James Long - Sixth Column

Reluctantly, at her command, the boys let the battered Americans get up.

‘Jeezus,’ said the leather-faced man as he brushed himself off, ‘who are these guys, the SAS Cub Scouts?’

‘Young people at risk,’ said Heather distractedly.

‘ They’re at risk,’ he said ‘you sure you got that right?’

‘Just go,’ she said.

‘Yes ma’am. I’ll say goodnight.’

When the Shogun had left, Heather rounded up the boys and got them in the van.

‘It was all I could think of doing,’ she said, ‘I thought they might have killed you.’

‘You were amazing. Thank you. Those boys are quite something.’

‘I’ll get in terrible trouble if anyone finds out,’ she said. ‘I chose the toughest nuts we’ve got.’

‘Do you need any help to get them back?’

‘No,’ she said, ‘it’s better if it’s just me. They’ll do what I ask them. They were dead keen to help out.’

He kissed her but there was a chorus of cheers from the van and they stepped apart again.

‘There’s just no time,’ she said, ‘I must get them back, but I have to know what it’s all about.’

‘It can wait until tomorrow,’ he said, ‘I’ll tell you tomorrow.’

It was a request from the Base Commander, a good-luck breakfast, he called it, for Chief Inspector Reed and Sergeant Hayter. Reed was suspicious. It wasn’t at all the sort of thing the Americans usually did. When the Commander asked him to come ten minutes before Hayter, he smelt a rat. When he found Ray Mackeson there as well, the rat turned fetid.

‘Mr Reed,’ said the Commander, ‘I know it’s late in the day to say this, but we’ve done a re-evaluation of the parameters of this case and frankly, our opinion is heading south on this one.’

Reed raised his eyebrows to cover the fact he had not the slightest clue what the Commander meant.

‘We don’t feel that the er… the risks inherent in this hearing justify proceeding.’

‘I’m not sure I follow you.’

‘Well, come on now, Commander. I don’t want to get into policy issues with you, but you gotta know we have some major planning hoops to jump through with the local population here. We don’t think that a prosecution right now is going to help with that.’

Reed felt a red flush start to suffuse his cheeks. Steady, he thought to himself, hold on there.

‘It’s a little bit late for that,’ he said.

‘Things change. You gotta be flexible.’

‘Sergeant Hayter was the subject of a serious assault,’ said Reed, who had come to the scene after the event and had no reason to suspect otherwise. ‘If the Weston woman wins this case, he is liable to be prosecuted himself.’

‘That’s a separate issue.’

Reed was on his feet before the cautious part of him could lasso the raging bull. His fist slammed on the Commander’s desk. The Commander flinched. Mackeson merely gave a sardonic smile.

‘This is not in your jurisdiction,’ Reed said. ‘This is a case brought by the Crown Prosecution Service, the British Crown Prosecution Service, on behalf of us, the British Ministry of Defence Police, who are charged with the difficult job of protecting you. You have no say in the matter. I have my men’s future safety to consider.’

There was a silence.

‘Mr Reed,’ the Commander said, ‘we could go through channels on this one but the case starts in three hours and I guess I thought you could…’

‘I can’t.’

Mackeson and the Commander looked at each other.

‘OK,’ the Commander said, ‘get Hayter in here. Let’s eat some breakfast.’

By the time Hayter walked in, the Americans were all smiles.

‘Big day, Sergeant Hayter,’ said the Commander.

‘Normal line of duty, sir,’ said Hayter in what Reed always thought of as his sergeant major’s voice. ‘Open and shut, I’d say. It’ll be good to see that… er, that woman locked up.’

‘You better get your strength up. We got sausage, eggs, hotcakes. You want coffee? OJ? We got tea in case?’

Johnny sat high up in the public gallery, waiting, fretting while the court below slowly filled up with the drab-clothed servants of justice. They all seemed to have urgent reasons to talk in little knots among the ranks of light oak benches but their conversations were broken by smiles which seemed, unnervingly, to imply that there was a social life which was more important to them than the temporary business they were here to transact. Heather’s barrister, Lisa Gardiner, came in clutching a large pile of files.

He’d parked in the big car park under the mound of Clifford’s Tower at nine o’ clock and walked across the wide, open square to York Crown Court. There’d been a camera crew at the bottom of the steps and he’d made sure his face was averted out of sheer habit.

Jo, Margo and three other women were just inside the doors by the security desk.

Jo saw him first. ‘Johnny! Morning, Superman.’

The other women turned, breaking into smiles. Margo gave him a round of applause. He smiled back and shrugged.

‘Where’s Heather?’

‘Through the doorway, right then left. She’s in the waiting room with her brief.’

He’d gone in, seen them sitting, drinking coffee, talking earnestly. He’d stood there until Heather noticed him and introduced him.

‘Have you thought about what I said?’

Heather smiled, distracted. ‘About what?’

‘About my going into the witness box.’

‘Oh.’

‘Well?’

The barrister answered, ‘I don’t think it would work, Mr Kay.’

‘I’m Johnny.’

‘Johnny. Even if we could get you into the box – and I think there’d be massive objections as soon as we tried it, I don’t think we could use you.’

‘I don’t see why not.’

She looked at him, summing him up. ‘Let’s have a go, then. I’m the prosecuting barrister, OK?’

‘OK.’

She spoke very quietly. ‘Mr Kay, in your previous employment, did you have any direct experience of the Ramsgill Stray base?’

‘No, but I did with Chelten—’

‘Please just answer the question. Before you recently trespassed into the base with the accused, had you ever been there?’

‘No.’

‘Have you ever, during your alleged time with the Security Service, been given any briefing on the activities carried out at Ramsgill Stray?’

‘No.’

‘Mr Kay, are you by any chance in love with the defendant, Miss Weston?’

His jaw dropped. Heather’s head lifted sharply to look with an odd expression at Lisa Gardiner. He and Heather avoided looking at each other.

The silence hung there, crackling.

‘You see what I mean?’ said the barrister, and she smiled sadly.

Now he looked down at the court, wondering what unforeseeable events were about to unfold. The document from the Stray had been where he had known it would be, in the roll-top desk in his father’s study. This time he thought his father wouldn’t have minded the search. Now it was inside the lining of his jacket, where it had been before – a tiny and probably hopeless precaution against a double cross. He’d been very much on the alert all the way to court, looping around in big detours to avoid the obvious direct route, watching every other car for signs of possible interception, half expecting to find himself arrested at the court itself where they knew he would have the document on him. Nothing happened. Whatever game the Americans were playing, it wasn’t that one.

Judge Belmont-Adams seemed exotically dressed, dark blue robes, violet sleeves, a red sash and a white cravat. He had a simple fuzzy wig. Johnny was looking steeply down on him from the public gallery, up to one side. It was a perspective that slightly diminished the grandeur of the court. The top of the canopy projecting over the judge’s head was in the course of reconstruction. Rough, unfinished boarding was visible only from above and on top of it some workman had left a crumpled cigarette packet.