After reporting briefly to Robert where she was going and
phoning Dorothy to check that she knew everything relevant, Cleo made a task
list for the coming days, answered a few emails, and drank a whole pot of
espresso, black and very sweet.
“It looks like they only had circumstantial evidence,” said
Cleo. “They obviously made no effort to find Banu Akbari.”
“I wish I’d been on that case.”
“Why weren’t you?”
“Roger Stone was still superintendent, and he kept the
juiciest bits to himself in those days.”
“But he dealt with this one in a very perfunctory way.”
“It would seem so.”
“Isn’t his wife in the same prison as Crane?”
“Elinor? I expect so. But knowing her, she’ll be plotting her
escape.”
“I didn’t know you were on first name terms with her, Gary.”
“Let’s not discuss Mrs Stone, Cleo.”
“Painful or embarrassing?”
“Both.”
“OK.”
“And before you start asking questions, I can tell you that
she was a hooker and I was a very naïve guy. But it was before my wife and
Charlie came along.”
Gary also told Cleo that apart from all her private
activities that included one-night stands with anyone willing, Elinor Stone had
egged Roger Stone on to pursue a noble career.
“Roger was deluded as far as his marriage was concerned,” he
said.
“Shit happens! Let’s concentrate on being journalists on a
mission to prevent a miscarriage of justice,” said Cleo.
“Will you make notes while I start the talking?”
“OK. We turn left at the next corner and I seem to remember
that the prison complex is somewhere on the right,” said Cleo.
“So it is.”
After parking the car, they negotiated the guards, who
looked briefly at the pseudo ID press card Cleo kept handy for emergencies.
Security did not ask for any other identity papers or even examine her
capacious handbag for a ballistic weapon. They took Gary for an acolyte. The
two pseudo-journalists soon found themselves in the interview room, Alice Crane
having consented to talk to them.
She was brought in by a female warder who stood motionless but
curious on their side of the door. Alice Crane was handcuffed but with her
hands at the front. She gestured to them through the grill that divided the inmates
from the visitors. The room was not designed for intimate assignations.
“We’re writing an article on miscarriages of justice, Miss
Crane. We hope you can help us to help you on this.”
“You’re the first to suggest that I’m here unlawfully,”
Crane replied, concentrating on Gary and ignoring Cleo.
“It’s a journalist’s duty to do deep research before he
publishes anything,” said Gary.
“What magazine are you writing for?”
“Freelance, Miss Crane. We hope to sell the article to a
national newspaper. The rest will follow.”
“And your assistant?” said Crane, acknowledging Cleo’s
presence for the first time. “What does she do?”
“Miss Hartley does research and helps put the articles into
good English,” said Gary.
“I wouldn’t have thought….”
“I’m dark-skinned, but I have university degree, Miss
Crane,” said Cleo.
“Sorry, I’m sure.”
Crane turned back to Gary. “What do you want to know?” she
said.
“You could tell us in your own words what happened to put
you in here.”
“Well, for a start, I do not hit children and never have.
The bruises on that child’s body were not inflicted by me.”
“We didn’t believe that. It’s one reason we’re here,” said
Cleo.
“The child was running after a pigeon and tripped. That’s
what happened, but how could I prove it? The bleeding pigeon had gone by the
time I got to that rockery.”
“And the child had fallen on a jagged piece of rock, hadn’t
he?” said Cleo.
“Yes.”
“How horrible for you,” said Cleo, who had written
everything down verbatim despite recording the interview on her cell phone.
Crane glanced at her briefly, which was Cleo’s cue to join
in the questioning.
“Weren’t there any witnesses?” she said
“One,” said Crane, answering as if the question had come
from Gary.
“Who would that be?” Gary asked.
“An Asian woman who had been following me around. Bani,
Banu... something like that.”
“Why was she following you?” Cleo asked, guessing that the
question had to come from her.
“I think she fancied me,” said Alice Crane, and Gary looked surprised.
“But I’m not interested in women,” said Crane, looking at
Gary in the special way women appraised him when they were attracted. Gary
squirmed a little. Cleo jumped in with another question to distract Crane.
“Do you know more about that woman?” she said.
Crane ignored Cleo’s question and asked one of her own
instead.
“Do you sleep with this guy?”
“Yes,” said Cleo. “But tell us more about Banu.”
Alice Crane looked gratified. She was quite surprised that
Cleo had owned up immediately.
“I would too,” she said.
Alice Crane had not mentioned the woman at her trial and
there was no record of any kind of homosexual inclination on Crane’s part. That
at least had been verified, though Cleo. The longer they sat there watching
this woman, the more Cleo thought Crane had given up hope that she could prove
her innocence. The police report had contained infamous statements by the
parents of the dead child as if that could heal their wounds. Gary would have
to get the case reopened somehow. Was there any chance of new evidence turning
up and making it possible?
“I’ll bet she’s good in bed,” said Crane to Gary, livening
up a little now she was able to ask a question or two.
“Yes, she is, but we’re here to help you not ourselves.”
“Miss Crane, do you have any idea who inflicted the older
bruises on that child?” Cleo asked. Gary relaxed. He could not think of
anything else he could ask the woman that would lead to progress.
Crane now seemed to be reconciled to having Cleo there.
“It was the child’s father, I’m sure. Daniels was a bully. I
think he knocked his wife about, too.”
“You didn’t tell the court that,” said Gary.
“I wasn’t asked.”
“And you didn’t say anything to your lawyer, either,” said
Cleo.
“I did. He wasn’t listening at first and then he told me to
stop inventing things.”
Cleo was shocked. What sort of lawyer was that?
“A guy called Collins. One of those who lose interest if
there isn’t a fat fee in the offing” said Crane. “He decided I was guilty and
ditched me.”
“But you aren’t guilty, Miss Crane.”
“What good is that to me now?”
“Are you prepared to repeat what you’ve told us,” Gary asked
her.
“I swear to God that I’m telling the truth. Can you get me
out of this dump?”
“We’ll do our best. Thanks for talking to us.”
Quite unexpectedly, tears rolled down Alice Crane’s cheeks. Cleo
instinctively reached out and Crane brushed over her cheeks with the sleeve of
her prison overall.
“Thank you for caring,” she said. “No one else has bothered.”
“We do care, Miss Crane,” said Cleo,” and we are going to
bother.”
“We want you out of here,” said Gary.
Alice Crane got up, nodded, and gestured to the warder that
she was ready to go back to her cell. Prison had tamed her and broken her
spirit.
Then Crane turned around and came close to the grille. Gary
understood the gesture and got as close as he could.
“You’re a cop, aren’t you?” Crane whispered.
Gary winked at Crane and said in a loud voice that he would
do his level best, but he didn’t think cheroots were allowed in prison cells.
Crane smiled for the first time and the warder skivvied
Crane along telling she could not smoke in her cell.
“Mission accomplished,” he said and Cleo knew their identity
had been smashed.
Gary could not resist pointing out that security negligence
meant that they could have shot the woman dead if they had wanted to.
“The warder must be hard of hearing,” said Cleo.
“I’m glad Crane realized I’m a cop. It gives her hope and
makes me even more convinced of her innocence,” said Gary.
***
Cleo and Gary did not talk much on the drive back to HQ. The
interview had revealed that the court
case against Crane had been a farce. The grieving parents - a father who beat
his wife and child - had decided on retribution and got it, not forgetting the
financial damages the guy would have seen as his legal right. Gary wondered how
many other such cases were on record. The parents of dead children invariably
enjoyed the sympathy of the public and the courts, but they were not always
innocent. Children’s homes were full of kids who had been betrayed or
maltreated by their parents or those responsible for them.
Cleo had already made up her mind to put the parents of that
dead child under observation.
“I’m not sure that Chris Marlow is as conscientious as he
should be, Cleo. I’m glad he wants to move on. The sooner the better.”
Cleo said she would contact Jenny, her new sleuth. Gary
thought she was a better choice than Dorothy for the task, and said he would look
into the affairs of one or two of the others who had been involved in the case,
including Miss Crane’s lawyer, who had made no effort to save her from the
ignominy and injustice she was suffering. The case had been heavily stacked
against Crane because no one had wanted to believe her story, though it was not
contradicted.
As far as Anna was concerned, Banu Akbari had disappeared
for years. Had anyone looked for her or even tried to find other witnesses to
Anna’s abduction? The woman’s return to the area years later had ended in her
murder. Was there a connection, or did that murder belong to the controversial
Muslim code of traditional clan ethics that gave men the dubious right to kill
women who ‘misbehaved’?
In his role as a D.I., Gary would phone the prison from the
office and order them to send a list of all Crane’s visitors during her
imprisonment. Though the interview had shown Crane to be a broken, despondent
woman, she might have been doing her own bit of investigation from within the
prison walls or even been threatened to keep her mouth shut. Did she have
contact to someone who cared enough to murder her or on her behalf? How
friendly was Crane with the man seen talking to Banu Akbari at the bistro?
“For me, the most pressing issue is whether Crane told us
everything,” said Cleo
Gary and Cleo decided to pay Crane another visit within a
few days to ask her to identify the man in the bistro from Mitch’s snapshot. If it was, that was the piece of evidence that
would be needed to get the case re-opened.
Gary was doubtful about allowing Jenny to visit the Daniels family.
Could she take a male escort, preferably a cop? If Daniels had been violent to
his small child, he would to pass up a chance to put Jenny in her place.
“Do you have time for a very late lunch, Cleo?” Gary asked
when they reached HQ.
“We could go to Romano’s,” Gary suggested.
“Again?” said Cleo. “Twice in one day?”
“Forever.”
“Won’t Romano be shocked?”
“Surprised, maybe, but not shocked,” said Gary. “ How’s our
baby doing?”
“Thriving.”
“I must say,” said Gary as they entered Romano’s guest room.
“I don’t think I can remember being in such a situation with a woman the day
after she had married someone else.”
“But you are, Gary. Let’s not talk about my marriage,
please.”
“We don’t need to talk at all,” said Gary.
Later that afternoon, Cleo could not get the image of that
dead child out of her mind despite the glowing feeling she had after that precious
hour at Romano’s. There had been a photo of the child’s bruised and battered
little body in the folder containing all the information on the Crane case.
Even without Alice Crane’s denial that she had hurt the child in any way, Cleo
was certain that the earlier bruising was part of the domestic violence Crane
had talked about. She rang Jenny, who was in the lab with Chris.
“We’re looking at fabric threads under a microscope right
now, Cleo.”
“Great, Jenny. I needed you to call on the parents of a dead
child.”
“That sounds ominous.”
“It is.”
Cleo proceeded to give Jenny enough information to start her
off.
“We’re through here in an hour. Is that soon enough?”
“Go tomorrow, Jenny. Their name is still in the phone book,
but they might have moved away. That will have to be checked first.”
“Can I talk to Chris for a moment?”
Jenny handed the phone to her colleague.
“Hi Cleo. What’s up?”
“Is it possible to date old bruises?”
“That’s a tall order, Cleo. I suppose you mean from
photographs?”
“Yes.”
“Scientists are still trying to get it right. You can really
only tell from colour changes in the bruising, and photos don’t necessarily tell
the truth.”
“Meaning?”
“Colour distortions. In one trial, red colouration was seen
in some bruises less than a week old, and there was yellow colouration in some
bruises over one day old.”
“Inconsistent then. Unreliable as evidence.”
“Unfortunately, yes.”
“Could such evidence be conveniently ignored at a trial?”
“I don’t know if you mean something specific, but yes, since
such evidence could be classed as too vague.”
“Meaning that bruises are simply classed as old or new, I
assume.”
“That’s almost as reliable as it gets. It depends to some
degree on the individual haemoglobin metabolism.”
“But you can tell which bruises have been caused by a fall
or are accidental if they are still very new?”
“I’d say yes and no to that.”
“So opinions differ, do they?”
“Not really. If you can examine the skin, an old bruise has
different colouration – yellow, red or purple, depending on how the victims
react to bruising.”
“You mean if it takes longer to fade?”
“Yes.”
“But you would say old bruises are generally speaking recognisable
as such.”
“Yes, and new bruises hurt much more than older ones, but
that’s not helpful when you’re dealing with the dead or photos.”
“The child is dead.”
“Another case of child abuse, I suppose.”
“Who ran forensics three year ago, Chris?”
“I did. I hope you are not planning to accuse me of negligence.”
“Not after what you’ve just told me, Chris. The information will
be useful to Jenny.”
“I’ll go through it with her again.”
“I’ll tell Gary that Jenny’s more or less on her way there.”
“How’s marriage treating you, Cleo?”
“OK, thanks.”
“You don’t sound very enthusiastic.”
“Another time, Chris.”
“Message understood. Ciao.”
Cleo wondered what Chris had read into the message. She had
not intended to send one and Chris Marlow was certainly not the right person to
confide in.
Before putting her feet up, Cleo called Robert to find out
what time they would eat supper. Customers were apparently still queuing to the
door. Friday was always the busiest day and Robert had often kept the shop open
longer to deal with the queues.
“I’ll come and help,” said Cleo.
“Don’t bother,” said Robert. “Gloria is coping.”
“It’s no bother,” said Cleo.
Robert and especially Gloria were glad that Cleo had not settled
for a siesta instead, though she looked as if she needed it.
Robert could not resist a taunt.
“What’s he been doing to you?” he said.
“Nothing I did not want to happen,” Cleo retorted.
“Heh kids, don’t quarrel. You’ve just got married,” said
Gloria.
“Just a lovers’ tip. Mother.”
Finally, the last customer left, and Cleo cleaned up the
counter display while Robert stacked the remaining meat in the fridge in the back
room. Gloria emptied the till and counted the takings out loud.
“Enough for a new car, Mother-in-law?” Robert joked.
“You could buy me one,” said Gloria, who thought he might be
serious.
“Coming to supper, Mother?”
“Not tonight, child. I’m dead beat. The wine was heady
yesterday.”
“You drank rather a lot of it.”
“It would have been fine if I hadn’t mixed it with anything.”
“Well, you toddle off, then,” said Robert. “Cleo and I will
finish clearing up here.”
“Thanks, Bobby. I’ll be fine in the morning.”
Blowing kisses as she went, Gloria did indeed toddle off to
her flat upstairs.
“And we’ll have the evening to ourselves,” said Robert.
“That will be nice,” said Cleo, not really caring.
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