The House in the Woods (Atticus Priest Book 1) Page 6

  She put up her umbrella. “Thank you,” she said. “I’m so grateful. Ralph will be relieved, too.”

  “You’re welcome,” he said. “I’ll do my best, but you need to be realistic. Cases like this don’t get to court unless the prosecution is confident.”

  “But—”

  “But there will be loose ends,” he said. “There always are. I’ll find them, pick at them, and we’ll see what unravels.”

  13

  Allegra called Dafyd Cadogan as they walked back to the court, and the solicitor was waiting for them as they arrived in the waiting area.

  “This is Atticus Priest,” she said.

  “I know Mr. Priest,” Cadogan said with a flat smile. “Our paths crossed now and again when he was a police officer, didn’t they?”

  Atticus nodded with a forced smile. Cadogan was a large man both in stature and personality. He was wearing a baggy suit and a white shirt that was at least a size too small for him. His gut strained against the buttons, opening gaps through which Atticus could see his chest. He had been in to represent several of the scoundrels that Atticus had investigated, and had always, without exception, been a right royal pain in the arse. He was pompous, full of the delusion that he had a modicum of talent, and seemingly blind to the fact that he was a two-bob provincial solicitor who earned his crust representing low-life criminal scumbags whose guilt was never really in question.

  “I’ll leave you two to it,” Allegra said.

  She shook Atticus’s hand and made her way back to the public gallery.

  Cadogan glared at Atticus. “What do you want? We start again in five minutes.”

  “I need to see all of the documents in the case. Everything you’ve got and everything that the prosecution has disclosed.”

  “There’s a lot,” he said.

  “I’m sure there is. I’d appreciate it if you could arrange for someone to copy them and bring them to my office. I’m just round the corner from you.”

  “That’s going to be expensive.”

  He shrugged. “I can’t do my job without the evidence.”

  “And what job is that?”

  “I’m reviewing the case. Finding the errors in the evidence that you should have found.”

  Cadogan curled his lip in annoyance. “Is she paying for this?”

  “She is. I’m sure you’re already inflating your disbursements. You can add it to the bill.”

  “I’m pleased to see you haven’t lost your sense of humour, even after… you know, after all that unpleasantness.”

  “I have thick skin.”

  Cadogan raised his chin and stuck it out, posturing defensively. “She’s deluded if she thinks this is going to be anything other than a waste of time. She’s relentless. She calls me every morning to go through the case and to tell me all the wonderful new ideas that she’s had to try to prove that her husband is innocent.”

  “I’m sure you have the meter running.”

  Cadogan didn’t rise to the bait. Instead, he gestured towards Atticus and said, “And now she’s hiring the likes of you. Getting more and more desperate. She didn’t think that they were going to arrest him, but they did. She didn’t think they’d charge him, but they did. This morning in court won’t have helped. I advised him to plead guilty, but he wouldn’t.”

  “So you think he did it?”

  “I think the prosecution have a strong case.”

  “That’s not what I asked.”

  “We’re giving him the best defence possible. Do I think the jury will convict him?” He paused. “Make up your own mind when you see the evidence. It’s circumstantial, maybe, but there’s a lot of it and it adds up. The jury will want something credible, and this is. Someone killed the Mallenders. In the absence of a more convincing explanation…” He shrugged.

  “Your confidence in your client is inspiring,” Atticus said. He eyed the door, where the press was beginning to funnel back inside.

  “I’m just being honest. And this”—he prodded a fat finger in Atticus’s direction—“is a waste of time and money.”

  “We’ll see. But at least I’ll be able to tell her what a terrible job you’ve done. Get me the papers.”

  14

  Atticus retook his seat just as the associate called the court to order and the judge and jury came back inside. Abernathy resumed his spot and, with the same thoroughness he had displayed during the morning’s session, continued his opening speech. He finished with another rhetorical flourish, his hands spread wide as he regaled the jury with his certainty that the Crown’s case was strong. He finished with the suggestion—not far off an exhortation—that the evidence would leave them with no choice but to find Mallender guilty.

  Abernathy thanked them and sat.

  Somerville looked up from his notes. “Thank you, Mr. Abernathy. Are you ready to call your first witness?”

  “Indeed, my Lord, we are. The Crown calls Jimmy Robson.”

  The usher called out for Jimmy Robson, and the witness made his way into the court. He was a big man in his mid-twenties, shaven-headed and clearly unaccustomed to the suit that he was wearing for the occasion. Tattoos were visible above the line of his collar and down the back of his right hand. His eyes flashed around the room, but he didn’t show the nervousness that might otherwise have been expected of someone here for the first time. Atticus wondered if he had prior experience of the criminal justice system.

  “Mr. Robson,” Abernathy said, “please tell the court what you do for a living.”

  “I’m a gamekeeper for the Wilton Estate. I look after the woods.”

  “What does that entail?”

  Robson shrugged. “I keep an eye out for poachers, mostly. We’ve had gypsies coming in to try to shoot the deer. Had hare coursers in last week, setting their dogs loose in the fields. Had to chase them off.” He spoke slowly and deliberately.

  “And you live near to Grovely Farmhouse, do you not?”

  “I do,” he said. “You get to their house and keep going down the track and you get to my place. Five minutes away. Owned by the Earl of Pembroke. Comes with the job. Nice little perk.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Robson. Please, would you tell the court how you know the Mallender family?”

  “Used to work for Mr. Mallender,” he said. “Worked there since I got out of school until earlier this year.”

  “Do you know the family well?”

  “Well as most, I reckon. I worked there the better part of ten years.”

  “Would you say that the family had any enemies?”

  “No, sir, I wouldn’t. Mr. Mallender had a bit of a temper on him, but no worse than others I know.”

  “And the rest of the family?”

  He shrugged. “Wouldn’t have said so. Everyone loved Mrs. Mallender. Same for Cassandra. I didn’t know Cameron very well, but he always seemed like a nice enough sort of bloke.”

  “And the defendant?”

  “I knew him a bit,” Robson said. “Not all that well, like his brother.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Robson. Now—let’s move to Christmas Eve. Please tell the jury about the last time that you saw Hugo Mallender.”

  Robson cleared his throat. “It was around half nine,” he said. “Like I said, we’ve had poachers in the wood. I was going out to do a check. I went out by the house and saw Mr. Mallender smoking a cigarette by the gate.”

  “Did you speak to him?”

  “No,” he said.

  “But you’re sure it was him?”

  “Definitely.”

  “And after that?”

  “Well, I went home. I’m not into Christmas—I live on my own, and, well, you know, it can get lonely at that time of year—so I ended up having a drink and watching a film.”

  “And what about later?”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Did you go out again?”

  “I did,” he said. “Saw the lights from the police cars. I walked Dave—Dave’s my dog—up to the house
and where the police had set up the cordon. I spoke to a couple of the police and they told me to go back home, so I did.”

  The rest of his evidence was uncontroversial and had been included only to help establish the timeline that led up to the discovery of the bodies. It was coming up to three when Atticus decided that he had seen enough for the day. He got up and made his way along the row, mouthing apologies as he disturbed the others sitting between him and the aisle, stepping around them and over their feet. He reached the end of the row, noticed that Mack was watching him from her spot behind the barristers, and, after giving her a nod of acknowledgement, made his way to the door and went outside.

  15

  Atticus walked back to the office. He passed through the city, by the Playhouse and then down into the square with its ancient buildings, everything dominated by the tall finger of the cathedral’s spire that was visible from almost everywhere in the city. He felt better and, buoyed by the confidence of his new work, he allowed himself to feel positive about his prospects for the first time in a long while. He found himself thinking about what his father had said about his change of career. Atticus imagined what he might say if he was able to influence the direction of a case as notorious as the Christmas Eve Massacre.

  The old man would have no choice but to take him seriously then.

  Atticus stopped at WHSmith and bought the things that he was going to need: fresh A4 pads, new markers for his whiteboards, a selection of stationery. He paid and walked back to the office.

  A young man was waiting for him in the passageway. He had a porter’s trolley and, balanced on it, three cardboard boxes.

  “Atticus Priest?”

  “That’s right.”

  “I’m from Cadogan’s. Got these boxes for you.”

  “Excellent. Good timing.”

  Atticus opened the door and helped the young man to carry the boxes upstairs to the office. He cleared a space against the wall and stacked them there, then opened them up and started to arrange the contents across the floor. He saw that he had been given a copy of the core bundle. It included the indictments, witness statements and exhibits, with separate bundles for the disclosure material. The criminal justice system was supposed to run on a paperless footing these days, but Atticus had not been ‘invited’ into the digital case. It didn’t matter; he preferred to have paper for a review.

  He flicked through the crime scene photographs and the report from the pathologist who had carried out the post-mortems on the family. There were reams and reams and reams of material.

  “Need anything else?” the young man asked him.

  “I’m good,” Atticus said. “Thank you.”

  The man disappeared down the stairs and shut the door to the passageway behind him.

  Atticus knocked on Jacob’s door and smiled as he heard the drumbeat of Bandit’s paws thundering across the upstairs room and then down the stairs. He saw the dog through the smoked glass and heard the whacking of his tail against the wall.

  “You’re early,” Jacob said.

  “Did what I needed to do. How was he?”

  “Good as gold. We went for a long walk—he decided he wanted a swim in the river.”

  “He loves it there,” Atticus said, rubbing behind the dog’s ears. “Thanks for looking after him.”

  “Any time. I need the money.”

  “You’re my first port of call.”

  Atticus led the way back to the office. Bandit slouched over and started to sniff the boxes.

  “We’re going to be busy,” Atticus said.

  16

  Atticus took Pink Floyd’s ‘Dark Side of the Moon’ from his collection, slid the vinyl from the sleeve and placed it carefully on the platter. He lowered the needle to the first song, adjusted the volume and waited for ‘Breathe (In the Air)’ to play. He whirled around the room for a moment, strumming in time with Dave Gilmour’s guitar, and then, as the track finished and turned into ‘On the Run,’ he went to sit down on the leather sofa in the bay window. He took two A4 pads and laid them out side by side on the coffee table.

  On the right-hand pad he wrote DEFENCE.

  On the left-hand pad he wrote PROSECUTION.

  He started to take notes, beginning with the evidence that Ralph would give in his own defence. The account was based almost exclusively on his testimony, given first to the police at the farmhouse and then afterwards to the investigating officers and his own lawyers. The police interviews had been painstakingly transcribed into interview records that ran to several hundred sheets of A4 paper.

  Ralph’s account was that the Mallenders had gathered at the farmhouse for a pre-Christmas celebration on the day of the murders. Those present were Hugo and Juliet Mallender as hosts; the twins, Cameron and Cassandra Mallender, who had arrived from Bath University the previous day; and Brenda Grant, their cleaner, together with her husband, Keith. Ralph Mallender rounded out the attendees. Atticus wondered where Allegra had been, and, after skimming the papers, he found that she had reported feeling unwelcome at the farmhouse and had gone Christmas shopping in Southampton instead. Cellphone records confirmed that she had been in the city until the early evening.

  Ralph said that he had had an argument with his mother and father. He said that he had brought up their treatment of Allegra and, specifically, that she didn’t feel wanted at the house. He reported that the argument became heated and that he had left the house in anger at around eight. The police had interviewed a dog walker, who had testified that she had heard a car driving away from the farm at around the same time.

  Atticus made himself a cup of coffee, flipped the album over onto the second side, and returned to the papers. Ralph said that he had gone to the Greyhound pub in Wilton after leaving the house. His presence there was confirmed by the landlord, who would later testify that Ralph had been in a black mood. Ralph ordered dinner and a pint and had been seen speaking to someone on the phone. Ralph said that was true, that he had called Allegra to tell her about the argument. The police had checked the calls that had been made and received on his phone and accepted that he had spoken to his wife. She had said that they had spoken, too.

  Ralph testified that he had felt guilty at the direction the conversation with his parents had taken, and that he wasn’t prepared to go home without at least trying to reconcile with them. It was Christmas Eve, he said, and he felt bad. He didn’t want there to be an atmosphere over the dinner table when he and Allegra arrived the next day. He got back into his car and returned to the farmhouse. He said that he couldn’t be sure precisely what time he arrived back at the property, guessing that it was somewhere around ten thirty. The publican at the Greyhound did not have CCTV and was only prepared to say that Ralph had left the Greyhound at some point before he called last orders.

  Ralph said that he had tried the door to the farmhouse and found it locked. He did not have his key with him, but the kitchen light was on, and he had looked inside. He saw his father’s body slumped on the floor with blood on his clothes and what he thought looked like gunshot wounds. He said that he froze, taking a moment to process what he had seen, and then he had been overcome with horror.

  His 999 call was timed at 23.15 and a transcript was included in the file. Ralph—noted by the operator to have been in a panic—had reported that he thought his father was dead and that he needed the police to attend as quickly as possible.

  Atticus flipped through to the police log. The attending officer was Detective Sergeant Tristan Lennox, who had been night duty CID cover that night. Lennox recorded that he had arrived at the property at 23.32 and found Ralph in the farmyard. Neither Lennox nor Ralph could say whether the rest of the house was empty, and given that Ralph had reported that his father had been shot to death, Lennox was not prepared to investigate without backup. He called for an armed response unit and then waited outside the property with Mallender for fifteen minutes before two uniformed constables—Ryan Yaxley and Vernon Edwards—arrived.

  It was a
t this point that Atticus noted the first real point of interest. Lennox said that he thought he saw movement in one of the uncovered upstairs windows. Yaxley said that he remembered Lennox’s statement, but, when questioned afterwards, said that he hadn’t seen anything himself. He’d qualified that—most likely because he didn’t want to drop his sergeant into it—by saying that he had been distracted. It was clearly going to be one of the pieces of evidence around which the case would turn: the defence would seize upon it, for, if someone was still alive in the house while Ralph was outside, it made it much less likely—and would certainly introduce reasonable doubt—that he could have been responsible.

  The record came to an end and the stylus swung back to its cradle with a thunk. Atticus looked back at his notes and summed up what Ralph would say in his defence: he would admit that there had been an argument, and that he had decided that he would return to the house in an attempt to reconcile with his family. When he arrived, he found the door locked and, on looking through the kitchen window, he saw his father dead. He called the police. The explanation that he would suggest—the same one that the police themselves had originally posited—was that his brother, Cameron, had murdered his father, mother and sister sometime between Jimmy Robson’s sighting of Hugo Mallender and Ralph’s return to the house.

  Bandit padded over.

  “What do you think, boy? Did he do it?”

  The dog cocked his head and nuzzled Atticus’s hand.

  “Exactly,” Atticus said. “I agree. Doesn’t look good for him.”

  He put down his pen. He had taken six pages of notes, including a page noting the inconsistencies in the police case and the questions that he wanted to ask Ralph and his wife.

  But it would have to wait. It was ten and he hadn’t eaten yet.