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FIVEWednesday Afternoon – The Inquiry

It was quarter to two. How had that happened? My solicitor’s office was on Broad Street, near the Convention Centre. There was little point in trekking all the way over there if the inquiry was starting at two thirty. I rang him from the street on my mobile. I realised it was the first time we had spoken to each other. He was new to the firm and most of our communication had been by email. Now, he sounded weary. ‘Don’t worry about the fresh paper. It’s nothing urgent,’ he said.

‘Is it stuff I ought to know before this afternoon?’

‘Oh no. Some statements from two social workers from London saying they visited the children on a regular basis. And there’s a couple of reports from other inquiries. I’ll bring them down to the Grange. I thought you were coming in this morning to pick them up,’ he said vaguely.

‘Unfortunately I had to do a directions hearing for a colleague and it went on rather longer than I expected.’

‘Who was your judge?’ he asked.

‘Norman?’

‘You were lucky to get out alive.’

‘Given how things turned out, death might have been a blissful release.’

He laughed.

Encouraged, I went on, ‘One of the barristers there said … Do you know any reason why our case, well, this brief would be regarded as the poisoned chalice?’ I asked him.

‘No, not at all,’ he said. But then he’d only been on the case about three weeks. ‘Look, I’d better go now. Do you know how to get to the Grange?’

I told him I did and then he said he’d got to find a fresh shirt before we started this afternoon. I wasn’t sure whether I should be reassured that personal presentation was important to him or worry that he had to change shirts in the middle of the day. Perhaps it was the Birmingham way. I looked down at my own, black, shirt, it was creased and sticking to parts of my body. Perhaps I had things to learn from the Midlands.

The inquiry was being held at the Grange on Dalton Street. The name, the Grange, might make you think it was a large old country building covered in ivy, with fields of cows somehow miraculously nearby. But no. It was a square 1950s concrete municipal office block, grey and flat with wide steps leading up to a vast glass door. The upside was that inside the building were long wide corridors which led into large airy rooms. I was directed to the first floor, down one of the long corridors, through a wide vestibule to the room where the inquiry was to be held. In fact it was two rooms whose shared middle wall was folded back to create an enormous space with one huge glass wall, looking out over a scratchy piece of lawn. Inside the room were historically daring light fitments, municipal chairs and long trestle tables.

Lawyers are not used to appearing in rooms with natural light and I wondered if it was the glare of the sun that made the room seem empty. A woman in a short purple jacket and black slacks was straightening green baize on the top table. She looked up at me with a polite smile. ‘Can I help?’

‘I’m Frances Richmond, counsel for the … victims,’ I said breathlessly. I had to find another name for my clients. Calling them victims made them sound weak and pathetic when they were actually angry and frustrated and hungry for action. I looked wildly round the room. Whatever they were called, they weren’t here.

‘Oh,’ she said, and gave me a puzzled look. ‘I’m Mrs Gisborough, eh, Ellen Gisborough. I’m part of the administrative team. We’re providing secretarial and administrative support for the inquiry. We’re not starting till tomorrow. Have you not been told?’ That was the reason for the look.

With a rush of paranoia I wondered if it was just me who didn’t know, or if it was our team who hadn’t been given the information. Was this what Roseanna had meant?

‘So you won’t know it’s the press conference this afternoon.’

‘Ah,’ I said. We both looked round the room. ‘Not for the clients then?’

‘Not really. I think your solicitor said something about them not wanting photos.’

‘Of course.’

‘Yes, this afternoon is just – what would you call it? – a bit of PR for the inquiry.’ She stopped as if she had said too much. Which she probably had. Busily, she began to pull the other tables in the room into a straight line facing the head table. There was nothing to do but help her.

At twenty-five past two, lawyers began to appear. You could tell they were lawyers because they carried large pigskin briefcases. Three of them were men who I would, at some stage, be able to distinguish from each other. At the moment they all had plump cheeks, varying shades of grey hair and wore subdued navy suits. As a gesture to the press conference, I assumed, they were all wearing snazzy ties. A woman introduced herself as Catherine Delahaye, the advocate to the inquiry. She and the only other woman wore careful, understated peach-coloured lipsticks and small, black polished shoes. I felt worn and dusty, the word ‘hack’ seemed to hang over my head like the ghost of things to come.

At two thirty the panel of three came into the room and we all stood. The panel sat and then so did we. I had placed myself next to a large man who looked in his late fifties, wearing a double-breasted suit and a navy blue tie with large red spots. I put a low pile of my papers in front of me, then, leaning across my neighbour, took a glass from the tray Mrs Gisborough had anxiously provided, and poured myself some water. ‘Water?’ I asked him, but he obviously didn’t hear.

Mrs Gisborough ushered in the press and I began writing, as if I were preparing incisive, justice-provoking, questions. I wrote ‘Bad Company’ – I ought to dig it out and play it. Then I wrote ‘Pay bills’. Then ‘New Suit?’ Finally I added, ‘Solve the mystery of Danny’s murder charge (personal interest only). Possibly need more info from Yolande. Tell Kay? No.’

There was a camera crew with several metres of trailing wire and a BBC logo on their camera, and two journalists who looked more dishevelled than I did. They were almost professionally crumpled, as if how to wear baggy corduroy was something they had learned on their media studies courses. The journalists eagerly wrote down every word as the Chair of the panel introduced the panel members, a senior social worker from Sussex, a childcare expert from a Scottish university, and himself, Henry Curston QC. I vaguely recognised him. He was something auspicious at the Bar Council and his face had been in Counsel magazine on one or two occasions.

The BBC crew moved away from the panel and directed their attention to the legal representatives. As the TV camera panned round towards me, I put down my pen and bent confidentially towards my neighbour and began talking earnestly about the weather.

He looked at me with disdain, then turned firmly away from me and spoke to the person on his left.

The camera panned away. The Chair bent across the table, looking questioningly from side to side, murmuring to his colleagues. The journalists craned forward excitedly, their pens poised, waiting for some details, some hint of the dreadful stories to come, to thrill their readers, to please their editors, to make their mark, then sank back despondently as the panel nodded to each other and rose and left the room. The press conference was over and the press disappeared like grease spots when you squirt Fairy Liquid into the washing-up bowl. The lawyers pushed back their chairs, picked up their pigskin bags and, laughing and joking with each other as if they’d all been friends for years, filed out of the door. I was left packing my notebooks into my non-pigskin bag. I didn’t want them to like me, I didn’t want them to be my friends, but I felt loneliness lapping at my ankles.

‘The chair has asked me to say we’re starting at ten thirty tomorrow morning.’ Catherine Delahaye had stepped back into the room. I looked round to see who she was talking to. It was me. I just stopped myself throwing my arms round her neck. She took out a sheet of paper from a plastic folder. ‘I thought it would be useful if I circulated a list of all the legal representatives’ phone numbers, so I can be in touch if anything crops up. Especially people from out of town.’

‘Do you mean here, or in London?’ I took the sheet of paper which was divided with two meticulously ruled lines.

‘Both.’

I tugged a pen out of my jacket pocket and, with what I hoped was a friendly grin, enthusiastically scribbled Julie’s number in Birmingham and my number in London. I didn’t give her the number for my mobile as I never switched it on, and I had recently become aware that the ringing tone didn’t always work.

She slid the list back into the plastic folder. She was obviously from the Miss Neatly Organised school of advocacy and I reminded myself sharply that, like a pupil on her first day at a new school, I must beware of making friends with the first person who wants to play with me. I went back to rearranging my notebooks, when I heard Catherine Delahaye’s resigned, ‘Oh, hello.’

A young man who looked about sixteen with short brown hair and small rimless glasses, his tie at a forty-five degree angle to his collar, approached me, with his hand out, saying breathlessly, ‘Hello, I’m Adam Owen. You’re…?’

‘Frankie Richmond, yes, hi.’ My heart sank. This child was my solicitor. What would he know? How could he help me? Had I imagined it or had he done a double take when he saw me? Perhaps it was just a guilty start. He was late after all.

He looked round the room. ‘Oh God,’ he said. ‘I’ve missed it haven’t I? The senior partner even let me drive one of the cars to get here. I’m meant to be getting as much publicity for the firm as I can. I’m really, really sorry.’

I shook my head.

‘One of our clients had a crisis, social services were threatening to take her son into care, I’ve just spent an hour at her house, trying to reason with them. And they’ve got dogs,’ he said, looking down at his trousers. As he got closer I could see white dog hairs from knee to ankle. He followed my glance. ‘I wouldn’t mind but they were only about six inches high, they just bounced a lot.’ He looked round the room. ‘Did anything happen?’

It was four o’clock. ‘Let’s go and have a drink and I’ll tell you what you missed,’ I said. ‘While you pick dog hairs off your trousers.’

He grinned. ‘And that way I don’t have to go back to the office. Perfect. And if you’re good, I’ll let you pick off the dog hairs.’

‘Now then,’ I said.

We walked out of the room as a couple appeared at the top of the stairs into the lobby. I thought hard, this was … yes, Mr and Mrs Springer. They had been at the one conference I’d had with my clients. Mr Springer was my actual client, but it was his wife whose face was working with indignation. Today, as on the day of the conference, she was wearing a thick sheepskin coat, which she held tightly round herself with thin, red hands. I noticed that her wedding ring was too big for her finger, slipping back and forth to her knuckle.

‘I told them not to come,’ Adam muttered to me, as we advanced with apology on our faces.

Gregory Springer sank into himself, shaking his head and telling us not to worry, so sorry to be troublesome. Mrs Springer looked around angrily, as if expecting to catch a glimpse of the other clients, hiding behind pillars or in the stairwell. ‘Why shouldn’t we come?’ she asked.

‘When I rang them, most people decided they didn’t want to be photographed,’ Adam said.

‘Our story has a right to be heard,’ she said. ‘There’s been too much whitewashing already.’

‘The press may well be here tomorrow,’ I said. ‘They do want to hear what people have to say. But Mr Springer, I thought you had decided not to give oral evidence.’

‘Yes, well, he’s still considering his position.’ Mrs Springer spoke before her husband could answer. ‘Come on Gregory,’ she said. ‘I took the afternoon off work for this.’

‘I’m so sorry,’ I said, ‘but we’ll see you tomorrow morning.’

‘Yes,’ said Mr Springer, as his wife said, ‘Maybe.’

Adam knew a tapas bar behind the inquiry building. We dashed the last ten yards as it started to rain and immediately ordered some tortilla and patatas bravas (egg and chips) to make up for the lunch I hadn’t had, and a bottle of red, oaky wine to make up for everything.

‘Nice shirt,’ I said, looking at the crisp pink creases as he shook off his jacket and hung it over a chair.

He laughed, embarrassed. ‘I cycle to work, and we’re usually quite casual in the office, but I didn’t think … you … would go for lycra.’

He said he had rung chambers again this morning as soon as he had learned of the press conference, and left a message. So it wasn’t that the victims were being victimised before the inquiry started, or that my solicitor was hopeless, it was just chambers being useless and failing to ring me, probably Gavin not wanting another earful about Simon’s case. I made a mental note to speak to Gavin.

In any event it made me feel happier about Adam, so I could relax, and because we had the time, discuss the other lawyers. Adam ran through the list of representatives. Because the abuse had happened twenty years before, not everyone who had worked at Haslam Hall was going to be represented. The perpetrators, the five men whose names had been given to the police, were in prison. Some of the other staff could not be found, one or two had died, and a few simply wanted to forget it had happened.

But David Wyatt, the man who had been principal of the home at the time of the abuse, was being represented. He had not been charged with any offence and was now, it said in his statements, anxious to help the inquiry. His solicitor was Mr Frodsham, who from Adam’s description was the man I had attempted to swap meteorological niceties with earlier. Frodsham worked for Stiversons, Adam told me – the Carter Ruck of Birmingham – an old firm situated in a narrow alley off Corporation Street. Six social workers were participating in the inquiry, they were from four local authorities and were represented by two solicitors’ firms in Leicester. The two care workers who had never been implicated in the abuse had chosen a firm in Sutton Coldfield.

Adam was an assistant solicitor in the firm of Painter, Pavish and Rutland. PPR, as he called them, was regarded with suspicion by the other solicitors in the inquiry. Although the partners were old school, recent recruitment had brought in lots of bright young things with too many degrees for their own good, earning enormous amounts of money. ‘Not me, though,’ Adam explained, ‘being the most junior solicitor in the firm.’ PPR had new, modern offices near the Convention Centre, and an intense work ethic.

I devoured the potatoes and tortilla, and he picked at a piece of bread, and we watched the rain falling steadily outside. ‘I still don’t know how come I was instructed,’ I said.

Adam’s face began to colour. ‘Well …’ he began. ‘I had nothing to do with it, because it was before my time. But I was quite surprised to see you. You weren’t … quite what I expected.’ He opened a crisp yellow file and began flicking through a deep pile of correspondence and attendance notes, held together by a metal pin. ‘You were instructed before my time. Yes, here.’ He held back a bunch of papers and read from a note dated the autumn of the year before. It had been sent to someone who had been a new trainee, who had since left the firm without finishing his training. ‘David, ring 19 Kings Bench Walk to instruct Francis Richmond to represent the victims, whom they have requested.’

‘17,’ I corrected. ‘My chambers are at 17 Kings Bench Walk.’

‘19,’ he repeated, staring at the scrawl on the note. ‘Francis with an “I”.’

‘That’s not me.’

‘Apparently not.’ There was a beat of silence. ‘But the clients haven’t said anything, which is obviously why it wasn’t picked up. And they’re obviously happy.’

Francis Richmond had been a well-known and apparently well-liked Birmingham solicitor who had decided to become a barrister. He divided his time between London and Birmingham, where his wife remained. When she had fallen ill with a wasting illness, he was forced to stay in London where he could find better, more lucrative work. A prolonged period in Birmingham on this inquiry would have been a godsend for him. The money, the proximity to his wife, the quiet rhythm you get into in an inquiry.

Instead the trainee had made a mistake looking up the number in the Bar directory. He had rung my chambers and got me. ‘I should have noticed there are several different numbers for your chambers,’ he said.

I shook my head. Not only was I not the right person, but I was positively the wrong person. And they all knew it.

I made a note to ask Gavin if he had known. I had a horrible feeling that he had. When your world is falling all around you, shoot the clerk. I added it to my mental list of things to do.

‘It may have been 19 KBW that I rang this morning about the press conference,’ he said.

I was still going to shoot Gavin.

When I got back to Julie’s, my shoulder sagging with the weight of my soaking wet bags, which I had dragged through the rain, from a parking place halfway down the street, Marnie was curled, dry and comfy, on the sofa in front of the TV. ‘I just saw you on the news!’ she crowed as she let me in. ‘Can I come down and watch you one day? Ooh, you’re wet.’ I dropped a dripping bag. ‘But who was that horrible man?’

‘Which one?’

‘The one who slapped his thigh and turned his back on you. He was so rude. I wanted to punch him.’

‘Perhaps you should come to the inquiry as my minder,’ I said carelessly.

‘Yeah!’

‘No.’

‘But I want to meet all your lawyer friends.’

‘That would not be possible,’ I said bitterly. ‘I have no lawyer friends.’ I dragged the two bags ostentatiously across the room. ‘I’ll just take these heavy wet bags upstairs then.’

‘OK,’ she said cheerfully. ‘Oh, Mum said to tell you she’s working late, so we should take something out of the freezer.’

‘Oh great,’ I murmured as I climbed the stairs. Julie’s freezer was like mine. Everything was three years old, nothing had labels, and it was all mince.

As I threw the bags onto the floor of my room, I noticed the stitching in my work bag had perished in several places and a corner of my brief was poking through. It was wet. Everything was wet. What a lousy start to the inquiry. Water is not my medium. My star sign is not a water sign. And clearly my bag was not waterproof. Not now anyway. I was going to have to buy a new work bag. And, on top of everything, I was about to have melted mince for my supper. I needed warmth, I needed human kindness, so, foolishly, I fished my mobile out of my bag, sat on the edge of the bed and rang chambers for my messages. There were none.

‘Forget the freezer food,’ I said to Marnie, stomping back down the stairs. ‘We’re going to have a takeaway, and we’re going to have it delivered.’

‘Oh cool,’ Marnie crowed. ‘Can I order it?’

An hour later I was back in my room.

I pulled out my files. I made a list for myself of all the witnesses to be called. It gives you an idea of the shape of the case, how it might go. But really it’s just to make you feel you’re doing something.

Time Table

Opening submissions – half a day

My clients – three days?

Social workers – a day?

Teachers – two days

Mr Wyatt – principal – a day

The medical experts –

called by my clients

Psychologists × 2	) – 1 to be called to give oral
evidence – half a day
	) – 1 written evidence to be read
Paediatrician	) – half a day
GPs	) – written evidence
Counsellors ×1	) – written evidence
Therapists ×2	) – written evidence

called by advocate to the inquiry

Two psychologists re theory of sexual abuse – 1 day called by the principal

Child-development expert – ? an hour

Other experts –

called by the advocate to the inquiry

Architect – half a day

Safety officer – ? an hour

Training officer – ? half a day

Management consultant – ? an hour

University lecturer in social work – half a day

called by the social workers

Field worker in child abuse – half a day

Others –

Police – ? one day

View of Haslam Hall?? – half a day?

I gazed at the list. I could be up here for weeks.