Felix Francis - Guilty Not Guilty

‘Why on earth would they want that?’ I said. ‘I would have thought three trials would be much more of an ordeal for their client.’

‘Yeah, but they think that the evidence for the theft and the attempted murder are much stronger than that for the murder. They are worried that if found guilty for the other two, it will taint the jury in making their decision on the murder. And they’re probably right, although attempted murder is notoriously difficult to prove. Did he really try to kill you or was he just wanting to cause you some pain and suffering? Difficult question to answer.’

‘Trust me,’ I said. ‘He was trying to kill me.’

‘Anyway, the Oxford resident judge had ruled back in March that all three counts should be tried together, but the Justice Department have parachuted in a High Court judge from London for this case because of its high media profile. So the defence tried again.’

He smiled. ‘Thankfully, after hearing the arguments, the new judge agreed with the old one and made the same ruling. And he’s right. The indictments are all interconnected. The motive for the murder is related to the theft, and the motive for the attempted is related to the murder. The defence weren’t happy but we were delighted because we think it gives us a better chance of getting convictions on all three.’

‘How about the conspiracy to defraud the HMRC?’

‘That’s been dropped by the CPS. At least as far as Joseph Bradbury is concerned. They felt that it clouded the issue on the other charges.’

I could understand that.

‘So, after all that was settled on Monday, there was the opening by the prosecution yesterday, laying out the case to the jury and giving an indication of the evidence that’s to come. That took several hours.’

‘So am I the first witness?’ I asked.

‘No, no. The Home Office pathologist was first up, yesterday afternoon. He would have given his findings from the post-mortem. The CPS thought it was a good idea to get that in early, to make the jury fully understand that this is a very nasty murder case.’

I was very relieved that I hadn’t been in court for that. What I’d heard in the Coroner’s Court had been quite sufficient, thank you very much. It had been enough to give me nightmares for weeks, at least it would have if I hadn’t been in a coma for some of the time.

‘And then I’m on before you,’ said the DS. ‘And I’m afraid you might be waiting here for some time. In fact, I’m quite surprised they called you at all for today. I’m quite expecting to be in the witness box all day, and maybe for most of tomorrow as well. I’ve got lots to go over.’

‘That’s fine,’ I said. ‘I’m happy to wait.’

I had lots to go over as well — in my mind.

‘Detective Sergeant Dowdeswell,’ shouted a voice. ‘You’ve been called.’

‘That’s me,’ replied the DS, standing up.

‘Good luck,’ I said.

‘Thanks,’ he said, and departed, presumably to go to the court.

I spent the next two complete days sitting in the witness suite waiting, thinking, and twiddling my thumbs.

One of the idiosyncrasies of the British legal system is that witnesses who are yet to be called cannot listen to the evidence that others are giving before their turn, in case their accounts of events become tainted by, or are argumentative with, what someone else has said earlier.

Only after having given their evidence are witnesses allowed to sit in the body of the court to observe further proceedings.

Hence, I felt somewhat detached from the trial and that made me hugely frustrated, especially as everyone was in there talking about my wife and me.

It was all too easy to speculate on what was being said in the courtroom and how the jury were reacting to it, so I tried to take my mind off things by thinking back to what had happened to me over the months since the funeral.

I’d heard it often said that a funeral can bring some sort of closure to one’s grief, and I was certainly glad to have put the ordeal behind me, but in my case it did little to ease the pain of loss.

I had spent weeks moping around the Old Forge feeling sorry for myself, eating little and sleeping less, but all the while my motor nerves had improved their communication skills and my mobility improved, such that I could finally manage the full flight of stairs and venture outside into the garden. I had even contemplated having a go at driving my car, which had been returned by the police along with all my other stuff.

So my life went on, lonely, rudderless and miserable.

But I had to earn a living.

I had discovered that, while it could take many years, decades even, to establish a persuasive reputation within the insurance family as a highly accomplished actuary, it could all be undone almost overnight by a single false accusation and malicious gossip.

Insurance, after all, was based on the assessment and control of risk, and hence underwriting companies and practitioners were largely of the opinion that any potential risk to their business had to be mitigated. So it was easier not to employ someone against whom there existed any sort of black mark, real or imagined.

And that was me.

No matter that I had been released from any sort of investigation into Amelia’s murder, and that someone else had been charged with the crime; hiring me, it seemed, even on a freelance single-task basis, was a gamble not worth taking.

‘I’m so sorry,’ said one of my regular account managers. ‘If it were up to me...’

He had left the sentence up in the air because... it had been up to him.

‘Try again after the trial,’ he’d said. ‘Provided her brother gets convicted.’

At least my enforced unemployment had given me time to sort out Mary Bradbury’s estate.

I had placed her cottage with a local office of one of the national estate-agent chains and had almost instantly received an offer of the full asking price, on condition that it was immediately taken off the market.

‘No way,’ I’d said to the prospective buyer. ‘If you want it taken off the market, sign the contract and pay the deposit.’

In the end, this had resulted in a bidding war between three interested parties and I had eventually agreed to accept the highest of three binding, sealed bids, which had resulted in the property raising more than twenty-five thousand pounds above the asking price.

It had taken quite a lot of toing and froing from the agent, but it had all been worth it, not least because half of the sum raised would be coming in my direction. That was, after deduction of the fees, legal charges and inheritance taxes.

As the completion date of the sale had approached, I’d sent an email to Rachael inviting her to come to the property and choose some of the contents for her daughters to have in memory of their grandmother, but she had sent me a rude message back telling me to get lost, and to do whatever I wanted with Mary’s ‘dreadful’ belongings. She also wrote in her missive that she’d never liked any of Mary’s stuff and, as far as she was concerned, ‘it could all go on a bloody big bonfire’.

Charming , I thought.

Needless to say, it hadn’t gone on a bonfire, bloody big or otherwise.

I had kept some of the more personal items for myself, such as some photos and mementoes of holidays that Mary had spent with Amelia and me. Plus I’d retained a few pieces of her best antique furniture, but the remainder had been taken away by a house-clearance company and sold for peanuts at a local Sunday-morning auction.

I, meanwhile, made sure that I maintained a meticulous record of every transaction as I was certain that, at some time in the future, Joe Bradbury would accuse me of stealing.