They brought up poor Beryl first, who could also barely even look in my direction, though I wondered if that was more out of the pressure than any kind of embarrassment or shame. I saw the poor lady fight any kind of outward emotion, wrestling with herself to try and keep some poise, as Isla approached her. The more I observed Isla in the courtroom, the more she seemed closer to a vulture than a human. Picking on the carrion of the poor people speaking in the box, wearing them down until any defence had been pecked away.
Problem was, Beryl started out strong, saying that I was a great neighbour and there was no way I could have committed so heinous a crime. But when Isla pointed out that she had only known me for a few months, the whole thing fell apart.
Isla noted that Beryl had had her doorbell camera for two years, and it seemed rather coincidental that it was broken not forty-eight hours after O’Neill’s suspected murder. Beryl was forced to admit that she had never seen me help O’Neill previously – and nor had I ever expressed an affinity for the man– with Beryl revealing that we’d both found him to be the strange old senex of the neighbourhood.
Isla managed to tell a quick anecdote about how she’d dated one of her neighbours when she was a graduate, only to find out he was married with family and kids up near Yorkshire. ‘You never truly know who your neighbours are,’ she said, with a sly hint of a sneer.
Andrew did his best to salvage the situation by questioning Beryl about how I walked Tony every day, and my (rather exaggerated) involvement in the community, but there was no coming back from Isla’s questioning. Everything seemed far too coincidental for me not to be guilty.
O’Neill’s carer didn’t help my cause. I was hoping that she might have outed him as a creepy old man – maybe she had been groped by him, or had walked in on him pleasuring himself to a picture of Charles Manson or something. But instead she said that while he was a crotchety old git, he had never been verbally or physically abusive to her.
We had a quick recess, and the police led me to yet another small, dimly lit room just above the court. Andrew came in with a cup of coffee and a sandwich for me, wiping his brow like it was halftime at a football game, psyching himself up for the next forty-five minutes. I realised Lawyer Andrew must only be reserved for a select few moments in his career. Most of the time, I got the schlub.
Sorry, that was mean; forgive me, I am very stressed.
‘So, how is it going, coach? Good? Bad?’ I asked. I glanced down at the sandwich. ‘Oh?’
‘What is it?’ Andrew asked, puckering his brows.
‘Oh, it’s just, I don’t really like tuna,’ I mumbled. ‘But that’s beside the point, sorry, tell me how’s it going?’
‘But I asked what you wanted, and you said “anything”,’ Andrew responded, half-defensively. He wasn’t going to let this one go easily.
‘Yeah, but I just didn’t think you’d go for tuna, that’s all. I thought you’d pick something like a BLT or a ham and cheese. But not tuna. Just – I don’t care, just tell me what you think of the case so far.’
I could see Andrew wanted to argue more about the sandwich, but he abandoned the topic and pulled up the chair.
‘Too hard to tell right now,’ Andrew said, like he was analysing the opposing team’s every move. ‘Isla works the jury, that’s what she does, so even if they don’t openly realise it, she’s got you in their heads as a cold, smart, violent murderer and O’Neill as a sweet old man who wouldn’t hurt a fly.’
‘Fantastic,’ I murmured, not quite matching Andrew’s zest and zeal. I think I was becoming a little more resigned to everything the more the trial progressed.
‘But don’t worry. We prepared for this; I have some leaked docs that will get the jury thinking about the police’s obsession on blaming this case all on you. That’s going to change things. I’m sure of it. If that doesn’t work, we can leak them to the press tomorrow.’
‘What, how?’ I stammered, but Andrew had clearly already moved on, scrawling some notes in his diary.
‘And who have they got coming up next?’ I asked as Andrew tapped his pen against his temples.
‘Urgh, well, the upside is that, despite their efforts, they still don’t have a strong motive for you. They’re trying to suggest you had a reason, but they don’t actually know what that is, and we need to use that to support our case. Right now, they’re just trying to convince the jury there’s a connection. So they have a Clark something or other, friend of O’Neill. But I can’t imaginehe’s going to be much trouble,’ Andrew said indifferently, with a wave of his hand.
The world could have ended right there and then and my first primary emotion about the sudden cataclysm would have been complete, serotonin-laden relief.
‘You didn’t tell me about him,’ was all I could say, hoping it wouldn’t be too unlikely that the world might swallow me up.
‘I must have, surely? The friend, the friend of O’Neill, they went way back together. He used to be Leader of the Opposition, like, forty years ago,’ Andrew said, still jotting down notes into his diary.
‘No, no, no, I can’t…’ I stammered, launching myself up from the chair and walking towards the door, forgetting I was still technically in police custody.
The air suddenly vanished from my lungs and all the muscles in my body shrank and weakened as I clasped at my chest.
Andrew rushed over and grabbed me as I began to keel over. My back arched as I retched, dribbling saliva onto the floor.
‘Whoa whoa whoa, easy, Fran, easy,’ he said, patting and rubbing my back.
I’m not a damn horse, Andrew.
‘Do you know him? Who is this guy?’ Andrew said, as I moved from all fours to a decrepit slouch, my back against the wall. I yanked off my blazer and slid it across the floor. ‘I just assumed he was some random friend of O’Neill’s. Is he connected?’
‘O’Neill and he were part of the…organisation, thing, charity, something. Clark was the master of the whole operation, kept them all in line through fear.’
