A Touch of Love (8 page)

She let the breeze play on her face for a few more seconds, then turned and went inside.

It was dark and hot, but there was no music playing – that was something. Misspelt notices in chalk advertised the day’s bargains in salads and Beaujolais. Emma felt, as she descended the stairs, the absurdity of having worn such high heels – they seemed so noisy and impractical – and found that she was clutching her handbag to her bosom with a fervour which would have made her nervousness obvious had she not checked herself in time. Briefly she wished, very hard, that she was somewhere, anywhere else.

Alun was sitting at a table for two in the corner, his briefcase keeping the second chair occupied. Blue striped shirt, red tie, the same light grey suit. But the moustache had gone; and he looked thinner, considerably thinner, since she had last been with him. Tall, too, when he rose to his feet and smiled his yellow smile of welcome at her.

‘Emma. You look charming. You are charming. I’m charmed. Please sit down.’

For a dreadful moment she thought that he had been going to kiss her cheek; but they shook hands instead.

‘What’s it to be? What will you have?’

She asked for white wine and soda. Then they made small talk for about ten minutes.

‘Look, Alun, time’s getting on,’ she said, finally. ‘What’s all this about Hepburn?’

‘Well, he’s come to his senses, basically. I’ve managed to disillusion him about what he might have come out with in the way of a court settlement. These people, they read in the papers about people being compensated to the tune of tens of thousands of pounds. I told him that he wasn’t even certain to win, if it came to that.’ He smiled. ‘Well, I’ve saved you some work, haven’t I?’

‘Yes, you have. Thank you. I’m very grateful. Not that things are especially busy just now, as it happens.’

‘Oh? Business isn’t slackening off, I hope?’

‘No, but you know how it is: sometimes you get quiet phases. I’m not complaining, I mean it’s nice to have a bit of space. Two people both doing demanding jobs… it can be a strain.’

‘Two people?’

‘Mark and I.’

‘Of course. I did warn you, though. A lawyer and a medic: what a combination.’

‘We knew what we were doing.’

Alun fell silent and tried to force a meeting with her eyes, but they were elsewhere. Defeated, he began to rummage inside his briefcase, which contained the papers relating to his current cases and also a thermos flask and an apple. His wife made him a packed lunch every day but he quite often ended up throwing it away, preferring to go for pub meals with his friends from work. Meanwhile Emma was thinking of an evening several weeks back, with her and Mark lying side by side and wakeful; she was looking at herself as she lay in that dark and silent bedroom, thinking how stupid it was that she didn’t even feel that she could raise the question of a child any more, and if it was all going to come to an end, which she had started to see as a possibility, at last, then had she really missed her chance, a woman of thirty-four, would she be able to find anyone else quickly enough, someone she liked enough, would she even feel like going through the whole rigmarole again? She had felt so lonely that night, sharing a bed in the dark with a man whose bed she had shared for the last eight years of her life, and she felt lonely now, sharing a drink and a bowl of salad with a man whom she had never, it seemed, had much grounds for liking.

‘Let’s talk about Grant,’ he said, and pushed his salad to one side in order to make room on their needlessly small table (there were other, bigger ones free) for a small red notebook.

‘Fine,’ she said, genuinely relieved. ‘What was it you wanted to show me?’

‘You’ve met this chap, have you?’

‘Robin? Yes, twice.’

She noticed a flicker of surprise at the fact that she had instinctively used his Christian name.

‘Twice?’

‘Yes. We met socially, last week.’

He left a short, mannish, tiresomely eloquent pause.

‘Well, that’s your business. You must know what you’re doing.’

‘It’s not like that at all. We met through a mutual friend. A former client.’

Alun waited, banking on a further explanation.

‘Some years ago – I don’t know if you remember – I defended this man called Fairchild. Hugh Fairchild. He was being prosecuted by the DHSS for fraud. He’d finished his Ph. D., and he was doing a bit of teaching at the university, earning about ten pounds a week or something, only at the same time he was claiming the dole. So the DHSS finally cottoned on to this and they asked for everything back. It wasn’t very much, a few hundred pounds or so, but it was far more than he had, and it actually looked for a while as though he might have been facing some kind of jail sentence. They were cracking down at the time and they seemed to have chosen him as someone to make an example of. So he pleaded guilty of course, and then I got this quite convincing case together and we managed to get him off with a fine and negotiate quite a sensible repayment programme. Which, so far as I know, he’s still in the middle of.’ She frowned. ‘Four years ago, now, at least. Strange how time goes, isn’t it?’

‘Go on,’ said Alun, who disliked it when people became reflective in his company.

‘Well, Hugh and Robin know each other, it transpires, so as soon as this thing comes up and he needs a solicitor, Hugh sends him over to me.’

‘You’ve been in contact with Hugh, all this time?’

‘Yes, I’ve had dinner with him. Two or three times. He’s a very good cook. He lives in a little bedsitter, out towards Stoke Green. Squalid, but homely. So he had this party out there last week – it was his birthday – and I went along. You know, just to show my face. I suppose I should have guessed that Robin was going to be there, but for some reason it didn’t occur to me. I had other things on my mind, at the time. I only spoke to him for a few minutes. Have you met him?’

‘Only in court.’

‘Well, he was very nervous that morning. As you’d expect.’

‘So, what’s he like? How would you describe him?’

‘Describe him?’

‘Yes. I mean, is he the usual child-molester type?’

Emma leaned forward, for the first time, and looked him directly in the eye, also for the first time.

‘Let’s get this clear, Alun, Robin hasn’t done anything. There’s no case to answer here. I have absolute faith in him.’

‘How can you have faith in someone when you’ve only spoken to him for a few minutes?’

‘We had a long formal interview. I know all that I need to know.’

‘So what’s going to be the basis of your defence? Character? Are you using a psychiatrist?’

‘Of course not. There’s no need for that.’

‘You see, I have an eyewitness. I would have thought that puts you in a rather weak position.’

‘Who – not the boy’s father? But he didn’t see anything.’

‘He saw enough.’

‘I’ve already read his statement. It won’t stand up.’

Alun smiled, a quiet, prematurely triumphant smile. He leaned over and picked up Emma’s glass, which was empty.

‘We’ve got a lot to discuss. Would you like another?’

‘No, thank you, I wouldn’t.’

‘Want to keep a clear head, I suppose. Something non-alcoholic?’

‘No thanks.’

‘Well, I’ll get you an orange juice. You can always leave it.’

While he was away, Emma picked at the remains of her salad, until she could no longer palate the acrid taste of soft green lettuce leaves. A few questions tumbled through her mind but she couldn’t find it in her to follow any of them up. Which was odd, because she knew that only a few months ago this would have been precisely the kind of case which most excited her. She could not remember having felt so listless before, and started to wonder whether perhaps she ought to go and see a doctor: for some days now she had been conscious of a curious heaviness in her head – not headaches, exactly, as she had tried to explain to Mark only last evening, but a sort of throbbing drowsiness which made it hard to concentrate on anything. Well, isn’t it nearly that time of the month, he had said, and had seemed to think that he was being sensitive.

‘You look tired,’ said Alun, lowering the glass gently into her hand. ‘Is anything up?’

‘It’s been a long week. Maybe I’ll take the rest of this afternoon off and go home. Or something.’

‘Good idea. Put your feet up. You’ll feel better for it. Kerry and I are going away soon: two weeks in Portugal. When did you and Mark last have a proper holiday together?’

‘Oh, some time ago. Look, the father is your main witness, is he?’

‘Yes. His version of events is – well, you’ve read it yourself. He says that his son went into the bushes to retrieve this ball and Grant followed him in there.’

‘But that’s not what happened at all. Robin was there already.’

‘So
he
says. But what does a grown man sneak off into a clump of bushes for, at seven in the evening?’

‘To relieve himself, of course. Which would explain, wouldn’t it, why he was looking “shifty”, as I believe the father put it? He’d been drinking tea and coffee all day, with a friend.’

‘A friend?’

‘A male friend. Parrish. Edward Parrish: they knew each other at university. Have you not been in contact with him?’

‘Oh, the elusive Mr Parrish. Yes, I have. I found him very reluctant to testify. He might yet be open to persuasion, though.’ Alun crossed and uncrossed his spindly legs, so that they came into embarrassed contact with Emma’s beneath the table. ‘Well, there we have the facts. There we have the facts which, as you rightly say, are open to quite different interpretations, given their overall sketchiness. And so, since we cannot furnish additional facts, in all probability, we must take the ones which we have already, and arrive at a more
solid
basis of interpretation. Wouldn’t you agree?’

‘Yes, I suppose so,’ said Emma, who was only just beginning to remember how boring he could be. ‘What are you suggesting, then?’

‘Well, we have the boy’s testimony. It’s not very coherent, it’s not very conclusive, it just says that this man exposed himself and he was very frightened. Then we have Grant’s version, and we have the other’s version. Whom do we trust, that’s what I’m saying: which of these people is the most trustworthy?’

‘I haven’t met the father.’

‘I saw him a few days ago. He phoned me and said that he’d remembered some more details since making his police statement. As it turned out, they weren’t all that significant, but I found out a few more things about
him.
He’s going to make a very good witness.’

‘Meaning?’

‘The man is a pillar of the community. Without a doubt. A scoutmaster, for one thing: good with children. A member of the local RSPCA, for another: kind to animals. He’s a staunch churchman, a methodist. He hands out the bibles every Sunday. He started his local neighbourhood watch, he belongs to the Rotary Club, he may even be a Freemason. His wife regularly attends W. I. meetings and is the guiding light behind the Radford Ramblers’ and Birdlovers’ Coffee Club. They are blood donors, both. What more do I have to say?’

‘What does that prove? So he’s a family man, and this boy is the only child. All the more reason to be neurotic about his safety. It’s an obvious case of overreaction to a harmless and really rather comic incident.’

‘I wouldn’t try to use that line in your defence if I were you. A man strips naked in front of a terrified child and you call it comic!’

‘He did not strip naked. He undid his trousers, that’s all.’

‘You know, perhaps your trouble with this kind of case, Emma, is that you don’t have any children of your own.’

Emma did not know what to say to this. To hide her confusion, she took a sip from the orange juice which she had silently resolved not to touch. She assumed that Alun would apologize, but when he spoke again, his tone remained aggressive.

‘So, tell me about Robin. I’ve just given you a description of a reliable and trustworthy witness. Now tell me what’s so special about this man. What gives you so much faith in him after knowing him such a short time?’

Emma swallowed hard; but her voice, once found, was brave, with more of her Edinburgh accent in it than had been noticeable before.

‘Well, I found him very likeable, if you must know. Likeable and intelligent: very intelligent. He’s depressed, of course. He’s going through a bad patch, with his work and everything. It takes a while to get him to come out of himself. But once you’ve made the effort, it’s very rewarding. I thought he was funny, and sharp, and very… perceptive.’

Alun left another strategic pause, this one designed to make her feel that he did not think she could possibly have finished.

‘Well, OK., Emma,’ he said. ‘Play it your way. I dare say you’ve got some tricks up your sleeve which you don’t feel like telling us about. Fair enough. But believe me, it’s for
your
benefit that I’m asking these questions. I don’t want you to get your fingers burned on this one. I want you to be absolutely sure that you know the kind of man you’re dealing with.’

‘Meaning?’

‘Well, for instance.’ Alun picked up the red notebook and tapped it with his forefinger. ‘You know about Grant’s writing, do you? You know that he fancies himself as a writer?’

‘Yes.’

‘And have you read any of his stuff?’

‘No, I didn’t think it was necessary. Surely it could have no evidential value.’

‘Of course not. But that isn’t to say that it wouldn’t be illuminating. This notebook was found in the pocket of his jacket on the evening of the crime – I’m sorry, the
alleged
crime. It contains one of his stories.’

Emma took the notebook and flicked through the pages. They were covered with dense, untidy handwriting. She closed the book and read aloud the title which Robin had written in block capitals on the cover.

‘
The Lucky Man
,’ she said. ‘What’s so special about it? What’s it about?’

‘I wouldn’t like to give it away. Let’s just say that it projects a rather unusual personality,’ said Alun, and added, ‘You’ve hardly touched your drink. Is it worth me getting you another?’