘So he led you across the road into the opposite alleyway. This is the one that runs alongside the Catholic church of Our Lady and St Thomas, past a junior school and out onto Harrow Hill itself.’

‘Yes, only we didn’t go so far.’

‘What did happen then, Miss Hewson?’

‘Just past the church, before the primary school, there is a Scout hut.’

The lawyer made a show of consulting her notes again. ‘The Seventeenth Roxborough?’

‘Yes. He opened the door and pushed me inside, telling me to be quiet.’

‘How did he open the door?’

‘He had a key.’

Selena Carrow turned pointedly and looked at Michael Robinson for a moment or two, letting the jury see the scorn on her face.

‘Can you tell the court, please, what took place in that hut, Miss Hewson.’

‘He closed the door behind him; it was dark inside.’

‘Even though it was a moonlit night?’

‘The windows were grimy, it was dark. He came in, like I said, and closed the door. He ordered me not to look round. He said he would hurt me if I didn’t do exactly what he said. He held the point of the blade to my throat as he said it. It was a very sharp blade.’

‘What did you do?’

‘I …’ She paused for a moment and took another sip of water. ‘I voided my bladder,’ she said.

‘You wet yourself?’ Selena Carrow clarified and looked at the jury.

‘Yes.’

‘And what did the man do?’

‘He laughed and said I would be punished for it, then ordered me to take my clothes off.’

‘And what did you do?’

The woman put a hand to her neck, in an involuntary gesture.

‘I did as he said.’

‘You stripped naked?’

Stephanie Hewson shook her head. ‘I left my knickers on.’

‘And what did he do?’

‘He told me to get on all fours, pushing me down. Then he held my knickers and ripped them up hard. I gasped with pain as they pulled between me and then he tore them right off, stuffing them in my mouth and ordering me to keep quiet.’

Selena Carrow nodded sympathetically, letting the words hang in the air as she consulted her notes.

‘And you did?’

‘Yes.’

‘What did he do?’

‘I heard a zip being pulled. He said he was going to put on a condom, that he couldn’t afford to pick up diseases in his line of work.’

‘And then he raped you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Repeatedly?’

‘Yes, first he …’

She trailed off and Selena Carrow held her notes up. ‘It’s okay, Miss Hewson. I know it is hard for you to talk about it. To relive the horror. I have your police statement here. You informed the police surgeon on duty that night at Harrow Police Station that you had been anally and vaginally raped. Is that correct?’

Stephanie Hewson nodded her head, tears springing in her eyes.

‘I am sorry, but we will need to hear your answer. Is it true that you were brutally raped, anally and then vaginally?’

‘Yes! And when he was done he sliced me with his knife and left.’

‘And what did you do?’

‘I got up and went to the window.’

‘You weren’t feeling any pain?’

‘I didn’t register the knife at the time. I was in shock. The surgeon said I was in shock. It was later … it didn’t really hit me until later.’

‘So you went to the window. Could you see anything?’

‘He was outside, adjusting his hat, and then he hurried off past the school towards the hill.’

‘Did you see his face?’

‘Sideways on.’

‘Enough to recognise him?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then what did you do?’

‘I waited some minutes, then I put my coat on, grabbed my other clothes and ran to the apartment block to raise help.’

‘And then the police and ambulance came, and they treated you and took your statement.’

‘They took my statement the next day at the police station. I was sedated overnight and kept in at Northwick Park Hospital.’

‘Thank you very much, Miss Hewson. I know this hasn’t been easy for you.’

‘I can go now?’

‘Not just yet, my learned colleague will have some questions for you. But I have one final question?’

‘Yes?’

‘You said you could recognise the man again, from what you saw of him through that Scout-hut window?’

‘Yes, I would.’

Selena Carrow nodded and paused for a moment. ‘Can you look around this room then, please, and tell the court if you can see him here.’

Stephanie Hewson slowly looked around the courtroom, at the accused, at the visitors’ gallery, at the jury and finally at Jack Delaney. She looked at him for about three seconds, studying him, and then turned back to the lawyer.

‘No,’ she said. ‘I don’t see the man who attacked me.’

THERE WAS UPROAR
in the courtroom. The judge had to bang her gavel several times to get order restored. Selena Carrow was about to speak, but the judge motioned her to silence.

‘Sit down, please, Miss Carrow,’ she said, then turned to the woman in the witness box.

‘Miss Hewson, you do understand you are on oath?’

‘I do.’

‘Mr Robinson was arrested and charged and brought to court, largely based on the identification you made of him.’

‘Yes.’

‘You picked him out of a police line-up. How were you able to do that, if he was not the man that you saw through the window of the Scout hut?’

‘Because I had seen a photo of him, Your Honour.’

‘When did you see the photo?’

‘Before the line-up took place.’

‘Days before the line-up, weeks?’

‘It was less than an hour.’

Murmurs ran around the court once more, and yet again the judge gave a couple of sharp raps with her gavel. ‘And who showed you this photo of Michael Robinson?’ she asked.

‘He did,’ said Stephanie Hewson and pointed at the visitors’ gallery. ‘Detective Inspector Jack Delaney showed me the photo.’

DI JACK DELANEY
took a sip of his pint of Guinness and looked at his watch.

He was sitting at the bar in the Viaduct Tavern on the corner of Newgate Street and Giltspur Street, right opposite the Old Bailey. He took another sip and smiled approvingly at the barmaid; it was a Fuller’s pub and they kept their beer well.

‘So what’s new and different then, Lily?’

‘How do you know my name?’

Delaney pointed to her polo shirt with her name printed on it.

‘Keep forgetting about that. Only started yesterday.’

‘Well, you’re doing a magnificent job!’ He flashed her a smile and she smiled back, a tad embarrassed, and went off to serve another customer.

Delaney put his beer glass neatly on a London Pride coaster and looked around the bar. It wasn’t the first time he had been there and as sure as Shinola wouldn’t be the last, he figured. Fighting for the cause of justice was thirsty work after all, and the tall lady on the dome of the building across the road was famous for turning a blind eye. The Viaduct Tavern had been built in 1869, the selfsame year that Her
Britannic
Majesty Queen Victoria had opened the Holborn Viaduct opposite, after which it had been named. The world’s first flyover connecting Holborn to Newgate Street over the River Fleet, which likewise gave its name to the famous street of shame nearby. A river that fittingly enough had become a sewer by the eighteenth century and was now the largest of London’s subterranean rivers. Subsumed as London grew. The Viaduct Tavern was a reverse Tardis of a pub, smaller on the inside than the large, curved frontage on the outside would suggest. But it kept its Victorian origins proudly evident. A square-shaped wooden and canopied bar in the centre of the room, with silvered and gilt mirrors on the wall and original art.

Delaney liked it.

A stool was moved beside him and DS Diane Campbell sat on it. She gestured to the barmaid. ‘Large vodka and slimline tonic, please.’

‘Cheers, Lily,’ said Delaney and smiled at her again.

‘Lily?’ said Diane and looked at him.

‘She’s got her name printed on her polo shirt.’

‘Hard for a man like you not to notice a thing like that.’

‘As a trained and experienced detective, you mean?’

‘I was thinking more of as a committed lecher.’

Delaney held up his hands. ‘I’m a reformed man, Diane. There’s only one woman in my life now. Two, if you count my daughter.’

‘I’m glad to hear it. Kate is a lovely woman.’

‘So she is.’

‘And she’s been through enough.’

‘Yeah, I know.’ Delaney’s eyes darkened, remembering
how
close he had been to losing her, and sipped his Guinness.

Diane picked up her change from the barmaid and took a sip of her vodka too.

She looked back up at Delaney for a moment or two and then jerked her head backwards in the direction of the Old Bailey. ‘Well, that certainly didn’t go according to plan.’

‘No. Seems someone had rewritten the script.’

‘A clusterfuck in fact, as our ex-colonial cousins across the pond would have it.’

‘I take it Napier is not pleased?’

‘I would go so far as to say Superintendent George Napier would quite like to have your balls removed with a rusty pair of secateurs and fed to his pet dog.’

‘I didn’t know he had a dog?’

‘Small one.’

‘Figures.’

‘So what Stephanie Hewson said in court – you showed her a photograph of Michael Robinson just prior to the line-up?’

Delaney shrugged. ‘I don’t think so.’

Diane took a contemplative sip of her drink. ‘You don’t
think
so?’

‘It was a while ago, Diane.’

‘I know. We had to wait until the man’s bones healed.’

‘That was nothing to do with me.’

‘You remember that then?’

‘I had nothing personal against the man.’

‘You had everything personal against any man who hurt women, Jack. You still do.’

‘I’m not a vigilante.’

‘No – what you are is a pain in the bloody arse.’

Delaney winked at her. ‘Nice arse, though!’

‘This one is out of my ability to control.’

‘What I figured.’

‘There’s going to be an investigation.’

Delaney shrugged. ‘I’m on holiday after Christmas anyway.’

‘Yeah, I know, Jack. Not really the point here.’

‘I guess not.’

‘You’re going to lose your job over this, if it isn’t sorted. Napier will see to that. The official interview is for Monday afternoon. So you have the weekend to get your facts straight.’

‘Maybe that’s not such a bad thing.’

‘What isn’t?’

‘Losing my job.’

‘Really? What would Kate think? What with a baby on the way and all?’

‘Kind of my point. This job is toxic, Diane. This whole city is toxic.’

‘No, it’s not. People are toxic, Jack. Some of them. That’s why we do the job we do.’

‘Sanitation engineers?’

‘About that.’

‘I can’t remember what happened that morning, Diane. But I am pretty sure Eddie Bonner covered for me. I didn’t get in until just before the line-up.’