The type of handbag you carry says a lot about you. For example, if you’re carrying someone else’s handbag, it says that you’re a thief. But, from petty thieves to porn stars, Pandora’s was open to all women in trouble. At the time of Phyllis’s arrest, our little practice had three other cases on the legal boil. One involved a woman whose Arabic hubby had been watching a pornographic film for the first time and was shocked to discover he was married to the star. He was now divorcing her and claiming custody of their two children and half her earnings. The other case involved a fire-eating stripper whose flaming nipple tassels had set off the club’s smoke alarms. The nightclub’s owner was trying to sue her for water damage. And then there was the bigamist who targeted women who were financially stable but vulnerable. He ended up leaving a string of ‘wives’ in thousands of pounds of debt. Roxy explained wryly to Portia: ‘Bigamy is having one husband too many. Monogamy’s the same.’
A solicitor’s job is to collate all the relevant documents and witness statements. As Roxy was snowed under preparing all these briefs for me, it was decided that day that she would head back to the office to toil at the case coalface while I visited Chantelle in the hospital.
Pushing into the overheated hospital was like opening an oven to check a roast. A wave of stale warmth hit me. I eased open the door to Chantelle’s room to find the bed occupied by an old man.
What with eighty-hour working weeks, no sleep, financial cutbacks and waiting lists longer than the Great Wall of China, nurses are a curiously uncommunicative lot. Too busy to answer my frantic enquiries, staff passed me from one desk to another like an unwanted parcel – one possibly laced with ricin. Then I saw the pre-Raphaelite-pale, auburn-haired nurse who’d been taking care of Chantelle. I grabbed her arm, begging for information. She gruffly explained that the teenager had checked herself out.
My intestines macramed instantly. Rape victims are statistically vulnerable to self-harm and suicide. Heart in mouth, I rang the mobile number Phyllis had given me. When I heard Chantelle’s voice, my sigh of relief was so loud it’s a wonder passing paramedics didn’t suspect I was having an asthma attack and order an oxygen tent. Chantelle explained that she couldn’t bear all the people at the hospital knowing what had happened, so she had gone to stay with her best friend from school.
I turned the car down the hill from Hampstead towards Camden and on to the Tony Benn Estate. In my rush to find Chantelle, I forgot to take my armoured personnel carrier – otherwise known as Roxy – which is why, fifteen minutes later, I found myself surrounded by a group of hooded youths, poking at me and demanding money, iPhone, car keys . . .
Council estates are daunting for bookworms like me. The rats here could use a woman my size as a chew toy. Using my famed streetwise skills, honed for survival in the urban jungle, I immediately fumbled for my mobile to call my mother. But as I reached into my inside jacket pocket, the tension ratcheted up. Two flick knives materialized. The hair stood up on the back of my head as though I were a cartoon character.
‘I told you the council estate was not your natural environment.’ It was the handsome, golden-haired Roman emperor from the prison forecourt. I recognized his clotted-cream consonants and statuesque build. Even through a thick jumper his flexed arms were so muscular, it looked as though he had packets of cement implanted under his biceps. ‘The only firm rule on an inner-city estate having drug-turf wars is that those with rocket-grenade launchers have the right of way, isn’t that correct, boys? . . . So, what are you guys carrying?’
With the same pride and enthusiasm as an Englishwoman showing off her camellias, the boys paraded their weaponry. Four flick knives, a machete, six knuckledusters and a revolver of some kind – basically, everything lethal bar a drone plane and a ton of napalm.
‘Oh my God! It’s like a war zone. All that’s missing are piles of sandbags with jumpy eyes and gun barrels sticking over the top,’ I said nervously.
The stranger then advised the gang to get rid of their weapons and drugs as a police raid was imminent – at least, I think that’s what he said, as he imparted most of this information in rapid-fire, guttural street slang. I needed United Nations headphones to decode the conversation.
‘It’s considered good manners to convey information about impending raids from rival drug gangs or police,’ the Roman emperor told me. ‘This takes the place of weather reports in inner-city ghettos. News of stab victims takes the place of celebrity gossip.’
After a bit of high-fiving and back-slapping, the boys sauntered off.
‘If teenagers were a radio, then you seem to have their frequency,’ I marvelled.
‘You just need to speak their lingo.’
‘Really? What’s the local lingo for “I’m unarmed and not dangerous and quite academic, really, so please don’t let me suffer a lingering death and just point me to the nearest library”?’
He smiled. ‘Sorry, there’s no such phrase in the local vocabulary. It’s just that reaching inside a jacket for your phone resembles the gesture of drawing a gun and makes trigger-happy, macho boys a little more jumpy than is entirely prudent. They’re not bad kids, really.’
‘Really? I dunno . . . The way they clean under their nails with the blades of their flick knives kinda makes me suspect they failed their Health and Safety badges in the Boy Scouts.’
This time the stranger laughed. ‘They’ve just been thrown on society’s rubbish heap. They’re in that weird no man’s land between school and—’
‘Jail?’ I interrupted.
‘Well, yes, sadly. Most graduate from school with certificates in how to make kerosene bombs out of plastic milk bottles. Where are you going, by the way? Would you like me to escort you?’
‘I want you to know that I’m a feminist – totally independent and self-sufficient in all things . . . But, yes please.’ I fumbled through my handbag for the scrap of paper on which I’d scribbled down the tower block and flat number Chantelle had given me over the phone. The stranger pushed up the sleeves of his jumper, threw his leather jacket over one shoulder, took me gently by the elbow and steered me through the buildings with no effort or disorientation.
‘People presume those kids’ only vocation is crushing beer cans against their foreheads. They’re demonized as “chavs” by the press. But these boys have grown up amid poverty, family breakdown and the lure of easy money from dealing. What you have to understand is that, since Britain lost its manufacturing base, the drug industry’s the only factory still open.’
I was trying to pay attention but was completely distracted by the man’s muscled forearms, which flexed deliciously with each swing of his arms. ‘In my line of work I see kids as young as eight or nine employed as lookouts and couriers.’
‘And what is that, exactly? Your line of work?’ I asked, thinking, Mr Universe? Hugh Jackman’s body double? Number-one female masturbation fantasy as voted by Moist magazine?
‘Nathaniel Cavendish.’ He extended his hand. ‘Ex-banker turned do-gooder.’
‘I thought the only bank we could rely on since the Global Financial Crash was the sperm bank?’ I bantered, thinking how much I’d like to make a withdrawal.
‘You’re right.’ He laughed. ‘As an investment banker, I was an expert at extracting money from people’s pockets . . . only without the traditional method of resorting to violence. So I left the Swiss bank I worked for in the City and I now run a charity helping young offenders go straight.’
‘Wait,’ I said, intrigued. ‘You gave up a life of luxury to work with the disadvantaged? I think you’re the one on drugs.’ But I was secretly impressed. This was the kind of man I thought Jack Cassidy would turn into.
‘The whole GFC was caused by wanker bankers ripping off the system. It hit me that we were no better than these kids being sent down for dealing. If I hadn’t been born with a whole canteen of silver spoons in my mouth and had grown up here’ – he gestured around us, at the underbelly of the estate – ‘I’d have been one of those boys you just encountered. They’re not bad. They’re just angry at their situation, at society, at themselves . . .’
Nathaniel Cavendish had a soulful, elegant quality that reminded me of a young Marcel Proust before he took to his bed to write À la recherche du temps perdu – if Proust had been in possession of rock-hard abs and perfect pectorals, that is.
‘The worlds of investment banking and drug dealing are so similar. It’s all alpha men, danger, deals, adrenalin, quick money, fast cars and sexy women. If you’re in investment, you’re managing a portfolio. Guys on the estate, they’re the CEOs of drug businesses. They understand how to market, how to distribute . . .’
I was listening, but also awestruck by the man’s caffè-latte skin tone, which was nearly as smooth as his style.
‘Drug dealing’s like a corporation, you see. It’s a pyramid structure. Drugs from Afghanistan or Turkey are driven across Europe by young Bulgarians and Lithuanians, stuffed into every orifice of their cars. The heroin gets taken from them at Dover and hidden in the back of lorries. Once the drugs are in London, they’re passed down through the distributors. In banking and drug dealing, cash is so easy to come by it becomes like Monopoly money.’
‘Yeah, until you get the “Go to jail. Do not pass Go” card.’
‘Exactly. But the worst that can happen to a banker is that your bonus is docked. I try to show these kids a different possibility. The charity I run gets young offenders work experience at banks and businesses.’
Nathaniel Cavendish seemed to have just popped in from the age of Enlightenment. All he needed was a frock coat and a pair of breeches. Even though I’d only just met the man, I could already see myself sitting by the fireside of his ancestral home, running my hand soothingly through his lovely locks as he told me about the hard day he’d had, saving ragamuffins and urchins from chimneys and coalmines.
‘So how exactly do you wave this magic philanthropic wand of yours?’
‘While they’re inside, I have a captive audience. Literally. I get kids reading about the stock market and property investment. Then, when they leave prison, I ask friends to mentor them and give them work and show them how to invest in shares and make money from legal trading.’
My heart did a fast fandango. Nathaniel seemed mail-ordered – he was just the type of male I would write away for.
‘Drug dealers are good at maths. I just show them the mathematical equations. For someone making money through drugs, if you add up the time they’re going to spend in prison, the money for lawyers, et cetera, it’s always going to work out better going straight. Even working at McDonald’s is going to be a better bet in the end.’
‘But what about you? Don’t you miss the high life at all?’ I asked, thoroughly captivated.
‘Not really. After all, the best things in life are free – walking, talking, laughing, oxygen and orgasms.’
I swallowed hard. Oxygen might be free, but I didn’t seem to be getting enough of it all of a sudden, as my head was spinning.
‘I’m sorry. That was very forward of me! . . . But when tragedy waits to check your coat and jeopardy’s mixing the drinks, there’s no doubt that it adds a certain piquancy to the daily pleasures of life,’ he said, in his mellifluous melted-chocolate tones. ‘It makes wine taste better but also makes kissing a beautiful woman all the more poignantly appreciated.’
I would have swallowed again, but I didn’t seem to have any saliva left after drooling throughout our entire walk across the estate.
Nathaniel stopped in front of a tower block with smeared-glass doors leading into a drab landing. ‘Here you are.’ He glanced back at my crumpled bit of paper, still in his hand. ‘Floor 12, flat 49. Hawthorn House, Buttercup Road . . . Hawthorn, Buttercup . . .?’ He looked around sadly at the sea of grey asphalt. ‘England has become a place where they tear down the trees . . . and then name buildings after them. But, oh, do forgive me. Here I am, blathering on. Just as well you found out how boring I am now, and not on a walking tour of the Cotswolds.’
Was he suggesting a walk in the Cotswolds? I’d rather he took me for a walk on the wild side . . . Although, in my scuffed shoes and dowdy pencil skirt, I was clearly not dressed for a date, I thought, wishing I’d spruced up a little more that morning. Since joining Pandora’s, my only sartorial motto seemed to be – if the shoe fits, it’s ugly.
Nathaniel turned to face me, full on. ‘But you haven’t said a word about yourself. Why are you here, if you don’t mind me asking?’
‘Interviewing a witness. I’m a lawyer.’ I gave him my ‘Pandora’s – Thinking outside the Box’ card.
He cast his eye over it. ‘Matilda Devine . . . divine by name and divine by nature.’ He slipped it into his back jeans pocket then kissed my hand in his gallant way. ‘I’m delighted by this propitious encounter. Our second. Seems it’s meant to be.’ He smiled, doffed an imaginary hat, then strode off to abolish slavery or invent penicillin, or something equally noble.
Riding up in the rackety lift and walking along the dank corridor, all I could think about was Nathaniel Cavendish’s general perfection. I would have dwelt longer on his aristocratic loveliness, but I’d found the right door, knocked and was now being appraised through a cyclopean spyhole. The perfectly coiffeured and made-up child who opened the door to me was lap-dance ready and wet-T-shirt glamorous . . . if you like your fifteen-year-olds that way. Once I’d given my name, she let me into a tiny handkerchief square of a flat.
Chantelle was curled up on the couch next to an imitation Tiffany lamp. The stained glass reminded me of the delicate wings of a butterfly.
‘How are you, Chantelle?’
‘I ain’t been able to cry yet . . . Though I seem to be able to cry in my dreams,’ she said. ‘How’s Gran? When can I see ’er?’
I didn’t have the heart to tell her that her gran was currently claustrophobically ensconced in a psychotic boot camp otherwise known as remand prison, so said instead, ‘Your grandma’s well. She sent you all her love.’
‘She’s still in jail, ain’t she?’
‘Her bail hearing appeal is scheduled for next week. Meanwhile, I can take you to see her when you’re feeling stronger.’
‘I’m strong!’ Chantelle’s body may have been frail, but her voice was pure steel. ‘I’ve already enrolled online for kickboxin’ and karate at the YMCA. I ain’t gonna be a victim. I’m gonna fight back. To protect my gran.’
‘That’s so good, Chantelle. Because that’s what I need to ask you.’ I sat beside her and took her limp little hand in mine. ‘Do you want the Crown Prosecution Service to go ahead with the prosecution? You can ask to withdraw your evidence. Being in the witness box in court can be really scary and intimidating. Nobody would judge you if you didn’t want to go ahead, Chantelle. Nobody at all.’
She snatched her hand from mine and leapt up off the weathered settee. ‘I hope their ears turn to assholes and shit on their shoulders! I want ’em locked up for ever! So they can never ever do this to any other girl! J’hear me!?’
Roxy was right. Chantelle did have her grandmother’s fighting spirit. ‘Are you sure?’
She gave a strained smile full of endearingly crooked teeth. ‘Yeah, I’m sure.’
I relaxed for the first time in days.
Later, after a quiet supper with Portia, going over the most tedious multiple-choice maths homework (Q. Why did the maths student’s mother throw her watch out of the window? A. Because she wanted to watch time fly), I went to bed that night and slept soundly, totally confident that justice would triumph and the rapists would be convicted – and all without the intervention of the Senior Treasury Counsel Jack bloody Cassidy.
I only wish I’d reminded myself that, if everything seems to be coming your way, you’re probably going the wrong direction up a one-way street . . .
I awoke at dawn with the distinct feeling that I was being watched. I sat bolt upright in bed and switched on the light. As my eyes and mind adjusted, I realized that there was a parcel on the end of my bed. I picked it up with hesitant, pincered fingers. It was a box of handmade, crystallized rosepetal chocolates from the Burlington Arcade – the most expensive chocolates in London. Plus a note. Typed. No signature.
WARNING. YOUR GRAN’S NOT TELLING THE WHOLE TRUTH AND NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH. THE GRANDDAUGHTER LEFT THE HOSPITAL AFTER SHE WAS ADMITTED. SHE WAS MISSING FOR AN HOUR – THE EXACT SAME TIME THE RAPISTS WERE SHOT. SUSPECT THE KID POINTED OUT THE CULPRITS TO HER GRAN AND WATCHED THEM GET THEIR PUNISHMENT. THEN WENT BACK TO THE HOSPITAL. HERE’S THE HOSPITAL REPORT – THE ONLY ONE. WHICH I’VE NICKED TO HELP YOUR CASE.
A FRIEND.
P.S. HOPE I GOT THE RIGHT CHOCCIES
Enclosed in the envelope was the original hospital record, which clearly showed that Chantelle had been missing and unaccounted for between the hours of 9 and 10 p.m. Her rapists had been shot at nine thirty exactly.
I turned the letter over and over. There was no indication of who had sent it. Was it a hoax? If not, then Phyllis and Chantelle had lied to me. But, more worryingly, who had left this mysterious package? How had they got into my bedroom? I looked around, panic-stricken. I tried the window – locked. I break out into a sweat even thinking about jogging, but now found myself sprinting from room to room, flinging open cupboards and peering beneath beds. How could Chantelle have left the hospital when she was so battered and bruised? But there it was, in black and white – the official hospital record.
I rang Chantelle’s mobile and confronted her. She maintained that, after the police had interviewed her, she’d staggered outside for a ‘ciggy’. The kid’s pants were so badly on fire I expected an automatic water-sprinkling system to kick in.
After briefing Roxy, we dropped Portia at school then headed straight back to Holloway Prison. On the drive there, my mother was smoking so much I was tempted to give her a tracheotomy so she could smoke two cigarettes simultaneously.
Then came the interminable wait at the gate to gain entry, followed by the mandatory free medical exam. As the officer gave my mother an intimate pat down, she feigned disappointment. ‘What? Not even a movie and dinner first?’ A surly half-hour later, we were finally granted access to the prison. Even on a sunny day there was an air of twilight and deliquescence to the place. It was hard to think of anywhere less appealing. Put it this way, if the prison officer had told me to go to hell, compared to my current surroundings, I would positively look forward to the trip.
‘Kiss my left flap, you dog-fingerin’ twat’ were the charming first words I heard upon entering the remand wing – and it was downhill from there.
‘Did Chantelle leave the hospital with you to point out the rapists?’ I asked as soon as we were ensconced in our glass aquarium of a cubicle, wardens circling like sharks.
Phyllis put her hands to her head and covered her face for a moment. ‘I can’t remember. It’s all a blur.’
‘You can’t remember if your bruised and battered granddaughter limped out of the hospital, went in the car with you to the estate then stalked two rapists?’
Phyllis shrugged, her plump triceps swinging like sodden washing in the wind.
‘Phyllis, I have the hospital record here, saying that Chantelle was missing from her bed between nine and ten.’
Phyllis’s cheeks hung slack as ancient breasts. Her silver hair was now a horror of Gorgon-like dreads from lack of brushing. Her few days in prison had not just been unkind to her face – they’d stomped on it with hobnailed boots.
‘She was worried I’d shoot the wrong blokes . . .’ She trailed off nervously, sending us sidelong glances in sudden embarrassment. She gripped her hands together convulsively. ‘Me eyesight’s not that grand.’
‘Forget your eyesight.’ Roxy sighed. ‘Do you have any idea how bad this makes you look in the eyes of the law?’
‘Chantelle no longer looks like a victim, but a cold-hearted, calculating killer. She could be charged as an accomplice. Aiding and abetting attempted murder when her trigger-happy gran went for some testicular target practice. Didn’t you think of that, Phyllis?’
The colourless dough of Phyllis’s face was suddenly highlighted by the blotches of angry red which now rose in her cheeks.
‘J’know the attitude of men to girls on the estate? These are throw-away girls. Worth less than a lollipop tossed down on the ground. Men are predators. Girls are prey. From the age of eleven they get raped. Those men told Chantelle they’d burn her alive if she told anybody. They threatened to cut my ’ead off with an axe. I just wanted Chanty to see them in pain. What would you ’ave done if it was your daughter?’ she asked me desolately. ‘Well? Answer me! What would you ’ave done?!’
Phyllis gave a brittle sob of exhaustion. Roxy patted her arm until she was ready to go on.
‘Chantelle’s mum, she was raped. She used to be teacher’s pet. But these older men. They started buyin’ her gifts – cigarettes and vodka, then crack cocaine and heroin. Then the rapin’, the beatin’. When she got pregnant with Chanty, they threatened to murder the baby if she didn’t start recruitin’ younger girls for ’em. They said they’d chop Chantelle’s head off and put it in a suitcase, then kill me, too, real slow and painful like. So, she smuggled in drugs for ’em, from Europe. Only she got caught and sent down. For workin’ as a drug mule.’ Her face was knotted in pain. ‘I vowed on me ma’s grave never to let anythin’ like that happen to my darlin’ Chanty . . . And I failed. I failed!’ She buried her face in her chapped hands.
Roxy and I sat in sad silence for a moment, then my mother turned to me. ‘My hearing’s mucking up. I can’t put any of that stuff about Chantelle leaving the hospital in the statement, as it just wasn’t audible.’
‘We’re supposed to tell the truth, the whole truth, remember – not the varnished untruth. Besides, the prosecution are bound to find out,’ I warned.
‘Then we’ll claim mental myasthenia gravix.’
‘Christ, what’s that when it’s at home?’ asked Phyllis, alarmed.
‘It’s Latin for memory loss in the mental muscle,’ I explained to her.
‘So, how does it affect yer memory?’
‘I forget,’ said my mother, winking. ‘Besides, how can the prosecution find out that Chantelle left the hospital when we have the original documentation?’
‘You’re trusting an anonymous tip-off?’
‘Well, whoever nicked it is obviously on our side. We can easily keep this as our little secret . . . Phyllis, you and Chantelle must not mention this to anyone else, okay? Otherwise, Chantelle could be charged as an accomplice and you’ll both go down.’
Phyllis nodded furiously.
‘So, let’s talk about your defence again, shall we?’ Roxy continued. ‘You went around there with a firearm to protect yourself. Because it was the only way they’d listen to you and not denigrate your granddaughter. You had no intention of using the firearm. But it was when he pulled the knife out that you felt under threat and accidentally squeezed the trigger.’
I looked at my mother. There had been many times in my life when I’d wished that parents would be seen but not heard, but the predominant question on my mind right now was How could I ever have agreed to set up practice with a person who proved on a daily basis that the term ‘criminal solicitor’ is a tautology? Professionally, my mother and I had as much in common as a Las Vegas stripper and an Amish butter-churner.
‘Um, Roxy, need I remind you that lawyers can’t present a case in a way that is false to their knowledge.’
‘If opportunity doesn’t knock, get a doorbell. That’s my motto.’
‘You can’t expect Phyllis to lie under oath. Oh, I can’t believe what I’m seeing!’
‘Then look away, kid. After all.’ She winked again. ‘Justice is blind.’
‘Yes, and perjury is a real eye-opener.’
‘Hon, the law is nothing more than a legal lottery.’
I looked at my mother, aghast. ‘Sure . . . and Stonehenge is just a rock,’ I shot back. ‘The rule of law is the only rule I live by. It’s practically a religion to me. I know I sound like the Julie Andrews of the judiciary, but Phyllis will get a fair trial, without having to lie.’
It was my mother’s turn to eye me as though I were the one with a few kangaroos loose in my top paddock. ‘Matilda, if life was fair, Elvis would be alive and all the impersonators would be dead . . . Did you feel under threat, Phyllis?’ Roxy probed, more vociferously this time.
Phyllis thought for a moment. ‘Yeah. It was when he pulled out the knife. I felt under threat. The big, tall one,’ she improvised. ‘I was so frightened that I must have accidentally squeezed the trigger. I can’t remember doing it.’
Roxy patted her hand. ‘Thank you, Phizz.’
Our visiting time was up and we were being bustled out of the prison. There was no point arguing with my maverick mother – I would just have to jump off that bridge when I came to it.
Leaving Holloway, Roxy and I drove straight back to the estate to counsel Chantelle. It was vital that she didn’t talk to anyone about her moonlit flit from her hospital bed.
Whenever I ventured on to the estate, I felt as though I were wearing pork-chop jeans in a dog pound – a little something to do with the fact that parts of it are populated by people in ski masks who aren’t necessarily Olympic tobogganists. But Roxy was totally unperturbed. She stomped about as though she owned the joint. I led my mother to flat 49 on the twelfth floor of Hawthorn House.
It was a very different girl I encountered this time. Whereas on my previous visit Chantelle had been chippy and defiant, she now lay curled on the couch with her back to the room. She wouldn’t respond to my entreaties to talk to us. A wash of weak afternoon sunlight lay over the sofa, pale as the flesh of a lemon.
‘What’s happened?’ I asked her girlfriend, who was so tarted up I presumed she’d just got home from an audition for Britain’s Next Top Model and not her geography class.
‘Dunno. I just found her cryin’ an’ that. She neva said nuffin’. But that was tossed on the floor under the telly.’ She handed me a DVD case. I scrutinized the typed label. It read ‘Girls Just Wanna Get Stabbed’.
‘Bugger it. The poor kid’s been got at.’ Roxy turned to the dolled-up teen and spoke harshly, like a foreigner. ‘Did you tell anyone that Chantelle was staying here?’
The girl shook her head violently. ‘Nobody knows nuffin’. Not even me mum. She works nights.’
My mother scowled, before entreating, ‘Chantelle, darling, talk to me, love. For your gran’s sake. Did someone come around here and intimidate you?’
When my mother rolled the teenager towards us, her eyes were red-rimmed crescents from hours of crying. Roxy scooped her up into a giant bear-hug. Chantelle lay limp in my mother’s strong arms. She then emitted the kind of noise you make before your car collides with a stationary object.
‘They filmed it. The attack. On their phone. It’s just close-ups of . . . the way they’ve cut it . . . it makes it look as though I’m enjoyin’ it. The note said they’ll put it up on Facebook if I don’t drop the charges. All my friends will see it.’ She drew a shuddering breath, then collapsed into heart-wrenching sobbing.
I felt my colon corkscrew. I would never complain about anything ever again. I mean, cystitis, childbirth, divorce – these are the jewels in life’s crown compared to the sheer horror of seeing your own rape recorded by your attackers. ‘This is blackmail. We’ll call the police.’
This only made Chantelle scream louder. She pushed Roxy away as though she were radioactive. ‘No! No! I don’t want no cops seein’ me like that! I don’t want anyone to see it, ever, ever, EVER!!’
Chantelle’s little schoolpal now moved to stand protectively between us and her friend. My mother and I locked eyes.
‘The level of sexual violence in these gang-afflicted innercity areas is comparable to a friggin’ war zone,’ Roxy sighed angrily. ‘If I had my way, sexual abuse would be regarded as being as harmful as a gun or a knife. How can the poor kid testify now?’
But any person with an IQ – even a moderately sized amoeba – would know that, if Chantelle withdrew her rape allegations, Phyllis would be in serious danger of being convicted. It was imperative that we got her case on first. There was only one solution . . . and I was looking forward to it about as eagerly as I would root-canal surgery with a jackhammer.