I Know What I Saw

Jan nods.

‘And the record itself, too. They must have it as an exhibit somewhere, I’d have thought.’

Jan scribbles a note and looks back at the screen. ‘Wait a sec,’ she says, catching something. ‘Enlarge that pic there. Isn’t that a bit of a record, there? Looks like it could be.’

Nasreen frowns at the screen and nods. ‘You might be right, Jan. Good eyes,’ she says and then turns to me. ‘We will do our best to get this information from the Crown. But you should be aware that we don’t even know at this point what in terms of real evidence they have retained. The police did not initially have this as a murder. Some of the scene was photographed and preserved for the inquest. But we have no idea how much from the original scene exhibits they still have.’

‘But how can that be? Aren’t they relying on that for their case? I mean, to prove I was there. DNA, prints and all that?’

Nasreen laces her fingers together so the red polished ends are aligned.

‘No, Mr Shute. That is not what they are doing at all. Their evidence of your presence at the scene comes entirely from your admissions in the interviews. If, and I mean if, they still have any of the items from the room, they might be able to do a fingerprint lift but DNA is out of the question. If they didn’t do it at the time – and frankly, they wouldn’t have even for most murders back then – any DNA would have degraded by now. And that’s if they preserved it properly.’

‘So why are we asking for things they probably don’t have?’

‘Because you never know. And the sleeve they could well have,’ she says.

They then begin to draw the interview to a close. Nasreen puts her pens and her notebook into a neat stack.

‘Wait. There’s this. You have to read this,’ I say, finally finding the space to show them the letter. ‘It’s from Grace.’

‘Grace?’

‘He means Michelle. She didn’t like “Michelle”,’ Jan says.

I hand the letter to Nasreen. By the time she finishes reading it, her brows are crossed and she slides it across the table to Jan who skims through it.

‘This is good, Xander,’ Jan says, stabbing the letter with her finger. ‘She’d given you the money anyway, so that won’t hold as a motive.’

‘It definitely helps,’ Nasreen adds. ‘I mean, the Crown doesn’t have to prove motive in this country, Mr Shute, but if they have one it never hurts.’

‘So, what now?’ I say.

‘I’d still like to know what happened to it,’ Nasreen says, in a way that implies that she doesn’t expect an immediate answer.

‘You need to be ready to enter your plea at the next hearing,’ she continues. ‘I take it from you that is not guilty. We are not arguing diminished responsibility or insanity. Just a straight not guilty. Then we get some directions from the judge and wait for trial. In the meantime, the prosecution will serve whatever evidence they want to rely on, and once we have it we send them a document telling them what your defence is and then we can get some disclosure.’

‘Disclosure?’ I say.

‘Yes. If they have anything which could help your case, they have to give it to us, disclose it. And, of course, we wait to hear about whether they have the record or the sleeve that we will have asked for and if they do, what the fingerprint tests show.’

‘What are we hoping for?’ I say.

‘Well, best ways, there are prints on it that don’t belong to you or the deceased but a third party, our alternative candidate. And even better if the Police National Computer turns up an identity for our man. Worst ways, we get nothing, but lose nothing. I’m assuming you didn’t touch it, Mr Shute? Where you saw it and where it is on the photograph, is that where they left it? The deceased or her murderer?’

‘Yes, that’s right,’ I say, but the truth is that whatever I do remember dwindles to almost nothing when I am scrabbling about, desperate to remember. I don’t know what I touched.

‘Then we are all good,’ she says, and stands to shake my hand.

I offer mine but withdraw it when I see her face. She smiles at me instead and opens the door to show us out.

Jan leaves the building with me and we walk to Temple Station a few minutes away. ‘That letter is good,’ she says, once we get there. ‘Same paper, same handwriting as the others the police have. And Nasreen. She’s my first choice for your case.’

I manage a smile.

‘But we still need to know where the money is. They could put you through the mill for that.’

I wipe a hand across my face and watch as she turns and disappears through the barriers and down the stairs, deep underground. Once she has gone I walk the other way towards the river. Now this is done, I have to speak to Seb. I don’t want to, but he has left me no choice.

44 Tuesday