Brian Freemantle - A Mind to Kill

It was another opportunity for Keflin-Brown to demonstrate his finely balanced timing. Jennifer Stone was such a person, the barrister picked up once more. In her first year at Enco-Corps she’d topped the in-house chart of successful trades, earned bigger profit-related commission than any other dealer and maintained that supremacy every year until she left.

‘That departure was to marry Gerald Lomax, a millionaire vice President of Euro-Corps’ American parent company and its head, here in Europe,’ continued the prosecutor. ‘It was a marriage that took place just six months after the death of Lomax’s first wife, from what an inquest jury concluded to be an inadvertent overdose of insulin upon which, as a severe diabetic, she was dependent…’

Jennifer saw Jeremy Hall’s sharp, sideways glance at the other barrister at the innuendo of the phrasing seconds before the voice burst through her head in a screaming, echoing tirade. ‘ Murdered. Killed me. The bastards killed me.’ And then, over and over, the same roaring chant, ‘ Murder, murder, murder, murder.’

But Jennifer was prepared, more so than ever before, alerted by the first reference to Jane. She clung desperately to the chair edge, her body rigid, pulling the control into herself and with her chin tight against her chest hopefully to prevent anyone seeing the bizarre, eyes-shut, face-squeezed contortion against the engulfing noise.

‘… As the facts of this case are outlined to you, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, one of the conclusions you may reach is that Gerald Lomax was a promiscuous womanizer,’ Keflin-Brown was saying. ‘While his first wife was still alive, Lomax was engaged in an extramarital affair with Jennifer Stone, his brilliant, top-achieving trader…’

No! thought Jennifer, outraged. They were the facts but they weren’t the facts at all. It hadn’t been like that, as it was being made to sound, as if she and Gerald had been rutting animals. It wasn’t sex: it was love. It was…

‘ Yes! ’ contradicted Jane. ‘ Exactly what you were, rutting, grunting animals. Pigs on heat. Fuck, fuck, honk honk. ’

‘No!’ protested Jennifer, forgetting where she was. She came up with a start. Hall remained looking forward but was hunched, almost as if he was trying to shield himself from her. Perry glared around and Keflin-Brown worsened the moment by halting in mid-sentence, turning his head from the jury to look enquiringly at her.

‘Mr Hall!’ said the judge, exasperated. ‘I really will not allow this to continue, as you well know.’

‘My Lord,’ said Hall, rising. ‘I apologize once more to the court for the behaviour of my client, which is in no way disrespectful-’

‘But which is precisely how this court is minded to regard it,’ stopped Jarvis, impatiently. ‘I would remind you there are ways open to me to restrict such behaviour.’

‘I am so reminded, my Lord, and I am obliged,’ said Hall, meekly.

‘… As I was saying,’ restarted Keflin-Brown. ‘Before their marriage, before the death of the first Mrs Lomax, Jennifer Stone and Gerald Lomax were lovers. After their marriage, the new Mrs Lomax gave up what had been a glittering career and chose to spend a considerable part of her time in the couple’s country estate, in Hampshire. For part of every week, however, Gerald Lomax chose to remain and live in London, which was, after all, his place of work…’ The slight, throat-clearing cough and the sip of water was as timed as everything else. ‘… At that place of work, the place where this terrible crime was committed and witnessed by no fewer than sixteen people, from all of whom you will hear, was employed another female trader, a fellow American named Rebecca Nicholls. You will hear, ladies and gentlemen, that for some years, maybe simultaneously with the affair he was conducting with the accused, Gerald Lomax was also engaged in a relationship with Miss Nicholls. Indeed, in New York which they had frequent occasion to visit and where Miss Nicholls retained an apartment, the couple lived virtually as husband and wife…’

‘ Doesn’t that make pretty listening! That’s your bastard of a husband he’s talking about, Jennifer. This is Gerald who used to come across with all that shit about love and happiness and how much he adored you and would do anything for you. And Rebecca, your best friend. Listen up now. I don’t want you to miss a single word.’

Keflin-Brown had turned, to look at Jennifer and by so doing brought most of the jury around with him. He said, ‘After the hideous stabbing about which you will hear, Mrs Lomax did not make what amounted to a full statement to the police: did not explain herself. But it is the Crown’s case that Mrs Lomax discovered the affair in which her husband was engaged with Miss Nicholls. That she decided to wreak the most terrible revenge imaginable upon the man, for his deceit and that in full and sound mind she set out just two months ago, entered her husband’s office and in full view of the entire staff, stabbed, cut and slashed Gerald Lomax so savagely and so severely that he died on the spot… and that, ladies and gentlemen, is what I intend to prove to your satisfaction.’

‘ And I shall make you insane. That’s what I’ll do, in the end, of course. Really destroy that mega-mind of yours. But slowly, so very slowly: I’ve got for ever, after all. So I want you to know how it’s happening, when it’s happening, every moment that it’s happening: chip, chip, there it goes, every little chip of the way. And that’s how I’ll leave you in the end, Jennifer: a piss-soaked, mind-emptied imbecile, dribbling down her front without knowing it…’

Jennifer was aware of Perry at the dock edge. ‘For God’s sake wipe your face! Spit is running all over you!’

‘… Just like that.’

The diminutive judge was the main target of Jane’s attempted abuse, trying to get Jennifer to call him a dwarf and Santa’s little helper and a short-ass, but she also tried with every formal witness with whom Keflin-Brown opened the prosecution. Almost every time Jennifer beat her, lips clamped against the outbursts. She did practically as well against any uncontrollable movement, arms rigid by her sides to hold the chair edge, her feet entwined around the seat legs. Had it not been secured to the floor to avoid its use as a weapon by a berserk prisoner, that unbalanced posture would have worked against her, bringing her crashing down entangled in the chair, when her body lurched violently sideways. As it was, the movement, the worst, stopped the court again. The motherly wardress who’d kept a handkerchief ready since the dribbling episode managed to snatch out, stopping Jennifer being thrown off, and Jarvis warned Jeremy Hall yet again. That was the occasion Jane tried to make her call the judge Santa’s little helper at the same time as telling him to keep his rat-trap mouth shut.

Keflin-Brown, even more adept at ingratiating himself with a judge than he was with a jury, managed to create a very visible contrast between Jennifer’s impromptu interruptions by the efficient quickness with which he called his technical witnesses.

A police photographer produced an extensive portfolio of pictures, individual copies of which were distributed to the jury and among the assembled lawyers. The man quickly itemized each print. Copies were not given to Jennifer but she could see some open in front of the lawyers that included Gerald’s blood-soaked body and the gore-splattered office and the lip-clamped shuddering the sight caused her had nothing to do with Jane. The photographs were supplemented by the official plans of the Enco-Corps’ office, which were sworn by the architect as those he’d drawn to rebuild the property after the IRA bombing but which had been additionally marked for the trial showing the positioning of Gerald Lomax’s permanently visible office and its glass-sided approach corridor in relation to the open trading floor from which the murder had been witnessed by so many people.