view of the entire length of the foyer outside the courtrooms. It was nearly ten when Ruth swept into sight, a nervous-looking man almost trotting to keep up with her. Ruth shoved the door open and subsided into the chair opposite me with a huge sigh. ‘God, that holding area depresses the knickers off me,’ she complained, lighting a cigarette. ‘Kate,’ she added through a mouthful of smoke, ‘this is Norman Undercroft, the duty solicitor. Norman, this is Kate Brannigan, my client’s partner.’
Norman ducked his head politely, looking up at me from under mousey brows. Close to, he looked a lot older than my first impression. His papery skin was covered in a network of fine lines, placing him in his late forties. He opened his mouth to speak, but Ruth beat him to it. ‘Right, Kate. Listen very carefully, I only have time to run this past you once. This morning, Richard will be represented by Norman here. Norman will get up on his hind legs and tell the court that this is a complicated matter about which his client has not yet had the opportunity to consult his own solicitor fully. Therefore, Norman will be asking the court to remand Richard in custody for the weekend. The prosecution will leap to their feet indignantly and respond that Richard is a menace to society, and furthermore, the police are investigating other serious charges in relation to him. They’ll ask for a lie-down so that these matters can be resolved. And the mags will smile sweetly and agree. Any questions?’
‘When can I see him?’ I asked.
‘Between seven and nine in the evening. Any visit is at the discretion of the duty inspector, so don’t be stroppy. You go round to the back entrance in Gartside Street opposite the car park. That it? Sorry to be so abrupt, but I’ve got twenty for lunch and Peter has not got the knack of getting the caterers to do any work.’ She got to her feet. ‘Have you made any progress, by the way?’
‘It’s early days yet, but I think I might just be getting somewhere.’
‘OK. Look, I’ve arranged to see Richard tomorrow morning. Why don’t we meet afterwards? Say eleven, in the Ramada. You can buy me brunch.’
‘Make it Salford Quays,’ I called after her. ‘I might need to be down there.’
‘The Quays it is,’ she tossed over her shoulder as she disappeared round the corner. The room seemed to double in size now only Norman and I were left. I gave him a friendly smile.
‘Overwhelming,’ I said.
‘Mmm,’ said Norman. ‘Good, though. I’d choose her if I was ever charged with anything, especially if I’d done it.’
I hoped everyone else wouldn’t assume Richard was guilty just because he’d hired the best criminal lawyer in town. Wearily, I followed Norman round to Court 9. There didn’t seem to be a journalist in the court, unless the court reporting agency had taken to hiring elderly women who look one step away from bag ladies and have such excellent powers of recall that they don’t need a notebook.
I sat on one of the flip-down seats at the back of the courtroom. There were two magistrates on the bench, a man and a woman, both middle-aged, both decidedly middle class. After two breaches of the peace and a soliciting, I decided she was a teacher and he owned his own small business. She had that unmistakable air of wanting to tell them all to behave, and he had the blunt style of the self-made man who has no conception of why everybody can’t be like him.
Richard was the last case of the morning. Watching him walk into the dock, I realized just how hard it is for people to get justice. After thirty-six hours in custody wearing the same clothes, not having shaved or showered, he looked like a bad lad even to me, and I was on his side. The very structure of the court itself made the accused appear to be some sort of desperado. Richard stood in the reinforced dock, behind a barrier of heavy perspex slats, the door into the court locked to avoid any possibility of him escaping. Behind him stood an alert prison officer. The system made it clear who was the sinner here.
Although he was familiar enough with court procedures from his days as a local paper journalist, Richard looked around the court with all the bewilderment of an animal that went to sleep in the jungle and woke up in the zoo. His hair seemed to have gone lank and dead overnight, and he pushed it back from his forehead in a gesture I’d noticed hundreds of times when he was working. When he saw me, one corner of his mouth twitched in a half-smile. That was a half more than I could manage.
There was no chance for Richard even to protest his innocence. He was treated like a parcel that has to be processed. As Ruth had predicted, the magistrates made little difficulty about remanding Richard in custody. The prosecuting solicitor obligingly explained that not only were the police pursuing further inquiries but they were also keen that Richard be kept away from other prisoners to avoid any collusion with his alleged co-conspirators. They all looked as if the very idea of a bail application on a charge like this was the best joke they’d heard since Margaret Thatcher announced the National Health Service was safe in her hands. The whole thing took nine and a half minutes. As Richard’s prison officer escort led him out of the dock, he turned his back to the bench, wiggled his fingers at me and blew a kiss. I could have wept.
Instead, I thanked Norman Undercroft politely for his efforts and walked briskly out into the fresh air. Since I was only round the corner from Alexis’s office, I cut through Crown Square and entered the building via the underground car park. I had wheedled the door combination out of Alexis ages ago; you never know when you’re going to need a bacon sandwich at four in the morning, and the motto of the canteen staff of the Manchester
I took the lift up to the editorial floor. Things were fairly peaceful. Most of the sports staff hadn’t come in yet, and Saturdays are such quiet news days that there’s only ever a skeleton team in the newsroom. Alexis sat hunched over her keyboard in a quiet corner cut off from the rest of the room by a dense thicket of various interesting green things. I recognized the devil’s ivy and the sweetheart plant. I’ve killed cuttings from both of them. I edged round the plants. Alexis flapped a hand at me, indicating I should sit down and shut up. I did.
With a flurry of fingers over the keyboard, Alexis reached the end of her train of thought, leaned back, narrowed her eyes and re-read her last paragraph, absently reaching out for the cigarette in her ashtray. It had already burned down to the tip, and she looked at it in astonishment. Only then did I merit any attention. ‘All right?’ she asked.
‘As predicted. Remanded till Wednesday to allow for further police inquiries relating to other serious crimes. And unless the court agency has taken to hiring the Invisible Man for Saturday shifts, we’re clear there too.’
‘It’s only a matter of time before somebody gets a whisper.’ Alexis warned. ‘It’s too good a story for the Old Bill to sit on. It’s not every day they capture a parcel that size.’
‘So let’s get a move on,’ I said.
‘What’s with the “us”? Isn’t unpaid childminding enough?’
‘That’s only the start. I need to look at your copy of the electoral roll.’
Alexis nodded and tipped back dangerously in her chair till she could reach the filing cabinet behind her. She pulled out the bottom drawer. ‘Help yourself,’ she said. I don’t know exactly where she gets it from, but Alexis always has an up-to-date copy of the city voters’ list. She keeps it next to another interesting document which fell off the back of a British Telecom lorry, a list of Greater Manchester names and addresses sorted by phone number. In other words, if you’ve got the number, you can look up the address and name of the subscriber. Very handy, especially when you’re dealing with the kind of dodgy customer Alexis and I are always running up against.
I looked up the relevant street in the electoral roll and discovered the occupant was listed as Terence Fitzgerald. The phone book revealed no listing for Terence Fitzgerald, but I checked Directory Inquiries on my mobile phone and discovered there was a mobile listed for him.
‘Find what you wanted?’ Alexis asked.
‘Maybe,’ I said. I had a way to go before I could be sure that the car thief and Terence Fitzgerald were one and the same. Thanks to the poll tax fiasco, the electoral roll has ceased to be an accurate guide to who actually lives at any particular address.
‘Time for a coffee?’ Alexis asked.
I shook my head. ‘Places to go, people to see. Thanks all the same.’
For the briefest possible time, she looked concerned. ‘Take care of yourself, KB.’
‘I’ll be fine,’ I lied. I waved goodbye and headed for the lifts. As I drove out of the car park, I stared up at the grim concrete facade of the court building and tried not to think about Richard sitting in a windowless cell, nothing to do but stare at the walls and sweat with fear. I’d once been behind the heavy iron bars of the CDC, while I’d still thought that being a lawyer was a fit and proper job for a grown-up. A criminal solicitor friend had let
