have been too frightened to tell the police about a vicious attack on your six-year-old granddaughter, yet you happily talked to a private investigator who turned up out of the blue.'
'Not about my granddaughter. I told you, I didn't mention it.'
Martha Denton stared into space, as if trying and failing to make sense of his answers. Then, with a dismissive shrug and a curt, 'Oh well,' dropped into her seat.
Jenny watched two jurors in the front row exchange a knowing look. Martha Denton had made them feel clever and made Madog look a fool.
Havilland had no questions, content to align himself with Denton's attack. Sensing a breakthrough for his cause, Khan managed to repair some of the damage she had inflicted by establishing that Madog had no credible reason for lying about his sighting, and his subsequent encounter with the ponytailed driver, short of being bribed. Madog insisted he had never taken money and had told only the truth. Not all the jurors appeared convinced.
Collins had no questions for the witness. Madog stepped eagerly from the witness box, keen to escape as quickly as he could.
Halting him in his tracks, Jenny said, 'If you could wait in the hall until the end of the afternoon, Mr Madog - you may be required to answer some further questions.'
Jenny watched for Rhys's reaction. He remained impassive. Smug. She allowed herself a brief indulgent fantasy: perhaps she could still raise sufficient doubt, pose enough awkward questions to lead the jury to a brave decision that would shock him out of his complacency. Although the substance of the evidence would have to remain secret, the jury's verdict could not be suppressed. And a coroner's jury had the unique power to deliver their findings in the form of a narrative. If they decided Nazim and Rafi had been spirited away against their will and that the official investigation had been negligent or deliberately suppressed, they could spell it out.
The eight very unsuspecting men and women, currently suffering varying degrees of boredom and annoyance at having to perform their obscure civic duty, had the power to whip up a storm.
The next witness was David Powell, the proprietor of the vehicle-hire firm Jenny and McAvoy had visited in Hereford. Short and heavy-set, he spoke in a broad borders accent and made no attempt to disguise his impatience at being prised away from his business. He glowered at Jenny with the same suspicious disdain with which she imagined he greeted all officials.
Yes, his firm had owned a black Toyota Previa in June 2002 he said, but his records showed it had been rented from 20 to 23 June and not again until 6 July. It would have been sitting in the yard out front on the 28th. When Jenny suggested that he might have hired it out without keeping a paper record, Powell answered with an adamant no and wouldn't be moved. If the records said it wasn't hired, it wasn't. No argument.
Jenny changed tack. 'You have a regular customer called Mr Christopher Tathum, don't you?'
'Not that regular,' Powell grunted.
'Have you brought details of the cars he's hired?'
He nodded and unfolded a sheet of paper which he produced from his jacket pocket. Alison took it from him and handed it to Jenny. Printed on office stationery, it was a computer-generated list of transactions conducted with Tathum, C. Mr. The first was for the hire of an Audi saloon in December 2001. Running her eyes down the list, Jenny saw that Tathum had rented the same vehicle half a dozen times over the next two years, usually for week- long periods. There was only one hire of the Toyota listed: in March 2003.
Jenny said, 'Are you friendly with Mr Tathum?'
'Not particularly.'
'You wouldn't do him any special favours - a cash deal, for example?' 'No.'
Jenny fixed him with a look as she asked her next question. 'Has he or anyone else spoken to you or your staff about this vehicle?'
Avoiding her gaze he muttered, 'No, ma'am.'
It was little to go on, just a hint that he was lying, but it stoked her anger. She couldn't resist making a point for the jury. 'Are you quite sure you've told this court the whole truth, Mr Powell?'
'Quite sure.'
After Khan had probed with a few speculative questions, all of which met with denials, Jenny asked Powell to join Madog in the empty public gallery. It was a piece of theatre - lining up the links in the chain to keep the story vivid in the jurors' minds - but one Jenny felt justified in using. Since Donovan had given his implausible evidence, she'd been fighting a growing suspicion that events were being managed. She had been scrupulous in keeping Elizabeth Murray, Madog, Tathum and Maitland's identities secret until they had reached the witness box, but none of them had raised Alun Rhys to even a moment of visible concern. She needed to push harder. Her chest tightened at the prospect. She had to fight panic with determination.
Tathum took his time walking from the committee room to the witness box. Dressed in a suit and tie, he could have been a business executive. All that gave him away as a former military man was the solid squareness of his shoulders and a certain predatory quality to his narrow gaze. Jenny glanced over at Madog, hoping to detect signs of anxiety: he touched his cheek, scratched his neck. Tiny clues, but not sufficient to reassure her.
Tathum took the Bible and read the oath with the relaxed demeanour she imagined he might have adopted while leaning through Madog's car window. She felt an instinctive and visceral dislike for him, an irrational loathing which she knew would only weaken her if she let it show.
'Mr Tathum,' she said, having confirmed his name and address, 'can you tell the court who you were working for in late June 2002?'
'As far as I can remember, ma'am, no one.'
'Then how were you supporting yourself?'
'I'd left the army the year before. I had a military pension and I did occasional contract work. I still do.'
'What kind of contract work?'
'Close protection is the technical term.' He aimed his explanation at the jury. 'A bodyguard in layman's language.'
He was effortlessly confident, not in the least frightened of the jury knowing who and what he was.
'Who was your main employer during that year?'
'I had several contracts with a company called Maitland Ltd. I was looking after British oil execs in Nigeria and Azerbaijan.'
'Were you armed while carrying out these duties?'
'I wouldn't have been much use if I wasn't.'
Despite her blanket of medication, Jenny's heartbeat picked up and her diaphragm drew tighter. She kicked herself on.
'You had a different hairstyle at that time, didn't you, Mr Tathum? You wore it in a ponytail.'
'I did,' he said without hesitation.
Jenny stalled, his directness had thrown her. 'Let's talk about 28 June of that year. Are you able to say where you were on that day?'
'I was probably at home, what there was of it. I bought a broken-down old farmhouse when I came out of the army and was rebuilding it.' He smiled at the jury. 'It's turned into my life's work.'
They didn't react. There were neither smiles nor frowns, just a vague sense of wariness at Tathum's practised charm.
Jenny steeled herself. 'Two men were seen in the front of a black Toyota people carrier that evening in Marlowes Road, Bristol. The same or a similar vehicle was seen crossing the Severn Bridge at about eleven p.m. The driver was a white man, thickset, with close-cropped hair; the passenger, also white, had a ponytail. There were two young Asian men in the back seat. Were you in that vehicle, Mr Tathum?'
Tathum smiled and shook his head. 'No, I wasn't.'
'On several occasions you have rented cars from Mr Powell's company in Hereford. Were you travelling in one of his vehicles that day?'
'No. I have my own car which I use when I'm not working.'
His denials weren't surprising, but Jenny was rattled by the depth of his confidence. She didn't believe anything she could throw at him would shake it. The jury's questioning expressions told her that they were slowly putting two and two together, but still there was no solid evidence on which they could hang their suspicions.
'On the following Saturday, Mr Madog, the toll collector on the Severn Bridge who noticed the Toyota, says
