Brian Freemantle - A Mind to Kill

‘Beryl, don’t tell us what we’re going to do. We tell you what we’re going to do,’ said the tattooed woman. ‘We want to play.’

‘While we’ve got the chance,’ picked up Fran. ‘She won’t come back here, after the trial. She’s off her head, full of voices. She’ll be sent to some secure mental institution for other people to play with

…’ She puckered her lips, for the amusement of the others. ‘It’s not fair!’

The huge woman shook her head, smiling dismissively. ‘You just can’t think, can you?’

‘What are you talking about now?’ demanded Fran.

‘She’s got more than tits and a cunt for you to play with. She’s got money.’ Triumphantly the matron produced a sheaf of notes. ‘I promised to keep you away if she paid me. And she did. Authorized me to withdraw her cheque-book from admissions…’ The smile expanded. ‘So now it’s ours!’

All three women smiled back. ‘How much?’ demanded Emma.

‘Hundred for you, hundred for me.’

‘Ours gets split three ways, you get the lot,’ challenged Harriet, at once.

‘Because I’m officially in charge and I’m taking the risk giving her to you.’

‘For which we paid you,’ reminded Emma.

‘And here there’s lots more, more money than you’ve ever thought of. And we’ll get it providing we’re not greedy.’

‘I want to fuck her again before she goes,’ insisted Harriet, in reluctant agreement. ‘Cut her a little. I like seeing blood run.’

‘She might not be going after the trial,’ lured the matron. ‘Don’t forget I’ve looked after her at the remand hearings here: seen the papers. The police think she’s faking the voice. If the court agrees she’s sane she’ll come back here, for a time anyway. How’s that sound?’

‘Wonderful,’ said Emma.

‘Perfect,’ agreed Fran.

‘All right,’ accepted the still reluctant Harriet. Then: ‘If she comes back here permanently we could sell her on when we’ve finished and get even more money couldn’t we? This could work out very well.’

‘See!’ exclaimed the matron, when she entered Jennifer’s ward an hour later. ‘They didn’t come, did they?’

‘Thank you.’

‘ Now she’s got you all to herself.’

‘Nursey’s brought her cream.’

‘I don’t want you to do it, either.’

‘Nursey likes doing it.’

‘No.’

‘ Open your stupid legs. Tell her you want it.’

It was a personal test for Jennifer to stop herself and she succeeded.

‘Don’t make nursey angry.’

‘ Open your legs! ’

‘Would nursey like another sort of present?’

‘What?’

Jennifer felt a sensation in her legs, a pressure to part them but she managed to resist it. ‘Give me my cheque-book.’

‘A girl at school said she saw Mummy’s picture in the papers.’

‘She must have been mistaken,’ insisted Annabelle.

‘She’s going to bring it tomorrow to show me.’

‘Which girl?’ asked Annabelle, as casually as she felt able.

‘Margaret Roberts.’

That night Margaret Robert’s mother said she quite understood the telephone call and of course she’d destroy the newspaper. ‘What’s going to happen to poor little Emily?’

‘I don’t know,’ admitted Annabelle.

‘Such a lovely child.’

‘Yes.’

‘An absolute tragedy.’

‘Yes.’

The repelling and physically real horror of lesbian rape – literally of being their beck-and-call sex slave – shattered Jennifer’s previous near catatonic shock of what had come close to happening to Emily.

It would have been trite – too easy, too simple a metaphor – for Jennifer to have thought about awakening from nightmare upon nightmare. But the return of Jennifer’s implacable determination to overcome everything and everybody was very much like coming to her senses after being too long asleep.

She positively refused to equate one nightmare against the other. Each, by itself, sickeningly revolting but with this new awakening she could separate them. Believed, even, that she could get them into some proportion.

It hadn’t been her, Jennifer Lomax, who’d attacked Emily. It had been Jane, like it had been Jane who’d murdered Gerald. Using her body. Not her responsibility then. And she had been raped and sexually terrorized: drugged at the very beginning and afterwards threatened with disfigurement if she’d resisted. Not her responsibility either. So it would be immature – ridiculous – to feel guilt or shame for what had happened, like rape victims did. No woman invited rape, of any sort. And she certainly hadn’t invited what had been inflicted on her. But which wouldn’t be inflicted again. Ever.

The grotesquely fat matron with the probing finger had shown her how to stop it and never in her life had Jennifer needed the same lesson taught twice: certainly not this lesson. The balance came at once. There was an equation here. Matching it was knowing of Jane’s presence, which in her apathy she’d almost forgotten, opening her mind to the unseen presence like she’d opened her legs to the monsters that she had very definitely been able to see and feel.

Something else she’d recovered, with her waking-up determination. And why she felt safe now, without any tingling to warn her of Jane. It was difficult to be sure, because she hadn’t kept any sort of count, but it seemed Jane hadn’t occupied her so much in the last few days: almost as if the accept-anything, unopposing indifference had taken the pleasure from the taunting.

Jane was going to be surprised at the reversal. Upset, hopefully, at not anticipating it. Jennifer hoped so. It would represent a victory – a triumph over a presence, a thing, that believed itself able to control her every thought and every word and every action. It was exhausting – draining – to fight against mouthing the rudeness and the profanities but she’d learned how to do it, as she’d realized how to be sedated to keep Jane as far out of her head at night as possible.

Now she had to control her body movements, too. Gerald’s murder should have been warning enough but hadn’t been: Jennifer had been taken utterly by surprise at the total possession that had made her attack Emily. After that episode Jennifer knew she had to be alert at all and every time for a physical outburst that could ridicule her – worse, possibly harm people – in any situation with another human being.

But she could do it, like she’d always been able to do anything she set her mind upon. The confidence ran through her, a good feeling, despite the caution that immediately followed. She’d never imagined – how could anyone imagine? – confronting what she had to do now. She still couldn’t imagine. Just knew she had to do it. Had to survive.

Would it become any clearer today how to do that? Perhaps, although she wasn’t sure. Pre-trial conferences with counsel, Humphrey Perry had called it in his pencil-pointing way. What about the long ago insistence – not long ago in terms of time but certainly in terms of what had happened in between – upon being represented by a QC? Something else she’d let go, hadn’t even thought about, after Emily. Was there still time? A question for Jeremy Hall, along with a lot more. She should have made a list, against the distraction of Jane appearing. Or should she? It would be a hell of a recovery if she was able to resist Jane’s intrusion and words and body movement and conduct a rational conversation with the barrister. More than a hell of a recovery: it would be that all important proof – proof to herself more than to anyone else – of her sanity as well as of her strength to resist.

Even the scars, on her arms and hands, didn’t depress Jennifer. The bribe-obedient matron (‘nursey will be good if you’re good to nursey,’) had removed the stitches that morning and left the bandages off, allowing Jennifer properly to look for the first time. The right arm was worse, the wound deep and jagged, in a zig-zag from wrist to elbow. She’d have to wear long sleeves all the time, until she was able to get plastic surgery advice. Have the left arm and her hands done at the same time. She was ugly, like this. Emily would be frightened. Abruptly the reflection dipped. Could Emily ever be more frightened than… Jennifer didn’t allow the thought to finish. She could only try to think of so much: the most immediate things. Too soon yet – there was too much in the way – to plan how to build things with Emily: to make Emily love her again. She would, of course. Plan. And recover. She had to. Emily was all she had left. Her life, as soon as she got rid of everything else in the way. Soon, she thought, now there was a trial date. She was impatient to get it over with. There was movement from the main ward entrance and through the window of her separate room Jennifer saw Hall and Perry approaching.