Czytaj książkę: «The Follow»

2

Hove Crown Court looks more like a library than a courthouse from the outside, with dark brown brick and dirty white walls. It’s situated on the corner of Holland Road, with no parking for anyone other than workers, and it sits several streets away from any of the bus routes. It is as convenient and well thought out as the rest of the justice system.

I paced up and down in the police waiting room trying not to annoy DI Jones, the officer in charge of the case. Normally, the OIC was a detective constable but, since it was a police officer who had been stabbed, they’d bumped it all the way up to an inspector.

She looked very smart in a no-nonsense trouser suit, with her hair scraped back into a tight bun and just a hint of make-up to hide the strain of a four-week court case. She sighed as I walked past her for the eighth time in the tiny room.

‘Gareth, can you please sit down?’ she asked, looking threateningly at me over her glasses.

‘Sorry, ma’am, I’m just nervous. I want him to go down and I’m a bit wound up.’

‘We all want him to go down, Gareth. But right now I’m trying to read through the file and you’re putting me off.’

I stopped pacing and stood in front of the mirror, checking myself for the twentieth time since I’d been in the room. I’m not used to wearing a suit and it had felt strange to be looking smart. I’d chosen a grey double-breasted affair with a lavender shirt and tie, and was extremely grateful that I’d remembered to shave that morning. Usually I don’t, due to the fact that a few days’ stubble makes you look less like a police officer when you’re on the streets. I hadn’t, however, managed to get my hair cut and my brown locks were getting long enough that they were starting to curl over my ears.

The door opened and a court usher stepped in, the black gown looking strange over the security-style uniform she wore underneath.

‘PC Bell?’

‘Here,’ I said, sounding like a naughty schoolboy as the nerves made my palms sweat and my stomach flip over.

‘They’re ready for you now. Would you like to swear or affirm?’

‘Affirm, please.’ Not that I have a problem with swearing on the Bible, but not being religious, it had felt to me like I would be lying from the outset, which isn’t a good frame of mind in court.

She led me across the corridor and into the court, situated right at the back of the building on the top floor. As I entered, I headed towards the stand, nodding at both the judge and jury as I went in.

Once I had been safely escorted to my position, the usher placed a card in my hand and I read the words with barely a quiver in my voice. ‘I do solemnly, sincerely and truly declare and affirm that the evidence I shall give shall be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.’

As I introduced myself, I let my eyes drift around the courtroom, taking in the jury, all trying to look thoughtful and solemn, the barristers in their ridiculous gowns and wigs, and Quentin Davey himself, secure behind a Perspex screen.

Davey was staring at me intently, with a half-smile that I didn’t like playing around his lips. Although not an imposing man at five feet six inches, four inches shorter than me and only half my build, there was an air about him that had made the hackles rise on the back of my neck. He has a blatant disregard for anyone or anything else, and that shows in almost everything he does.

I once jumped one of his runners, Peter Finn, a heroin user trusted just enough to sell small amounts of the drug for Davey, and had arrested Finn and seized the five bags of heroin he had left on him. For the loss of the £50 the drugs would have made, Davey had thrown an entire kettle of boiling water into Finn’s face, disfiguring him for life. Try as we might to get Finn to prosecute, some kind of twisted loyalty, or maybe just fear, had held him and he still works for Davey even to this day.

The man that would scar someone for life and stab a copper was staring at me and trying not to laugh. He had to have something up his sleeve that I hadn’t thought of, but what?

‘PC Bell, did you get enough sleep last night?’ The judge’s voice brought my head round with an almost audible snap.

‘I’m sorry, Your Honour, I was just looking at the man who stabbed my partner.’ When lost, confused or cornered, go for the throat.

The defence barrister shot out of his seat like a cork out of a bottle. ‘Objection!’ he called, putting one hand to the wig that had nearly slipped off during his heroic launch.

‘Sustained,’ said the judge, one that unfortunately I didn’t recognize. ‘PC Bell, I don’t want you leading the jury with unsolicited statements, am I clear?’

‘Yes, Your Honour.’ I did my best to sound repentant, but I could see a few members of the jury giving me looks of approval. Strike one.

After my little outburst, I was first given to the prosecution barrister, who very neatly led me through my statement asking no awkward questions, but instead asking me regularly how I felt as I first subdued Jimmy’s assailant and then applied the first aid that had saved my colleague’s life. I spoke vividly of the minutes I waited for the ambulance, my hands covered in Jimmy’s blood as I held a credit card to the outside of his chest to prevent the lung from collapsing as it filled with fluid.

I told the jury about the looks and threats that Davey had thrown at us as I laboured to save Jimmy’s life, about his laughter rolling over me as I was busy keeping my friend alive.

I told them about the blood that had flowed down Hollingdean Road like a flood, staining the pavement while the ambulance crew worked on Jimmy, trying to stop the bleeding before they moved him. I knew as I glanced at the jury that I had them. I could feel tears in my eyes as I finished, and my fingers were white as they gripped the edge of the box. I glared at Davey as if daring him to challenge anything I’d said but he just looked right back at me, his thin face still struggling not to break into a grin.

Soon enough it was the defence barrister’s turn to question me, and he began without preamble. ‘PC Bell, am I right in thinking that it was you who seized the knife in question, after PC Holdsworth had been removed in the ambulance?’

‘That’s correct.’ I didn’t like his tone; he sounded like he was about to unleash something nasty at me.

‘And did you follow the correct procedure when you seized this knife?’

‘Yes, I did. I placed it in a knife tube, sealed the tube and wrote out an exhibit label, which I then applied to the tube. I then placed it all in a clear plastic bag which I sealed with a cable tie.’

‘So, PC Bell, would you say that you are confident that the tube has not been opened since you sealed it?’

I thought for a second, realizing that the only option the barrister had was to discredit the evidence; the rest of the case was too strong to touch. ‘I haven’t had hands on the tube since it went into the store at John Street. I would have no way of knowing, but I presume that if someone had opened it then they would have followed the correct procedure.’

Let him work his way around that and still find a way to blame me for whatever was coming.

‘Your Honour, I would like to produce exhibit GB/250308/1355, which should be a black-handled kitchen knife, stained with the blood of PC Holdsworth.’

The judge motioned with a lazy hand, indicating his approval.

The defence barrister, with slow, deliberate movements accepted the exhibit from the court usher with both hands, holding up the clear plastic bag for the jury to see. Inside the bag sat a knife tube, a plastic cylinder of two halves that screwed together to make varying lengths of tube for holding sharp objects.

‘So, PC Bell, you are saying that this is the knife that you claim my client used to stab PC Holdsworth, is that correct?’

A cold feeling blossomed in the pit of my stomach, trying to claw its way up into my throat and stop me from speaking. What the hell was he playing at, I wondered? Of course it was the knife.

‘Uh, yes.’

The barrister slowly undid the plastic bag, then pulled out the knife tube. From that distance I could see the knife within, but not make out any details. I wondered whether it was my imagination or it looked different somehow.

He unscrewed the knife tube, stripping off the tape that sealed it first then tipping the knife onto the desk in front of him. Instead of the clatter I was expecting, there was a dull thud, as if the knife was made of rubber.

Which, somehow, it was.

He held the knife up, wiggling the rubber blade from side to side with one finger, while I stood there with my jaw hanging open almost to my chest.

‘So, PC Bell, you are saying that my client stabbed PC Holdsworth with a rubber knife, which you then seized and exhibited falsely as a real knife? Would you like to tell us what really happened that day, officer?’

I could only stand there stunned, unable to work out what had happened. Then it clicked. Davey must have someone inside the police station on his payroll; it was the only thing that made sense. I looked over at him, seeing him almost doubled up with repressed laughter, and something inside me snapped. I swung back to glare at the barrister, standing there triumphantly waving a rubber knife at the now thoroughly confused jury.

‘Davey stabbed my partner, then I took the knife off him. I administered first aid to Jimmy, then I seized the knife, the real knife, not the one your client paid someone off to swap. I should arrest you both right now for perverting the course of justice.’

My voice rose at the end, and I spat the words at him as if they were sharp things that would cut and tear at him. I stepped towards him, intent on carrying out my threat, and I’d made it halfway across the court when the insistent hammering of the judge’s gavel brought me back to myself and I remembered where I was.

‘PC Bell!’ he shouted, spit flying from the corners of his mouth. ‘You will not treat my courtroom like a police station. There are rules here and you will follow them. You are dismissed from court while we adjourn to sort this mess out. The police’s mess, I might add.’

I froze, my fists still clenching as I saw the barrister throw a quick, knowing look at Davey. He must have been in on it. Somehow, God only knows how, they had managed to find someone in the nick who was dirty enough that they would screw with the evidence in a case that involved another copper being stabbed. Just thinking about it made me want to throw my head back and scream in anger.

Game, set and match to Davey and his empire.

I turned and strode from the court before I could do anything they’d regret, kicking open the door to the police waiting room.

DI Jones had been in the back of the court but was now standing in the corner of the room on her mobile, a look of sick fear mixed with anger on her face. As I slammed into the room she snapped her mobile shut and glared at me, as if it was somehow all my fault.

‘We’re going back to John Street; the chief super wants to see us. What kind of wanker would do something like that to the evidence?’

The look she gave me clearly said that she thought I might be that kind of wanker, and I felt my hackles rise in response to the implied accusation. ‘Don’t look at me. I’ve been working with Jimmy for years. I don’t think we’ll help each other by throwing shit and arguing, so let’s get back and see what Pearson has to say, huh?’

Jones picked up her bag and strode past me without another word, leaving me to follow in her wake as her heels clicked angrily down the stairs towards the exit.