A Question of Guilt Read online

  Dedication

  For my family, friends and neighbours

  Contents

  Dedication

  Foreword

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  About the Author

  Also by Frances Fyfield

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  FOREWORD

  Sylvia Bernard slept beside her husband, sharing his deep, untroubled sleep. They never argued, they were comfortable together in a small and luxurious house like two curled cats in a tasteful basket. Michael Bernard turned over once per night, pushing aside the clutch of the duvet and the heat of his wife’s body, then slept again, happy.

  Flitting lightly, breathing heavily, Stanislaus Jaskowski failed to admire the quality of the designer curtains as he moved across the garden, but he coveted the car in the driveway, pausing to stroke it as if it were alive, stung by its coldness. Sweat froze on his forehead, and his tongue moved constantly, licking the moisture from his upper lip. When he had planned a little more, this would be the real thing, perfect, shocking, but not today: some other more courageous day than this. And in daylight, even if he had not been so afraid of the dark, he would have craved the innocence of daylight. After that there would be no more nagging, and he would have been a hero once at least, providing for them all. A hunter, happier than he had been ever since a child, and not often then.

  Georgian front door elegantly screened from the road by the evergreens made it easier. Stanislaus shivered, remembered the whisky left in the car and crept away. The tinted glasses he wore intensified the darkness, giving him the appearance of a sinister clown, a description which would have hurt, even enraged him as he strode away, relief increasing in proportion to his distance from the house.

  As he walked, he observed. Such a beautiful street, but the sight of those dignified buildings, fine windows and impenetrable doors filled him with horror. What a noise he made: next time he would wear soft shoes, the kind he had worn for dancing, and after the next time, or the time after that, he would be as happy as he had been then. Perfectly happy.

  Footsteps at one in the morning were not rare in a street so near the city, and Helen West heard Jaskowski’s without noticing as he passed her lighted basement window and hauled himself into his car. Applying the last piece of tape to the boxes containing the last debris of a marriage, she decided the occasion called for another drink, rather than tears. Of course it was easier without him, without the tension of his presence, easier without anyone at all. After two years’ absence and the formality of divorce, they could even talk to one another, not that he had ever wanted to stop, and any kind of improvement in life was worth celebrating. The last of his possessions: how long they had remained with her, indicative of his belief in the good life, her dislike of the way he earned it, and how much he had hated her for finding out. Now she supposed he had happiness in kind. Ah well, like gold and tweed in the same garment, glitter and homespun do not match.

  Helen went into her bright kitchen where ferns and plates hid the age and lack of equipment. She surveyed the gin bottle with distaste. Wine? None. She boiled the kettle. Coffee? None. Cocoa? Who would have believed it, thirty-six, and resigned to cocoa. Cocoa and brandy, needs must in the middle of the night. Sipping this brew, which even one as careless as herself could recognise as faintly poisonous, she wondered, with an interest which was merely academic, what it was like to be happy.

  Detective Superintendent Bailey, yawning in the gloom of the interview room, had ceased to contemplate the nature of happiness, or even trouble his mind with a prospect so unrealistic. Such an abstraction was not his concern and he had ceased to desire a state so unattainable, preferring survival with dignity. The youth on the opposite side of the table, stating at the yellow wall, stiff with fear and contrived insolence, his hands trembling even as he sneered into space, believed he had no options at all, least of all happiness. Happiness would have been not to have carried the knife, or used it on flesh. Happiness might have been a belief that he was not about to confess, was stronger than the silent man opposite, or the same man might give him bail. Fat chance of happiness.

  Mrs Eileen Cartwright, widow, forty-six years old, black-haired, sallow, least naturally blessed with physical favours than any of those who were awake to their own conditions, and with nothing more in common with any of them than the same square mile, stared at her empty television screen, smoking her fortieth cigarette of the day. Her room was cluttered, possessions gathered within touching distance, her mind as clear as her best crystal. At that moment in time, Eileen did believe in happiness. She believed complete and utter happiness would be hers some day soon, to hold and wonder at like an object of priceless and simple beauty. There was no belief in any God as free from doubt. She would fulfil her right to perfect happiness; pay and wait for the gift to be hers.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Monday morning. Arrested by the pile of papers. A quick first look at the report like a runner measuring the distance of the work. Helen read with her coat on, grumbling into a cheese roll.

  Court date Jaskowski: remanded in custody until 24 March, 10 a.m.

  Court Clerk J. Kehoe.

  Solicitors Daintrey and Partners, Dalston. Good, not a bent firm. Or at least not known for it.

  Defendant Stanislaus Jaskowski, age forty-four. Married, four children. Polish origin, born UK. Occupation: hospital porter. Part-time occupation: private investigator. Address: 31, Hackington Estate East, London N5.

  Antecedents Previous convictions: Two, spent, both theft employer (see CRO). Previous employment: antique dealer; business failed. Domestic circumstances poor, but clean council flat. In arrears with rent, four children. Take home pay; £150 per week. Large HP debts.

  Charge For that you, on 18 November 1986, did murder Sylvia Bernard at Cannonbury House, Cannonbury Street, contrary to common law.

  But not, thank God, so common. Helen settled further, resigned to the next few pages.

  Brief Summary of Facts The deceased, Mrs Sylvia Bernard, was found in the hallway of her home address at Cannonbury Street at about six-thirty in the evening of Monday 18 November by her husband. She had been dead for some eight hours, the result of numerous blows inflicted largely on the head and neck with both sharp and blunt instruments, most likely a hammer and a knife. It appeared at first a frenzied attack without apparent motive, Mrs Bernard being a well-respected woman, married to a solicitor (Michael Bernard of Messrs Bernard, Miles and Haddock, EC1), for eighteen years. No suspicion attached to the husband, but it was only through lengthy questioning that he revealed reluctantly that his wife had complained to him of being followed, both with him or alone, on several occasions. Bernard stated he had dismissed this as fantasy on her part, although believing there was some truth in it. After some hesitation, he stated to the investigating officer that he believed that both he and his wife may have been the subject of some irrational attention from a female client of his, Mrs Cartwright, who appears to have maintained an unhealthy affection for Mr Bernard ever since he had acted for her in the disposal of her husband’s estate several years ago. Bernard stated that this affection was not reciprocated in any way by himself, but he had been aware that her presence in restaurants, theatres, sporting events, coincided with his own far beyond chance. Mrs Cartwright is a businesswoman, and Bernard frequently acted for her. It is respectfully considered by the investigating officer that Mr Bernard wilfully or naïvely underestimat
ed the nature of Mrs Cartwright’s affection for him. He presents himself as an unemotional man, and describes his marriage as contented. There are no children.

  He was of the opinion that Mrs Cartwright either followed him, or had him followed. Enquiries among local private investigators revealed that one of their number, a retired Detective Constable of this force, had been engaged between 1980 and 1983 to follow both Mr and Mrs Bernard and report on their movements to Mrs Cartwright, especially the movements of the former. This task had been done with great circumspection, until it was resigned in favour of a more lucrative overseas contract in 1983. The private detective describes his client as obsessed with Mr Bernard and his welfare, and was of the view that she would have immediately sought a replacement for his services in furtherance of that obsession. [The phone rang. Helen ignored it. Too early for concentration on the spoken word. These written words were bad enough.]

  In brief, after considerable enquiries Mr Tysall, brother-in-law of the defendant was spoken to by police. He admitted to helping Jaskowski, during 1985 only, to follow a man answering to Bernard’s description. This was done at various times. Both men work shifts. Jaskowski was questioned. Initially uncooperative, when faced with certain evidence from his building society accounts, he finally admitted to being hired by Mrs Cartwright, first to follow Mrs Bernard, then to injure her, which he refused to do, and then to kill her, to which he agreed. He was paid five thousand pounds for this task with a further sum of five thousand to follow six months later. His client was Mrs Cartwright throughout, he knowing her only as Eileen. There is ample corroboration for his receipt of the initial sum.

  However there is little corroboration of his knowing Mrs Cartwright. They were never seen together. Aside from Jaskowski’s lengthy confession, virtually no independent or circumstantial evidence against her exists. There is evidence of devotion to Mr Bernard, but nothing concrete to link her to the murder. She has been arrested, interviewed at great length, to no avail. She denies any contact whatever with Jaskowski; her bank balance does not reflect the payment by a single withdrawal. There is nothing but his admissions, which explain the incidents with disturbing completeness. However these are the admissions of a co-defendant, and not sufficient to secure conviction as long as he is a co-defendant.

  Mrs Cartwright was therefore released and is still at large, pending your advice. It is the view of the investigating officer that she should be rearrested, again pending your advice. She is guilty of murder, and should be indicted for such.

  Coat off, out of the Ladies’ Room into her own. Late, but not very: time for a little grouting and making good of a tired face, six hallos in the corridor and two more chapters of life history from staff. She would never be late if she did not know them all, and she would be early if she did not listen so much.

  Then Helen returned to the huge file with acute distaste. It complemented her hangover in its pale, already battered state. When would they issue new files less flimsy than these? By the time this one was completed, the cover would be in tatters, held together with Sellotape in celebration of the technical age. She yawned. Well – a contract killing, not normally detected, not a middle-class pastime, since successful North Londoners of the professional classes did not possess this kind of single-mindedness, to say nothing of the cashflow or the contacts. She pulled herself from the seat, cracking her ankle against the desk as she did so and tripping over the telephone cable, two daily hazards she rarely survived without swearing or bruises on her way to the large metal filing cabinet, standard issue, civil servant grade 6 for the use of. The design and contents of her room owed nothing to research unless studies had been undertaken expressly in the alienation and discomfort of the human species. She retreated to her chair carefully as the telephone rang, its tinny sound accentuated by its cracked casing, the result of her hourly tussle with the trip wire.

  ‘Hallo? Helen? Hang on a minute; what was it I wanted to say?’

  ‘I don’t know. You’re the boss. You tell me.’

  ‘It’s Monday, Helen, and I’m due in court – don’t be funny. I remember now. That file … the murder, Mrs Whatshername.’

  ‘Yes. I’ve just read the report.’

  ‘Good, good.’ He coughed. Helen would have liked him less if he neither smoked nor panicked with such regularity. ‘Good,’ he repeated. ‘I’m dreadfully sorry about it.’

  ‘So am I. It’s the normal human reaction when someone’s killed. Anything else?’

  ‘Shut up. I mean I’m sorry you’ve got it. You weren’t supposed to have it, but Brian’s sick. Wouldn’t have sent it to you in the normal run of events. Bit close to home for you, isn’t it, geographically, I mean? Bit difficult prosecuting a murder so near your own patch. Do you think you should do it?’

  ‘I really don’t see why not. If you knew my little corner of London, you’d see there was a vast difference between the site of this murder and the street containing my pit. More your social status than mine, if you see what I mean. I’m hardly likely to meet the merry widower in the pub, and I’m not about to call on the murderous lady. Besides, there’s some advantage in knowing the area.’

  ‘Do you think so?’ The voice of the Crown Prosecutor swelled with relief. He had long since lost interest in cases themselves once the trauma of allocating them was over and his own schedule could continue. ‘Well, if you’re sure …’

  ‘David, get off the line, and find something else to growl over. I’m busy.’

  He giggled, his deceptive response to a rising panic. Helen was his favourite solicitor and she never made a fuss: there was no one else he could have trusted with a case of this importance. No one else in an office full of misfits, young idealists, displaced barristers, incompetents, worthies and other underpaid legal refugees from the commercial world who formed this odd little minority of lawyers who were willing, if not always able, to survive conditions of work which could hardly be described as comfortable. Helen would sort it out: her office might be a tip, she might spend half her time on other people’s work, and all their problems, but she was clever and quick, and what was more, she was well aware of the futility of screaming for help. A committed prosecutor – that was Helen.

  Committed. Helen Catherine West had been once, committed to an unfashionable belief in the law. Maybe that uncertain time of life, or the consistency with which she somehow failed to impress promotion boards by her distressing habit of confessing ignorance wherever she found it, but her allegiance had shifted from the committed fraternity into the one which realised how a primary purpose of work was to do it well and pay the mortgage. There was little enough to be gained from the professional prosecution of criminals and the small rewards had not included popularity, status, frequent enjoyment, satisfaction, or gratitude. Self respect, maybe, but not much of that.

  She combed her hair, rearranged her papers for a long session of reading, looked at her face in the mirror, which she did too many times a day with something between resignation and puzzlement, noting the laughter creases, the bags beneath the eyes, that irritating frown line on the forehead which seemed to grow by the hour. She smiled at the reflection and pulled a hopeless face in an effort to charm herself which always failed. Get to work.

  Emptiness was easy to hide. Perhaps she disguised the cracks with laughter more effectively than she imagined. She saw too much, and in all her accidental knowledge, found too small a quantity of anger alongside far too much dangerous compassion. Bad habit in a prosecutor, noticing desperation in passing faces, struggles slyly revealed in a method of walking and talking, all those symphonies in failure however poorly played. Pity was a cancer incapable of research. Also the failure to be surprised. Worse still, so little genuine evil despite newspaper verdicts which encouraged the public to hunt this animal or that, and moral indignation become a luxury she had ceased to be able to afford. It had moved into memory along with hatred or even acute dislike. She missed its passing, like a religious belief.

  Prosecu
ting people was only the same as protecting them, the inevitable suppression of some individuals in order that others might stay alive in relative freedom, a sort of dramatic wheel-clamping exercise, something which had to be done even by one who drew a short enough straw to be damaged in the doing, as she had been: each year eclipsed by that insidious lack of hope, enlivened by jokes. Stuck with it, bound until death by weary, cynical, all embracing love of the human race, never eclipsed by more than grim pity.

  The light in the office was poor. Too many hours in the working day, and this only the first. Helen sighed, squinted beneath the neon, wondered if she needed glasses, suspecting she did, reminding herself to shop for food at lunchtime, but unable to remember what it was she needed. Reluctant to begin reading the remainder of two feet of paper while duty and habit dictated she would.

  Confessions first. Attack the document unwittingly designed to consign Stanislaus to a lifetime inside. Why a hammer and a knife, for God’s sake? Wouldn’t one of them have done?

  ‘… I, Stanislaus Jaskowski, made this statement of my own free will … [Oh, Stanislaus, I hope you did.] I used to be in antiques [for which, read house clearance, Helen thought cynically] but that didn’t work out. I work as a hospital porter now, and a couple of years ago I had the idea of doing part-time work as a private investigator, because I thought I would be good at that, and I needed the money. I didn’t advertise or anything, just did bits and pieces for other firms when they were busy. Mostly following husbands and wives. You get known, and sometimes I would be phoned up out of the blue, especially after I put an advert in the Hackney Gazette for a couple of months, giving my home number.

  ‘Sometime in January 1985, I was phoned up at home by this woman. On reflection, it must have been January. She had an odd voice, and she asked me if I was a private investigator, how much I charged, and things like that. As far as I can remember, this person said the work would be in and around Islington, which suited me, being so close to home, and because I know it. I told her that would make it cheaper. The person asked me where I would like to meet, and I suggested a pub outside the area in Hackney, close to where I work. I suggested The Cock in Hackney Broadway. I told her she wouldn’t be known there. Most of the customers are black. I could tell she wasn’t.