Jupp addressed the jury. ‘Members of the jury, I must now ask you to leave the court while I speak to my learned friend, Ms Brown.’
After the jury left, Jupp instructed Brown to continue.
‘It has just been brought to my attention that my next witness, Barbara Gready, who is at the back of the court, has changed her mind about appearing as a defence witness, Your Honour. I need time to speak to her.’
Terence Gready looked shell-shocked.
His wife stepped forward and started shouting at him. She had tears streaming down her face and was sobbing uncontrollably. ‘You, you lying bastard, you’ve broken our family. How could I have been such a fool — you’ve lied to me, you’ve lied to your children, and I’ve been sitting there listening to you lying to the court. If you think I’m going to speak up for you, you are sadly mistaken.’
Gready looked ashen-faced. ‘Barbara! I’m not lying, they’re making it up. They’ve fitted me up, can’t you see that?’
‘It’s lies, Terence, it’s all lies. How did you think your little story could convince anyone — you can’t even convince me?’
Jupp raised his voice, sternly. ‘This is not the time or the place for this sort of behaviour to continue, this is a court of law. I’m now adjourning this court sitting for this issue to be resolved.’
Primrose Brown turned to Barbara Gready. ‘Let’s go outside where I can talk to you privately.’
‘Don’t waste your time. I’m through with this. He’s a loser, he deserves everything he gets. They can throw the book at him for all I care.’ She turned, still crying, and stormed out of the court.
Well aware that this could be grounds for appeal, the judge looked around sternly at those present in the court and up in the public gallery. ‘I am instructing all of you to disregard what you have just heard. If any of you mentions it in or outside of this court, you are in contempt and you will be dealt with severely.’
Twenty minutes later the hearing resumed, with the jury back in place, unaware of the drama that had just unfolded in the court. Jupp looked at Ms Brown. ‘Do you have any further defence witnesses?’
There was a moment of awkward silence.
Brown got up. ‘No, Your Honour, that concludes the case for the defence.’
Jupp looked at the clock, which read 4.18 p.m., then turned to the jury. ‘Thank you all for your patience today — you have a lot to consider. We have now heard from all the witnesses for both the prosecution and defence. Tomorrow we will hear the closing speeches from the prosecution followed by the defence. When these are finished, I will sum up for you, after which I will send you out to commence your deliberations. I would like to remind you again that you must speak to no one about what you have heard during this trial, nor must you attempt to look up anything related to it on the internet.’
Then, addressing the whole room, he said, ‘Court is adjourned. We meet back here at 10 a.m. tomorrow.’
90
Thursday 23 May
Rain was still pelting down an hour after Meg had left the court. She sat in her car in the Hove station car park, engine running, demister on full blast, trying to clear the windscreen. Rain pounded the roof and thoughts pounded her brain. The trial today, how had it really gone?
The defence counsel had scored some points and all her witnesses had been robust. How much would that prosecutor twist everything in his closing speech tomorrow? How would she respond? How would the judge direct the jury — impartially, she hoped? Richard Jupp had been hard to read all along.
A text pinged. It was from Ali, suggesting they meet for a coffee or a drink on Saturday and saying they were having a barbecue on Sunday, if the weather was better. Then she noted a WhatsApp had come in from Laura some hours ago — it must have been while her phone was on silent when she had gone into court.
She opened it immediately, scared what might be there. Scared, suddenly, now the trial was almost at an end, that she might have been abducted and this was going to be yet another threat. To her relief, she saw a happy Laura, in a floppy hat and sunglasses, standing on a rock in front of a massive sea lion that almost dwarfed her.
Mum, he barks like a dog! XXXXX
Meg smiled. God, I need to get a message to you. To warn you to disappear if it goes badly tomorrow. How?
How?
I love, love, love you so much. My precious angel. I’m going to keep you safe, whatever it takes, somehow, I promise you.
As she drove home, she continued churning over the day’s events in her mind. It had been a good day for the defence, no question. But how good? Enough to convince the disparate jurors?
Good enough to save her daughter’s life?
A quarter of an hour later, entering her house as warily as always now, she was greeted by a stench from Daphne’s litter tray. But there was another, fainter smell. As if someone had been cooking. Meg frowned. She had made herself an omelette and fried tomatoes for breakfast — and burnt some of the tomatoes in the process. But it seemed strange the smell still lingered.
Daphne suddenly gave a pitiful miaowww. Meg knelt and stroked her neck. ‘You want food, right? Of course you do, when didn’t you?’
She stuck her umbrella in the Victorian coat stand, hung up her wet cagoule and went through to the kitchen. As she tore open a packet of cat food, Daphne vaulted up onto the work surface and began eating ravenously, once she’d tipped the contents into her bowl.
She cleaned up the litter tray, then went upstairs to check Laura’s rodents had water. As she reached the landing, she heard the familiar squeak-squeak-squeak of the gerbils on their spinning wheels. She switched on the light and entered her daughter’s bedroom.
She peered into their cage. They looked up, twitchily, on their hind legs. They had plenty of water. She moved on to Horace.
And stared, puzzled. The cage was empty.
She opened the door, put her hand in and lifted up the tiny little covered area at the back where he sometimes slept on his bed of straw. It was empty.
Had the little bugger escaped? How? She felt panic.
‘Horace!’ she called out. ‘Horace!’
Useless, she knew, he had never responded to his name. She checked all around the room, looking under the bed, Laura’s chair and in every other nook and cranny where he might possibly be. Then she returned to the cage, checking it carefully.
Could she have left the door open this morning, after feeding him and filling up his water, she wondered? And had she left the bedroom door open or closed? If closed, he must be in here. If not, he could be anywhere in the house. What would she tell Laura if she couldn’t find him? She doted on this dumb little creature above all her other pets.
Exhausting every possible hiding place in the room, and feeling increasingly anxious, she searched every room in the house. Had he gone through a hole into one of the cavities? Or out of the house somehow? Her best hope, she thought, was that he would get hungry and head back to what he knew as his food source. And, despite all her anxieties, she was hungry too, she realized.
She propped his cage door open and went back down into the kitchen, trying to remember what quick meals she had in the freezer. Bending down, she opened the door of the freezer compartment and pulled the top drawer out.
And stared in numb horror at what lay there, with a handwritten note beside it.
91
Thursday 23 May
Brown in parts, blackened in others, shrivelled and covered in flecks of ice, was a skinned, cooked creature the size of Horace.