Jayne waited patiently in a small room in the solicitor’s office.
She’d found the building easily enough. It was on the main road into the town centre, a long curve dotted by small shops and hairdressers, the entrance squeezed between a bakery and a jewellery-repair shop that looked deserted inside, a narrow set of steps running to the floor above.
The solicitor must have been expecting her visit, because as soon as she was identified she was shown through to the small room she was now sitting in. She wasn’t offered a drink, nor was she told how long she would have to wait. There was a view outside, so she watched the slow trickle of pedestrians making their way into town, most with the level of urgency expected of people with nothing much else to do.
There were footsteps in the corridor on the other side of the door before it opened, and a man stood wheezing in the door frame.
‘Ken Goodman,’ he said, and he shuffled towards the chair on the other side of the desk, his stomach pushing his trousers out, held up by red braces over a blue and white striped shirt.
He was over sixty, his hair was long but grey and swept back, dampened by sweat as it reached his shirt collar. He filled the room with the aroma of stale cigars and sat down with a grunt, taking deep breaths before smiling, his teeth browned by tobacco.
‘Hi, I’m Jayne Brett. You spoke to my boss earlier, Dan Grant.’
‘Yes, and that man has an attitude problem. Do you have a business card, or any proof that you are who you say you are?’
Jayne reached into her wallet and pulled out her driving licence. He made a note of her address.
‘I’ve got to be careful,’ he said. ‘I can’t go revealing client secrets, even if they are over twenty years old.’
She held out her hands. ‘I’m not making notes, Mr Goodman.’
‘Ken. Call me Ken.’ He smiled and glanced towards her chest. His gaze lingered, as if he didn’t care whether she noticed or not. ‘You’re not taking Rodney’s case on then?’
She pulled her jacket tighter. ‘No, nothing like that, although we want to speak to him in prison, if you’re okay with that. Perhaps you could clear it for us. Call it a legal visit.’
‘What’s your interest?’
‘We act for a man called Nick Connor, who’s accused of murdering a reporter, Mark Roberts. Nick Connor is some local small-time criminal who came across Mark’s wallet and phone and took them. Now they’re using that as proof that he was the killer.’
‘And you’re looking for alternative suspects, for a reason why someone else might have killed this Mr Roberts.’
‘Exactly. He was a writer putting together a true crime book, and he was looking into Rodney Walker’s case. Whatever he found, it convinced Mark that Rodney was innocent.’
‘There’s your defence, I’m guessing.’ He wagged his finger at her. ‘If Rodney is innocent, someone else is guilty, and they won’t want their secrets uncovered.’
‘We’re investigating, nothing more.’
‘Whoever this Mark Roberts upset, you’ve upset people too.’ He pointed to her black eye. ‘The Brampton hello.’
‘Pardon?’
‘It’s something they say in the summer. A town like this, it often seems there isn’t much else to do but drink and fight. It’s kept me in nice suits through the years, mind. All winter, they go at each other, spilling out of the pubs like cowboys through a saloon door. In the summer, when the tourist coach parties start arriving, they bond together and spend their time fighting with day trippers.’ He chuckled, his chest heaving into a wheeze. ‘They like fighting in Brampton, but I’m sorry if you got a taste, a pretty girl like you.’
‘I’m an investigator. It’s an occupational hazard. Tell me about Rodney.’
‘There isn’t much to tell. He murdered two children. He was caught and convicted. There were no other murders after that.’
‘But what sort of man was he?’
Ken frowned as he thought back. ‘Quiet, sullen, but how else was he going to be? He’d murdered two children and was going to prison for the rest of his life.’
‘What was his story?’
‘I can tell you the things that everyone knows. A local man, born and bred in Brampton. Had a job, but nothing spectacular, although you’ve probably seen that it’s not a town of high‑flyers.’
‘It’s a nice town, in parts.’
‘It is, and I like the fact that it’s not full of money. We are who we are, uncomplicated, glad for what we have rather than yearning for what we don’t have. That’s not enough for everyone though.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Rodney married a local girl straight out of school. Sarah, she was called. Pretty and blonde.’ Ken winked. ‘All tits and promises, if you know what I mean.’
Jayne ignored him, uncomfortable at the sudden glint in his eyes.
‘The town was too small for her. Two children and a husband doing it steady and she got bored. It wasn’t her fault. She settled down too young, should have seen that there was a whole world beyond Brampton. One day, she went off and found it and never came back. She left Rodney with the babies.’
‘Where did she go?’
Ken leaned back and stared at the ceiling, until he sat forward again and said, ‘Leeds. Somewhere around there. She wanted something of the big city. But it was twenty years ago. She’ll have moved on.’
‘What was her maiden name?’
‘Revell. Her parents used to own a cafe in town. Long gone now, but everyone knew the name.’
‘What happened to the children?’
‘Taken into care at first. Foster parents, I think. Rodney’s parents said they were too old. I don’t know what happened to them after the trial. Perhaps Sarah took them in.’
‘Did Rodney ever admit it to you?’
He wagged his finger playfully. ‘That’s the confidential stuff you’re not going to get from me.’
‘Oh, come on, Ken, don’t be bashful. I can call you Ken, can’t I? I won’t tell anyone. Just help me out here.’
He flushed and his tongue darted to his lip. He looked as if he was having a brief wrestle with his conscience, and then said, ‘You work with a law firm, you know how it is. Your clients fill you with excuses. They might be lies, but that doesn’t matter. It gives you something to work with. If it comes to nothing, you discard it. The point is, though, that the guilty ones can’t stop talking, as if they feel they’ve got to convince me.’ He chuckled.’ Don’t they know that I don’t care? My job is to represent them, not believe them, and then bank the fee. Rodney was different, almost a mix of the two. He was desperate for us to believe that he didn’t do it, but whenever we tried to go through the evidence with him, he clammed up, wouldn’t discuss it.’
‘What did you do then?’
‘Tried to attack the prosecution case, show that if some pieces of the jigsaw were removed the picture was less damning. It didn’t work, and we knew it wouldn’t, but he wouldn’t admit it.’
‘What’s your theory?’
‘The same as I told Mr Roberts.’ He smiled. ‘Sorry for holding it back, but of course he spoke to me. I wouldn’t let him use it, not if it was intended for a book, but I told him I’d give him my take on it if he bought me lunch and left me out.’ He patted his stomach. ‘It cost him more than expected, but just like I told him, Rodney is guilty but couldn’t stand the guilt. He had no answers to the evidence but had some stupid vain hope that if he stuck his fingers in his ears and said la-la-la for long enough, it would all go away. That’s why he couldn’t say the word guilty, even though he was.’
‘What exactly excited Mark Roberts?’
‘He wouldn’t tell me, because he wanted to confront Rodney with it first, to arrange a meeting. Do you know what I think though? It was just youthful excitement. I’ve seen how these campaigners work, that they don’t care about the crime. They just want the exposure and will latch on to any case to raise their own profile. Killers lie, and they don’t get that they’re being manipulated and used, just like the original victims.’
‘But Rodney never lied, that’s what you said. He didn’t say anything.’
‘He lied as soon he said the words not guilty.’
‘My boss wants to speak to Rodney. I understand he needs a letter of introduction from you, his nominated lawyer. Can you provide that?’
‘What’s in it for me?’
Jayne furrowed her brow. ‘I don’t understand.’
The leer was back, his smile too moist, his eyes too keen. ‘You want me to do something for you. You should do something for me.’
‘Well, yeah. What like?’
‘Mark took me for a meal. I’m sure you can do better than that.’
Then she noticed his hand was under the desk, and the slow flick of his tongue along his bottom lip gave away his intentions.
Her anger rose through her body. He’d given up on any pretence that any glances towards her chest were accidental.
‘I’ve got a better idea,’ she said, leaning forward. She gripped the front of her shirt. ‘How about you do as I say or I’ll scream and rip these buttons off? It will be easy to say that you lunged at me, because no one will believe I’d go anywhere near a fat pig like you. And I can bet that I’m not the first one you’ve made a move on.’
He scowled, the gleam gone from his eyes.
‘You dictate that letter of introduction and send it to the prison for a visit this afternoon. Send a copy to Dan Grant, of Molloys, in Highford.’
‘Get out.’
Jayne stood. ‘Not until I get a copy of that letter in my hand.’ She pointed towards the door. ‘I’ll be waiting in reception. I’ll be looking down as if I’m about to start crying.’
She left the room feeling dirty.