Хилари Боннер - A Kind Of Wild Justice

‘Oh, is that all?’

‘Christ, Jo, you’re a bit heavy on the sarcasm today, aren’t you,’ he countered, the irritation clear in his voice.

‘You really don’t change, Mike,’ she murmured softly.

‘I was thinking just the same thing about you,’ he said.

‘OK, why do you want me to go to her family? Why don’t you go to them yourself? Do they know about the DNA match, has anybody told them?’

‘No, they don’t know and the brass have decided they shouldn’t be told. No point, too painful, some such bollocks. I don’t agree with it, but I don’t dare go against them. I’ve only got two and a half years to do for my thirty and I have enough blots on my record as it is.’

‘Maybe you have changed after all,’ she said, her tone lightly bantering.

‘Maybe,’ he said. ‘Or maybe I’ve just settled for what I’ve got. I’ve risked enough already. There comes a time. The Phillipses wouldn’t want to hear from me anyway; they blamed me, you know, left me in no doubt that they considered me responsible for the whole damn cock-up. I’m the last person to persuade them to get involved in another major court case, to drag it all up again.’

‘I don’t think they were exactly mad about me in the end either,’ she remarked wryly. ‘Not after the buy-up.’

‘Perhaps, but you didn’t have the same personal involvement — and you’ve still got clout.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘Well, I’m damn sure they’d still like to see their daughter’s murderer get what’s coming to him, but whether or not they’ll be prepared to take on a case against him by themselves I very much doubt. Apart from the anguish of it, there’s the financial side too. A case like this could cost hundreds of thousands if it went wrong. I know they were wealthy people then, but I’m told their fortunes have changed considerably. I don’t think they’d dare take the risk. Not after all this time. I was hoping you might be able to get the Comet behind this one. Get the paper to finance it.’

‘Mike, for God’s sake. What planet are you on? Papers don’t throw money around like that any more.’

‘C’mon, Jo. They do if a story’s big enough. We both know that. You do a deal with this family and you get everything first. Think about it. It’ll be a huge ground-breaking court case and the Comet will be on the inside. All you have to do is pay the costs and it’s yours.’

‘Just like that,’ she responded.

‘Just like that,’ he repeated expressionlessly.

‘Well, it’s not just like that, Mike, not any more, not if it ever was. What if it all goes pear-shaped again? The CPS have turned you guys down. The risk factor of a private prosecution would be huge. Apart from anything else, there’s a big argument that, right or wrong, this case was buried a long time ago.’

‘I don’t think it ever will be, not for you and me,’ he said quietly.

He was right, of course, and perhaps it was that which made her so angry. ‘Oh, grow up, Mike,’ she snapped. ‘The case, you, me, everything — it was two decades ago, for Christ’s sake. It’s over. Anyway, even if I wanted to get involved again I honestly don’t think I would have a hope in hell of getting the Comet to back it, not in the present climate.’

She knew she must sound patronising. She knew how much he hated being patronised, particularly by her. But she still didn’t expect him to come back to her quite the way he did.

‘I wouldn’t have thought you’d have any problem there, Joanna,’ he shot back at her. ‘After all, you are sleeping with the editor.’

The anger overwhelmed her then. ‘Fuck off, Mike,’ she told him.

Joanna put one hand to her head and glared at the telephone, which she had promptly slammed down on him. Just who did Mike Fielding think he was? How could he be so damned arrogant? How could he think he could just bowl back into her life with all his baggage? The whole O’Donnell business was his problem, not hers. She had just been a young crime reporter covering the case — not the detective who blew it wide open because, as usual, he was in too much of a hurry. For her it was history. She had a new life. She had the column she had always wanted, ‘Sword of Justice’, a weekly eulogy championing the rights of the individual against the restrictions of a government and a legal system which purported to be liberal but actually, in her opinion, encroached upon freedom more than any other in her lifetime. She was proud of ‘Sword of Justice’, even though she knew well enough it was little more than the Comet ’s sop to great campaigning days long past.

She also had a family she was proud of, an eleven-year-old daughter who was the apple of her eye — and a husband. A husband who happened to be the editor. Anybody but Mike would have said, ‘After all, you are married to the editor.’ Not Fielding. He had always had a way with words. He could always out-snide the best. He could never resist going just that bit further than other people would.

Her eyes were drawn to the photograph on her desk. She and Paul, taken at their wedding reception. Both beaming at the camera. She was wearing a tailored cream silk suit. It still seemed very beautiful to her, as indeed it should have been. It was Paul Costelloe and had cost nearly £1000 even then. Her bridegroom had wanted the best for her. For them both.

She studied him closely. Even features. Average height. Mousy brown hair, thick and springy, slightly longer then than would be fashionable now. Horn-rimmed glasses. He was never a typical Englishman in any way. She always thought he had looked more like a Harvard preppie in those days, a real American WASP. He was glancing at her sideways, smiling proudly, shyly almost. He did not have the appearance of a remarkable man at all. He had never looked like one or, in his younger days at any rate, appeared to behave like one.

She switched her attention back to her own image in the photograph. The long mid-blond hair framing a thin person’s narrow face, her smile easy and wide, displaying even white teeth. She’d had them professionally scraped and cleaned four times a year then, in order to keep the nicotine stains at bay. That had been her big vanity. She hadn’t been able to stand the thought of yellow teeth, but she never even considered giving up smoking, not until years later. All too often it had felt as if only the cigarettes got her through the day. She looked happy in the picture and she supposed she had been happy, though what she actually remembered more than anything else was her sense of bewilderment.

She looked into her husband’s eyes in the photograph, masked by those thick-lensed glasses. She had often thought they must be very convenient to hide behind and once she had asked him if he really needed such thick lenses. He had laughed lightly and changed the subject. She had never asked again.

Absently she stretched out her right hand and placed the tip of her forefinger very precisely over his smile so that the lower part of his face was covered and you could only see his eyes. Masked by those heavy lenses they were, as ever, merely cool and fathomless.

She sighed. As well as being a bloody great editor he was an attentive, caring husband and a brilliant father who managed to find time for both his wife and daughter in spite of holding down one of the most demanding jobs in the modern world.

Their daughter, Emily, was bright, well adjusted, healthy and self-possessed. Perhaps a little too self-possessed, but certainly she had so far given neither of her parents much anxiety about anything. Of course, Joanna realised that might all change when Emily reached the dreaded teens. However, perversely she knew, she sometimes found herself rather looking forward to having a petulant adolescent to deal with. Occasionally it felt as if life were just too well ordered.