She felt humiliated, utterly exposed and shamed, sitting like an exhibit in this horrible wooden box, everyone examining her and speaking about her and having opinions about her. Her suit itched; it was like thousands of tiny insects were crawling under her skin. The courtroom came in and out of focus. She knew that she had to concentrate but her mind kept drifting. Suddenly she remembered a math lesson long ago, and Stuart Rees leaning over her as she worked, his breath hot and stale on her neck. How had she let him—? She bunched her fists: she needed to focus.
Now Simon Brockbank was standing, pulling down his cuffs ever so slightly, taking a small sip of water from the glass, looking down for a moment at the notes in front of him, taking his time over everything, relaxed and composed. He turned toward the jury, looking slightly sorrowful. Tabitha gritted her teeth; there was a precise nub of pain in her temples. She gripped her notebook, leaned forward slightly.
“Members of the jury,” Brockbank said. His voice was rich and sonorous. “Over the course of this trial you will hear the testimony of many witnesses and have the opportunity to consider a great deal of evidence, some of which is straightforward and some technical and complicated. But at its heart, this case is very simple. Tabitha Hardy is charged with the murder of Stuart Rees. There can be no graver crime. There might be times when you feel sympathy for her because—as the prosecution will show—she had good reason to feel angry with the murdered man. But do not let pity divert you from your task, which is to decide whether or not on the twenty-first of December 2018 Tabitha Hardy killed Stuart Rees in a premeditated act of murder.”
He took another sip of water and turned back to the jury.
“I have been a barrister for more decades than I like to admit.” He gave a rueful smile. “And I have to say that I have rarely come across a case that is so straightforward and so—”
Tabitha rapped on the Plexiglas several times. Everyone looked at her. Simon Brockbank’s mouth was open in mid-sentence.
“Ms. Hardy?” said Judge Munday. “You will have your opportunity to respond, but this is the prosecution’s opening statement.”
“I need a pen,” said Tabitha. “I need to make notes and I haven’t got my pen. Michaela’s got some.”
Michaela leaped to her feet. She rummaged among the piles of papers in front of her, looking rather frantic, then held up a clutch of pens held together by a thick elastic band.
Judge Munday nodded at a woman seated at the bench below her who rose and made her way to Michaela. She took a pen and brought it to Tabitha.
“Also,” said Tabitha, “I can’t hear very clearly from here. It’s a bit fuzzy. Maybe he can speak more clearly.”
Simon Brockbank looked toward her and gave a tight smile then resumed, talking slowly and carefully. Tabitha opened her notebook and several loose pieces of paper dropped to the floor. She picked them up, ducking out of view for a second. The pen didn’t work at once and she had to scribble it across the page.
Now he was saying she had motive. She had opportunity. There was ample evidence. He was going to tell the jury the salient facts of the case that would be laid out during the trial.
Tabitha grasped the pen. Her hand was sweaty.
“First of all, motive. When the accused was fifteen, she was involved in a sexual relationship with Stuart Rees.” He put up a hand as if someone were trying to interrupt him. “However complicit she might have been at the time, she was underaged and vulnerable. Her life was blighted by this sorry episode.”
Tabitha listened to his words rolling out across the court. Her mouth was dry and the precise pain in her head had widened out into a booming ache. She kept her eyes on her notebook, but she could still feel all those eyes on her.
“You will hear,” continued Simon Brockbank to the jury, “how she suffered from severe clinical depression, how she had psychotic episodes, how she was hospitalized and how she has been under a regime of drugs to help her cope. It’s a sad story,” he said solemnly. “Very sad. But”—and here his voice became firm—“it also gives the accused a powerful motive. Tabitha Hardy believed, with reason, that Stuart Rees had destroyed her life and got away with it.”
One of the men on the jury nodded. Another juror wrote something on the pad in front of her. Tabitha chewed at her lip until she tasted blood. She was very hot and then suddenly she was cold and shivery. Her whole body felt wrong. For a few moments, she lost her grip on what he was saying. His words slid off her, his mouth opened and closed and expressions passed across his florid face: sorrowful, knowing, stern. She sat up straighter.
He was describing how she had concealed what had happened when she was fifteen from the police. He was making each point clearly and calmly, laying it down slick and flat like a playing card peeled from the deck. How in the last six weeks of his life Stuart Rees had been visibly anxious and how he had abruptly decided to put his house on the market and move from Okeham. “Almost the same number of weeks, members of the jury, that Tabitha Hardy had been living there.
“You will hear,” the barrister continued, “various witnesses testifying that the accused publicly threatened Stuart Rees, even on the morning of his murder. You will hear how on that day, she was in a highly agitated state. You will hear how she even went so far as to make a partial confession to one of the residents.”
He paused and looked down at his notes once more, gave a
