Three months after I was sentenced, Paul Dewar came to see me for the first time. I was sitting in the recreation room watching television. I’d been transferred here, Her Majesty’s Prison Whitemoor in Cambridgeshire, the same day I’d been sentenced. The prison was Category A, reserved for the worst of the worst. It had been dark by the time the van got here that evening, so I had no idea what the outside of the prison looked like and didn’t really care. I wasn’t going to be looking at it from the outside anytime soon.
The warder had only just reinstated television privileges after a fight between two prisoners over which channel to watch. One of them had wanted to watch Britain’s Got Talent, the other one wanted to watch The Voice. I’d missed the fight itself as when it happened I was just sitting in my cell, not having the slightest bit of interest in either program. By all accounts the fight turned nasty pretty quickly. Blood was spilt. The warder’s rules were clear. Any public disorder offences resulted in punishment for the whole wing. Most of the time this had the desired effect in that it was the wing population that policed itself, but the two prisoners who’d been scrapping were two of the biggest lads on the wing. No-one had fancied getting stuck in the middle of them.
There was a second-rate soap opera playing on the television. I was only watching it for something to do, not because I was that fussed about it, when I was interrupted by one of the prison officers.
“You’ve got a visitor, Mr Dawson,” he said. I looked up, surprised. It was Mr McLoughlin. I didn't know what his first name was, but he was one of the more approachable guards. He was older than most of the guards, maybe mid to late forties, but he had a kinder face than most of them did, and I quite liked the bloke.
“Are you sure? I’m not expecting anyone today.” I didn't really get that many visitors, not helped by the fact Whitemoor was an hour and a half from Norwich on a good day. It was only Andy or Jacob, and occasionally Tommy and David, but I always knew they were coming as they had to book the visits in advance. Big Joe had even been once, but never been back. According to Tommy, he still felt bad about having to roll over to the Old Bill with the phone messages. I’d tried to get a message to Big Joe via Tommy to say I was fine about it, that I would have done the same thing in his position, but he hadn’t been back yet.
“Your visitor’s a lawyer, so we let him in even though he’s not booked in,” Mr McLoughlin replied. “Not from your firm, though. His name’s not on the list.” He handed me a business card. I took it from him, turning it over in my fingers to read it. The card was very smooth, made from some sort of posh cardboard with a dimpled surface. The text on it read ‘Paul Dewar’ on one line, with ‘Phoenix Trust’ underneath. Both lines were written in a copperplate handwriting font, but as I examined it I could see that it wasn’t from a printer but proper handwriting. That was it. Just a name and a firm. No phone number, no e-mail address, no website.
“You’re sure he’s here to see me?” I asked again. “I’ve never heard of him or the Phoenix Trust.”
“He’s definitely here to see you. Even gave us your prisoner number to make sure he’d got the right guy.” I got to my feet, figuring that talking to someone from the outside was much more preferable than vegetating in front of the television.
“Okay, lead on Mr McLoughlin.”
The prison officer walked me to the visiting area, which was arranged like an examination room in a school, but with seats either side of each desk. He handed me a bright orange vest to put on as we walked through the door. Peeling magnolia paint covered the walls of the visiting area like most of the wing, and signs reminding everyone of the ‘No Touching’ rule were all over the walls. Not that many people took much notice of the rule, anyway. Another of the warder’s punishments was a hard enforcement of this rule, along with strict searches. Everyone knew this dried up the inflow of life’s little essentials on the inside, and it was one punishment that most of the prisoners dreaded. Personally, I wasn’t bothered. I didn’t do drugs and had no real need for anything from the outside world apart from the odd bit of cash to buy more cigarettes with. I was still off the smokes, but they were useful as currency on the inside.
“We had to put him in the visiting area as he’s not on the approved lawyer list,” Mr McLoughlin said, nodding toward a man sitting alone at a desk in the far corner of the room. I looked across at the man who was sitting calmly with his hands crossed on the desk in front of him. A battered leather folio sat by the legs of the table. He seemed completely unfazed by being in a prison.
“I’ll leave you to it,” Mr McLoughlin said, walking off to join one of his colleagues on the other side of the room.
“Thanks,” I called after him before crossing the room to meet my unexpected visitor. As I approached him, I examined him in more detail. He had to be in his late fifties, early sixties perhaps. Grey hair swept straight across his head, with a sharply defined widow’s peak. He was wearing a suit. No surprise there. I’d never yet met a lawyer who didn’t wear one, but as I got closer, I could see that it was a fine suit. Since Andy had bought me one to wear for my trial, I’d become quite the expert, and one of my idle daydreams was how many tailored suits I would buy when I got out. This Paul Dewar chap had a three-piece, double-breasted, finely dotted pinstripes over a navy-blue material. Very nice. He looked familiar, but I couldn’t place him.
The lawyer looked up as I pulled the chair out from under the table on my side. He got to his feet, extending a hand.
“Mr Dawson, I presume?” he asked in a clipped South Coast accent. Not a local boy, then. I must have been mistaken about him being familiar as I didn’t recognise his voice at all. I shook his hand, figuring that as he was a lawyer the prison officers wouldn’t be too bothered about the rules.
“Yes, that’s me,” I replied. He had a firm handshake, and I had to resist the urge to stroke the material of his suit with my other hand. “You’re Paul Dewar, I’m guessing?” He smiled at my reply, showing a row of perfect white teeth. They might have lived in a jar by his bed at night, I had no idea, but they gave him a reassuring smile. He was around my height, slightly less broad but still well built. As we sat down, I complimented him on his suit.
“Thank you,” he replied. It was a retirement present to myself a few years ago. Holts of Saville Row.” I didn't know who Holts were, but I’d heard of Saville Row so nodded to show my appreciation. “Except I never really retired properly, of course,” he continued. If he had retired a couple of years ago, he had to be in his mid to late sixties, unless he had taken early retirement. I reassessed the man, impressed at the way he held himself. He looked like he could still pack a punch, that much was for sure.
We sat opposite each other for a few minutes in silence, him smiling at me and me looking back at him.
“So,” I said, curiosity getting the better of me as I ended the little game we seemed to be playing. “What can I do for you?” He smiled again, the skin around his brown eyes wrinkling. “I’ll be honest,” I continued, putting his business card on the table between us. “I’ve never heard of you or the Phoenix Trust.”
“No,” he said, relaxing back in the chair and putting his hands flat on the table between us. I glanced down at what looked like a very expensive watch hiding under one of his cuffs. He splayed his hands on the table and I noticed a thick gold wedding band on his ring finger. I’d taken mine off to put in Jennifer’s coffin the day we’d buried her and had regretted it ever since. “You don’t know me, and very few people have heard of the Phoenix Trust.” He steepled his fingers on the desk, his cuffs sliding back a couple of centimetres. Was that a Rolex? “They’re rather, ah, what’s the best term? Secretive? Yes, that’ll do for the moment. They’re rather secretive.”
“So, what do they do? And what do they want with me?” I asked.
“We’re getting ahead of ourselves, Gareth. May I call you Gareth?” he replied.
“Of course you can,” I said, smiling at the formality of his request. “It’s my name.”
“Perhaps you could humour an old lawyer and talk me through where you are with your case? It’ll all become clear, I promise.” I looked at him, wondering where he was going with this. What the hell, I figured. It wasn’t as if I’d got much else planned for the afternoon, and there was something quite endearing about the chap.
We spent the next thirty minutes going through my trial and the events leading up to it. Paul didn’t take any notes. In fact, he hardly spoke at all except to ask the odd question when something wasn’t clear to him. I opened up to him more than I had to anyone for a long time. I finished by telling him about the final stages of the trial, and about how my defence lawyer kind of fell apart and gave up at the end. Paul nodded as I said this.
“Yes, I thought so too,” he said.
“You were there?” I asked, surprised. The penny dropped. That’s where I knew him from. He’d been in the public gallery for the last couple of days of the trial. “You were there,” I repeated, this time not as a question. “Why?”
“Call it professional curiosity, my old chap,” he replied. “One thing I do like about Norwich is that there aren’t many murder trials here. So when one came up,” he paused for a second. “When your trial came up, I listened in to a bit of it.”
“What did you think?” I asked him.
“About what? The trial, your defence lawyer, the verdict?”
“Well, all of it?”
“I didn’t see the full trial, but I know the judge of old. He’s a good man. Very wise.” Paul looked over my shoulder and beyond me. “Your defence? Not good, but public defenders often use cases such as yours to build their way to better things. Sad, but true.” He looked at me directly, frowning. “And the verdict? Yes, in the eyes of the law it was the correct verdict. Assuming you did kill him.”
His last statement threw me. What did he mean by that? I’d been convicted of murder. I was just about to ask him what he meant when he looked at his watch, nodded, and reached down for the briefcase. Assuming he was about to leave, I put a hand on his arm.
“Wait, please.” I could see Mr McLoughlin frowning at me from his position on the other side of the room, so I removed my hand. “Don’t go.” Paul looked at me, balancing the briefcase on his lap and unbuckling it.
“Oh, I’m not going, my dear boy.” He opened the case and reached in for a single sheet of paper. “But we need to change tack. Do you sail? Or rather, did you sail?”
“Er, no,” I replied, confused by the sudden change in the topic.
“That’s a shame. The Broads are lovely at this time of year what with the trees turning and everything.” He put the piece of paper down on the table and returned his briefcase to its original position next to his leg. “Now, let’s talk about the Phoenix Trust.”
I sat back, relieved that he wasn’t leaving. The truth was that I was enjoying talking to him. It wasn’t just that he listened, but I didn’t think he was judging me, either. Everyone else that I’d spoken to about my case in the last couple of months had judged me to one degree or another, but this rather odd man wasn’t.
“The Phoenix Trust are, as I’ve said, rather reclusive. I’ll be honest, until they approached me about your case I’d never heard of them,” he said.
“Why did they approach you about my case? Who are they?” I leaned forward, intrigued.
“I can answer the first question, but I can’t answer the second I'm afraid. One of the conditions of my being retained by them is that I don’t try to find out who the people behind the Trust are, you see.” He smiled, showing off his straight white teeth again. “I’m quite happy with that arrangement given how generous the terms of the agreement are.” I frowned. I didn’t understand.
“So why did they approach you about my case? You said you could answer that.” Paul slid the paper round so I could read it as I asked this question. I scanned it as he spoke.
“They specialise in unusual cases, cases which are perhaps not as they seem. Such as yours.” The paper was a lawyer engagement form. I’d signed one for Toby’s firm to handle my appeal. Part of the form was a section releasing the lawyers handling the case. In the one I’d filled out before, this section was empty, but the piece of paper in front of me already had Toby’s firm’s details filled out.
“Sorry, Paul. I don’t get this.”
“It's a lawyer engagement form,” he replied. He pointed at the section of the form I was looking at with Toby’s firm’s details. “This part releases your current lawyers.” His finger moved to another section. “And this part transfers your case to my firm, such as it is. I am a one-man band at the moment, but I will bring additional resources to bear.”
I frowned, re-reading the form in front of me.
“So, this form transfers my case to you?” I asked. His face lit up.
“Yes, precisely dear boy. That’s exactly what it does. You sign that, and I am your new lawyer.” I sat back, deflated, and pushed the piece of paper back at him. His face fell, and he looked at me, his disappointment obvious.
“Well it’s a nice offer, Mr Dewar,” I said, scraping my chair back a couple of inches. “But I’m going to have to refuse it. Thanks for coming to see me, and I’m sorry you’ve had a wasted journey.” I got to my feet.
“Gareth, please, sit down,” he pleaded. “Hear me out.” I looked at him, trying to decide. This had to be some sort of scam. Taking on hopeless cases and fleecing people out of what little they had left. I was disappointed, not angry. I’d enjoyed talking to Paul, but I didn’t have a penny to my name. I sat down, crossing my arms.
“Paul, I don’t have any money. Not a brass button,” I said. To my surprise, he laughed.
“Oh really, how delightful! Is that what you’re worried about?” he asked. Now I was getting really confused. “You don’t have to pay anything. Here, read this bit.” He pointed at another block of text on the form that was in a much smaller font. I squinted as I tried to read it. The size and the language made it difficult to understand, but as I read it a couple of times, I realised that it said the Phoenix Trust would cover all expenses.
“There’s a catch, right?” I asked Paul. “There has to be.”
“No, no catch. The only stipulation is that you don’t try to find out anything about the Phoenix Trust. The same agreement I’ve signed. They value their privacy, so to speak.”
“But I still don’t understand. Why my case?”
“They believe there are, now what was the word they used? Anomalies, that was it. Yes, they believe there are anomalies in your case that could be very useful in an appeal.”
I stared at Paul. I was starting to get an idea of what this was all about. The last time I’d spoken to Toby he was downbeat about the chances of even being able to mount an appeal, let alone have a chance of winning one. He’d even used the term ‘bang to rights’ at one point. If I hadn’t liked the guy, I’d have slapped him for saying that.
“Gareth?” Paul said. I didn’t reply, still trying to process the last hour or so. “Gareth?” I looked at him.
“They think you’re innocent. Not only that, but they think we can prove it.”